Final Surrender (19 page)

“Nothing, I guess,” she answered unconvinced. “Just a bad feeling. I’ve never had a bad feeling here before. I think I’m ready to go home now.”

Clay immediately pulled her to her feet and her entire body shook from head to toe. He pulled her under the shelter of his arm and actually growled at her when she tried to pull away. He held her closely and they walked to the edge of the park.

After they got into a cab, the corners of her mouth turned up as she whispered, “Pushy.”

He pulled her close again and agreed. “Yep,” he whispered in her ear as his tongue peeked out and licked the bottom of her satiny earlobe.

Her breath caught in her throat and it remained there for the remainder of the cab ride.

She was exhausted again and knew she wasn’t going to get rest any time soon as they pulled up to her apartment to find Detective Wyatt standing outside her building.

“Sorry we’re late,” Clay apologized to James after greetings were made. “Went for a little outing and I lost track of time.”

“No worries at all,” he offered with a nice smile. “We’d only been here a few minutes and Maddy showed up carrying something that smelled wonderful. She let us in and left a Tupperware container on the counter.”

Clay helped Angela into the building where she went and recovered Maddy’s wonderful chicken soup waiting for her.

“I totally forgot to call her last night or this morning. I’m such a bad friend,” she chided herself.

Clay caressed her back, took the soup to carry, pulling her alongside him. Detective Wyatt led the way upstairs.

“You’ve been through a lot in the last twenty-four hours. Cut yourself some slack. I’m pretty sure she was one of the people who called this morning. You can talk to her tomorrow after more sleep and more food.”

Angela reached the top of her stairs and had a foreboding sense of déjà vu. Boxes of tracing equipment lay across her living room floor, with the detectives wiring everything together.

Clay deposited Angela on the couch and went to warm the soup for her. She spent the time removing the hood and sunglasses and running her fingers through her hair. The smell of Clay on the shirt was captivating. She inhaled deeply, hoping no one saw what she was doing.

He brought her a bowl back and told her, “Eat, you’ll feel better.”

She took the bowl and tried to set it beside her before Clay caught it and held it in front of her again. “It will just make me sleepy,” she whispered.

Clay rested a hand on her thigh and Angela looked up into his eyes. They made her feel lost and found all in the same heartbeat. “If you eat, I’ll rub your back later, and then you can be as sleepy as you like.”

Something akin to pure fear and raw lust bubbled under her skin. His hands on her would be her undoing. She knew it. Had always known it and still she couldn’t tell him no. Her sorrow was dulled by how he took care of her when she needed him. How he was there to protect her and find the person so hell-bent on killing her.

“Are you bribing me?” she whispered as her eyebrows drifted down towards her nose. She tried to sound pissy, but her body was having a hard time staying awake, so she really only managed to sound confused, which she honestly was.

“Yes,” he answered as she took the bowl from him and inhaled the warm broth.

She weighed her options and decided as he stared back at her, with how sore she was, she would do just about anything for him to rub on her.

Her first bite was wonderful and she retorted, “Do you know how strange it is when you actually answer a question directly?”

With a smirk on his face, Clay stood without an answer and walked back towards the detectives. She knew he heard her mutter under her breath, “Really strange.”

Chapter Nineteen

As the sun started to set, Detective Wyatt and his crew were all done as Angela dozed on the couch, refusing to drift off until the men were out of her home.

After his crew was packed up and rolling, Detective Wyatt hung back to ask, “Did you tell her about the package with her name on it?”

Clay prickled at the thought of something so monstrous being addressed to her in any way.

He wiped a hand down his face. The day was finally catching up with him, too. “This morning, and she definitely didn’t know. Who the hell is behind this? She’s terrified to leave the house. Every time the phone rings she jumps a mile. We’ve got to get to the bottom of this and fast. I feel like she’s living on borrowed time.”

“You care for her?” Detective Wyatt asked with what Clay could feel were good intentions, but he wasn’t asking about a purely client basis either.

“Yes,” he admitted for the first time in his life.

“Then keep her close, man. She’s special.” And then he turned away and walked back towards his car with a knowing look.

“Did you guys ever…date?” Clay asked through gritted teeth, unable to bury the need to throttle his friend if he had touched Angela in any way. Just them being on a first-name basis rubbed him the wrong way, and it made no difference that he had no right to feel that way.

James turned back around with a knowing look on his face. “She loved someone else, so all of my suave moves have gone unnoticed. She’s a friend, nothing more. One in a million, that’s what she is,” he added as he opened the door to his vehicle.

Before he stepped inside, James paused. “I don’t know what you did last time to break her heart, but I’ll tell you this much. She needs you now more than ever. Don’t hurt her again, or she won’t make it, and I will beat your ass into the ground.” He got in, shut the door and drove away, leaving Clay standing there shocked and slightly amused.

Anyone else and he would have laughed in the face of that threat. James Wyatt…it’d be a fair fight if nothing else.

“Are they all gone?” Angela asked as Clay entered the living room, looking just as tired as she felt. Her eyelids just wouldn’t stay up, but she fought it.

