Scorch (19 page)

She stared at the screen that was a silent selection of inane comedies she had yet to choose between. Maybe she should turn it onto the channel that showed shorelines or fountains while playing lazy instrumentals. She could pretend she was in Spain or on the Amalfi coast. Was there something that might transport her to Pluto? It would be awesome to disappear to the far reaches of the universe right this second.

Vin came to sit down on the coffee table facing her, plucked the remote from her loose grip and turned off the TV.

She dropped her gaze to Mutt’s black nose.

Vin braced his forearms on his thighs, body warmth seeping toward her calf.

She pretended it didn’t make her feel like all the molecules in her body realigned so they were magnetized to all the little ions or whatever they were that attracted her to him.

“He loved you, Jacqui,” Vin said with quiet sincerity. “Whatever you’ve been telling yourself about how we love our jobs more than the women in our lives—”

“You weren’t here, Vin. This isn’t about the way he died or even the fact that he did die. I know what my marriage was, and it wasn’t what it looked like to everyone else. The problems weren’t because of his job. It was because he was too fucking nice to reject me before we were in too deep.”

Silence.

A really long, damning silence because Vin knew as well as she did that Russ had been loyal and generous and could very well have shouldered a responsibility like marrying the girl who loved him because it looked like the right thing to do.

Worse, when she looked up at Vin, he wasn’t trying to say anything. He was trying to read her. He was trying to see how bad this was ripping her apart so he could somehow make it stop.

Her lips trembled.

He flinched and his hands moved restlessly, sliding up and down his thighs.

“I don’t know what to say, Jac.”

“There’s nothing
to
say. Quite honestly, I think he was comfortable with not caring as much as I did. It meant I worked harder to keep him happy. He didn’t have any regrets when he left for a jump because he wasn’t worried I would leave him. If I did, well, he wouldn’t be the bad guy, would he?”

“Even I think that’s too cynical.”

She swallowed. “He always wanted people around as a buffer. He didn’t want to have kids, even though he loved kids, because he didn’t want them with
me
. He didn’t want that permanent tie because he didn’t think we’d last. He was a man worth loving and I’m not sorry I did, but I’m tired, Vin. I’m tired of pretending our marriage was perfect. I’m tired of being the woman who carried a torch. People said I was too young to get married. Russ said it. I didn’t listen, but I guess I was.”

She let her head fall back against the sofa, releasing a noise of despair.

His hand settled on her shin, warm and heavy. “He was lucky to have been loved that much. If he was destined to die young, well, at least he had that.”

She rolled her head to look at him. “From anyone else, I would think that was the corniest cliché you could possibly come up with.”

“I mean it. He was really lucky.”

“I know you do.” She met the pensive blue of his gaze, heard what sounded like deep sincerity, and leapt into the void. “I love you.”

His breath hissed in. He took his hand from her leg and rocked back in a small recoil, hands curling into fists on his thighs. “Jac—”

“In case you die young, too. I want you to know.”

“Jacqui.” He didn’t believe her. He wanted to, she could see it in his agonized expression, but he wouldn’t allow himself to.

She held her open palm toward him. “If you want to believe it’s just as a friend, that’s okay.”

“I don’t,” he admitted tightly. “I want it to be the real thing.” He set his elbows on his thighs and pushed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. “I couldn’t stand being here, knowing he was the one you loved. How could you care for me even half that much? Ever? But I don’t care if it’s a quarter. I don’t care if you’re using me to scratch an itch.” The words were pouring out of him like a dam letting go. “I want to be with you in any way you’ll have me.”

He lifted his head out of his hands.

“That’s not fair to you, though. Not after what you just said about thinking Russ didn’t care. I could say the words, Jac. I could. But I would feel like, Christ, like it would jinx it or something. Love makes things so fucking fragile. What you and I have…” He held something invisible in his hands and stared at it. “I don’t want it to be fragile. I need to know it’s going to withstand whatever you and I try to do here tonight.”

Try
.

She blinked, ready to go all-in with her own heart. Everything in her yearned for him to match it, but she was moved at the same time. It meant something that Vin wanted to protect not just himself, but
them
.

She left the sofa and slid onto his thighs.

The coffee table groaned and he closed his arms around her, shifting so he sat on the couch with her in his lap.

She nuzzled closer, yearning for him to love her, hoping that he could, but at least she was starting from a deeper level of honesty than she’d had with Russ.

Vin gathered her closer, kissing the lips she offered.

It was hot, but sweet. Urgent, but unhurried. Thorough.

After a moment, with a muted groan, he gave the dog a nudge to push him off the sofa and flattened her beneath him on the cushions.

“I do think of it,” he said into her neck. “Us. That day that you blew the walls off my mind,” he lifted his head. “I think of it all the time. It was the best ever, Jac.” He fiddled with the button between her breasts, but didn’t open it. “Exactly how drunk are you?”

“Sober enough to be horrified that I flipped my shit at The Drop Zone.” She draped her hand over the back of his neck, fingers exploring for the tiny stubble in the hollow beneath the back of his skull. “You could lie and tell me it will be fine, that nobody was paying attention. Maybe kiss me and make it better.”

“We’re both going to be in for it,” he said with mild disgust. “Let’s never leave the house.”

“Deal.”

He kissed her and they settled their bodies into closer alignment. She crooked her knee, inviting him between her legs and he sighed, shuddering lightly, already hard as he nestled into the space. They began burrowing under clothing like a pair of teenagers and pretty soon they were panting, pants open and shirts askew.

“I don’t have a condom on me.” He drew back. “You wanna go upstairs?”

“Yes.”

He grinned at her prompt reply and dragged her to her feet, then pushed her up the stairs ahead of him. When he steered her toward the door of the room he’d been using, she paused.

