Chapter 18 #2
I take a drink of wine to cover whatever my face is doing. “I think you might be the first person to call hauling creels sexy.”
The conversation trails off, the quiet settling back in around us.
Ellie shivers, though she tries to hide it, pulling her jacket tighter and shifting her shoulders.
Crap, I hadn’t even noticed the temperature had dropped.
I get up without a word and head to the wheelhouse.
The spare jacket is where it always is, hanging on the hook behind the door.
It’s old and heavy, salt-stained, smelling of the sea and engine oil and probably me.
It’s not the kind of thing you’d choose to wear, but it’s warm.
I bring it back and hold it out. “Here.”
She takes it and pulls it on. It swallows her, the sleeves hanging past her fingertips. She pulls it tightly around herself and tucks her chin into the collar, and something about the gesture—the way she wraps herself in it, in something that’s mine—hits me somewhere deep.
“Warm enough?” I manage.
“Much better. Thanks.”
I sit back down beside her, closer than before. Our shoulders touch. Neither of us moves away.
The sky has deepened to a bruised violet, and the first stars are showing. The hills are darkening, and here and there a light glows along the shoreline. The air smells of salt and the last traces of garlic from the scallops.
“It’s so quiet out here,” Ellie says softly. “It’s a different kind of quiet than you get on land, isn’t it?”
I look at her. She’s gazing out at the water, her profile lit by the last of the light, her hair lifting slightly in the breeze. Her face, in this light, is—
She turns to look at me.
My heart is hammering, but this time I don’t panic. I bring my hand up to the side of her face, slowly, giving her every chance to pull away. She doesn’t. My thumb brushes her cheekbone, and her breath catches.
I kiss her.
Not like in her kitchen. That kiss was a detonation. Sudden, unplanned, over before I could register what I’d done. This one I mean.
Her mouth is warm and soft and tastes faintly of wine. I kiss her gently at first, carefully, my hand still cradling her face. She makes a small sound—barely audible, just a breath—and leans into me. Her fingers curl into the front of my shirt.
The boat rocks beneath us, a slow, steady rhythm, and the kiss deepens. Her mouth opens under mine and the taste of her floods through me. My free hand finds her waist and settles there, over the jacket, but I can still feel the shape of her through it.
It’s been so long since I’ve done this. So long since I’ve let myself want anything this much.
Ellie’s hands slide up my chest to my shoulders, and the pressure of her fingers through the fabric makes my skin prickle. I pull her closer—gently, but with intent—and she comes, shifting on the blanket until we’re pressed together, her chest against mine, and—
Christ.
Ellie breaks the kiss. She’s breathing heavily, as am I. For a second we just look at each other. She smiles, her face soft and a little dazed. Then her eyes flick downwards, to where the evidence of exactly how she’s affecting me is making itself very clearly known.
I’m hard. Fully. Unmistakably.
Heat floods my face. “Sorry. I didn’t—it’s been a while, and I—”
She gazes at me, her lips swollen, her eyes steady. Then she reaches out and lays her hand over the front of my jeans, her palm resting on my dick.
My breath stops. Everything stops. There’s only her hand and the fact Ellie Macpherson is looking at me like she’s not even slightly sorry. Then she leans back in and kisses me again.
This kiss is different. There’s heat in it now, and urgency, and the sound I make against her mouth—low, involuntary, dragged from somewhere deep—is not a sound I’ve ever heard myself make before.
Her hand stays where it is, and the weight of her palm through the denim is doing things to me that make it very hard to think.
I kiss her back. Harder. My hands move over her back, her sides, pulling her closer, and the jacket bunches between us. I want to touch her properly. I want—God, I want—
But I hold myself in check, keeping my hands where they are, over the jacket. Because this matters too much to rush, and she matters too much to get this wrong.
We kiss until the urgency eases a little, then builds again, then softens into something slower and more searching. The boat rocks gently. I lose track of how long we’ve been here.
Ellie breaks away. She’s breathing heavily. One of her hands has moved to my chest and is resting over my heart, which is beating so hard she must be able to feel it.
“Douglas,” she says softly. She glances down at her other hand, which is still resting against my cock. She presses more insistently, and I suck in a breath through my teeth. “You can put your hands on my breasts, if you want to.”
The words go through me like a current. She’s flushed, her eyes bright, her lower lip caught between her teeth. There’s nervousness there, but underneath it, something fierce and certain.
She zips open the jacket, and I carefully, reverently, cup her through her top, the weight of her filling my hands and then some.
She’s big—full and soft and warm—and my large hands can’t cover her, can’t contain her.
The reality of that makes my breath come ragged and uneven, and my thoughts blank.
There’s nothing in my head now, nothing except the softness of her under my palms and the way she arches into my touch.
I stroke my thumbs across her, gently, her nipples hard through the fabric. She gasps—and then the hand pressed against my jeans begins exploring. Her fingers trace the shape of my cock through the denim, and my hips jerk forwards before I can stop them.
“Ellie—” Her name comes out broken.
She squeezes me, and I nearly lose my mind.
She runs her hand along me slowly, feeling me out, and the deliberateness of the action—the way she’s not rushing, the way she’s taking her time, learning the shape of me—is almost more than I can bear.
I’m leaking for her. I can feel the slickness of it, the ache of it.
My own hands drift—without thought, on pure instinct—lower. Past her waist. Towards her hips. Towards—
I check myself, stopping my hands. Then I return one to her breast and settle the other at her waist.
Not unless she wants it. Not unless she tells me.
We stay like that. Kissing, touching through clothes, the urgency building and receding in waves that match the motion of the boat beneath us. Her hands on me. Mine on her. There’s no rush towards a finish. No pressure to escalate beyond where we are. Just this.
I don’t know how long we stay like that.
Long enough for the sky to go fully dark.
Long enough for the cold to creep in, despite the warmth of our bodies.
Eventually Ellie pulls back, and I feel the loss of her touch straight away.
Her breathing is unsteady, her eyes huge in the low light, the grey-blue almost swallowed by her pupils.
She looks at me, and I look at her, and neither of us speaks for a while.
She smiles first—a small, slightly awed smile. “I could stay here all night, but it’s getting late.”
“Aye.” My voice is rough. “It is.”
I press my lips to her forehead—a different kind of kiss—and get to my feet. My legs are stiff from sitting on the deck. I pull up the anchor and turn the key. The Mary Beth rumbles to life, and I bring her round, heading back for Ardmara.
Ellie comes to stand beside me at the wheel. She’s still wearing my jacket, and she tucks herself against my side like she belongs there. I wrap one arm around her shoulders and keep my other hand on the wheel.
We round the headland and the lights of Ardmara come into view. Real life waits on dry land, but for now the taste of her is still on my lips, and the ghost of her touch still burns through my jeans.