He teased my lips, flirted with them. His kisses were short and raspy. Then they would change into long and seductive. Just as I would get used to one kiss and begin spiraling into deep desire, he would change his angle, his intensity, or the pressure of his mouth, and it would be an entirely new experience all over again.
He left all my senses reeling.
And that was only with his kiss.
I couldn’t help but ask myself what he would be like in bed. Naked.
He pulled back and gentled his hold, dropping a quick kiss to my temple. “You smell like cinnamon.”
“You still smell like a Christmas tree.”
“Cinnamon and Christmas go together.”
“Yeah,” I murmured. “Yeah, they do.” I dragged my hand along the back of his neck, caressing the smooth skin and then slipping my fingers beneath the neckline of his T-shirt.
He made a sound of appreciation, and I smiled.
“What do you have going on today?” he asked.
I wished I could say nothing. I wished I could sit in his arms every second of this day. “I promised my parents I would come over for a while. They’re still pretty freaked out. And I have to get a new cell phone. It feels weird not having one. Plus, I really need it for work. I use it all the time.”
“Are you a social media junkie?” He teased.
“It’s my job.” I defended my serious bad habit. “It’s called marketing.”
“Be careful today,” he whispered against my lips and kissed me softly. My heart turned over. How such a big, rough guy could be so tender I would never understand.
“I don’t think my social media obsession is dangerous.” I joked.
“I’m not talking about your unhealthy online habits, sweetheart.”
I couldn’t even complain that he called my habits unhealthy because he went and added sweetheart at the end of his sentence. *sigh*
After my initial melty reaction, his true meaning broke through, and my stomach tightened. I knew what he was talking about. I just didn’t want to think about it.
‘Course, pushing it away wouldn’t make the problem disappear; it would only make it worse. If I wanted all the potential that I felt Nathan presented, then I needed to deal with the here and now so I could realize those possibilities. “Yeah, I know,” I said and pulled away to stare out the window at the trail. A woman was running along with a dog on a leash.
I watched them go, my eyes staying with the dog, a chocolate lab. I wondered what kind of dog I should get…
“Did you watch the news at all last night?”
“No,” I answered as the dog and woman ran out of sight. I looked up at Nathan. “Why?”
“It’s the reason I drove over here.” He paused. “Well, one of the reasons.”
“Tell me.” I was going to face this head on and kick it in the balls.
“The media reported your name. Your full name. And they reported his name too. They connected him to Mary.”
I felt the blood drain from my head. “Why would they do that?” I asked, dazed.
“Because the media is a bunch of bloodsucking drama hags.”
I laughed. “I’m so going to use that in one of my books.”
He grinned.
“So now he knows my name. And can find my address.”
“Yeah, pretty much. Not only that, but we blew the whistle on his identity. He’s a walking target.”
“Maybe that will send him away. He will run to some place people won’t know him.”
Nathan considered my words. “It’s definitely a possibility.”
“But you don’t think that’s what he’ll do.”
He scrubbed a hand down his face. “Shit, Honor. I don’t know. Part of me hopes to hell he runs to Mexico.”
“And the other part?”
His eyes met mine. “The other part of me thinks we pissed him off. Badly. I’m afraid you’ve become a challenge to him, one he won’t want to walk away from.”
I shivered. His words were scary.
“I don’t want to go back in that hole,” I whispered. Everything inside me felt numb, like my body was locking down some sort of self-protection mechanism in preparation for something terrible.
He swore in a way that only a Marine could. “You’re not going back in that hole,” Nathan vowed and pulled me into his chest. I wrapped my arms around his middle and held tight, like he was the last rooted tree in a raging tornado.
“Wait here,” he said and pulled away. I watched him go to the front door, unlock it, and walk out in the biting autumn wind.
A few minutes later, he came back inside. “I have something for you.”
His hands were empty. “What is it?”
He came up the stairs and I met him at the top. He reached behind him and pulled something out of the back of his sweats.
It was a gun.
“I want you to take this.”
I stared at it like it was the plague. “I don’t want that.”
“Yeah, I know. Take it anyway.”
Given my situation, having a gun would be smart. I may not want to carry it around, but I knew to the bottom of my slipper boots that if Lex showed up I wouldn’t hesitate to shoot him.
I’d probably shoot him more than once.
I took the gun, the weight of it not entirely foreign considering I carried one just like this the other night in the woods.
“You remember what I told you?” Nathan asked.
“Point and pull the trigger?”
“Yes.” He showed me how to work the safety and then made me show him that I understood how to use it.
“Listen to me,” he said once I knew exactly how to use the gun. “Shoot first. Ask questions later.”
“Okay.” Then I tucked the gun in my purse.
Nathan rolled his eyes.
“What?” I said. “Should I carry it in the back of my pants like you do?”
“Hell, no. You’d probably shoot yourself in that luscious ass.”
I had to admit, I liked he thought my ass was luscious.
“You gonna be okay today?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“Maybe you should just stay at your parents’ house tonight,” he suggested.
“I like my house.”
“What about my house?” he asked.
“Your house?”
“You might like it there too. I have a king-sized bed.” He arched an eyebrow at me and gave me “the look.”
“What are you suggesting?” I asked. Inside, my nerves were fluttering around like a moth near a lamp.
“Stay with me tonight. It will be safer.”
“Is that the only reason you want me to stay?”
He shook his head slowly. “I have this image,” he began, reaching out to twirl a strand of my hair around two of his fingers, “of your hair spread out over my pillow and my sheets smelling like cinnamon.”
“I should probably stay with you, then,” I said, my lips curving into a smile. “For safety reasons, of course.”
“Of course,” he murmured as he stepped closer and claimed my lips in a gentle kiss.
I felt my nipples harden and crush against the silky fabric of my bra. I pressed myself closer to him, arching just a little, and his giant, warm palm settled over one of my breasts. I sighed and his tongue licked into my mouth as his hand gently squeezed my sensitive flesh. My bra and sweater annoyed me. They were in the way of what I knew would be an all-encompassing feeling.
I pushed my hand beneath the hem of his T-shirt and raked my nails up his abdomen, around to his lower back. Gripping his taut skin, I urged him closer.
One of his thighs slipped between my legs as he brought me fully up against him. My inner muscles clenched and the rapidly swelling and sensitive bud between my legs began to ache. I bore down against his solid thigh, looking for sweet release.
Everything inside me felt wound tight as tension continued to build. I made a small, desperate sound in the back of my throat and sank my nails into his back just a little bit more. My hips gyrated over his leg as he cupped my butt and pushed me more firmly against him.