by Jill Shalvis
A funny look flashed over her face. “You . . . think I’m tired of you?”
“Sure. It happens. No hard feelings.” Now he flashed her his own personal brand of the fake, polite smile and turned away.
And this time, it was her turn to grab him and force him around. “You think I’m tired of you,” she repeated.
Given her incredulous tone, he had to reassess. “Uh—”
“Are you kidding me?” With jerky movements, she yanked open her purse and pulled out a string of five condoms. “I bought these to keep on me because you and I? We tend to need them in a hurry. I’ve never bought condoms in my life, Shayne, so you tell me. Is the fact that I did, that I went to the store, trolled the condom aisle, and picked out a box just for you the actions of a woman who’s tired of you?”
Before he could respond, she’d tugged him inside her apartment, kicked the door closed and shoved him up against the wood with shocking strength, then clamped her lips on his.
That’s when all the blood in his head drained for parts south as her mouth ravaged his.
Finally, when he was breathless and stone hard, she lifted her head. “Does that feel like I’m tired of you, Shayne? Or this . . . ?” She tore one of the condoms off and slapped it against his chest.
“Jesus.” His vision actually blurred. His hands went to her face, guiding her mouth back to his. He had to have her mouth on his, now, right now.
Her hands were already pulling open his pants and tearing at the condom packet when he spun them around, pressing her to the door now, needing the leverage. Her top went sailing over his shoulder, as did her bra. “Kick off your shoes,” he commanded as he dragged down her pants, taking her panties with them, leaving her completely and perfectly naked as he slid his hand between her legs, groaning roughly at how ready for him she was.
“Told you.” She yanked his shirt off and sank her teeth into his shoulder. “Not done with you yet, damn it.”
He stroked her with his thumb and her head thunked back against the door, exposing her throat for his mouth, where he did some biting of his own. Lifting her, he wrapped her legs around him, which opened her more fully to him, and helpless to the pull, he sank in deep with one powerful stroke.
Just her low gasp of sheer pleasure turned him on so much that he had to go still a moment. “Don’t move,” he demanded gruffly. If she did, if she whispered his name in that sexy-as-hell whisper, if she so much as breathed, he was going to come.
“Have to.” She rocked her hips, and his vision blurred.
“God. Dani, not yet.” Gripping her tight, he held her still, but she sighed his name and he felt lost. Just as whenever he was with her, he was also found. Terrifying, and utterly, overwhelmingly simple.
“Oh, Shayne,” she said, sounding as if maybe, just maybe she felt the same way. She was wet and hot, sucking him into a chasm of pleasure so deep he couldn’t see his way out. Didn’t want to see his way out. This wasn’t just sex, he knew that now. This was a heart and soul connection, and he opened his mouth to tell her, but she fisted her hands in his hair and bit his lower lip, tugging on it, bringing a sweet stab of pain until she released it and then licked the spot while he pounded into her, the sound of her hips hitting the door, of him sinking in and out of her driving him to the very edge of his mind.
Past the edge, where there was no cognitive thought, only the sensations. Hot and wet and deep and overwhelmingly amazing. It was all he could do to hold on to her. “Dani, I’m going to—”
But she burst first, his name on her lips as she came all over him in gorgeous, violent shudders that sent him skittering into it with her. Then his knees collapsed, and they sank to the floor in a tangled, naked, damp, and sweaty heap.
“Jesus,” he breathed. “Did you get the license of that truck?”
She rolled to her back and stared up at the ceiling, and even stripped of all energy from the wild sex, he recognized trouble. Coming up on one elbow, he looked into her face. “Why do I get the feeling we just had make-up sex without making up, after a fight I didn’t understand?”
“That wasn’t make-up sex. That was just sex.”
Okay, definitely, he’d missed the fight. Damn, he hated that. “Come here.”
She didn’t. “Do you always cuddle and talk after sex?”
“I wouldn’t call lying on the wood floor, butt-ass naked, cuddling.”
Turning only her head, she gave him a long look. And he had to concede. “No. I don’t usually cuddle and talk afterward.”
“So why me, Shayne?”
He wished he knew. When she made a soft noise and turned away, he pulled her back. “If I had the answer to that, this would be simple, but . . .”
“I know. Not simple.”
“I’m working on it. I swear I’m working on it.”
