Chapter 45
Jodi Castle
Jodi wasn’t sure where she was geographically. Usually, that would have sent her into a full-scale panic. She felt none of that as the shower spray hit her upturned face and chased off the last of the chill that had penetrated her bones.
She was safe.
Her very own knight protector was standing guard outside ready to see off demons, vampires, spiders, stalkers, ex-boyfriends, and any -one or -thing else that had the discourtesy to wish to disturb her.
After Paul had tucked her into Ash’s Danger Car, and they’d hit the road with the car heater on full, she’d quickly drifted off.
Her exhaustion had kept her comatose for most of the multi-hour journey.
She’d woken on the far side of the Norwegian-Swedish border on the approach to the rendezvous point with the rest of Black Halo.
That reunion had lasted mere minutes before Paul had bundled them both into a waiting hire car and brought them to this here lakeside cabin.
Theoretically, that ought to have helped her pinpoint her position, but Sweden being a country of almost a hundred thousand lakes, she might as well have just stabbed a random area of the map and drawn a hundred-mile radius around it.
Truth was, it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that she was here with him.
A man so good, he hadn’t taken her to task over all the shit she’d said and done to him.
Nah, he’d shrugged it off, grinned, and said, “You’ve always been a walking catastrophe.
I knew when I signed up it was likely to be a bumpy ride.
Now, eat. And marshmallows, cream, or sprinkles with your hot chocolate, or all three? Also, I’ve fed the cat.”
After plying her with the best cuppa on the planet and thick-cut slices of crusty bread spread with butter and honey, until the hollow in her stomach was well and truly filled, he’d turned her towards the shower, where she’d now been for some time judging by the enquiring knock on the door.
“You okay in there, Castle?”
“Yes,” she said, only to repeat herself louder realising he probably couldn’t hear her over the thud of the rainfall shower. Although, actually, “No.”
“No? Fuck, what’s up?” Genuine concern scored his vocals.
Curious how the timbre of his voice could have such a direct effect on her body. Pleasure tickled beneath her skin. “You’re out there and not in here with me.”
Maybe that was forward, but she’d been holding her feelings for him in check for so long that she had no intention of doing so now that it was no longer necessary. She just wanted him close. Heck, she just wanted him.
“Aw, that so, is it?”
“It is.”
The creak of the door hinges alerted her to him sticking his head around the door. “Wasn’t sure if I was welcome,” he said, voice husky with hope. “Thought after everything, you’d maybe prefer some space.”
“I’d prefer your company.”
She hoped that made him grin. There wasn’t an easy means of confirming since she couldn’t see much besides fuzzy shapes through the hazy glass of the shower surround.
An awkward silence followed.
“Are you saying... Should I—”
“Plenty of space for two in here,” she sang out.
Through the hazing she could just about make out that he was undressing. Well damn, that was something she’d have liked to watch.
He cracked open the door, releasing a cloud of vapour.
Jodi shuffled backward, making space for his bulk in the enclosure.
Okay, so maybe it’d be a squeeze after all.
He was a giant and she was the opposite of dainty.
A smile painted itself across his face as water drops caught in his eyelashes.
Damn, he was something, all carved definition, ink, and washboard abs.
Plus of course the bejewelled pleasure stick that had given him his moniker.
Jodi let her gaze eat him up. There’d been few other opportunities in their acquaintance for her to do so.
Shame, because he truly was a piece of art, and deserved admiration.
He was evidently also excited to see her, given his cock was jutting out from his body at a forty-five-degree tilt. A fact he wasn’t even attempting to hide but also wasn’t trying to tackle her with. She felt her cheeks heat realising she was staring and dragged her gaze sidewards.
“Nah, you drink your fill all you want.” His thumb grazed her chin and turned her back towards him.
Jodi opened her mouth to him and kissed him.
It’s what she’d wanted to do ever since she’d woken, but the moment had never felt quite right.
Firstly, because there were too many other members of his band around hurling questions at them, then because he was driving, and then feeding her.
