Jill Shalvis - Flashpoint

Coward. Yeah, despite the tough-guy image his job gave him, he was a coward. At least he knew it, knew his limitations, knew that loving her, loving anyone, was something he couldn’t do. “What hurts?” He stayed very still. “Everything hurts like hell.”

Leaning over him, she very carefully kissed his jaw beneath a bruise. “Does that help?”

“Yeah,” he decided. “Yeah, definitely.”

“How about here…” She kissed him again, closer to his ear this time, making his breath catch.

“Uh-huh.”

“Maybe I should kiss all your hurts.”

“Okay.”

“Tell me where,” she murmured.

“Here.” He pointed to his throat.

Nodding somberly but with a hint of humor in her beautiful eyes, she obediently kissed his throat, slowly, hotly, with a touch of tongue that shot all the blood in his head to his groin in zero point four.

“Where else?” she asked against his skin, her hand slipping down his side, then back up again, lifting his T-shirt as she went. “Here?” She kissed him over the bandage on his left shoulder and part of his chest, and then the other side, where there were no bandages, just skin, and he felt his heart leap. “Zach?”

“Yeah, there-” He broke off on a shaky breath when she licked his nipple and then began a trail of hot, wet, openmouthed kisses down his torso, southbound.

“Maybe here, too?” She was at his abs now, her fingers toying with the string tie of his sweats. She stopped to glance up at him with an expression that said there was nowhere on earth she’d rather be than right here licking him.

He could come from just looking at her. “Everywhere,” he said hoarsely, and felt her yank on the tie and slip her hand inside, beneath the material, wrapping those magic fingers around him. “God, Brooke.”

“Shh.” She worked his sweats down. “I’m healing you here.” Her lips hovered over him and he held his breath, which came out in a rush when she kissed him.

And then drew him gently into her mouth. He lost himself for a while after that, but managed to tug her up before he exploded. “Skin to skin,” he whispered, and with an eager smile, she pulled off her clothes, and then with such slow care that he was aching by the end of it, she removed the rest of his, as well, before raiding his nightstand for a condom. Shaking with need, he pulled her down over the tip of him and kissed her as she spread her legs, straddling his, and brought him home.

Sensations swamped him, but then she began to move so that he slid in and out of her, in and out, and he lost his breath again. Time drifted away, his entire world shrinking down to the feel of her surrounding him, milking him, and he had to fight the inclination of his own body to let go and fly.

“Are you hurting?” she murmured, her mouth on his jaw, her hands-just her hands had him letting out a groan of agonized pleasure. “Zach?” She stilled. “Am I hurting you?”

“Killing me.” He swept his one good hand down her back to grip her sweet, sweet ass, loving the way she panted his name softly in his ear. Slipping his fingers in her silky wet heat, he stroked and teased, doing his damnedest to bring her up to speed to where he was, which was standing on the edge, teetering, so desperate for the plunge he shook with it.

“Zach-”

Unable to help it, he thrust up into her. She was letting out soft whimpers with every breath, assuring him she was as turned on as he.

“Zach, I’m going to-”

“Do it. Come,” he murmured against her mouth. “I want to feel you.”

And she did. She came completely undone for him, on him, her unbound hair in his face, her fingers tightening painfully in his hair. She was breathless, crying out, and he was gasping as her tightening thighs and the slow grind of her hips set off his own climax. He followed her over, swamped with a tidal wave of unnamed emotion as he poured himself into her.

* * *

A whisper, then a low male laugh broke through Brooke’s subconscious, and then it all came back to her. Going to Zach’s house, him answering the door, her taking in all that rumpled, surfer-boy glory.

Taking him to bed, taking him on the bed, seeing the look in his eyes that told her he was way more invested in her than he wanted to believe or admit…

She opened her eyes. Yep, still in bed with Zach. Actually, she was wrapped around him like a pretzel, thankfully with the covers up to their chin, because at the foot of the bed stood Aidan, Sam, Cristina and Dustin.

“Definitely, he’s doing better than Blake,” Dustin said. “Blake didn’t have a woman with him in his hospital bed.”

They were holding fast-food bags, and, as Sam so cheerfully held up to reveal, porn. “To cheer you up.”

“But apparently Brooke had other ideas on how to cheer him up,” Cristina said.

Dustin shushed her.