She stared at him for a long moment, then nodded and set her head on his chest. A gift. She was this rare, precious gift. Pulling her in close, he held her tight and did some ceiling watching of his own, wondering what the hell was wrong with him that he couldn’t just tell her.
After a few minutes, Dani pulled free and stood up.
“We have got to start making it to a bed,” Shayne murmured, and rolled to his back in all his naked glory, and there was lots of glory. “Where are you going?”
Throat tight, she managed a smile. “Just getting some water.” She couldn’t have said another word without giving herself away, that being the fact that she couldn’t hide from it anymore. This bone-deep, desperate, insatiable yearning clawing at her? Love. She moved into the kitchen for the water she didn’t really need and tried not to panic.
And failed.
Gripping the counter for strength, she pressed her head to the cool tile and gulped for air.
She loved him.
“Dani.”
Jerking upright, she turned around just as Shayne flipped on the light, and she realized two things at once.
One, she was still naked, and standing beneath the harsh fluorescent kitchen lights in that state was probably a worse nightmare than getting caught in a green mask with an entire carton of ice cream and one spoon.
And two, there was a piece of paper stuck to her forehead. Shayne’s gaze narrowed in on that, and also naked, he strode toward her, but even with the unflattering light cast over him, he still stole her breath.
Pulling the paper from her forehead, he looked down at it, face tight with tension.
Peering over his arm, she went still at the words she read: You’re next.
Chapter 24
They turned the note over to the police, who scratched their collective head and sort of went, “Oh, guess someone is after you.”
Duh.
Dani offered to let Shayne sleep over after that. Of course he said yes, after running home to get Bella, who was ecstatic at the field trip. Dani looked at the determination on his face, the determination to keep her safe, and felt something warm deep inside. He had a sense of responsibility an annoying mile long.
But it hadn’t been responsibility that had made her come so many times in the night that she’d lost track.
The next morning, she got up to go to work.
“Oh, no,” Shayne said. “Not this again.”
“What do you suggest I do?”
“Something that doesn’t require you leaving my sight.” While the words were thrilling, the intent behind them was not. He was scared for her, worried beyond belief, but neither of those things was something one based a relationship on.
And God help her, she’d figured out that that was what she wanted—a damn relationship. She was tired of being on her own, tired of fighting off her emotions for him, of not letting him in because she was tough and independent. She could be herself and still have a guy in her life. Him in her life.
“Come with me,” he said.
“Where to?”
“Trust me?”
She looked into his eyes, not all that surprised to realize she trusted him more
than she’d ever trusted anyone.
She let him drive, but instead of taking her to his house as she’d expected, he took her and Bella to Sky High.
“I’m not ready for another flight,” she told him, hugging the dog. “I haven’t had any alcohol.”
“I just have a quick flight to Santa Barbara.”
“And you, what, think I’m going to sit and wait for you?”
He came around the car for her and pulled her out, holding her hips, pressing her back against the car as he looked into her eyes. “You won’t be alone here.”
“I’m capable of taking care of myself.”
“More than,” he affirmed, sliding his fingers into her hair, holding her face up to his for a long, sweet, slow kiss that pretty much melted all her resolve. “But this isn’t about you, Dani. It’s about me.”
“That’s ridiculously Neanderthal.”
He closed his eyes, then opened them again. “I’m worried about you. I’m so goddamned worried about you that I can’t see straight, not even to fly.”
She stared up at him, her throat tight.
He glided his thumb over her lower lip, his gaze on her mouth, which he covered with his for another extremely nice kiss. “You turn me upside down.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “So completely, fucking upside down.”
What did that mean? Before she could ask, Bella barked with enthusiasm to get inside. Shayne took her hand and led them inside. He waved at Maddie, who was at the desk talking into a radio while working not one but two keyboards and looking like a supermodel while she was at it. She waved at Dani, handed Shayne a stack of files, tossed Bella a doggie cookie, and went back to multitasking.
Shayne took Bella to his office, then brought Dani onto the tarmac, where they walked past two hangars. They entered a third, a huge steel building housing four planes, all shiny and gleaming and looking very expensive. “Are these all yours?” she asked, awed in spite of herself.
“Those two.” He pointed to the two planes in the back. “The Moody’s on the left, the Learjet on the right.” He gestured to the front planes. “That’s a Piper, it’s Brody’s new baby. Cost a pretty penny, and once we fix her up, she’s going to be the new girl on the block. The other’s a Beechcraft. It’s a client’s, in for some regular maintenance.”
