Jill Shalvis - Serving Up Trouble

“No. Yes.” What was he doing? “Don’t stop,” he said in a strangled voice.

“Oh, good, because I was hoping…” Then she covered his hands with hers, and gently but inexorably moved them off her hips, over her ribs, then even higher, until the tips of his fingers were just touching the bottom curves of her breasts.

He closed his eyes and concentrated on breathing.

“Sam,” she whispered in that voice again, the one thready with desire and need, and there was no way he could resist her sweet plea, no way he wanted to.

She fit perfectly in his palms, one sweet, curved breast in each, and as she let out a choppy breath, he stroked his thumbs over her satin-covered nipples, groaning at the feel of them tightening against his touch.

Her head fell back against the front door. Her hair was free, flowing over her shoulders, a strand of it clinging to the stubble of his jaw. Her eyes were closed, her breath coming in little pants as he rasped his fingers over her again and again. Her mouth fell open a little, as if she needed it open to simply breathe. Her skin glowed damp and rosy. And against his, her hips arched, rubbing the neediest part of her over the neediest part of him.

He didn’t have a condom. That thought stopped him cold, as did his second, and far more devastating one…she was not the sort of woman who could separate sex and love. For her the two would come together.

Not for him.

Not ever for him.

This shouldn’t happen. This couldn’t happen, but before he pulled back, she did. She put a finger to his lips and sighed as she opened her eyes. “I’m sorry.” She met his gaze and slowly shook her head. “I don’t want to stop. God, I don’t want to. But…”

“Protection.” He had to clear his rough throat. “I know.”

“No. Not that.” Her smile was so many things-sweet, sad, regretful, as she pulled her hands from beneath his shirt, leaving him feeling…cold. “This isn’t some thing I…” Her cheeks went a little red, further endearing her to him. “I don’t do this lightly, you see, and-”

“Angie, I know. I-”

“Please. Let me finish. I want to make love with you. I want to because I think we could really have some thing. You’re smart and wonderful and…” Her blush deepened. “And I think you’re really sexy. But I don’t want to be with someone who doesn’t feel the same. I want you to respect me. I mean me as me.”

When he opened his mouth, she put her fingers back on his lips. “I need someone who can see me for what I really am on the inside, not just the…well, you know, the pesky waitress.” She drew a deep breath and straightened her shirt. “So this is a bad idea, no matter how much I want you.”

He was the biggest jerk he knew. “Angie… God. I never meant to make you feel-”

“I know.” She focused her dark eyes on his. “But let’s be honest, okay? I’m a big old pain in your butt half the time. We both know that.”

He winced, dragged his hands down his face, and turned to look at her again. “I’m an ass. I really am. Know that right now. I like to keep people at arm’s length. I mean, I really like that, Angie, and you’re pretty impossible to keep that way.”

“I know, I’m s-”

“Don’t apologize. Don’t. It’s who you are. And no matter how I snap or growl at you, don’t ever think I don’t like or respect you, all right? I just…”

“Don’t like to like me?”

That tore a smile out of him. “Yeah. Some thing like that. Look, my own mother doesn’t understand me. I don’t expect you to, either.”

“Being a cop is who you are, Sam. I get that. I’m not like your mother. Don’t you two ever talk about it?”

He blew out a breath. “No.”

“Maybe you should.”

“We never talk. Period.”

Her eyes went soft. “Does she live near here?”

“She’s a librarian here in town.”

“At the library right across the street from your station?”

“Yeah. But we don’t run in the same circles. Not everything can be fixed by some sort of epiphany, Angie.”

He was talking about the holdup. How she’d made the conscious effort to change her life because of it. “I know.” She just thought it so wrong. She took one good look at the magnificent man in front of her and wondered who’d want to walk away from him.

Not her.

His hair was all messy, his shirt slightly askance. She’d done that, she realized with a good shock. She’d nearly devoured him.

And him her.

Stopping had been one of the hardest things she’d ever done, but even she had her pride. Sam, incredible kisser and amazing man that he was, was not the man for her. He never would be.

But he was still looking at her as if he wanted to gobble her up for dinner, and it was making her knees quiver. “I haven’t made the wisest of choices with men before. And last time, I sort of ended up…”

“Hurt.” He grimaced. “I know. Josephine told me. Right before she threatened to kill me with her paring knife if I did the same.”

