Authors: Mary Margret Daughtridge

SEALed with a Ring (20 page)

ON THE COTTAGE STAIRS, THE WIND WHIPPED HER SKIRTS, tangling them in her legs. More fearful that she would step on the precious dress and tear it than that she would stumble, JJ gathered the material over one arm, expos ing her legs to the sharp wind.

"Brrr. It's cold!" She glanced up. "But my goodness, look at the stars! The sky is so clear. A clear atmosphere is the best thing about winter. I love to look at them."

"Yeah, it's a good thing about being a SEAL. We operate—do what we do—undercover at night. Except in the jungle, where the tree canopy is so dense there's no sky at all, the stars are always there. Aboard ship in the middle of the ocean, they're really good."

JJ shivered. "Too bad we can't stay out here to look at them."

David dropped his duffle bag and unlocked the cottage's beautiful, paneled redwood door. When JJ would have gone ahead of him, he stopped her. "Wait. There's one more tradition. I have to carry you over the threshold."

He reached inside to turn on a wall switch and scooped her in his arms.

A couple of times during the day, she had doubted if she knew what she was getting into with David. Blount at least had been predictable. He would never, never have carried her over the threshold. The sheer romance of the gesture caught her unawares and scrambled her breathing circuits. As a result, she was a little shy, a little breathless when he put her down.

With her still in his arms, he closed the door by back ing up against it until the latch clicked. "Welcome home, Mrs. Graziano," he said in his creamy chocolate voice. He set her on her feet but kept his hands at her waist.

She couldn't meet his eye. She was unsettled. Off balance. Fragile. Tenuous-feeling.

Funny she should feel so shy when she already knew this man's body. But that one night had been all heat and madness and impulse—a delirium. She could claim afterwards she didn't intend it. This…
this
was real.

He tilted her face up. She steeled herself not to give in too much to his kiss.

David felt her resistance. The darling. He understood her well enough by now to know she wasn't unwilling; she was unsure. He liked her a little off balance. It was only fair. He felt a little off balance himself. He had re membered the bit about the threshold in the nick of time. His heart was pounding, and it wasn't from carrying her. He hadn't expected the lump in his throat when he called her Mrs. Graziano. She was his. His wife.

He wanted her. Hot and urgent. Mingled together until they were one flesh. Not yet though. Under his hands, he felt the tiniest tremor. He brushed his lips across hers. Once. Twice. He released her.

"Why don't you change out of that wedding dress? Put on something warmer." She looked a little hesitant. "Go."

While she was in the bedroom, he had time to re connoiter. He opened the sliders to the deck. Was he living right or what? The wind tonight was out of the northwest. As he had guessed, the south-facing deck was protected. Although it was chilly, probably around fifty degrees, wrapped up, they would be okay.

The next problem was some place to lie down. The deck's planking was thoroughly wet from the storm, as was the redwood lounge chair. Damp, he and JJ would lose body heat quickly, and
losing
heat was not part of his plan.

Loungers like that didn't come cheap, and he'd bet they didn't come without cushions. Which would have been stored for the winter. A smile spread across his face. Wherever it was, the cushion was nice and dry.

He lowered the back of the chair from its upright position. Shortly he had everything ready.

"What were you doing out on the deck?" JJ asked when he opened the sliders after arranging everything. She had changed into loose, stretchy pants in a deep teal velour with a matching long-sleeved, zippered top. She was barefoot. Perfect. She probably had chosen it believing it wasn't sexy. Little did she know there was nothing she could put on that would keep him from thinking about sex around her.

He wasn't going to be able to see her tonight, which was a damn shame, but tonight wasn't for him. "Stay right there," he said. "Don't move." He went to her bedroom and pulled the king-size comforter from the bed. He re turned to the living room and bundled it around her.

"I'm not cold. What are you doing?"

"Keep it around you." He opened the slider, then picked her up.

"The deck? What's going on?"

"I'm giving you the stars."

"Warm enough?"

"Toasty." The lounger was a tight fit for two abreast. He had turned out all the house lights before kicking off his shoes, lifting an edge of the comforter, and crawling in beside her. His body heat quickly erased the chill. They were lying pressed so close together she could feel the vibration in his chest when he spoke.

In an oddly innocent gesture, he had entwined his fingers with hers and lifted both their hands and carried them to his thigh. She wiggled a little to allow more of her arm to rest on him.

Little pats of wind occasionally tumbled past the shelter of the house, but only enough to make them conscious of the snugness of their haven. Up and down the beach, a mile in each direction, the houses were dark, closed for the winter. Starshine was their only companion. On the beach, long, slow breakers crashed and made the funny hissing noise as the spume of their crests was blown backwards.

She had lived at the cottage for a year and had never once thought to lie on the deck at night to watch the sky. But really she could hardly remember the last time she let herself stop and do anything for the simple pleasure of doing it.

"I haven't looked at the stars like this since I was a little kid."

"Didn't you ever camp out?"

"In a tent."

"Not the same. You ought to see the stars in Afghanistan. In the mountains, the air is so dry and clear. They don't twinkle. Even the faintest constellations jump out at you." He turned his head on the pillow they shared. His breath was warm on the side of her face. "Which is your favorite constellation?"