“Well, she did.” Cristina gave him a little shove. “And as I told you before you turned me down, sex is really good for cheering people up.”

Everyone looked at Dustin, who shifted uncomfortably. “Maybe I don’t like casual cheer-up sex,” he said in self-defense.

“Everyone likes casual cheer-up sex,” Cristina scoffed. “Normal people like casual cheer-up sex.”

“Maybe I like it to mean something.” Dustin looked into her eyes. “Maybe I want to know it’s going to happen again.”

She jabbed him in the pec with a finger. “I told you, I don’t make plans.”

Dustin lifted a shoulder, wordlessly admitting they were at an impasse.

Cristina glared at him, then at the others. “And what are you all looking at?”

In unison, eyes swiveled away from the train wreck waiting to happen, to the other train wreck that had already happened.

Brooke, in Zach’s arms.

In his bed.

Surrounded by goggling eyes.

“Get out,” Zach said to them all. “And Aidan, I want my key back.”

“You gave it to me for emergencies.”

“Is there an emergency?”

“Well, I thought junk food and porn constituted one, but I can see I was mistaken.”

“Brooke’s hair is down,” Sam noted. “That’s new.”

“Out.” Zach pointed at the bedroom door with his injured arm. “Now.”

When they’d filed out, Brooke covered her face. “This is bad. I fell asleep-”

“It’s okay.”

“They thought it was funny!”

“It is funny,” he said. “A little.”

Slipping out of the bed, she hurriedly reached for her clothes. Hearing the guys in the kitchen, digging into the food, she felt naked.

Very, very naked. “I’ve got to go.”

“At least stay and eat.”

She couldn’t stay. Not right now. Not when she’d just realized that in her heart, she was like Dustin, and not cut out for this lightweight sex thing. In spite of herself and her promise on that night on that rock, her damn heart had opened to Zach.

How stupid was that? She’d fallen all the way, leaving herself vulnerable to pain. And there would be pain. She was okay with that, but she needed a moment, a few moments, before she could smile and mean it.

“Hey. Hey,” he said when she turned away, snagging her hand, pulling her back. “Brooke? What is it?” The bruise on his jaw had darkened, the white bandage wrapped around his left shoulder stark against his tanned skin. He had bed-head again, and tired eyes that said he was hurting like hell.

He didn’t need this, the burden of her feelings. “I need to go home for clothes before work,” she said, faking a smile. “That’s all.”

He was quiet while she pulled on her shirt, so quiet that she finally glanced over to find him looking at her. And in his eyes was a wariness because he felt things for her, too, she knew he did, feelings he kept inside because he didn’t intend to let them go anywhere-but what was worse was the comprehension she found there.

Oh, God. Despite her best effort, he could see what she was feeling. “Yeah, I really, really have to go.”

With a wince, he sat up in bed. “Brooke-”

“No.” She shook her head. “Please don’t say anything.”

“I’m sorry.”

Oh, God. “Don’t be silly. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“Yes, I do. I’m sorry that I can’t give you what you want.”

Casually as she could, she slipped into her shoes and attempted to wrangle her hair. “And what is it you think I want?”

Reaching out, he grabbed her hand again, stilling her frenetic movements, waiting until she looked at him. “Love,” he said quietly.

She managed a light laugh. She realized she might be pathetically needy when it came to that particular emotion, but love hadn’t exactly been prominent in her life. She’d come here to Santa Rey a little bit in limbo, but the one thing she’d known was she’d wanted that to change. But she’d made Zach a promise not to get attached, not to have messy emotions.

She’d failed on both counts.

“Brooke.” He stroked a strand of hair from her face, all the while holding her gaze with his so that she couldn’t look away to save her life. In these eyes were affection, heat…and a brutal honesty. “I don’t want to hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you, but-”

“It’s not your fault-”

“I wanted a physical relationship with you, you know that. And now I’m holding back, you know that, too. It’s just that if you’re going to add love into the mix-” He grinned ruefully. “Well, you can’t. I don’t seem to have the parts required to do love. So you can’t fall, not for me.”

Her throat tight, she nodded. “I know.”

Only she also knew it was too damn late.

Zach slept on and off for two days. Or rather he tossed and turned for two days. He spent his third night at home surrounded by the guys, grateful not to still be in the hospital like Blake, who’d suffered a more serious head trauma, his leg broken in four places, and two cracked ribs, and was by all accounts cranky as all hell.