Chapter 4
Note to Self: Your toes aren’t the only thing tingling
Tessa and Venice walked together down the street to the park and made their way to a walking path through the trees. The conversation was easy: the weather, the town, the bookstore where she was going to work, and the nearby familiar adoption agency.
“I’ve never really spent a lot of time around supernatural people,” she admitted. “I think Sable Cove is so neat because of how varied the people here are. Humans and shifters and vampires and witches. It seems like a really unique place.”
“It definitely is,” he said. “It’s very welcoming, too.”
“Have you been here long?”
He hummed. “Six years.”
There it was again. A hesitation. Like he didn’t want to talk about whatever had happened before he came to town.
But she could admit she didn’t really want to talk about her life before she came to Sable Cove either.
Although she felt very comfortable around him and had been surprised to realize how often her thoughts had turned to him over the course of the day, she wasn’t looking for anything.
She hadn’t planned to get involved with a man for a very long time, contemplating a life with a battery-operated boyfriend and a house full of cats to keep her company.
But Venice was intriguing, and she really liked being with him.
She’d been looking for something when she’d gone to the beach that morning, and he’d walked right up to her.
A sexy man in uniform.
Her very favorite kind.
But he was more than a badge; he was intriguing on a number of levels.
Charming and sweet, with a wry sense of humor and a killer smile.
And his blue eyes? Like precious sapphires.
Her stomach flipped, and her toes curled in her shoes.
She didn’t think she’d ever been more attracted to a man in her life.
But she pushed the sexy thoughts away, because she’d just met him!
They made their way back to the street where he’d parked his truck.
She tossed her empty cup in a nearby trash bin.
“Would you like a ride home?” he asked.
“Sure, thanks.”
He opened the door for her, and she got in.
When he shut the door, she caught the masculine scent of him, like sunshine and warm spices.
He got behind the wheel and turned the engine on, and then he gave her one of his smiles, and if she’d been standing, she would have swooned like an old Hollywood starlet.
They didn’t really talk on the drive to her cottage, but the silence wasn’t awkward; it was charged but quiet. She knew he was aware of the pull between them, because his firm grip on the steering wheel had turned his knuckles white.
But whatever was simmering between them didn’t worry her.
She was thinking about how fast she’d moved away from her I’m going to be a hermit to I’m going to wither away to dust if I don’t kiss him soon.
More than the sexy thoughts swirling through her mind was the realization that she actually felt very safe with him.
And she hadn’t felt safe in a long time.
He parked behind her car and came around to open her door. He offered her his hand, and the first touch sent a shiver down her spine. Their fingers linked as she stepped from the truck, and neither of them let go as they walked to the door.
“I didn’t expect today to turn out like this,” she said. She unlocked the door and pushed it open, but didn’t move to go inside. “But I really liked spending time with you.”
“I liked it too.”
He smiled down at her, his eyes darkening slightly, and the spicy scent of him made her stomach flip.
“Can I confess something?” she asked softly, her heart pounding.
“Of course.” He raised his hand and planted it over her head on the doorjamb, leaning slightly toward her.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you today.”
He raised his free hand and touched her jaw with his thumb, his fingers resting gently on her neck. She shivered as his gaze turned heated, the air electric between them.
“You were on my mind all day, too,” he said roughly.
He leaned down and brushed his lips over hers.
It was the briefest of kisses and made her gasp. He paused, his lips close but not touching, a silent request for her to take the next step if she wanted.
She laid her hands on his waist and pulled him toward her, rising to her toes to meet his lips with her own.
Their lips met and parted, and the first tentative touch of their tongues led to a deep kiss that she felt all the way to the center of her body. He moved closer, their bodies pressing against each other, as she experienced the very best kiss she’d ever had in her life.
When they parted, chests heaving, neither of them needed to say anything.
She stepped back into the cottage, and he joined her, his eyes flashing with heat as he pushed the door shut and stalked toward her as she made her way to the bedroom.
They met again in the doorway, his hands slipping up her back and pushing her shirt up as she loosened his tie and undid the buttons of his uniform shirt.
They kissed as they stripped each other, and then the back of her knees hit the bed, and she sat abruptly, breaking the kiss.
As she tugged her clothes off, she watched as he stripped off his clothes, revealing muscles on top of muscles under smooth, tanned skin. Her gaze tripped down his magnificent torso to his erection, and she let out a soft gasp.
Oh my.
He chuckled softly and lowered himself to his knees, pushing her knees apart and tugging her body to the edge of the bed.
“Look at how gorgeous you are,” he said, glancing up at her. “Wet and ready for me, my beautiful Tessa.”
He held her gaze as he lowered his head to her pussy and licked a slow path up her folds to her clit.
She let out a gasp and leaned back on her hands, tilting her hips as he buried his face between her thighs and moved his tongue in sweeping strokes.
Her body warmed, heat spiraling through her, as he slipped a hand up her stomach and cupped her breast, playing with first one nipple and then the other, until she was writhing under his touch while he tongued her core.
His tongue flicked over her clit, his fingers digging into her hip, and she lost herself to the heat that speared through her.
Her fingers curled into the bedding as she came, gasping his name.
He kissed up her body as he stood, hooking his arm under her bottom and lifting her from the bed. His cock pressed against her heat and pushed inside slowly. He moved up the bed and settled her under him, thrusting forward until he was buried deep inside.
Her head kicked back as she was filled so fully, so perfectly.
Her body was still swimming under the effects of the first orgasm a man had given her.
“Damn,” he whispered through clenched teeth.
She cupped his face and grinned, then kissed him.
He hadn’t moved since he’d buried himself in her, but he moved now.
His hips tilted back to draw himself out and then pressed in again. Slow at first, so she felt every inch of him thrust in then pull out.
And then he began to move faster. Her slick heat welcomed him every time, the sheer pleasure of being with him like nothing she’d ever experienced before.
She let go of her grip on the bedding and wrapped her arms around him.
And that’s when she felt them.
Scars on his shoulder blades.
His rhythmic thrusting faltered, and she could practically feel his emotions drifting from pleasure to worry.
So he was a fallen angel.
She didn’t care about that; she only cared that he kept rocking her world.
Moving her hands so she wasn’t touching the scars, she hooked them over his shoulders and tilted her hips, seeking more of him.
He snarled softly and kissed her, and moved faster, harder.
More! She wanted all of him, every inch and blissful moment.
He tilted her hips, and his pelvis brushed her sensitive clit, and she exploded around him, her nails digging into his shoulders as her body spiraled from one plateau of pleasure to the next.
He came, thrusting a few more times as he groaned her name, kissing her lips and her cheeks and her forehead, his breath fanning her skin as he exhaled like he hadn’t relaxed in a long time.
He slumped over her, keeping his full weight off her, and kissed her lips once more.
“Beautiful Tessa,” he whispered, “you are a wonder.”
She hooked her ankles together and squeezed her thighs against his hips.
“I’m just getting started, sexy Venice. How about you?”
His smile, all heat and feral lust, made her pussy clench around his cock, and he groaned with a chuckle.
“This is just the beginning, sweetness.” He lowered his head to nuzzle her throat, biting gently against her throbbing pulse. She closed her eyes and giggled.
“I’ll follow you anywhere.”
Angel mine.