Читать книгу Ultimate Romance Collection - Rebecca Winters, Amalie Berlin - Страница 62

Five

He wanted her.

Flipper knew he shouldn’t, but he did. All through the delicious dinner Swan had prepared and while engaging in great conversation with her, the thought of just how much he wanted her simmered to the back of his mind. Now with dinner coming to an end, desire was inching back to the forefront. Images of her naked tried to dominate his mind, the thoughts made him shift in his chair to relieve the ache at his crotch.

“Ready for dessert, David? I made key lime pie.”

Right now, another kind of dessert was still teasing his taste buds. “Yes, I would love a slice, and dinner was amazing by the way. You’re a good cook. My mother would absolutely love you.”

Too late, he wondered why he’d said such a thing. From the look on her face, she was wondering the same thing. So he decided to clean up his mess by adding, “She admires other women who can cook.”

Swan smiled. “You don’t have to do that, David.”

“Do what?”

“Try to retract the implications of what you said so I won’t get any ideas.”

He had done that, but not for the reason she thought. He’d done so because it wasn’t right for either of them to think something was seriously developing between them. More than likely, she would hate his guts when she learned why he was really in Key West, when she discovered she was his assignment and nothing more. He couldn’t tell her the truth, but he could certainly set her straight on what the future held for them.

“And what ideas do you think I wanted to retract?”

“The ones where I would think we were starting something here, the ones that meant I would be someone you’d take home to meet your mother.”

He sat down his glass of ice tea, which she had served with dinner. “Any reason why I wouldn’t want to take you home to meet my mother if we shared that kind of a relationship, Swan?” Although he didn’t think he needed to let her know—again—that they didn’t share that kind of relationship, he did so anyway.

“Honestly, David, do I really have to answer that?”

“Yes, I think you do.”

She stared at him for a minute. “I’m well aware when it comes to interracial relationships that not all families are accepting.”

He chuckled. “My family isn’t one of them, trust me. Interracial or international, we couldn’t care less. My brother Brad met his wife, Sela, while working in Seoul, South Korea, and my brother Michael met Gardenia in Spain. Like I told you, my parents would accept anyone who makes us happy, regardless of race, creed, religion, nationality or color.”

She didn’t say anything to that. Then she broke eye contact with him to glance down into her glass of tea. Moments later, she raised her gaze back to him.

“My father’s parents didn’t. They threatened him with what they would do if he married Mom and they kept their word. They disowned him. Still, my mother reached out to them when Dad died to let them know he’d passed. They came to his funeral but had no qualms about letting Mom know they still would not accept her. They would only tolerate me since I was biracial. They even tried forcing Mom to let me go back with them. That’s when my godfathers stepped in.”

Flipper shook his head, feeling the pain she refused to acknowledge, the pain she’d obviously felt because of her grandparents’ actions. But he’d heard it in her voice nonetheless.

“It’s sad that some people can be such bigots. At the risk of this sounding like a cliché, some of my closest friends are black,” he added, immediately thinking of Bane, Viper and Coop. Like her, Mac was of mixed heritage and had a white mother and black father.

“I’m sure some of your closest friends are, David.”

He wondered if she believed him. One day, she would see the truth in his words. Then it suddenly occurred to him—no, she would not. There would be no reason for her to ever meet the four guys who were just as close to him as his biological brothers.

“I’ll be back in a minute with the pie,” she said. Then she stood and left the room.

Flipper watched her leave, feeling that he hadn’t fully eradicated her doubts the way he’d wanted to do. That bothered him. He didn’t want her to think he was one of those prejudiced asses who believed one race of people was better than another. What her grandparents had done to her father and mother, as well as to her, was unforgivable. Regardless of how she’d tried to come across as if their actions hadn’t hurt her, as if they still didn’t hurt her, he knew better.

She needed a hug right now.

He pushed back his chair and left the dining room to enter her kitchen. Instead of getting the pie like she’d said she would do, she was standing with her back to him, looking out the kitchen window at the ocean. And he could tell from the movement of her shoulders that she was crying.

“Swan?”

She quickly turned, swiping at her tears. “I’m sorry to take so long, I just had one of those miss-my-daddy-and-mommy moments.”

He crossed the room to her, knowing that her tears were about more than that. He knew it and he intended for her to know he knew it. “Not wanting to get to know you—that was your grandparents’ loss, Swan.”

