Chapter 15

Maddie sat on her sofa, Snowball curled up in her lap, and stared into the blank screen of her television. Her stomach ached and her chest was so tight it hurt to breathe. She was going to be sick. She thought about calling her friends and getting their advice, but she couldn’t. She was the strong, fearless one of the group, but at the moment she didn’t feel so strong or fearless. Far from it.

For the first time in a very long time, Maddie Jones was afraid. There was no denying it. She couldn’t call it apprehension and move on. It was too real. Too deep, and too terrifying. Worse than sitting across from a serial killer.

She’d always assumed that falling in love would be like getting slammed into a brick wall. That you’d just be going along as usual and you’d get knocked on your ass and think,

Gee, I guess I’m in love. But it hadn’t happened that way. It had just kind of snuck up on her before she’d realized it. It had happened one smile and one touch at a time. One look. One kiss. One pink cat collar. One pinch to the heart and one breathless anticipation after another until she was in so deep there was no denying it. No turning back before it was too late. No more lying about what she felt.

Maddie slid her hand down Snowball’s small back and didn’t care that the cat’s fur clung to her black shirt and the lap of her skirt. She’d always thought that she couldn’t lie to herself about anything. Apparently she’d gotten better at it.

She’d fallen in love with Mick Hennessy and the minute he found out who she really was, she would lose him. And she didn’t have a clue what she was going to do about it.

Her doorbell rang and she looked at the clock sitting on a shelf above the television. It was eight-thirty. Mick was at work and she didn’t expect to see him until sometime around one.

She set Snowball on the floor and moved to the door. The kitten chased after her and she scooped her up rather than step on her. She looked through the peephole and got that little heated flush she now recognized. Evidently Mick had skipped work.

He stood on her porch wearing jeans and his Mort’s polo. She opened the door and stared at him standing there with the first shadows of night bathing him in a light gray and making his eyes a vibrant blue. As he stared at her across the short distance, elation and despair collided in her heart and twisted her stomach.

“I needed to see you,” he said and stepped across the threshold. He wrapped one arm around Maddie’s waist and placed his free hand on the back of her head. His mouth swooped down and he kissed her. A long drugging kiss that made her want to attach herself to him and never let go.

He pulled back and looked into her face. “I was at work pulling beer and listening to the same old stories, and all I could think about was you and the night we had sex on the bar. I can’t get you out of my head. Put your cat down, Maddie.”

She bent down to set Snowball on the floor and he shut the door behind him. “I didn’t want to be there. I wanted to be here.”

She straightened and looked into his face. She’d never felt love like this in her life. Not really, not the stomach-lifting and skin-tingling kind of love. Not the kind that made her want to hold his hand forever. To leech herself into his body so she didn’t know where he stopped and she began. “I’m glad you came back.” But she had to tell him she was Maddie Jones. Now.

He pushed her hair behind her ear. “I can breathe here with you.”

At least one of them could. She rubbed her cheek into his hand, and before she told him who she was, before she lost him forever, she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him one last time. She poured her heart and soul into it, her ache and joy, showing him without words what she felt inside. She kissed his mouth and jaw and the side of his throat. She ran her hands over him, touching and memorizing the feel of him beneath her hands.

Mick slid his warm palms to her behind and then the backs of her thighs. He lifted until she wrapped her legs around his waist. A deep groan vibrated through his chest as he returned her hungry kisses, and he carried her into the bedroom.

She would tell him. She would. In a minute. Her legs slid from his waist and he pulled her shirt over her head. She just wanted a few more minutes, but the more she poured her heart in each kiss, the more he wanted from her. The more he sucked the breath from her lungs and made her light-headed. He slid his hands all over her,

her shoulders and arms, her back and behind, until she was left wearing nothing but her bra, unhooked and open in the back.

Mick took a step back from the kiss and gasped. He looked at her through eyes so far gone, there was no thought to stopping him when he slowly pulled her bra straps and the blue satin cups slid down the slopes of her breasts, shimmered across her nipples, then fell down her arms to the floor.

