Twisted in Tulips (10 page)

“No.” She pulled his dress shirt over his head so he stood before her in a long-sleeve, tight fitting undershirt. “You have to bake in this many layers.”

“Good, and I’m used to it.” He shrugged and traced her bra, the top swell of her breasts. His dick pleaded for freedom. For action.

“You don’t have to hide your arm from me, Jace.” Misty kissed him just above the neckline of his shirt. “You’ve shared so much of yourself with me, shown me the beauty of your spirit.”

His cheeks heated. The frou-frou talk had him wanting to roll his eyes, yet at the same moment she thrilled him.

“I hope you’ll trust me with all of yourself.” She pulled the neck of his shirt down some and kissed a little lower. “Besides, I’d like to see, taste, the body you hide under here.”

Unexpectedly, a boisterous laugh rumbled up and lightened him. She’d gone from gooey emotion to fun flirtation in a flash. In that same flash he’d gone from reluctant to willing, even eager, to share all of himself.

“You’re the only one I could trust.” With his heart at peace he stepped back, pulled the hem of his shirt from his pants, tugged the fabric up and over his head.

Statue still, Jace stood exposed to her. Pleased with the gift he’d just granted, she ran her hand over his pale skin. The breadth of his shoulders, the size of his biceps, didn’t surprise her. The definition of the muscles spanning his torso, abs, and arms didn’t surprise her. She’d felt him. Imagined him.

His left arm wasn’t what she’d pictured, though she wasn’t entirely sure what that was. A little below his elbow his prosthetic seemed to just sit there. Questions about how it worked, how he controlled the hook, how it attached flitted through her mind. Following those came the curiosity of how it felt, if it hurt or was hot or itchy.

While she wanted to know all the answers, she didn’t need them now. Rather than ask, she used the moment to show him he’d been right to trust her, because wound or no wound he was a gorgeous man.

Misty trailed her hand down his arm and followed the path with gentle kisses until she was kneeling at his side. The skin puckered around the edge of the prosthetic joint. When she kissed him there he shook with the force of an indrawn breath.

“Jace.” She stood again and kissed his cheek. “You’re the amazing one.”

“What I am,” he grumbled as he pulled her back in front of him, “is growing impatient.”

Misty wasn’t sure when they’d moved from the middle of all the vased tulips, but her back bumping a table stunned her. His forearms grasping her hips, lifting her to the table stunned her more. And excited her.

Her heart raced with the thrill of his passion. He’d offered himself to her, holding nothing back. He’d viewed his arm as a barrier when it made him uniquely beautiful. Misty wiggled as he shoved her skirt up to her waist. “Have you noticed how one of us always seems to keep something on during sex?”

“We’ll fix that next time.”

“Okay.” She reached for his pants and freed him.

Always prepared, he pulled a condom from his pocket. Misty took the package and ripped it open. Eager to feel him she sheathed him—thick and ready—in a quick stroke of her hand. “Maybe we can try a bed again too.”

“That’ll depend on your ability to not drive me beyond restraint.” He flipped her panties aside and tugged her closer to the table’s edge.

“Challenge issued and accepted.” To prove it, and since practice made perfect, she nibbled at the tendon sticking out in his neck. She wasn’t sure when she’d noticed it, yet she had thought a lot about that popping tendon over the last week.

“Not like you have to put effort into it.”

“That’s sweet.” She gripped his cock and guided him to her. “But it’ll be fun for me.”

“I’ll show you fun.”

“Promises. Promises.”

“Here’s a promise.” He moved her hand away and thrust deep. His neck tendon twitched and then stopped when he didn’t move again.

He captured her gaze with his earnest stare and cradled her in naked emotion. “You’ll never know another man this way.”

He pushed his hips forward, pushing slowly deeper. “You’ll never know the feel of another man deep inside.”

He again pushed forward, a little deeper when she’d thought he couldn’t go any deeper. “You’ll never know from another man the love you’ll know from me.”

“Jace.” Tears strangled her ability to speak. The love he spoke of expanded in a lava-like flow of excitement. The happy scent of tulips blossomed, buoyant on the air.

He pumped his hips, picked up urgency with each thrust, drove away anything else she may have said. Fresh and vibrant, freedom and happiness obliterated any lingering vestige of darkness. Her heart slamming an ebullient tempo, Misty raced with Jace and tumbled over the finish line victoriously.

Breathing heavy, they stripped away the rest of their clothes and settled on the table. Their beds weren’t going anywhere. Neither were they for a while.

Jace brushed her hair from her face as she lay curled against his left side. “You gave me my family back with last night’s reunion.”

“I wish you’d stop mentioning that.” She’d been concerned with how he’d feel about her digging into his life. Now, seeing how deep it had touched him, with similar emotions roiling in her, she wasn’t sure what to do or say.

“I want to spend my life thanking you.”

“It’s no big deal.”

“It is. You are.”

She had nothing to say to that, so she instead allowed the moment’s simplicity to rule. She hadn’t thought she knew how to love—her mother certainly hadn’t been a great role model—she’d never have guessed she could fall for a grumpy, judgmental guy who disparaged her because of how she dressed. Though sometime during their arguing she’d indeed fallen.

“I love you,” he whispered.

“I love you,” she whispered at the same moment.

Smiling at their synchronicity, she kissed his chest.

“Misty?”

“Yeah, Jace?”

“Will you decorate our wedding with tulips?”

Her heart skipped a beat. His question had been so casual she wasn’t sure if he meant it as a proposal. She was a little afraid to hope he did, because if he didn’t…

“I want to marry you, Misty.” He kissed her temple, settled her fears. “I want to spend my life with you. And I don’t want to have to chase you like Trevor is chasing Lori.”

