“Off the scale,” she assured him softly. “We were in your bed and you took off my nightgown…actually you ripped it off. And it wasn’t my nightgown, it was your tee shirt and…”
He stopped her mouth with a kiss, feeling her smile underneath it. He was moving so slowly, like the waves of the sea. Cupping her shoulders, he slid back into her, deep. As deep as he could go. Her smile had gone, her kisses now felt urgent. Mouths connecting like their sexes.
Nicole’s legs lifted, widened and she somehow impaled herself even more on his cock.
An electric charge raced down his spine and his balls tightened. Not good. He had to stop this, stop coming the instant he entered her. Of course, afterward he just kept on fucking, but he had to learn a little bit of self-control around her and try not to come in the first five strokes.
Still, the urge to torture himself was strong. Sam lifted himself on his forearms, so he could watch them as he moved inside her, oh-so slowly.
“Nice dream.” He had to work to keep from panting. “I had one too. In this one, I’m fu—we’re making love, and we’re in my bed. And we’re watching me enter you.”
In.
“It’s sexy as hell,” he breathed.
Out.
Nicole looked down too, at the picture they made together. It was almost unbearably erotic, her slender white torso moving, stomach muscles clenching, the puffy pink lips of her cunt visibly holding onto him while he pulled out, as if it couldn’t bear to let him go.
In.
She felt like heaven. He’d never fucked before without latex. Even wearing a rubber, sex with Nicole would have been more intense than any other sex he’d ever had. Bareback…it was sometimes a miracle he lasted those five strokes.
Out.
Bareback, he could feel every inch of her. He knew her cunt now like he knew the back of his hand. He knew how it became even softer after she came, he could tell in an instant what turned her on, the skin of his cock could feel the extra wetness.
In.
No latex between them. The only thing stopping her from getting pregnant was some hormones pressed into little pills. Had she been taking the pill over the past few days, with everything going on?
Out.
Because, if she hadn’t, if she’d forgotten to take them—and who could blame her?—then…well, then she could be pregnant right now.
In.
With his baby.
Out.
At the thought, Sam swelled even more, became harder, longer. Nicole gazed up at him, startled. She’d felt it, his almost unbearable excitement.
In.
Because if she were pregnant, it would have to be a little girl who looked just like Nicole. With glossy black hair and intense blue eyes.
Out.
A little girl who would twine her little arms around his neck and tell him she loved him. And he would love her and protect her, fiercely.
In.
Nicole would grow more outrageously beautiful in pregnancy. She just had that look; she’d become rounder and rounder by the day, shining in her beauty.
Out.
He’d fuck her carefully, entering from behind. Oh-so slowly. And late in the pregnancy, he’d be inside her, and his hand on her belly would feel their child, moving.
In. Out.
She could be pregnant…
In. Out. In.
right…
Inoutinoutinout
now!
Sam exploded, a hot wire drawn from the top of his head that ran straight down his spine and through his cock blew in one pounding, electric second. The top of his head threatened to blow off and his toes dug into the mattress so he could be as deep in her as was humanly possible. He clenched his teeth against a shout, it was so intense.
He came in waves, shuddering and spurting in enormous jets, flooding her with his sperm, collapsing onto her. He was heavy, he knew that, but there was no strength in his arms while coming, everything was concentrated on his cock.
It wiped him out. He lay sprawled on her, breathing hard, waiting for the spots behind his eyelids to dissipate, thinking of absolutely nothing, only feeling. Until consciousness slowly returned.
Shit, she hadn’t…
Yes, there it was!
She was coming! Sharp little contractions around his cock, breath puffing in his ear, thank you God, because he hadn’t done anything to deserve this.
He held himself deep inside her while she writhed around him. It was almost better than coming himself, feeling her pleasure. He’d learned to prolong her climax by rocking slightly inside her while she came and he did so now, small little movements with his hips, barely perceptible, but man, she liked that.
Sam smiled into her hair. He didn’t need to look to see her expression, it was imprinted on his brain. On his death-bed, he’d see her face, eyes closed tight with pleasure, long neck arched, luscious mouth open to pull in more air.
The contractions slowed and he stopped his movements. She liked quiet at exactly this moment as she slowly came back into herself.
He loved that. He loved that he knew her so well, knew her body, knew what she was feeling. Nicole never dissimulated, never tried any female games on him. Everything about her was utterly genuine, including her pleasure.
The pleasure he gave her.
Oh man, this was the best.
Her little cunt was still now, soft and wet, and her arms relaxed around him. She gave a long sigh of contentment.
Sam nuzzled her temple with his nose, her hair soft in his face. It always gave him a shock to feel how warm her hair was. It was so midnight black, he always expected it to be cool, but her hair, like the rest of her, was warm and soft.
Oh yeah, his woman.