"I don't know them, except for the Big Dipper. The Little Dipper. That's all. I never studied the stars. I just like to look at them."

"The Big Dipper and Little Dipper are both in the north, behind the house. I'm afraid we can't see them."

JJ chuckled. "
That's
why I'm never able to find them when I'm out here on the deck."

"But we do have a perfect view of the Milky Way." It sounded like he was attempting to console her with an exchange.

Some hitherto unexperienced combination of wonder and affection bloomed in her chest. In spite of his mas terful, take-charge—not to say occasionally overbear ing—behavior, he wanted her approval of his "gift" of stars. Feeling oddly tender and protective, JJ squeezed the hard warm fingers entwined with hers.

"What, exactly,
is
the Milky Way?" she asked, want ing to extend the moment. "I've heard about it all my life, but I don't even know what I should look for."

"See that long smear of light directly overhead? Looks like a thin high cloud? That's it. As for what it is—it's actually one of the spiral arms of our own galaxy. And there's Cassiopeia."

"Where?"

He slid his arm under her neck to bring his face next to hers, then pointed to the sky. "Put your hand on top of mine. Follow your finger. See the five stars on the Milky Way that look like a W?"

"Yes."

"That's Cassiopeia." He moved his arm. "And there's Andromeda. And Pisces." He moved his arm further to the left. "And there's Aquarius."

"Where's Orion? I've heard of it."

"It's visible in winter. We ought to be able to see it. Look there. Over the ocean. See the three bright stars? They form Orion's belt."

"That's what people always say. But I don't see a belt. And I certainly don't see a man."

"I admit the Greeks had a lot of imagination."

"Well, do you see a man?"

"No, not really. Orion is just coming over the hori zon. We're not able to see all of it."

"Maybe you should show me something easier to see. Where's the North Star? Everybody always says you can navigate by it, but I don't know how. I've never known how to find it."

"Polaris? We can't see it." He brought their hands down. He placed a kiss in her palm before he tucked her arm back under the comforter. When he had re tucked the comforter under her chin, leaving no gaps to leak cold air, he rested his arm over hers at her waist. With his thumb, he idly stroked a slow pattern on the underside of her breast. "We'd have to face north to see Polaris," he told her, a touch apologetically. "It's in the Little Dipper."

She turned her face to his. So close her nose brushed his cheek. His hand left her waist and moved higher. He gathered the fullness of her breast, which had slipped to the side, and cupped it, testing its weight. "Oh." She tried very hard not to think about what he was doing. "You mean if you face north, you see the North Star? And if the North Star is directly ahead of you, you're facing north."

"Uh, yeah." She saw the corner of his mouth curve upward. "You didn't know that?"

"Oh, go ahead and laugh at me. Not that I think un derstanding the connection will help. I don't have any sense of direction at all. None. GPS is the greatest thing ever invented."

He rolled his head toward her. She could see the glis ten of his eyes, his teeth. She wondered if she imagined the tenderness of his smile.

"I'm not laughing." His fingers kneaded the softness they had found. Every now and then grazing to the nipple, never quite landing exactly where she wanted them.

Warm puffs of air, smelling attractively of him, bat ted her face, as if he'd found a way to caress her with every syllable. She was a little breathless when she asked, "Did you learn the constellations so you would know how to navigate?"

"SEALs learn several methods of navigation, but, to tell you the truth, I'd rather depend on GPS, too."

She wiggled, trying to bring her breast into the contact she desired. "Never have to ask for directions again, huh?"

"I need to ask for directions right now." He hesitated. "I need to know if you've looked at the stars enough."

His hand on her breast stilled. She wanted more of his touch. But she hated to let go of this moment, this sense of communion. "If I say no?"

"Then we'll look at them longer. As long as you want to."

"Will you keep doing that?"

He gently squeezed her breast. "This? As long as you like."

She wondered if he meant it, if he would let her have what she wanted, or if he was setting her up. Sometimes he was so sweet; sometimes he was aggressive. She had a hard time knowing which to expect.

"Don't be on your guard around me, JJ," he whis pered. "You want me to play with your breasts while you look at the stars? I could play with your breasts for hours." He found the zipper tab and opened her top. He pushed aside the material and covered her flesh with his warm, hard hand. His strong fingers began again their slow kneading. With the new intensity, skin to skin, ex citement twisted through her deep inside, then in a ripple that took her whole body.

"Trust me to have your back. This is about pleasure. You're a passionate woman who likes to look at the stars for the sheer pleasure of doing so. I want you free to let yourself go."

Her mind slipped back to that night, exactly a year ago. They had already made love once. Had been lying in each other's arms like they were now. She had turned her head, burrowing against him.

She opened her mouth over his shoulder, enticed by the thought of tasting him, feeling his skin with her tongue.

"A biter, are you?"

She pulled back. "I don't know. I just wanted to put my mouth on you." The interpretation he would put on her words didn't occur to her until she saw the hope that widened his eyes. "I can't. I'm sorry."

"Hey, it's okay. I don't want you to do anything you don't want to."

"I—" she finished with a helpless shrug. She
did wan
t her mouth on him—exactly the
re. She wanted to tast
e him and feel him against her lips. "It isn't that I don't want to. I truly mean I
can't
." The couple of times she'd tried had been embarrassing and a complete turn-off for herself and her partner.

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