“She…threatened you?”

“Yeah. She’s-”

“Fearless,” she said with him, then laughed while he went very serious.

“You’re different,” he said quietly. “You…know me.”

“I do.”

He stepped close to her again, so close she could see the dance of light in his eyes, and the beginning hint of a five-o’clock shadow on his jaw.

“So tell me,” he said very quietly. “What sort of lowlife could ever hurt you?”

“Oh. That.” She lifted a shoulder. “Long story.”

“Tell me.”

“Well…Tony’s an assistant district attorney.” And another whose unrealistic expectations she’d avoided. “He’s smart. Strong. The perfect guy, everyone always tells me. I should have done whatever I could to keep him. But he didn’t like my clothes, my job, or anything about me other than I suited his life style because I was easy-going. I didn’t rock the boat. And it was true, Sam. I wanted to make him happy. I really wanted that.”

“And then he left you.” He touched her cheek. “He was an idiot, Angie.”

She shook her head. “You think he left me.”

“Forget him.”

“No, wait. You really think that.” A little mirthless laugh escaped her. “You know, that’s what everyone assumes. Which means I’m pretty pathetic in people’s eyes.” She looked up at him, her first spurt of temper feeling really, really good. “Tony left poor Angie. She’ll never recover. How could she from losing a perfect man like that?”

She knew her eyes were suspiciously wet when she stabbed her finger into his chest and didn’t care. “Well, guess what, Sam? I have some pride, at least. I left him.”

She strode away from him rather than do something tempting, like start a fight he didn’t deserve. But her body was humming, yearning, and she knew it was a hunger only Sam could fulfill, and that it wasn’t going to happen. Which left her entitled to her grumpiness. “I’m not that same woman who’d go on status quo rather than face the truth. I wasn’t living. I was existing.”

“Angie…”

She kept walking, and since her apartment just wasn’t that big, she was at the end of the hallway with nowhere to go but the bathroom or bedroom, inside of three seconds.

“Angie.”

The bathroom, she decided. Good protection. Not for her, but for Sam, whom she still had the most terrible urge to plaster herself against.

“Hey, wait up.” And then his foot was in the door, holding it open when she tried to slam it in his face.

“While I’m thrilled you’ve changed your life,” he said, muscling his way in with ease. “I’m a little confused.”

“You’re confused?” This entire evening had been a bad night mare. The break-in. Calling Sam-why had she called him? And then him finding her in her little pathetic huddle in the tub. She was stronger than that. “I have no idea what’s happening to me,” she said, feeling baffled.

“You need rest.”

“No.” She said what was really bothering her. “Sam, I don’t want to die and not have really lived.”

“You’re not going to die.”

“We all die. I enrolled in college. It’s what I’ve always wanted.”

“Okay. College is good.”

“I don’t intend to back off when it comes to your suspect.”

“Angie-”

“I don’t,” she repeated firmly.

“Yeah.” He moved in closer, let out a sigh and gently slid his arms around her for a hug that was shockingly welcome. “I already knew that.”

When she set her head on his shoulder, he sighed again. “I’m sleeping on your couch.”

“That’s not necessary.”

“I think it is.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re a horrible liar.”

“I’ll turn on all the lights. No biggee.”

“I’m staying,” he said, and this time he put his finger on her lips. “Don’t argue with me.”

She wrapped her fingers around his wrist. “I imagine not many would dare.”

“You would.”

“I’ll try to restrain myself. So…you’re sleeping here.” When she spoke, her lips slid over his fingers.

Electrified, they both shivered.

“Yeah,” he said. “On-”

“The couch,” she finished for him. “You’ve mentioned.”

“Just do me a favor. Don’t come out in the morning in your towel. I’m going to do my damnedest to act like the professional I am.”

They cleaned up the apartment a little. Then Sam spent a long night on the couch, staring at Angie’s living room ceiling, wondering what she was doing in her bed, wondering what she was wearing, how she looked… It was so damn juvenile.

Determined to think of some thing else, anything else, he flipped over…and fell off the couch. He spent some time swearing, before climbing back up and trying again. Tossing restlessly, he finally napped.

He rose at dawn. He crept down the hall and stared at Angie’s closed door, his hand on the handle before he got a grip on himself and turned away.

In the kitchen, he grabbed a pad and pencil, then stared at them, wondering what to say.