His Southern Temptation (16 page)

Lucky gloated. “Gotcha! You should’ve seen your face.”

Taylor splashed him again and he ducked to avoid the spray. “You jerk! I could have drowned!”

He grabbed her close and pressed a kiss to her lips. “Liar. You swim like a fish.” His eyes lit up with mischief. “Besides, I’m a Marine. I can always give you mouth-to-mouth if I have to.”

Taylor lifted her hands up onto his shoulders, caressing the water-slick skin covering his broad muscles. Her fingers tangled in the wet hair at his nape, and he arched toward her touch while she inched her legs up his body to clasp his hips. “Mouth-to-mouth, huh?”

She leaned in until the warm puff of his breath touched her lips. His eyes flashed in triumph as his hands traveled up her back, which is when Taylor levered herself up and dunked him under the water.

Sputtering, Lucky surfaced and came after her, splashing water and frightening every fish within a two-mile radius. Taylor tried to swim away from him, but he was fast and grabbed her ankle, dragging her back.

Screaming bloody murder.

Having the time of her life.

Like little children, they played in the water for a while. Lucky was bigger, but Taylor was faster, and many times she squirmed out of his grip and laughed in triumph at his look of surprise. She wasn’t laughing when he caught her and held her close, their bodies moving together just enough to keep them both on the edge. They floated around in the water, kissing, touching, enjoying the night and each other.

Wrapping his arms around her body, Lucky drew her in for a warm, wet kiss that curled her toes. Coming up for air, Taylor buried her face against his chest, pressing hot kisses along his smooth skin. He was beautiful, delicious.

Lucky pushed aside her hair and nuzzled the spot just behind her ear. “You make me so happy.” He pressed a kiss against her skin. “I will never need anyone like I need you.”

“Lucky,” she whispered.

He cupped her face, caressing her cheeks with his thumbs. “You’re so beautiful.”

Tears prickled at Taylor’s eyes and she blinked to hold them back. She knew that with every laugh, every kiss, every crazy surprise, Lucky had wormed his way into her heart and she’d let it happen. She’d
wanted
it to happen.

In spite of all of her bravado about having a “no strings attached” affair, she’d wanted to have more, to feel more, with Lucky.

Looking into his eyes, filled with desire, warmth, and affection, her heart leaped again at the knowledge that he felt the same way.

Lucky reached up, grabbed her hand, and pressed a kiss onto her palm. “For the first time in a long time, I’m right where I need to be. I don’t just want you here for tonight. I want you here with me all the time. I need you, Taylor.” His gaze caught her own in a stare of unapologetic need and desire. “I love you.”

It was the best and worst thing she’d ever heard. It was terrifying and thrilling to know that another person’s happiness relied on you. He leaned in and kissed her, his tongue thrusting inside her mouth with a brutal, possessive hunger she’d never felt from him before. For a split second, Taylor considered resisting, making one last attempt to save her heart. But when Lucky released her mouth and groaned, “Please, Taylor, let me in,” she knew she was powerless to deny his request.

He was already in. Lucky owned her heart, and she could deny him nothing.

Taylor wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his lips back to hers. This time when he invaded her mouth, she opened for him and met him thrust for thrust. Her nails scraped his shoulders as she pressed her sex against his straining cock until he groaned into her mouth. His hands were everywhere—her back, her ass, her breasts—the slick water preventing the delicious friction they both craved.

With a frustrated growl, Lucky propelled them to the side of the lake and she gasped as he rose out of the water, exposing their nakedness to the open air. The world tilted, heaved, but her focus was on Lucky. Gently, he lowered her to the nest of blankets in the truck bed and climbed in after her.

“Lucky, what you said.” She couldn’t say the words; too many thoughts and emotions jangled around in her head to think straight. But right now she needed to believe it was possible for them. “The words. Make me feel them. Show me.”

“You want me to show you how much I love you?” Lucky leaned forward, water droplets cascading off his body and caressing her skin like his own touch. Taylor opened her legs in invitation, her body already slick with want and need. “I can do that.”

“I love to worship your body with my mouth. Taste your sweetness here”—he ran a hand along her thigh downward until he reached the apex—“and here most of all.”