“All gone,” he answered on a yawn as he flipped all the lights off then scooped her into his arms before she could protest.

“What in the world are you doing?”

“Taking you to bed…”

She tensed and he couldn’t help but chuckle deep in his chest. “To sleep, not to have my way with you. Duh.”

Angela relaxed a bit and he sighed as she laid her head on his shoulder.

“Will you still rub me, even if I drool on you?”

He laughed, kissing her head. “Even if there’s slobber involved.”

“I was actually more thinking about drooling on my pillow after you rubbed me to sleep.”

“And I thought I was finally getting somewhere.” Angela relaxed, letting herself smile. A real grin he could feel from the pit of his stomach to the soles of his feet.

Clay walked through her room, stopping in the bathroom to set her gently on her feet. He flipped the light on and Angela buried her face in his chest.

“What are you doing? I want to go to bed,” she complained.

“Warm shower and then a lotion rubdown. You’ll be asleep in two seconds. Come on, Ang, arms up,” he prompted, lifting his hoodie to reveal her flat abdomen.

After a second of hesitation, searching his eyes for an answer to a question he didn’t know, she held her arms off his chest, raising them slightly over her head so he could remove the material covering her.

He tossed it to the floor and made quick work of her pants as well.

Sooner than he would have imagined she stood before him in nothing but a small lacy turquoise bra and matching panties.

“Can you hand me a clip, so I can put my hair up? I’m too tired to dry it and I don’t want to go to bed cold.”

A look of pure sex graced his face as he looked down at her. “The last thing you’re going to be tonight is cold.”

With that, he grabbed a towel for her, turning on the water, before handing her the clip she needed.

When she finished putting her hair up she found him with his shirt off, pushing off his shoes and undoing his pants.

“What are you doing?” she asked as her nipples stood out hard enough so he could see them pressing against the satiny material cupping the mouth-watering globes.

“I’m going to shower you,” he answered matter-of-factly as he pushed his pants and boxers down his legs.

He’d bet any amount of money that sugary wetness coated her pussy lips. The mere thought of which caused his thick cock to stand up almost to his navel.

She couldn’t take her eyes from it as he stepped close to her and reached around to unclasp her bra. He peeled it from her, letting it fall to the floor with the rest of her clothes.

Her nipples were pink and needy and Clay’s tongue throbbed in need to lick them until she screamed his name.

“You’ve seen it before if I remember correctly,” he reminded her roughly as she swallowed visibly.

“It’s been a while since I’ve seen it in the flesh,” she retorted back.

He hooked his thumbs on the sides of her thong, but stilled when Angela reached up and held his hands in place.

“What are we doing here? Are we friends, are we friends with benefits that we have to hide from everyone else? Or a two-night stand with a decade in between? I’ve got to know what to expect before this goes any further.”

Her whole body trembled. He could feel it beneath his hands. “I don’t know,” he admitted low and sexy as the engorged head of his cock grazed her abdomen, eliciting a groan of pleasure from her.

“All I know is I’ve thought about you every day since you walked away. Every day. You’re the one who got me through the nights overseas. And when death was at my door, after the explosion, you’re the reason I didn’t let him in.”

“I can’t love you again and have you regret it, regret me. I don’t know how I got through it the first time. I’ve been broken for so long. You’re the piece that’s missing and I don’t know how to make us fit together. How to convince you that we’re worth fighting for…”

Clay held her close, careful of her abrasions.

His cock nestled against her soft skin and she sighed as her hands made contact with his chest.

Clay reached around, smoothing his hands up her bare back, leaving heated trails everywhere his fingers touched. Like an electric path of lightning trying to find the quickest path through him to the ground.

He drew her thong down her sweet thighs and she stepped from it when it was low enough.

“Let’s take this one moment at a time, okay? You and me for right now and everyone else will just have to wait.” He pulled her to the shower and stepped in before her.

“I’ve never showered with anyone before,” she admitted as he soaped her body after they were both wet and slick from the water.

“Oh I’m sure Detective Wyatt wouldn’t have minded,” he grumbled under his breath.

“Why Detective Wyatt?” she asked, completely clueless.

“You have no idea your appeal. You are so gorgeous any blue-blooded American man would stand in line for eons to share a shower with you. Much less anything else a little more horizontal.”

He leaned forward and kissed her. It wasn’t a sweet and gentle kiss. It was a kiss filled with longing and barely restrained need for more.

Her hands seemed to have a mind of their own and she couldn’t keep them off his skin, which he sure didn’t mind. His shoulders shifted restlessly beneath her hands and her mouth when she finally pulled her mouth away from his lips, leaning down to lick his flat nipples.

His hands stilled on her soapy back and he ran them down and cupped her ass, pulling her towards him again. Loving the feel of skin on skin. Gliding against her as he was going to do inside her once he got her warm, dried and hornier than she’d ever been.

He moved seductively and the breath caught in her throat. His fingers were sliding down the cleft of her ass, oh so close to the forbidden entrance he longed to touch.

Then he reached up, cupping her breasts, washing them clean in the warm water from the showerhead.

