The Sapphire Affair (Jewel #1)(56)
“I guess I’ve found my own way to try to see justice done.”
“You’re Batman,” she pronounced, and that made him laugh. The serious moment started to fade away, like grains of sand pulled out to sea. “So that makes us Batman and Robin Hood, then?”
“Seems like it. Except I don’t have that weird nipple armor.”
She stopped walking, darted out her hand, and splayed it around the fabric of his shirt. She pretended to assess his nipple armor, or lack thereof. “Confirmed. The subject does not have nipple armor. However, he does have insanely hard pecs, and quite possibly the firmest chest we’ve ever felt.”
He chuckled deeply as he backed up, leaning against a lifeguard stand, unoccupied at this late hour. The bar wasn’t far away, but he felt like they were in their own corner of the night. He couldn’t deny there was something nice about the moment shifting so seamlessly from heavy to light. That the harder conversation was had, and they weren’t going to linger or wallow in it. They were speeding toward the path of innuendo again and that had its own risks.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
He clasped his hand over hers, tugging her closer.
“This whole just-work thing is working out really well, isn’t it,” he said in a low voice as he held her hand against his body. He craved her touch. Hell, right now, a part of him seemed to need it. Not just that insistent organ in his pants knocking on his fly. But his heart. That organ. Because he liked this woman. Liked her humor. Liked her heart. He still didn’t want to get involved on a job . . . but he knew one thing for sure—he wanted her.
Badly.
Despite all the reasons he was supposed to stay away from complications, he was having a hell of a time walking away. Maybe it was foolish, maybe it was risky, but this second, being with her felt only right.
“Incredibly well,” she whispered, running her thumb in a circle across his chest.
“Steph,” he said in a warning.
“Jake,” she said, like she was pushing back. “I thought we agreed . . .”
“We did.” He guided her hand across his chest and down to his stomach.
She inhaled sharply as she traced his stomach, her touch like a torch, setting his nerves aflame. He tried so damn hard to be practical, to be focused, to refuse to give in. He had a job. He had responsibilities. But he didn’t know if he’d last any longer holding out. “You have sand here,” he said, pointing to her ear. His voice came out like dust.
She ran her finger over it. But missed.
“No. Right there,” he said, reaching for her ear and brushing off the grains, and then catching a faint whiff of that coconut smell again. Drove him wild. He let his fingers drift into her hair. Looped them farther, cupping the back of her head. “What is it about you that I can’t resist? Your kisses are my kryptonite.”
He wrapped his hands in her hair, grasping the back of her skull as he kissed her on the beach by the lifeguard stand. Her lips were delicious, all cherry sweet from the Popsicle. As he deepened the kiss, she murmured against his lips, kissing back with all she had. It was a kiss you’d write home about or watch on a movie screen. He couldn’t even pinpoint what made it so damn good. He couldn’t deconstruct the kiss and say it was the shape of her lips, or the softness of her tongue, or the depth of the kissing.
It was something else entirely.
Something unknown. Something that drove him on. She kissed with such passion, such vulnerability, as if his kisses were the only ones she wanted, the only ones that would ever make her feel this way. She held nothing back as she melted into his arms and pressed her body to his in a full-body kiss—lips, tongue, hands, hips. Every part of her aligned with every part of him.
Even though they were fully clothed on the beach, she started rubbing against him, her crotch grinding into his erection. His body thrummed with lust. Whatever reasons he’d had not to touch her again seemed woefully unimportant compared to the rush of heat in his veins from her closeness.
“You taste so good,” he whispered hotly as he broke the kiss.
She flashed him the sexiest grin. “So do you.” She ran her fingers along his jawline, tracing his stubble and brushing her thumb across his face. Even that small touch turned him on fiercely. This was risky, but yet, his brain was urging him to roll the dice.
Or maybe it was his dick calling the shots.
He cupped her ass and tugged her closer, and soon, she was practically riding him vertically by the lifeguard stand. She moaned into his mouth, and his erection knocked against his shorts. He broke the kiss, grabbed her hand, and climbed up the lifeguard stand.
“Jake,” she whispered with a naughty grin.
“What? The view’s better up here. I can see the water perfectly,” he said as he sat down on the weatherworn white wood and held her hand as she reached the last rung. “Climb on top.”
They were far enough away from the bar that they weren’t making a spectacle of themselves, and the dark of the night shielded them the rest of the way. He tugged her on top of him, so she straddled him, her knees pressing into the wood.
“Ride me,” he said in a low voice.
She arched an eyebrow, asking an unspoken question.
No, he didn’t expect her to f*ck him like this, though the image sent blood to all the right places. But he wanted her close, wanted to answer the call he felt in her body. Her need. Her desires.