His fingers stroked her, spreading her desire and drifting up to circle her clit. Taylor gasped, closing her eyes against the onslaught of pleasure, wave after wave that swelled until she thought she’d come apart.

Lucky shifted, his big body scooting back until his warm breath coasted across the sensitized skin.

“Oh God.” Taylor’s eyes shot open, looking down to find him between her thighs, his face a mask of feral hunger, his eyes locked on her own. She shifted, her body involuntarily arching upward, inviting him to lower his mouth and take his fill.

He ignored her silent plea, offering only the sweet stretch of her flesh as he entered her with his fingers. In and out he pulsed, paced at a rhythm to drive her insane inch by agonizing inch while his gaze dared her to look away.

“Lucky, please.” Her voice cracked on the second word, but she was unashamed of her weakness. Lucky was right there with her.

His voice, no more than a deep whisper drifted across to her on the breeze from the lake. “I know, baby. I’ve got to have a little taste. Just a taste and then I’ll take you there, I promise.”

She swore the stars in the sky flashed when he finally tasted her. His lips, tender and urgent, kissed her thigh, her hip, and then trailed down to close over her clit. Taylor was a mass of feeling, her body crackling with the rush of electricity pinging off her nerve endings. The breeze from the lake, warm and moist with summer humidity, caressed her nakedness and heightened her pleasure.

Lucky groaned against her skin, the deep reverberation of his desire igniting the first spark of her orgasm low in her belly. Taylor tensed, her body clenching around him as the sensation overtook her. So fast, pleasure hit her, like a star shooting across the night sky in its last glorious ride. White hot. Intense. She had to cry out, had to scream her pleasure into the darkness or risk burning alive.

Lucky lifted up on his elbows, brushing her hair back from her face as his calloused fingers tenderly coasted the ridges of her nose, cheekbones, eyebrows.

“God, I love you.” Lucky whispered. Love turned his eyes to a hue that matched the vast sky serving as their cover tonight. “I dreamed of you…of this…just the thought of you kept me sane. If you only knew…”

Taylor’s breath caught in her throat at the naked emotion on Lucky’s face, the awe in his voice. Never had she thought that someone could look at her like that, like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to this earth.

“Did you hear me, Tay? I dreamed of you. I would lie in the desert and my body would ache to feel you next to me, to be inside you just like this. Safe and hungry, surrounded by your wet heat.” Lucky kissed her, a tender one and almost sweet in contrast to the fire in his words. “I would wake up and swear you were with me all night long. Sometimes the memory of you was the only thing that kept me alive. I swear to God…the only thing.”

Lucky moved then, lowering his head to brutally take her kiss. His hips rocking forward to thrust his cock deep inside her body. Taylor gasped at the exquisite pleasure radiating through her. Unrelenting, Lucky, drove into her, deeper with each stroke as his tongue plundered her mouth. She clung to him, giving him free rein to take what she offered.

For a split second panic rose in her throat. She couldn’t do this. Taylor closed her eyes tighter and steeled her heart to resist giving all of herself to this man. If she did, she wouldn’t survive it when the time came for it to end.

Lucky grasped her hands, pulling them back from where they’d been unconsciously pushing against his chest trying to create distance. He raised them over her head, stretching and opening her body further, making her more vulnerable to his rhythmic thrusts and rough caress.

His low, guttural voice broke through her concentration. “Taylor, open your eyes and look at me. I need you…so much.” Lucky threaded his fingers through hers, a sweet gesture that forced her to open her eyes. “I love you. Stay.”

All of the world faded away as Lucky’s gaze caught and held her own. With a sigh, the last part of her defenses crumbled into nothing.

She was done.

Her heart was his.

His honesty, his vulnerability, worked better than any slick seduction line. She’d spent years secretly yearning for him to look at her like he was right now. And although she thought she’d thrown out those girlish fantasies with her rumpled wedding dress, they were still here just waiting for Lucky to bring them back to life.

“I’ll stay.” She almost couldn’t believe what she was saying, but it felt right, true. “I’ll stay with you.”

She was still scared, still skeptical in the power to make anything last for a lifetime, but she’d follow his lead and step out in faith. Because Lucky believed in them.