She gazed into his eyes and nodded. “I know, David, but their actions hurt Dad, although he never said it did. I knew. Mom knew, too. I think that’s one of the reasons she loved him so much, because of all the sacrifices he’d made for her. That’s why she did anything she could to make him happy so he would never regret choosing her. But it wasn’t fair. He was a good man. Mom was a good woman. They deserved each other and should have been allowed to love freely and without restrictions, reservations or censure. It just wasn’t fair, David.”

And then she buried her face in his chest and cried in earnest. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her, leaning down to whisper in her ear that things would be all right. That her parents had had a special love, one she should be proud of, one the naysayers had envied.

Emotions Flipper hadn’t counted on flowed through him as he continued to stroke her hair and whisper soothing words next to her ear. Inwardly, he screamed at the injustice of trying to keep someone from loving the person they truly wanted to love. It was something he’d never understood and figured he never would. And never would he accept such a way of thinking from anyone.

* * *

Swan knew she should pull out of David’s arms, but found she couldn’t do it. Being held by him felt good. His fingers, the ones that were stroking through the strands of her hair, seemed to electrify her scalp. They sent comforting sensations all through her—and something else as well. A need that he was stroking to fruition. As a result, instead of pulling out of his arms, she closed her eyes and enjoyed being held by him while inhaling his masculine scent.

She wasn’t sure how long they stood there, but it didn’t take long for her to notice his breathing had changed. But then so had hers. His touch had shifted from comforting to passionate. He was using the same strokes, but now the feelings within her were beginning to build to an insurmountable degree of desire.

Opening her eyes, she lifted her head to stare up at him. The minute she did, she caught her breath at the intense yearning she saw in his gaze. That yearning reached out to her, jolted her with a level of throbbing need she hadn’t known existed. She’d heard of raw, make-you-lose-your-senses passion, but she had never experienced it for herself.

Until now.

“David...” She said his name as something burst to life in the pit of her stomach. It made a quivering sensation rise at the back of her neck. He implored her with his eyes to follow this passion, as if letting her know he understood what she was experiencing even if she didn’t.

“Tell me what you want, Swan,” he said in a deep voice while gently caressing the side of her face. “Tell me.”

The intensity in his eyes was burning her, scorching her with the sexual hunger that was coming to life inside her. She wanted more than his erection pressing hard against the apex of her thighs. She wanted him on top of her. She wanted him to slide into her body and begin thrusting in and out. She needed to lose herself in more than just his arms.

Suddenly, she felt emboldened to tell him just what she wanted. “I want you, David. In my bed.”

* * *

Flipper wanted to be in her bed as well. Lord knows he shouldn’t want it, but he did. He would have to deal with the consequences later. He felt too tight and hot to try to fight the demands his body was making. Sweeping her into his arms, he quickly walked out of the kitchen and headed toward her bedroom.

“You think you know where you’re going, David?”

He slowed his pace, remembering that she had no idea that he knew the layout of her home. Not only did he know where her bedroom was located, he knew the blueprint of the plumbing underneath her floor. He looked down and met her gaze, grateful she wasn’t suspicious. “I figured you would stop me if I went in the wrong direction.”

“Yes, I would have stopped you, but you’re going the right way.”

“Good.” When he resumed his swift pace, it didn’t take him long to reach her bedroom.

Swan had gotten next to him in a way he hadn’t counted on happening. Seducing her had not been part of the plan and he should not have allowed things to get this far. He didn’t want to think of the major complications involved, and not just because she was the goddaughter of three top naval officers.

But something was happening that he hadn’t counted on. His mind and body were in sync and a rare sexual aura was overtaking him. He could no more stop making love to her than he could stop being a SEAL. For him to even make such a comparison was pretty damn serious.

Instead of placing Swan on the bed, he eased her to her feet, loving the feel of her soft body sliding down his hard one. “If you’re having second thoughts about this, Swan, now’s the time to say so.”

She shook her head and then in a wobbly voice, she said, “No second thoughts, David.”

Hearing her affirmation spoken with such certainty, Flipper released a low, throaty groan as he lowered his mouth to kiss her again, needing the connection of her lips to his as much as he needed to breathe. Wrapping his arms around her waist, he pulled her body closer to him as he deepened the kiss, wanting her to feel his erection, the hard evidence of his need for her.

