Craving a Hero: St. John Sibling Series, book 3 (9 page)

"So he favors your half-sister because she's his biological daughter?"

"Not really." Kelly slumped back in her seat. "I was there first. His first little girl."

"But then she came along and you didn't have him to yourself anymore?"

She winced. "I really wanted a dad. It's not my sister's fault I felt threatened when she came along. But I needed a daddy, and if it took being his buddy, his hunting and fishing partner to hold his attention, that's what I did."

"So, what are you saying, he treated you tough like a son instead of a daughter?"

She shook her head. "No. It wasn't about me being the son he didn't have. He was tough on me because…"

"Because you were going to be a CO like him?" he ventured when she hesitated.

She gave him a small, sad smile. "Because my biological father is American Indian and Frank was afraid I'd get kicked around in a school full of blond-haired, blue-eyed Finish kids."

He eyed her dark brown hair and aquiline nose, drawing a glance from her pale brown eyes.

"I don't see it."

She shrugged. "Genetics. My biological father was only half Indian and my mother full Finn."

"Did the blond, blue-eyed kids in your school give you a hard time?"

She shook her head.

"So Frank thought he was toughening you up for reality, but reality wasn't what he thought it would be."

"I guess." She glanced away, not meeting his gaze.

"Yet you still want his approval."

"I'm a needy girl, Dane. Not that you'll be around long enough for it to become an issue for you. But, now you know."

He opened his door, stepped out of the truck and around to the driver's side where he opened her door, unsnapped her seatbelt and gathered her into his arms. "Bright Eyes, we all need something and right now I need to give you hug."

#

Kelly stretched, relishing the slip of the cotton sheets across her naked body and the warmth of morning sunlight. A contented moan escaped her, and slowly, she opened her eyes to find… Dane propped up on one elbow smiling down at her.

"What you doing?" she drawled sleepily.

"Watching you sleep."

She winced and swiped the back of her hand across her mouth.

"No, you weren't drooling," he said, answering her unspoken question, then grinned that soul-melting smile of his. "But you did moan a lot. I hope you were dreaming of me."

Oh yeah. She'd been dreaming about him alright. But he might be surprised to learn not all of them had been about him making love to her. Her dreams had been full of his defending her to her father—his caring enough to drag out all the harsh facts of her life—and his still wanting to comfort her. Such things were what love was made of.

No, no, no.
Do not go there. This is a fantasy. An affair of epic proportion and short duration.

She smiled back at him, teasing, "In
your
dreams."

He lifted her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to her palm. Damn, but he had a knack for finding her most sensitive parts.

"And if I
was
dreaming of you?" she all but purred.

He bowed his head and brushed his lips across the sheet tented over her naked breasts, the sensation making her nipples tighten almost painfully. "Then I'd say you were ready for an encore of last night."

Ah, but which time last night? The first time when he'd carried her from the truck into the cabin—from her confession to his tender ministrations? Or the second time, after they'd returned from scouting for night poachers and torn the clothes from each other as they stumbled to the bed?

"Are you always this responsive?" he asked, blowing his warm breath across her tender nipples.

He'd said everybody needed something; and his touch, the way he played her body made her come alive. And those goofy grins and wagging eyebrows he cast her way—his teasing manner made her feel desirable. Dane St. John made her feel like a woman, and no other man had ever done that.

But he was due back in Hollywood in a week. Who would make her feel this way when he was gone?

Her chest tightened, making her go still.

He pulled back. "Hey, where'd you go? I seemed to lose you for a minute."

She blinked at him. "Huh?"

"You left," he said, tapping her temple with a forefinger. "Up here."

What the hell could she say to him?

You're too good to be true…and will be gone too soon?

And there was something else. Something about how valued she felt by his simply listening—hearing her. It took her beyond the mindset of an affair.

But no way was she messing up the fantasy of a lifetime, not when she had only days left with a man who exceeded any fantasy she could have dreamed up.

She stroked his bare, broad shoulders, threaded her fingers through his shaggy, blond hair, and gazed into his mesmerizing blue eyes. "I've never spent a whole night with a man before you."

He gave her one of his impish grins. "I think I like that, being your first all-nighter."

"I've never jumped into bed with a guy three days after meeting him, either," she said, needing him to know this about her, too.

"I definitely like that," he said, his grin growing more serious.

Damn but the man gave her everything she needed, even when he didn't know he was doing it. Too bad her heart couldn't afford to buy into it, not with only days left to be together.

She smacked him in the shoulder, hiding her true feelings and spouting good-naturedly, "Sexist pig."

He laughed and scooped her close, the bed sheet slipping out from between them. "How would you like this
sexist pig
to serve you breakfast in bed?"

"Breakfast in bed sounds divine," she answered playfully.

He grinned, lowered his head, and pressed a kiss to the valley between her breasts.

A surprised, "Oh," escaped her.

Pressing her back against the mattress, he trailed kisses down her belly.

"When you said breakfast in bed," she said, "I didn't expect it to be meeee—"

He spread her legs and kissed her lower still.

"Oh. Yes. This is good," she said between tiny gasps.

And a glorious buffet he made of her before he flopped back on his pillow, panting. "Looks like we're going to get a late start on the morning marine duties."

"No morning duties today," she said on a contented sigh.

He groaned. "Tell me we aren't patrolling the woods this afternoon like the day I got stung?"

"Damn," she muttered, knowing she was about to lose her wonderful glow to another confession. "About that."