“We’ve only known each other for a short time.” He lightly brushed the tips of his fingers across the tips of her breasts and her breathing became shallow. “Why does it feel longer?” He moved behind her and Maddie looked down at his big hands on her breasts, touching her, squeezing her puckered nipples. Her back arched and she raised her arms. Her hands cupped the sides of his face as she brought his mouth down to hers. She gave him a hot, greedy kiss as she tilted her hips and pressed her naked behind into his erection. He groaned deep within his chest as he played with her breasts. He still wore his jeans and his shirt, and the feeling of worn denim and soft cotton against her skin was erotic as hell. His mouth left hers and trailed hot little kisses down the side of her throat, and he slid one hand down her stomach. He placed one of his feet between hers, then he slipped his hand between her parted thighs, and he touched her. Her insides melted, pooling deep and low in her pelvis, and she let herself savor the touch of the only man she’d ever loved. She’d always wondered if there was a difference between sex and making love. And now she knew. Sex started with physical desire. Making love started in a person’s heart.

She didn’t know what would happen after this, after she told him who she was, but perhaps it wouldn’t matter. She turned and looked up at him as her hands drifted down his stomach to the end of his polo shirt. She pulled the stretchy cotton from the waistband of his pants and Mick raised his arms. She yanked it over his head and tossed it aside. Maddie lowered her gaze from his passion-filled eyes to his strong chest. The tips of her breasts touched him a few inches below his flat brown nipples. A trail of fine hair ran down his chest, between her cleavage, to his waistband.

His voice was husky with lust when he said, “Why did I ever think I would get enough of you?”

Maddie pulled at his button fly and slipped her hands inside his jeans and cupped him through his boxer briefs. “I’ll never get enough of you, Mick. Whatever happens, I’ll always want you.”

She closed her eyes and kissed the side of his throat. “Always,” she whispered.

His breath whooshed from his lungs as she slipped her hand inside his underwear and wrapped her palm around his hot shaft. He grabbed his wallet out of his pants and tossed it on the bed.

“I’ll never get enough of the way you feel in my hand,” she whispered. “Hard and smooth at the same time. I will never forget what it feels like to touch you like this.”

“Who says you have to forget?” He walked her to the side of the bed and pushed her shoulders until she sat.

Who? He would. She laid down and watched him quickly undress until he stood completely naked in front of her, a tall, beautiful man who made her heart and soul ache. She raised a hand to him and pulled him on top of her. The voluptuous head of his hot penis touched between her legs. “I’ve loved being together,” she whispered as she sucked his earlobe and rubbed against his warm body. She delivered little nibbling bites to his neck and shoulder.

Mick pushed her onto her back. “We have a lot more time to be together.” He kissed her chin and throat. “A lot more.” He sucked her nipple into his warm mouth while his other hand slid down her stomach to touch her with his fingers. As she watched him kiss her breast, raw emotion pumped through her veins. This was Mick, the man who could make her feel beautiful and desired. The man she loved and would probably lose.

Mick raised his head and the cool night air brushed across her breasts where his mouth had left her wet and shining. He reached into his wallet and pulled out a condom, but Maddie took it from his hands and stretched the thin latex down the length of him. She could feel his pulse in her hand, strong and steady. She pushed him onto his back and straddled his hips. His lids lowered over his eyes and the breath left his body as he watched her lower herself and take him inside her.

“You look good up there,” he said, his voice low, rough. His hands grasped her waist. “Feel good too.” He slid his hands up her sides to her breasts.

Maddie rocked her pelvis as she raised a little and slid back down. The head of his penis stroked her inside and she moaned deep in her throat. Up and down she moved, tilting her hips as she rode him. Tingling heat flowed outward from where his body touched hers. “Mick. Oh, God.” He moved with her, matching her with powerful thrusts, until the sensations swamped her completely and her head fell back as a hot liquid orgasm washed through her, starting at her pelvis and spreading to her fingers and toes. “Mick. I love you,” she said as new emotions wrapped around her pounding heart, squeezing her chest in its fiery grasp.