He had never wanted a woman with this much intensity in his life, and he had no idea why Swan was having this kind of an effect on him.

Why she, and no other woman before her, had tempted him to cross a line during a mission. His mind didn’t function that way. He had yet to prove her innocence, so technically, she was still naval intelligence’s prime suspect, but at the moment that didn’t matter. For all he knew, he could be about to sleep with the enemy.

But right now, that didn’t matter either because deep down, a part of him believed she was innocent.

What was happening between them was definitely out of the realm of normal for him. He’d known he would have to get close to her, but he hadn’t counted on this—his intense desire to do inappropriate, erotic and mind-blowing things to Swan Jamison.

But he wanted her and there would be no regrets. At least not for him, and based on what she’d just said, there would be no regrets for her either.

The moment he ended the kiss, his hands were busy removing her skirt, followed by her blouse, and when she stood in front of him in her lacy panties and bra, he couldn’t help but growl his satisfaction. She looked sexy as hell and the rose-colored ensemble against the darkness of her skin was stunningly beautiful. She was beautiful.

He reached up and traced a finger along the material of her boxer-cut panties. This style on a woman had never done anything for him. Until now.

“You should have been a model,” he said in a deep, throaty voice, filled with profound need and deep appreciation. She had such a gorgeously shaped body.

“My mother used to be a model. I was satisfied with being a model’s daughter.”

“And a strikingly beautiful one at that,” he said, lowering to his knees to rid her of her panties. He couldn’t wait to touch her, taste her and do all those erotic things to her he had dreamed of doing over the past few nights. He breathed in deeply, getting more aroused by the second while easing her panties down a pair of long, beautiful legs.

After tossing her panties aside, he leaned back on his haunches and gazed at her, seeing her naked from the waist down. Her small waist, her stomach, the shape of her thighs and longs legs were perfect. She was perfect.

After looking his fill, he leaned forward and rested his forehead against her stomach, inhaling her luscious scent. He loved the way it flowed through his nostrils, opening his pores and causing his body to become even more erect.

And then he did something he’d wanted to do since their first kiss. He used the tip of his tongue to kiss her stomach, loving the indention around her naval and tracing a path around the area. Then he shifted his mouth lower, licking his way down and enjoying the sound of her moans.

When he came to the very essence of her, he licked around her womanly folds before leaning in to plant a heated kiss right there. It was as if sampling her special taste was as essential to him as breathing. His hands held firm to her thighs when he slid his tongue inside of her, loving the sound of his name from her lips.

Then he went deeper, using his tongue to taste her, claim her and brand her. The latter gave him pause but not enough to stop what he was doing. He’d never claimed a woman as his own and had never thought about doing so. But with Swan, it seemed such a thing wasn’t just desired but was required.

And he didn’t want it any other way. She was the first woman he wanted to claim. Forcefully, he pushed to the back of his mind what it could mean to make any woman his and decided he would dwell on that aspect of things at a later time. For now, he wanted to focus on the delicious, succulent, enjoyable taste that was Swan.

He took his time, wanting her to know just how much he loved doing this to her. He wanted her to feel the connection his tongue was making with her flesh. However, he wanted her to do more than feel it, he wanted this connection absorbed into her senses, into her mind, into every part of her body.

Moments later, Flipper knew he’d achieved his goal when he felt her fingers dig into his shoulder blades, followed by the quivering of her thighs. Tightening his hold on her hips, he knew what would be next and he was ready.

She screamed his name when she was thrown into an orgasmic state. Her fingernails dug deeper into his skin, but he didn’t feel the pain because knowing he was giving her pleasure made him immune to it. What he felt was a desire to take things to the next level, to slide into her body and go so deep it would be impossible to detect where his body ended and hers began.

He finally pulled his mouth away and looked up at her, saw the glazed look in her eyes. Without saying a word, he traced his fingers around the womanly mound he’d just kissed before inserting his finger inside of her. She was ultra-wet and mega-hot and he had every intention of capitalizing on both. The orgasm she’d just experienced would be small in comparison to the one he intended to give her.

Pulling his finger from her, he licked it clean, knowing she was watching his every move. “Sweet,” he said softly, holding her gaze.

He slowly eased to his feet and reached behind her to remove her bra. When she stood totally naked in front of him, he feasted his gaze on her. “And I’m about to show you just how sweet I think you are, Swan.”