He took the lobe of her ear in his mouth and bit, gently. His cock hardened in her, expanding within her soft wet walls. He licked behind her ear, hips moving forward to go more deeply into her.
“Sam?”
Another nuzzle in the warm, fragrant waves of her hair.
“Mm?”
“Sam—sorry. I think I have to check my e-mail. I haven’t checked it in two days, I can’t simply close up shop. Can you hold that thought?”
She pushed gently at his shoulders and, stifling a sigh, he reluctantly withdrew from her warm clasp. The air felt cold and unwelcoming against the wet skin of his cock. If it had been a person, it would have grumbled. It was not happy outside Nicole.
He smiled down at her, though. Even being near Nicole was better than fucking anyone else. She smiled back, cupping his jaw in a gesture of affection that was becoming familiar.
“When you’re all caught up, could you translate something for me?” he asked. “There’s this bank in Tijuana that wants to upgrade their security. Drug gangs have robbed them fifteen times in the past year, so they’re looking further afield than the local police. They put in a request for a bid but all the technical information is in Spanish.”
She raised herself up on her elbows and kissed his jaw. “Of course. Be glad to. I’ll even give you a special lover’s discount.”
Sam froze. An opening. An opening he could drive a truck through.
His heart started thudding, a frantic tattoo of hope and panic. He’d thought to wait. A month, maybe two. Let her get over the past couple of days, settle down. He had every intention of being by her side as much as possible, of course. Get her used to being with him.
He knew perfectly well he wasn’t the kind of man she ordinarily dated. On the face of it, they were a mismatch.
He was a roughneck, more a beer kind of guy than a champagne one. Nicole was champagne, the finest.
Being with him wasn’t going to get her an entrée into high society, though arguably, as an ambassador’s daughter, she had that covered on her own.
What he could give her didn’t look like much on paper, but was very real, though. Fidelity, devotion, unwavering support. And, presumably, at some time in the future, a normal sex life where he didn’t jump her bone
s at the slightest opportunity. He knew that was in his future, he just didn’t know when.
So the plan was to just stick by her like glue. He knew she needed to be with her father, and he respected that. He could drive her to work and back. They could have lunch together. She had to eat in the evening. He’d eat at her house, take her out for an hour, he didn’t give a shit, as long as he was with her. The point was to get her used to having him around and then…pop the question some time down the line.
But life was unpredictable. Dangerous, even. No one knew that better than he did.
He’d almost lost her, twice.
Now.
Sam took in a deep breath.
“I don’t know about that,” he said, making a major effort to keep his voice cool, casual. “I don’t believe in prenups, so when you charge me, you’ll basically be charging yourself. Doesn’t make much sense to me.”
Silence. Total, aching silence.
Sam sneaked a glance at Nicole, refraining from wincing at the totally blank expression on her face.
Shit shit shit!
What the hell had possessed him to speak up now? Christ, why couldn’t he have waited? Now he’d shot his wad and how could he—
Nicole narrowed her eyes. “Was that a marriage proposal I heard in there?”
He didn’t have the courage to do anything but stare.
“Well, was it?”
Mouth dry, he nodded.
“Because if it was,” she continued, aggrieved, “it was definitely the most half-assed proposal I’ve ever heard of.”
He nodded. Yes, yes, it was half-assed, all right.
“Sorry.” He cleared his tight throat. “You’re right, I don’t know what I was—“
“However,” she said, talking right over him, “I’ll cut you some slack since you did save my life. Twice. That earns you points. Do you love me?”
That he could answer. “Yes,” he said firmly and waited. And waited. She simply looked at him, a thoughtful expression on her face.
Fuck. She was going to say no.
Well, hell. How could he expect anything else? He knew himself and he knew what he wanted and he wanted her, no question. But not everyone was like him, able to make important decisions fast. He had no doubts at all, but what about her?
She was an extraordinarily beautiful woman. She’d probably had men falling balls-deep in love within five minutes of meeting her since she’d hit puberty. He had no doubts, but she would. She’d be crazy to trust someone like him, put her life in his hands.
She came from a solid, loving family. He was as far from that as it was possible to be and still grow up on the same planet. How could she trust him to—
“It’s a very good thing that you’re not going to be making any marriage proposals after this one, because you suck at it. However, the answer is yes.”
“I know I’m probably not what you’re used to, but I swear, you can count on me forever. I’ll take care of you. No one will ever hurt you, ever again. I promise you I’ll be true, and—”
“Sam,” she sighed. “I said yes. And for the record, I love you, too.”
His brain seized up, simply froze. He stopped breathing for a moment. “Yes?” he echoed blankly. He couldn’t possibly have heard right.
Nicole’s eyes rolled in her head and she pulled his head down for a kiss.
Epilogue
Bellevue Cemetery
December 15
It was an unusually cold and blustery day. Nicole shivered as she laid a small bouquet of snowdrops and baby’s breath on her father’s grave, then stood back.