That was enough. It would have to be.

Staring into his eyes, Taylor gave herself over to the pleasure created by the sweet friction of their bodies moving together. She chased the sensation until it crashed over her, pulling her under the waves of her orgasm. Her spasms, hard and intense, dragged Lucky with her as he shouted his release and collapsed on top of her. Taylor sucked in big gulps of air as she released her hands and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, holding him in a tight, sweaty embrace.

Her eyes fluttered shut, the moon creating a silver sheen against her eyelids, matching the shimmering glow now settled deep in her chest.

Right where her heart used to be.

Chapter Twenty

“Lucky Landon, cover your naked ass up and explain to me why you’re sleeping in the bed of your truck.”

Lucky stirred, blinking into the muted sunlight of morning. His mind hovered in the space between reality and one of the best dreams of his life. It took great effort to resist the desire to bitch-slap the man who was intruding on his awesome morning after.

He yawned, purposefully flashing the previously mentioned part of his anatomy before turning to face his good buddy Sheriff Burke. The older man was holding a cup of coffee, one foot resting on the tailgate as he sipped and smirked. The old bastard broke out into chuckle, saluting Lucky with his cup while he waggled his eyebrows suggestively.
Well, damn
. Under the ball-busting cop exterior the guy had a sense of humor after all.

“I take my coffee black. Taylor likes it with a little bit of milk.” Lucky lay a gentle hand on the woman next to him, pulling the blankets firmly over her, and shaking her awake.

“What do I look like? Starbucks?”

“Good morning, Sheriff,” Taylor murmured.

She sat up, her sleepy smile bright, and unashamed of being caught wearing nothing but a blanket in the back of a pickup truck in the woods. Ignoring their intruder, Lucky smoothed her tousled hair from her face, pressing a soft kiss to her mouth.

“Hey.” Taylor beamed up at him, her face displaying no signs of panic over the night before. Lucky sighed in relief.

“I’ve got a good idea of what y’all were up to last night, but it’s time you moved on home and did this stuff in a bed like normal people.” The sheriff lowered his foot from the tailgate and headed toward the squad car parked just behind them. He got to the bumper and turned, yelling out into the still of the morning. “Besides, y’all are late for your cousin’s piano recital brunch at the Southern Comfort.”

Shit. Lucky peered down at his watch—they weren’t technically late yet, but if they didn’t get moving they would be.

“Baby, we’ve got to go to or my mom will have my ass.” Lucky groped around for his jeans, shoving his legs in, opting to go commando.

“Well, since I have plans for that ass later, we’d better get moving.”

Taylor grinned up at him as she lowered her sundress over her head, covering up her luscious body. He bit back a groan of disappointment at the way reality was intruding on their time together. His consolation was the knowledge that now they had all the time in the world.

A crazy drive back to town, rushed showers, and a shave landed them at their destination with five minutes to spare. Pulling the truck into a parking spot just down the street from the diner, Lucky turned to Taylor. She looked beautiful, her chin-length, funky hairstyle framing her sweet face, the blond highlights catching the morning sunshine and making her hazel eyes sparkle. Dressed conservatively for Taylor, she wore a sexy dress that ended right at her knee and covered everything except her shoulders. She even wore underwear—a matching yellow thong and bra set he couldn’t wait to take off later.

Downtown Elliott was busy as usual, and there was no way to kiss her without someone seeing, so he settled for reaching out and giving her hand a squeeze. Taylor pressed back, her smile growing wider as he grinned back like a loon. He was so gone over this girl.

“So, you’re going to stay,” he said.

“I’m staying.”

He brought her fingers to his mouth for a swift kiss. “Thank you, baby. We’re going to beat the odds, you’ll see.”

“God, I hope so.”

Something in his chest shifted at the pang of doubt in her words. He’d do anything not to let her down, and as of today, it was his number one priority. Given time, she would believe as much as he did.

Out of the corner his eye, he spotted his mother peering out at the truck from the window of the Comfort. They had about one minute before she sent someone out for them. Time to set the game plan.

“So, we’ll tell everyone you’re staying, but nothing about us. Right?”

“Yeah. You want to talk to Teague first, and I think that’s the smart way to go,” she answered.