Assumed Identity(58)
Her fingers dug into his shoulders as he moved beneath her, sliding in faster, deeper—growing impossibly harder with every feverish thrust. He captured her nipple in his mouth again and drew on her until she moaned his name and her moist sheath began to spasm around him.
“Jake.” She leaned back, rocking her hips against his. He palmed her breast, tunneled his fingers into her hair. “Jake.” He tightened his grip around her buttocks and thighs, anchoring her to him as he thrust up inside her. Everything in him rushed to the spot where they were joined—all the guilt, all the doubt, all the need, all the fire. He could scarcely breathe. He could barely think. But he could look. He could feel. Her body gripped him like a firm, urging hand and he shook with his release deep inside her. “Jake!”
He’d never forget the wondrous look in her eyes as she flew apart in his arms.
He’d never forget her cuddling close as he stretched out on the sofa and pulled her down beside him afterward. He spread the quilt over them both as their bodies cooled, and he savored the skin-to-skin trust of Robin dozing off beside him.
He’d never forget how right and humbling and perfect it felt to be fully in the here and now, making new memories with Robin to store in his mind and heart.
“You need to sleep, too,” she whispered some time later, perhaps sensing that he’d been awake, trailing lazy circles along her hip, watching over her. She snugged that perfect little bottom against the cradle of his thighs and laced her fingers together with his, pulling his arm across her stomach. “Were you thinking about the nightmare again?”
Jake ignored the leaping impulses of his body, waking again at the intimate contact. There was something more than sex he needed from Robin tonight. He needed the peace this woman brought to his fractured mind. He needed the light she brought to his frozen heart. He needed to be the man—that good man—she believed he could be.
“No.” Jake pulled her hair aside and pressed a kiss behind her ear. “Can we hear Emma in here if she wakes up?”
Robin nodded. “I brought the monitor with me when I came to check on you.”
“Good.” He nuzzled the nape of her neck. “Because I don’t think I’m a strong enough man to let you go right now.”
“I’m not going anywhere, Jake. Promise me you won’t...go anywhere, either.”
He could guess she wasn’t just talking about staying with her physically. “I’ll do my best.”
After checking to make sure his knife was beneath the pillow, and his gun was within easy reach beneath the coffee table, Jake let his eyes drift shut. With his body sated and Robin tucked safely against him, he slept through the rest of the night.
Chapter Ten
Jake pulled a T-shirt on over his jeans and reached for the pair of socks he’d laid out on the sofa. “Hey, you.” One of the socks had tumbled over the side onto the blanket where Emma lay beneath an arched baby entertainment center. But instead of batting at the plastic animals dangling overhead, she’d found the plain white sock and was noshing on that as if it was her favorite toy. “Trade you.”
He knelt down to gently pry the sock from her fingers. She fussed a little, and while he was beginning to learn that the soft coos and protesting noises were just her way of communicating, Jake still got a knot in his stomach at the sound of distress and quickly guided her hands up to the blue cat hanging over her head. When she buzzed her lips in satisfaction, Jake smiled.
Jake Lonergan, babysitter. Not a job title he ever would have imagined for himself.
He tilted his head toward the soft humming coming from the shower in the master bedroom. “Your mama’s pretty skin must be pruning by now. Good thing you and I ate breakfast before she got in there.”
Emma’s blue eyes looked right at him and he imagined her smile was a “yes” to his conversation. With the Carter girls both temporarily occupied, Jake finished dressing.
He’d already showered and come back to the family room in his shorts and jeans to watch Robin sleep for a few minutes until he heard Emma fussing over the baby monitor and he’d leaned down to wake Robin with a kiss. He could see she was tired, despite a smile and a “Good morning.”
If surviving his nightmare and a round of lovemaking with him on a couch didn’t wear a woman out, then single parenting did. She’d pushed her hair out of her eyes and glanced at the antique clock on the mantel with a weary sigh. “Is she awake already?”