They walked up the middle of the hangar, between the planes, and Dani swallowed hard. She felt so small in here. But then Shayne opened the Lear and nudged her inside, and she gasped.
It was like looking into a beautiful, elegant, sophisticated house. A mansion. The interior was all plush, soft-looking leather, the carpet as thick as a forest. “But . . . it looks like someone’s living room.”
“I know.” Nudging her in, he shut the door behind them.
“We’re not—”
“Not going up, no. At least you’re not.” He led her down the body of the plane and opened a door at the end, which opened to a mouth-dropping master bedroom suite that might have been ripped right out of Architectural Digest. “There’s a TV,” he said, lifting a remote, “a small library, and hell, there’s even an exercise bike. Make yourself at home until I get back.”
“And then?”
“The kitchen’s fully stocked.”
“Shayne. You can’t baby-sit me forever. You have a life. Flying. Running Sky High Air. Perpetuating that lazy, sexy image.”
He came back to her, a frown on that sexy mouth. “Yeah, my life’s full. So’s yours. And I’ve lived my life just the way I wanted to, I won’t deny that. Neither would you. But maybe I’m . . .”
She stared up at him. “What?”
“Maybe I’m ready for some changes.”
Well, if that didn’t send her heart skittering. But he looked unaccustomedly uncertain, and she wasn’t used to seeing him look that way. Not this man, who’d never doubted himself, not once. “Changes or not,” she managed. “I’ll handle whatever comes.”
“On your own, right? Just like always?”
Was there an option? “Of course.”
“Of course,” he echoed quietly. “Dani.” His hands came up, cupped her face, his fingers sinking into her hair. “Maybe I’m not the only one who should be thinking about making changes.”
What the hell was that supposed to mean? She was fine, just fine—
Okay, she wasn’t exactly fine.
In fact, she knew exactly what he meant. She’d been a loner, too independent. She closed people out.
But she was going to work on that. She just didn’t plan to reveal her heart to the man who was most likely to break it. “Shayne, seriously. I can’t just live here.”
“Just today. Give me that much.”
When she only stood there, he made a low, rough sound in his throat and pressed his mouth to her temple, then her ear. “Come on, has it been that bad hanging with me? Have I been that bad to you?”
Memories of the past four days pelted her—Shayne playing the relaxed, smooth host of her mother’s party, him coming to her aid whenever she’d wanted, and even when she hadn’t, anticipating her, which took an excellent judge of character, not to mention the depth of caring.
And that, that caring, was what kept tripping her up. No, he wasn’t who she’d thought he was.
He was better.
And she wanted him. “No,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and just a little bit raw. Damn him for making her admit this. “You’ve been wonderful. Amazing.”
With that endearingly crooked smile, he lifted one of her hands to his mouth. “Okay, then. So the problem is?”
That you’re going to break my heart. That you are breaking my heart.
“Dani?”
Knowing now what she had to do, hating what she had to do, she turned her face into his throat and just breathed him in, wishing she could bottle him up and keep him forever. But if she let this go on much longer, it would kill her. “The problem is me, Shayne. All me.”
He went still for a beat and pulled back a fraction. “I’ve used that sentence. That’s an I’m-dumping-you sentence.”
She just looked at him.
“You are. You’re dumping me,” he said.
Cutting my losses . . .
“Why?”
“Shayne—”
“No. Don’t give me more of that it’s just you crap, okay? Don’t give me any excuses, just the damn truth.”
“Okay.” She stepped back. She needed space for this one. “I’m protecting myself.”
“I thought we were past this. I’m not going to hurt you.”
But you already are . . . She couldn’t help it, her love for him was spilling all over, and as she looked at him, with all that love most likely completely obvious, something in his eyes changed. Filled with the knowledge of what was already wrong.
She loved him.
She nodded. “It’s for the best, really,” she managed. “I’m going to be busy with my work, and you’re also extremely busy.”
“Yes.” But he shook his head in the negative. She’d have sworn his eyes were suspiciously shiny as he pulled her in.
A hug.
A good-bye hug.
His body was warm against her, and she wanted to cry so she tried to pull free but he held on. “For me,” he whispered, and she found her arms winding up, around his neck, pressing closer.
He let her in, fisting his hand in the back of her shirt as if maybe he couldn’t quite bring himself to let go.
Their eyes met. His mouth curved slowly in a smile that reached his eyes but was sad, so damn sad she actually felt her heart