Sam put his arm around her and she leaned gratefully into his strength and warmth. She’d dressed much too lightly. The morning had seemed almost warm when they’d set out from Coronado Shores an hour ago.
The icy wind whipping off the Pacific felt like it came straight from the North Pole. She didn’t even have gloves with her. She hadn’t been able to wear gloves for six months now. There wasn’t a glove in the world that would fit over the diamond ring as big as a pigeon’s egg Sam had insisted on buying her. It was beautiful but enormous, a source almost of embarrassment in the beginning, though she was starting to become quite fond of it.
Nicole reached out to touch the headstone. “Happy birthday, Pops,” she whispered. It would have been his sixty-second birthday.
She and Sam had been married by a justice of the peace in her father’s sickroom the day after he returned from the hospital, with Harry and Mike and Manuela in attendance.
Before the wedding, Sam had gone into her father’s room and closed the door. They’d talked for more than an hour. She couldn’t pry what had been said out of her father. He’d only clasped her hand between his cold ones and told her she was marrying a good man.
When the short, simple ceremony was over, instead of giving her a passionate kiss, as she’d expected, Sam held her in his arms and whispered into her ear, voice raw with emotion, “I’m going to make you a good husband, I swear.”
He had, too. He’d made her a better husband, actually, than she’d made him a wife, particularly in the first two months of their marriage—the last two months of her father’s life.
Sam had bought the small apartment next to his, opened up the door between the two apartments, and turned it into a hospital suite for her father. For the first two months of their marriage, Nicole basically let everything drop as her father began his painful slide into death.
Sam had let her know in no uncertain terms that her only responsibility was her father, she was to worry about nothing else. Bills were paid, food appeared and was cleared away, doctors and nurses came and went. Nicole barely noticed. Sam took care of everything.
When, after she spent three straight nights awake at his bedside, her father took his last breath, Sam had been there to hold her in her grief. As she moved in a stupor of mourning and exhaustion, it didn’t occur to her until later that he had arranged the funeral and had bought the plot and ordered the headstone.
Time had brought a healing. After the funeral, Sam had taken her to Maui for a belated honeymoon and made sure all she did was eat, sleep and make love with him. At their return, she dedicated herself to Wordsmith. Every day, Nicole rode with Sam to the office building and up to the ninth floor, where they worked across the hall from each other. Wordsmith was finally taking off. Mike had quit the force and joined Sam and Harry in the company, which was now officially RBK Security.
Their nights were filled with a passion that showed no signs of slowing down.
Sam was an incredibly loving, though at times annoyingly overprotective, husband. Wordsmith was growing by the day and she tended it the way a mother tended her child.
Well, she thought, rubbing a hand over her belly, almost.
The wind suddenly died down and the clouds parted. The grass turned a bright green in the sunshine, a gentle carpet edging down to the shore.
Her father would have loved it here. He’d spent much of his career in dry, arid places. Somehow, Sam had chosen the perfect cemetery, and the perfect spot, on a round knoll with a spectacular view over the ocean.
As the sun broke out, the temperature turned warm, almost balmy. Nicole lifted a smiling face to the warmth.
A benevolent presence hovered in the air, a whisper of love. Somewhere her father’s spirit lingered and she could almost feel his gentle hand passing over her hair.
Somewhere, she knew, he was smiling. And holding her mother’s hand. She’d wanted to wait, but now was the perfect moment. It felt like she had her family’s loving blessing from on high.
Nicole jabbed an elbow into Sam’s side. “I have a Christmas present for you.”
“Yeah?” He smiled down at her, hugging her closer to him. “Isn’t it a little early? Christmas won’t be here for another ten days.”
She leaned against him, rubbing her head against his shoulder. “Well, it’s a present that will take nine months to get to you, so I’m starting early.”
&nb
sp; A cemetery is a sad, bleak place, a place of grief, watered by the tears of those who have lost loved ones.
But that morning, the cemetery rang with the deep sound of a man’s delighted laughter.
Acknowledgments
A published author needs a lot of things, but above all, she needs time and space to write and the opportunity to be published. So I’d like to thank my beloved family for the time and space they give me and to thank my great agent, Ethan Ellenberg, and my wonderful editor, May Chen, for the opportunity.
About the Author
LISA MARIE RICE is tall and willowy and beautiful. She has won every major book prize in the world. She is a black belt with advanced degrees in archaeology, nuclear physics, and Tibetan literature. She is a concert pianist. In truth, she is a virtual woman who exists only at the keyboard when writing erotic romance. She disappears when the monitor winks off.
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By Lisa Marie Rice
INTO THE CROSSFIRE
DANGEROUS PASSION
DANGEROUS SECRETS
DANGEROUS LOVER
Credits
Cover photograph © Irkeyn/Shutterstock Images
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
INTO THE CROSSFIRE. Copyright © 2010 by Lisa Marie Rice. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.