“Have you brought any women here?”

“What? No. Of course not.”

The way he said it, kind of insulted, made her snicker. “I wasn’t judging. You’ve been staying here all winter. You were allowed to have sleepovers. I just thought we’d go to my place if you had.”

“Which place? Across the hall? You’re
still
not in the master bedroom?”

“I told you…”

He leaned on the jam of his door, hands on her hips as he gave her a considering look. “If I move into that room like you want, are you going to sleep with me in there?”

“That depends on whether we’re doing anything worth staying awake for, doesn’t it?”

“I can do stuff,” he said confidently, pivoting her into his room and backing her toward his bed.

“I’d love to see it, because all I’m getting right now is conversation…”

He nudged her chest so she fell backward onto his fluffy duvet. Her pants were already open, so he caught the ends of her pant legs and tugged.

She pulled her legs free one at a time and set the flats of her feet on the edge of the mattress, knees open. Then she hooked her thumb in the front of her undies, liking the way his gaze zeroed in on what she was doing.

Slowly she unbuttoned her top with her other hand, watching his lashes flicker as he shifted his attention to the strip of skin she exposed. Slipping one hand beneath the edge of her shirt, she palmed her own breast. At the same time, she slid her fingers into her underwear and stimulated herself, smiling at how the act that was both blatant and modestly shielded held him arrested.

He said nothing, nostrils twitching, seemingly mesmerized as he absently peeled off his shirt and shucked his jeans. His gaze grew hotter and hotter until it nearly seared her, tracking over her like that.

His boxers got tossed to the side and he curled a strong fist around his shaft, pumped slowly up the length and back. He seemed enthralled with the way her hips danced under her own touch.

“Are you gonna let me watch you come?” His voice was so low and rasped with arousal; it thrummed her with an extra pang of intensity. She had to bite her lip and stop rubbing herself.

“I want you too much.” She used both hands to open her shirt, arching to remove it.

He sidestepped to get a box of condoms out of the top drawer of his dresser, then came back to drop to his knees beside the bed. He dragged her hips close, hooking his arms under her thighs and leaning down to lightly bite at her through her underwear, making her sob as he grazed her clit.

“You get so wet,” he said, nuzzling alongside the damp placket.

“You make me wet. I get wet every time I think about you.”

“Don’t tell me shit like that, Jac. I’ll be texting you a hundred times a day, just to make sure you’re thinking about me.” He caught at her panties and peeled them away in a swift move, then rolled on a condom and rose to cover her.

“This is what I’ve thought about,” he muttered, lining up at her entrance and pressing in. “I wanted a do-over, where I wasn’t such a fucking animal—Ah! Damn, Jac!” He made a jagged noise as he met no resistance, just plunged into silky, slippery welcome with the help of her heel in his butt and her hips tilting to receive him.

“Don’t hold back, Vin. Please.” She gasped. “I like knowing you’re as turned on as I am. That you want me so much.”

He reared up enough to look at her with a feral kind of lust. “Be careful what you wish for.”

*

They moved into
her room after a sauna and a shower and a fresh bout of lovemaking that left his sheets damp. They were dozing in the dark, his arms around her and her lips were pressed to the ‘g’ in
Ignis
, when she felt him jerk.

“What’s wrong?”

“You didn’t see the flash?” he murmured.

She hadn’t, but now she heard the thunder as it rolled up the lake.

“Oh.”

“I should get my phone.”

The jumpers probably wouldn’t be called out until the storm had passed and dawn arrived, but at that point the odds would rise significantly that he would have to leave in a big hurry.

He padded back into her room a few minutes later, set his phone on her nightstand and said, “When did a twin bed sound like a good idea?”

“It’s a spare that Roni and Cliff had. It’s a king for someone my size. Why? Don’t you like to cuddle?”

“Yeah, I suppose that’s the compensation. You can’t go too far, can you?”

She smiled and kissed under his chin.

He found her lips and kissed her proper, so she moaned with pleasure as warmth stole through her. “I suppose you need some sleep if you’re going to get called out in a few hours.”

“No smokey I know leaves a fire smoldering. But we may have to improvise. You’ve about used me up, Jac.”

“Yeah?” She cradled the flesh that was doing a fine impression of rallying.

“Feel free,” he said dryly, kissing her. “But I’m pretty sure he’s just showing off.”

She giggled and slithered against him, enjoying the feel of his skin against hers. After a minute, she pressed him onto his back and kissed her way down, opening her mouth against flesh that was already hard and leapt eagerly against her tongue.

Vin let out a lusty groan. “You realize we’ll be setting a record that will be impossible to beat.”

She took him into her mouth, delicately sucking, bobbing her head until he drew her up and over him. He kissed her deeply as his naked flesh rubbed against hers.

She angled, liking the feeling of his almost penetrating her, so tempted to make it happen.

“That feels really good.”

“I would, you know,” she said softly. “Have sex without protection. I’d love to have your baby. Married or not or…” She smiled against his lips. “Just as friends.”

He cupped her cheek in one hand, holding her still above him so he could read her face in the gloom softened by the light from the bottom of the stairs beyond the half open door.

“I’m terrified enough as it is, Jac. That’s more than I’m ready to believe in.”

“Are you worried now that I’m only looking for a sperm donor? That wasn’t what I meant. I told you that I didn’t want to be a single parent. I meant that I would like to do it with
you
. That’s supposed to be a compliment. Belief in our future.”

He swallowed.

She covered his hand where his touch felt so tender against her cheek. She turned her lips into his palm and said, “But that can wait until you’re sure.”

Not that he was sure he wanted kids, but when he was sure of her. It hurt that he wasn’t, but she was starting to realize exactly how many times Vin had been knocked down by life. Too many.