"What about it?" he asked.

She rose onto her elbow and side facing him. "We don't usually patrol the woods during afternoons in July. There's not much happening and it's too hot."

Confusion puckered his brow. "Then that day I got attacked by wasps, why were we—"

She pressed her fingertips against his lips, those artful lips that could tease both laughter and orgasmic delight from her. "You were enjoying the marine patrol way too much. I wanted to make things hard for you."

He blinked at her…then laughed. "No wonder you thought my getting stung was your fault."

"I
was
responsible for you
wherever
I took you."

He levered himself up on his side, facing her, mischief dancing across his lips. "That's right, and I wouldn't have run into that hornet's nest if you hadn't taken me into the woods."

"And you wouldn't have fallen into it if you had stayed on the trail like I told you to," she said, poking him in the chest.

He caught her by the wrist, stilling her finger, rolled her onto her back and straddled her.

"What do you think you're going to do with me now?" she asked.

"Maybe I'll cover you in honey and tie you down on an anthill in retaliation for you getting me wasp stung. No, wait. I think I'll lick the honey from your body, instead. Yeah, that's a torture I'd like to ply on you."

Though she itched in the most delicious of places at his idea of torture, she couldn't pass on the opportunity to tease him back…or teach him a lesson.

She raised an eyebrow at him. "And you think
you
with your meager stunt training can keep
me
pinned down?"

"I think I'm doing a pretty good job of it so far."

She had him face down on the mattress and his arms twisted behind his back in an instant. "Really?"

He spit out a corner of pillow and said, "No fair using your cop skills on me…unless you've got a special plan, sitting there naked on my bare butt."

"You're incorrigible," she said, even as she considered taking another spin in the proverbial hay. But Max chose that moment to whine at them from the bedside.

Dismounting Dane's delectable derrière, she scooted to the edge of the bed and patted Max on the head.

Dane belly-crawled after her, asking, "Don't you ever take a day off?"

She rose and opened a drawer on the dresser beside the bed, giving him what she hoped was a saucy look over her shoulder. "Actually, today is a pass day for me."

"Pass day?"

"What you'd call a day off," she said, plucking a fresh tee from the dresser rather than go for her camisole on the floor where she'd dropped it in their frenzied path to the bed last night.

"Then why are you even leaving this bed, Woman?"

She nodded at the dog dancing a path between the bed and door. "Max needs to go out."

"Max, old boy," he called, momentarily gaining the dog's attention. "Haven't you ever heard the saying, leave sleeping dogs lie. Well, we were lying…kind of."

She shimmied the t-shirt down over her torso, enjoying the way Dane's gaze followed the downward glide of the garment. Butterflies took flight in her stomach. Still she tsked him and teased, "Middle child hogging the attention."

His eyes darkened on her. "Come here, I'll show you just how well I can
hog
the attention."

"I just bet you'd love that," she said, heading for the door instead.

A glance in his direction as she opened the door and let Max out confirmed his attention hadn't shifted off her. If only this moment could last forever. But it couldn't. It wasn't reality. This whole thing happening between them wasn't reality. He'd be back in Hollywood soon, and she'd be a notch on his bedpost.

But she could—would enjoy every moment she had left with him.

#

Max put out, he watched her stroll back to the dresser, thoroughly enjoying the womanly sway of her hips. She didn't walk like this when she was in uniform. But there was one thing he had noticed about her even when wearing fatigues.

"You have amazing, long legs," he said.

She huffed out a little, feminine snort and reached into the still open dresser drawer as though his comment was of no interest to her. But he caught the upward tug at the corner of her lips.

He patted the mattress beside him. "Why don't you come over here and let me measure just how long they are?"

She faced him, the eagle emblazoned tee she'd donned before putting Max out stretched across her breasts. Were he a boob man, he'd have lingered on the wing span of that bird in flight instead of her long legs bared beneath the hem of that shirt…which only reminded him she hadn't put her panties back on.

And if she wasn't trying to tease him, she'd likely have already slipped on the shorts she'd retrieved from the dresser rather than stand there letting them dangle from her fingers while arching a playful eyebrow at him. "Don't you ever tire out?"

"Me," he said, thumping his chest, giving her his best Neanderthal imitation, "male in prime."

She groaned and flung the shorts
at
him. Then dove on him, pinning him with a knee to the solar plexus and a forearm to the throat, but not too forcefully. Clearly her intentions were not to incapacitate, but the exact opposite as she nipped at his lips and played tongue tag.

He reached for her. She slapped his hand away and rose over him, shaking a finger at him. "Na-ah. I had my breakfast. Time for yours."

She slid her knee off him and planted a trail of nips, licks, and kisses down his chest and over his abdomen. When she closed her lips over him, he groaned.

He hadn't asked for this. He hadn't expected it. But he shouldn't have been surprised. She'd already proven herself an ardent lover.

Damn
, but he could spend a life-time losing himself in her enthusiasm. Too bad he had something to tell her that was going to dampen the mood, and there was no avoiding it.

But it could wait a little longer. No way was he interrupting what she'd started…or finishing without her.

About to come, he lifted her from him and slipped on a condom. Her bright eyes were all dreamy as she sank the length of him, riding him—the Eagle in full flight on her t-shirt mimicking her every stroke—the words printed below the image imprinting on him. Ottawa National Forest. When he heaved beneath her and she collapsed on top of him, he knew, if he lived another hundred years he'd always connect an eagle and the Ottawa National Forest with this moment.