Now all that noise was gone. It was just them.
Jodi moaned as his tongue pressed to hers.
The current between them was probably dangerous in a shower, given how well water and electricity mixed, but she wasn’t about to pull the plug.
Nah, she was all for turning up the voltage not down.
So what if bits of her ached, and so what if she’d literally stopped being engaged to a different man less than eight hours ago?
This had been a prospect for far too long. It was time to make it real.
As he crowded her against the tiled wall, and lifted her against him, his strong arms supported her effortlessly, skin so smooth, muscles concrete as he anchored them.
“Paul,” she gasped.
“I know. It’s in your eyes. And the answer’s yes. It’ll always be yes. I’m yours for eternity.”
“I want you.”
His grin said he still needed convincing. Jodi caught his hand, intending to guide him to where he could feel her readiness for himself, but he slipped down onto his knees before she got the chance, putting his tongue to work.
“You don’t have... That’s not necessary.” Her hand played over the centimetre or so of his hair that had grown back.
“Aye, but why would I deprive myself and you of the pleasure of it. I’ve got a taste for your pussy, and now I intend to indulge it.”
The spray continued to rain over them as he kept his promise and did just that.
He didn’t just go down on her. He worshipped her with an intense focus that ensured she lapped up the rewards.
Thus, one orgasm was rapidly followed by a second chaser that left her weak-kneed and mushy-brained.
And even then, he held her to him so she was practically mounted over his shoulders, and continued to tease her nub with the flat of his tongue.
“Come up here,” she commanded, sounding almost drunk.
“If you’re sure my work down here is completed to your satisfaction?”
Was he kidding?
He rose, like Neptune rising from the waves. Jodi pulled him to her and caught the taste of herself all over his mouth.
“I’m not sure my limbs are stable enough to take matters further right here.
” Shower sex could be a tricky affair. She made to open the door, but Paul hit the shower off with his elbow as he picked her up off her feet and carried her out of the bathroom and into the attached bedroom with its A-line sloped roof and low set windows.
They fell onto the bed together, damp, and slippery, bodies aligned and eager, hips, curves, and muscles perfectly moulded to one another.
“Let’s do this right, this time. Let me get—”
She clasped his hand as he made to rise, pulled him back to her. “I want to feel you.” The last time, back in Bergen had been too emotionally fraught and frantic to truly appreciate it.
“You’ll still feel me, promise.” He kissed her wrist. “I’m not ready to risk sharing you with anyone yet, I’ve only just got you to myself.”
True to his word, he was back in seconds, condom already out of the packet. He stood by the side of the bed and rolled it down his length while she watched, biting her lower lip to contain her grin.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“What?”
“Just all that’s mine.”
He chuckled as he straddled her legs and folded himself over her, trapping her beneath him and sinking them deep into the eiderdown. “You betcha it is.”
She folded her legs around his hips as she kissed his face, and raked her teeth over his chin, then down the slope of his neck to the intriguing dip by his collarbone.
“You’re something special too, Castle.”
Back as far as her teenage years, Jodi couldn’t recall ever looking at herself naked and believing she was anything other than too big and too wobbly, but the way Paul looked at her, revered her, suggested it was another thing she’d been wrong about.
His hazel eyes shone, eyelids falling to halfway as he closed the remaining inches between them.
“Goddess,” he hissed, as his cock slid against all the slipperiness he’d created with his care for her. She groaned in turn, caught in a delirium of anticipation.
“Paul.”
“Yeah,” he rasped.
“I want you.”
“Ah, God, I want you too.” He made an mmmn noise deep in his throat that made his skin vibrate against her lips as the tip of him notched against her entrance. “Damn!”
He clasped her hands, so they were palm to palm, and folded his fingers tightly around her, squeezing, as he gave inch after precious inch of himself to her. “You feel amazing. So wet and silky.”
“You feel like you’re mine.”
His smile stretched broad, swallowing up all of his features, and penetrating deep into the hearts of his eyes. “I am so totally yours.”