Jill Shalvis - Slow Heat

“Okay,” he finally admitted. “So I needed caffeine.”

She arched an agreeing brow and handed over the food.

He set the coffee down on the window ledge and opened the bag. Grabbing an Egg McMuffin, he sank his teeth into it.

She waited.

After another moment, he nodded.

“Feeling human again then?” she asked, keeping her smile to herself.

“I’ve got a start on it anyway.”

“Good.” Going up on her tiptoes, she brushed her lips over his. His eyes revealed their surprise. She rarely made the first move, instead letting him be the aggressor, sexual or otherwise. The realization startled her, and made her want to touch him more. She took a peek at Tag. His head was down. He was playing his Game Boy. “How are you feeling?” she murmured to Wade, setting a hand to his chest.

He looked down at her hand. “What did you have in mind?”

“Not the same thing you do.”

He let out a breath. “I’m good enough to play today.”

“You’re on the DL.”

“I’m good.” His eyes darkened and he wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Keep touching me like that and I’ll show you how good.”

“Your dad-”

“Sleeping off a hangover, no doubt.”

“Nope. I gave that stuff up, remember?” John stepped in the foyer. He was dressed in yet another eye-popping Hawaiian shirt and cargo shorts, a newspaper tucked beneath his arm, looking chipper but a little edgy. The lack of alcohol was definitely getting to him. “Hello, kids.”

Sam smiled and handed him a coffee.

“Thanks, darlin’.” John eyed his son. “I meant what I said, Wade. I’m here to quit.”

“And I meant what I said,” Wade told him. “I catch you with an ounce of alcohol, even cough syrup, and this little Brady Bunch experiment is over.”

John nodded. “I’ll be in the other room. Don’t want to cramp anyone’s style.”

“You’re cramping my life,” Wade said.

John’s mouth curved. “At least you admit I’m in your life.”

He was gone before Wade would comment on that but Sam heard the low, inaudible growl deep in his throat and gently pushed on his chest to hold him in place. “I see it’s going well.”

“Don’t worry,” Wade said, looking down at her. “I’m not going to kill him. Yet.”

“Wade.”

He closed his eyes. “Is this where you lecture me on being nice?”

“This isn’t my job. I’m not going to lecture you on anything. I just wanted to say-”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“But-”

“Ever.”

She studied his dark eyes, the muscle ticking in his jaw. “That’s ridiculous.”

“Really?” he asked. “Because I seem to remember a situation in reverse, only a few weeks back, when Tag got delivered to you. You didn’t want to talk about it. And you sure as hell didn’t want help from me either.”

True enough. “But I wasn’t being stubborn and obstinate.”

He laughed and pressed his fingers to his eyes.

“Okay, maybe I was a little.”

“Yeah. Thanks for breakfast.”

“But good-bye,” she guessed. “Right?”

“Unless you’re packing some TLC.”

“Is that code for sex?”

He gave her a look that singed her eyebrows.

“Yeah,” she said shakily. “It is.”

He set down the bag and pressed her back against the foyer wall and kissed her. It wasn’t soft and gentle. It was all heat and tongue and aggravation.

And all of her bones melted.

“Ah, jeez,” came Tag’s voice. “Again?”

Sam nearly leapt out of her skin as she jerked back from Wade. Tag had gotten out of the car and stood there slurping from his orange juice, studying them critically.

Into the silence, Pace drove up the driveway. He got out of his classic Mustang with a bag of McDonald’s and eyed Tag’s Mickey D’s. “I’m too late.”

“Pace!” Tag said with great pleasure, and took in Pace’s warm-up sweats. “You going to practice?”

“Yep. Soon as I check on Wade here.”

“They’re kissing.”

“Are they?” Pace asked mildly, his eyes reflecting his amusement.

“Yeah. Can I ride in your car?”

“I’ll take you to practice with me, sure. If it’s okay with your Aunt Sam.”

Tag whirled on Sam. “Yeah?”

A cab pulled up and honked.

Everyone looked at each other. What now?

“That’s for me.” John nudged his way past the four in the doorway, smiled at Tag, and headed down the walk.

“Where are you going?” Wade asked him.

“Progress that you even asked. I’m off to my first AA meeting.”

“You’ve been to AA a hundred times. A thousand.”

“Maybe a thousand and one is the charm.”