“They’re having fun with that.”

“Misty.” The dark hardness that had ridden his voice so much in the beginning was back, and it thrilled her. He may have relaxed, but he hadn’t changed so much he lost his bad-boy edge.

“Fine. I suppose we could have tulips at our wedding.” She sat up and straddled him. “They’re suddenly a favorite of mine.”

About the Author

Heart-stopping puppy chases, childhood melodrama and the aborted hangings of innocent toys are all in a day’s work for Nikki Duncan. This athletic equestrian turned reluctant homemaker turned daring author, is drawn to the siren song of a fresh storyline.

Nikki plots murder and mayhem over breakfast, scandalous exposes at lunch and the sensual turn of phrase after dinner. Nevertheless, it is the pleasurable excitement and anticipation of unraveling her character’s motivation that drives her to write long past the witching hour.

The only anxiety and apprehension haunting this author comes from pondering the mysterious outcome of her latest twist.

Nikki can be found online at her website
www.NikkiDuncan.com
. She chats with readers regularly on Twitter as
@NDuncanWriter
and
www.Facebook.com/NDuncanWriter
. Her Tulle and Tulips Wedding Planners can be found online at
www.TulleandTulipsWeddings.com
.

Look for these titles by Nikki Duncan

Now Available:

Whispering Cove

Wicked

Burned

Sensory Ops

Sounds to Die By

Scent of Persuasion

Illicit Intuitions

Tulle and Tulips

Tangled in Tulle

Coming Soon:

Her Miracle Man

Love could be their greatest liability.

Illicit Intuitions

© 2012 Nikki Duncan

Sensory Ops, Book 3

Ava Malia knows three things. She was once a kickass covert operative. She will eventually adjust to her new team, the FBI Specialized Crimes Unit. And the only way to finally be free of her professional past is to solve her first case and get her hands on a game-changing technology. The only problem? Success rides on her ability to swallow her distaste for the persona she must adopt in order to earn the trust of a mysterious scientist.

Dr. H escaped childhood captivity with three things. His sister. Complete control of his gift. And an engulfing distrust of anyone in the government. Adjusting to a life of freedom hasn’t been easy, but he’s found peace in solitude. The sexy woman auditing his empathic studies, though, has a way of getting under his skin that’s both arousing and disturbing. Plus, his psychic ability warns him of secrets so deeply buried in her psyche, they’d be better left alone.

Yet their instant attraction strips away all their protective barriers, down to the foundation of a new, fragile trust. And a vulnerability that, when an old enemy opens fire, could blast away any chance of a future.

Warning: If you don’t like mysterious heroes who can see into strong heroines, sexy love scenes, empaths, or quirky characters… Oh come on, who doesn’t like those things?

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Illicit Intuitions:

Of all the fuck-ups in all of the labs in all of the world, he’d given her that bikini in his. And damn if she hadn’t found a way to cover the tattoo. Her tattoo had floated through his dreams, shifting constantly from one shape into another with the multitude of possibilities.

The bottom edge he’d glimpsed had looked like feathers. Something soft and sexual to taunt him as vividly as the sensual dare coating her voice when the conversation turned to anything remotely sexual. Sensuality which tempted him into making stupid choices.

Choices like Dana’s suit, a suit he would never again be able to see on Dana.

She stayed behind him as they left the building and headed down the path he’d had designed to cut through the thick foliage. The beach wasn’t far away, but the tall palms and bushy landscaping he’d had put in around the lab hid it from view of the building. It had been a move he’d taken hesitantly, but in the end his focus during working hours had improved for it.

“You know, a little warning we’d be going for a hike would have been nice.”

“We’re almost there.” It was a short walk, easy enough when you got used to it. She handled it well, but her occasional grunts and muttered curses slapped at him with the sting of an electrode.

He lowered a mental shield and reached out to her. The water ahead became a richer blue while the trees adopted an unnaturally bright vibrancy.

Frustration and a sense of conflict were all he picked up before she went blank, as if she’d shut a door to her thoughts.

He risked a glance over his shoulder to check on her. She was adjusting the fabric over one perfectly shaped, palm-sized boob. He turned away, but not before glimpsing a flash of her puckered, perky, rose-pink nipple. She smelled of the gardenia and eucalyptus oils he put in a bowl of water each night for the soothing properties of the concoction.

He hardened instantly. The calming and protective qualities of those scents would never have the same impact on him again. Yeah. He’d screwed up.

What had started out as an exercise to test her in a relaxed environment, because he had a hunch she had empathic tendencies, had whipped around with a vicious backlash that instead tested his protective barriers. Barriers he’d spent his life building quaked with the desire to drop. A desire he couldn’t give in to.

“Where precisely are we going? And is anyone else joining us?”

“There’s a private beach Dana and I use often.” Blocked off from the main part of the beach by a steep wall of rocks combined with more precisely placed foliage. “And no.”

“A private beach in this part of Miami?”

“Yes.” It was doable when you had the right connections and money. His
connections
happened to want his silence more than they wanted to hang on to their precious dollars. Or they had. If the Feds were right, if he’d read the situation clearly yesterday, Janus would be making an appearance soon.

H’s gut knotted. He’d fortified his shields and security. He hoped it would be enough when the time came. “Our work can be stressful. We need our breaks.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

She misunderstood his relationship with Dana. Most people who met them did, but until the right person came along they wouldn’t worry about correcting misconceptions. When he and Ms. Sebastian stepped onto the beach, with the calm waves lapping at the shore and the sand just warming from the sun, instant peace moved over him.