Watching the water run down her body past her pretty, waxed pussy.

She had a faint scar on her abdomen. Rather long on her tight skin and he ran his fingers over it, like she had done to his. He was pretty sure he felt her stiffen, but then forgot as her hand wrapped around his ever present hard-on.

“I’m ready to get out now,” she convinced him as she ran her fingertips around the crown of his dick so flushed with need it was painful.

Clay turned the water off and helped her from the shower. He wrapped her in a big terry towel and patted her soft skin. His lips tingled with the need to taste her.

He had to be very careful with her. She needed a gentle lover and, by God, he was going to do everything in his power to be what she needed.

“Kiss me,” she demanded.

“I need to see if you’re still wet anywhere first.” He held her chin, moving her face to the side to run his tongue behind her ear.

“Nope, all dry.” His tongue painted a trail down to her collarbone and he ran it along her shoulder. “Dry there, too.”

She was panting by the time his fingers trailed down her body and he dipped one fingertip in her tiny belly button. He pressed his lips to hers. Her kiss was like midnight on a summer evening. Hot and sultry and he could feel her all around him.

His fingers moved still lower as he worked her mouth open and she slanted her head in such a way to take his tongue into her mouth as if she were sucking his dick instead.

Her slender hands wrapped around his heavily veined shaft again and his fingers finally found paradise.

Her breathing caught in her throat as she fought to suck air past the exploration his fingers were now on.

They ran through the wet folds of her greedy pussy, separating the lips still slick with moisture.

“Uh-oh. I think I found something that’s still wet, Angela.” His fingers traced the source of the moisture, filling just inside her weeping entrance.

She gripped his cock with her now sweaty palms and pumped the straining muscle.

“You feel like a dream. Let me get you to the bedroom before I wake up.” He scooped her up, carried her into the bedroom as he nipped at her lips and probed inside her mouth to find the origin of her sweetness.

He laid her down on the bed, spreading her legs.

Before her brain had the opportunity to register what was happening, one of his favorite fantasies played out in front of him.

His large hands caressed up the inside of her knees all the way to her warm thighs, pushing them open for his shoulders to fit between, and his wet tongue licked up her slit like candy.

All the while, he watched her.

Every heartbeat under her silky skin. Each flutter of her eyelashes as she reveled in the pleasure he gave her.

He craved her.

Every swipe of his tongue, each twitch of her clit jumping at his hunger. The sweet honey taste that had permeated his senses for years bathed his tongue.

“I want you, Angie. I want to feel your pussy tighten around my tongue when you scream my name. Your pretty little asshole is clenching every time I touch your clit. Do you remember what it felt like last time? It’s going to be even better now. I won’t rest until you are so exhausted from sexual release that you can’t do anything but moan and fall asleep against me.”

Angela strained to get closer to his mouth. “I need more. I need…”

Her body bombarded his with sensation as he coated two fingers in her slick moisture. Moments later they filled her, stretching her, as his lips drove her to the brink of rapture as they nibbled on her swollen clit.

He barely registered his own admission a few minutes later, “I can’t help myself,” before he ran his thumb in the cream escaping her seeping core.

The wet pad of his thumb made contact with the entrance to her ass. Her hips jerked involuntarily as he moved his thumb in a circular motion. Then he lightly caressed the entrance as if it were another tongue like the one he had buried in her pussy.

“I’m not going to last. Please don’t make me beg,” she requested with sporadic breathing.

“You don’t need to last, Angela,” he told her as he penetrated her with his thumb.

Just a little at a time, with her soft moans of approval rewarding him as he gave her more and more of his thick digit.

“Do you like how that feels? I hope you do, because one of these days I want to fuck that tight little ass of yours. You make me so hot I could explode without even touching you.”

“I like it,” she confessed on a hoarse moan.

How his dick was ever going to fit he had no idea, but he wanted to take her everywhere.

Her pussy lips were so swollen. Her breasts heaved with every breath. “Lick me…please. I’m so close.”

He fucked her ass with his thumb and buried the four other fingers in her greedy wet channel, using the fingers on his other hand to reach around her leg, tugging her pussy lips apart to force her delicate clit to peek out.

Clay sucked it into his mouth. He wasn’t gentle either while he fucked her with his hand.

His tongue attacked her clit until she arched off the bed, her thighs contracted close to his head as she screamed his name over and over again.

He continued to lick her clit every few seconds and penetrate her clenching pussy and she gasped when he finally removed his thumb from her quaking ass. A mini orgasm bloomed in her system every time he moved inside her.

“Clay?” she asked, close to comatose in her blissful awareness of him.

“Yes?” he replied as he pressed a warm kiss to her thigh.

“I want you inside me,” she answered as he stood.

“Your body is tired.” He helped her get higher on the bed and laid her head on a nice soft pillow. “Why don’t we call it a night and see how you feel in the morning?”

Before he could back up and flee into the bathroom to rub one out in the shower she gripped the hard-on jutting from between his legs.

“I’m not satisfied yet and until I feel you inside me, I won’t be sleeping,” she added with a confident smile.