Wade frowned as his father waved over his shoulder and got into the cab, which drove off. He looked at Sam, his gaze inscrutable though she was pretty sure it still had retribution in it. Oh, boy. “Time to go, Tag,” she said.

“I want to go watch Pace practice. Please?”

Pace tossed Tag his keys. “Wait for me in the car. Just don’t take it for a spin without me.”

“Next time?”

“When you’re sixteen, we’ll talk. Go.” Pace looked at Sam and Wade. “You two going to play nice?”

“I always play nice,” Sam said.

Wade let out a barely there snort.

Pace grinned. “Just don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” He nudged Sam. “Don’t worry about the kid. You know where we’ll be.”

And then it was just her.

And Wade.

Who stood there bare-chested in just those sweatpants, that edible body tense and unhappy. “I feel like this is my fault,” she said.

He softened with a low sigh. “It’s not. Okay, it is… but it’s not.”

“You’re hurting.”

“Yeah. Want to kiss it better?” He ran a finger over her collarbone, then along the edges of the deep V-neck of her dress.

Her breath caught.

He closed his eyes as his finger slid beneath the material. A muscle jumped in his jaw, then he opened his eyes again and stepped back. “You should probably go to your meeting.”

That had been her plan but now she wanted to stay and have him keep touching her. “Not for forty-five minutes.”

“Sam,” he said warningly. “I’m pissed off and really want to stay that way.”

“Pissed off isn’t productive to healing.”

Again, he ran a finger over her neckline. “What are you wearing beneath the dress?”

Empathy and lust warred within her, along with a genuine, bone-deep affection that shouldn’t have surprised her but did. She already knew she liked him, more than she’d meant to, more than she’d ever wanted to. Her dress was just another wrap dress, professional and relatively modest, and not at all overtly sexy in any way. Except that when Wade looked at her like that, with frustration and heat, with those green eyes at half mast, she felt sexy as hell. “Maybe you should find out yourself.”

As agile-minded as he was able-bodied, he reached around her to hit the lock on his front door. “Best idea I’ve heard all morning.”

Wade pulled Sam in, his eyes quietly and powerfully intense, all the more so because she knew what it meant. He wore that look when he was on the baseball diamond and going for the win.

And he wore it when he was making love to her.

And did he make love. He was good at it, so damn good.

“I dreamed you started your own PR firm and left us,” he murmured, pressing his mouth to her jaw.

She choked out a startled laugh even as she tilted her head to give him better access. “I’m thinking about it.”

He lifted his head and stared at her, then nodded solemnly. “Yeah, you should. You’d be great.”

“So in this dream,” she said. “I was gone. Did you miss me?”

His hand splayed over her hip, playing with the tie on her dress. “More than I can say.”

“Aw.”

“Fucking pathetic.” He pulled the tie until it gave.

“You’re still hurting,” she murmured, pressing a hand between her breasts, holding the dress together. “Probably you shouldn’t be doing anything… strenuous.”

He took her hands in his, spreading them out at her sides so that her dress loosened and unraveled, then slipped to her elbows, aided by his hands. He pushed her backwards until she bumped up against something.

The table behind the sofa in the living room.

On it sat a bowl with keys, a stack of mail, and Wade’s wallet. Clearly the dumping grounds for his pockets when he walked into the door at night. With one sweep of his hand, the entire contents were knocked to the floor.

She gasped. “But your ribs-”

“I’ll tell you when I need help.”

“Your head-”

“Is fucked up,” he granted. “But mostly just on the inside.” He urged her up on the table, then stepped in between her legs, bringing himself up snug to her body.

With her dress hanging off her elbows, she could feel the soft cotton of his sweatpants on her inner thighs, the contrasting heat of his bare, hard abs against her softer body.

Then he kissed her. And Lord, the man could kiss. He slid his tongue to hers and kissed her until she was nothing but a puddle of pulsing need. She tried to go for his sweats but found her arms caught in her dress. “Wade.”

He dipped his head to take in the sight of her sitting there, arms held at her sides, legs spread wide around his hips, wearing only a plain white cotton bra and matching bikini panties with a single tiny pink rose in the middle of the elastic edging. He ran a finger over that rose, then straight down between her legs, and heat shot through her body like lightning, centering on that fingertip.

“Pretty,” he said, and unhooked her bra. He pushed it and her dress off her arms, sending both to the floor. Dipping his head, he kissed her neck, making his way over her collarbone to her breast.