Maybe.
Not like I was sleeping well at night. Just down the hall rested the most unbelievably beautiful, challenging, and passionate woman I ever met. Living in close proximity was a fun tease, but I wanted more. A shared bed. Tangled sheets. Her whispering affectionate and perfect words instead of insults.
Her pleasure.
I’d roll over an IED for a chance to take her again. Fuck our parents’ ridiculous marriage. I didn’t care if we were step-siblings or not. I wanted Shay more than I ever wanted any other woman, and I’d prove it to her the best way I knew how.
My fingers tangled in the florescent pink bottoms. She gripped my hand, but releasing her hold on the wall only weakened her more. She groaned, even as she tried to bite her lip to silence her mew of excitement.
“I think you might eventually like swimming,” I whispered.
The bottoms pulled aside, exposing her puffy slit to the barbaric force of the water. But she didn’t protest. Her body shivered, shook, and arched against me in perfect pleasure. Her nails dug into the pool’s wall, but she didn’t move.
Just the opposite.
Her hips bucked.
Fuck yes.
She slammed against my hardness. I pushed, capturing her against the wall, shoving her into the jet, and grinding to hear her whimper.
I wanted to haul her out of the pool and shove her on her knees. Sink my cock inside that waiting slit and fuck her until she begged for more, forgave my indiscretions, and promised to ride me every goddamned night until I had to deploy.
She beat me to it.
Her orgasm nearly wrenched her body in half. She arched against me, and I’d have sunk to the bottom of the pool with her if I hadn’t caught her in my arms.
Fucking beautiful, everything about her.
Mocha skin, full, pouted lips, the ebony curls that clung to her body as the water eagerly lapped at her panting chest.
Her pleasure would boil the pool.
But I felt her get hotter before. Inside. Deep. Right where my cock ached to bury.
God damn, this woman was perfect. She knew how to writhe, how to tremble, how to come hard enough to rock through me with just a touch.
But now she struggled against the jet that trapped her body in sensitivity. I hated to let her go, but, at least she knew where she could get more.
So much more.
I’d worship the fucking ground she walked on. Kiss her toes, lick her skin, devour her pussy, suckle her nipples, nip her throat, and claim her lips with every passion I could offer.
If she’d let me.
If she’d stop hating me for just a minute, just enough time to prove I wasn’t the jerk she thought I was.
I wasn’t a pervert who wanted to sex his sister. I was a red-hot, testosterone-fueled man who fell too fucking hard for a beautiful face and harder for the frustrating woman who hid her passion, her happiness, and her fears behind a forced responsibility and layer of guilt. It wouldn’t bring her father back or fix whatever relationship they had. It made her hate herself and the fortune that she inherited.
I had to show her it was okay to be vulnerable.
Even if I couldn’t be.
But Shay moved before I could, squirming from my hold. She groaned—and not a good sound. I helped her to sit on the side of the pool. She tried to rise to her feet, but she stumbled as her strength still paddled in the water with me.
Shay was the type who needed to lay for a while, post-bliss, to recover. She was probably the only woman I had ever let cuddle me.
And I’d be the last. Next time it happened, she’d suffocate me with a pillow.
“Completely. Inappropriate.”
She scolded me, but she panted, satisfied, out of breath and ragged with pleasure. Usually how I preferred my women.
“It’s just a swimming lesson.” I grinned. “You did very well for your first attempt.”
“Don’t.”
“Wait until I show you my favorite stroke.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“That’s what I hear.”
She seized her towel and wrapped it over her curves. Not that it mattered, I still felt the heat where she bucked against my chest.
“Where are you going?” I asked. “You didn’t even let me show you how long I can hold my breath under water!”
Shay grabbed her things with trembling fingers, though her body swayed and shifted now, more relaxed. I’d get that stick out of her ass yet—and replace it with something better.
“I think we’ve had enough poolside fun for one day.” Shay swallowed. “Probably a lifetime.”
“You don’t mean that.”
She brushed her hair behind her ear, but her smile hadn’t returned. “Yes. I do. I’m sorry, Zach, I never should have let you…we can’t. Okay? You’re my step-brother. I don’t trust you here, I don’t trust you with the inheritance, I don’t trust that you won’t run around and find some other mermaid to…teach to swim.”
“Give me a chance.”
“Let’s do ourselves a favor and forget everything ever happened,” she said. “Save us the heartache, okay?”
She didn’t let me answer, and I didn’t know how to fight to get her back.
My stomach dropped.
Here I was, pissing with her, craving a chance to fool around, having some fun, and sneak beneath her sheets.
She thought it was something more?
Save us the heartache?
She hurried in the house.
I hadn’t moved. Couldn’t, not when she dumped the entirety of the pool over my head and froze it.
Was she falling for me?
I grinned, watching as she slammed the door the patio behind her.
She could hide from it all she wanted, but one thing was clear. Shay wanted me more than she let on.
And I wasn’t letting her get away.
Chapter Eleven - Shay
Lesson plans.
Safe, innocent lesson plans.
They were time-consuming. They were boring. They were due at the end of the week so I could present something to the school where I’d be observing.
But teaching kids their A-B-Cs wasn’t taking my mind off of S-E-X.
I was new to teaching, but I knew that would get me fired quicker than if I revealed my step-brother was the object of my forbidden desire.
I groaned. Who was I kidding? I used the step-brother excuse to stay away from Zach. If I forced myself to believe what we did was wrong, then I wouldn’t end up in his arms again. That humiliation was the only thing preventing me from grabbing a pen-knife and notching his bedpost for him.
Zach was a player. He was an asshole. I had to watch my every word around him or he’d twist it into something sexual and promising.
Except he had the prowess to justify his teasing.
And he knew it.
Lesson plans.
I meant to focus on my lesson plans.
I bit my lip. I loved the education program, the prospect of teaching, and the thought of working with kids. But unless I was huffing the glue I reminded myself to buy, no way could I use phonics lessons to forget what happened in the pool.
I sighed. I once thought the shower attachment was divine. Now every morning I eyed the Jacuzzi tub.
Bad idea. Just bad. Humiliating. Regretted.
Delicious.
No one touched me like Zach. No one stirred me like him.
No one nearly drowned me in literal pleasure and whispered innuendoes in my ear until I collapsed in his arms.
And no one was idiot enough to bolt from the pool, lock myself in my room, and pray the bikini hadn’t fallen off as I bounced to safety.
But, for Christ’s sake, one of us had to be responsible, and I wasn’t talking double-checking to ensure I took my pill in the morning. We had to be adults. We had to forget all about the sex. Since Zach was a meathead who spent every available hour harassing me, training, or eating, I’d be the one to take charge.
We had to end it.