Chapter 14 #2
She gasped as he dug his fingertips into her waist and thrust his tongue into her mouth while simultaneously pressing his hips hard against hers, his erection rubbing directly against her soft center.
She arched toward him as she sucked the tip of his tongue and her fingernails dug into his muscular shoulders as they rocked back and forth, the water lapping against her.
Now she understood his desperation. Now she understood his frustration. Last night, every second they had spent avoiding this had been a waste. It had only delayed what was bound to happen.
She dug her heels into his buttocks, wanting to better feel his cock, as she slid her hands over his damp skin and into his hair…and a moan escaped her lips as Austin’s large, searching hands slipped beneath the t-shirt clinging to her, his thumbs caressing the underside of her breasts.
She was lost. It was like before. No, worse than before.
She lived for his touch. Lived for the rough sounds that came from his throat as she wrapped her thighs tighter around him. Lived for his hands that moved to her ribs, even though she needed them somewhere else entirely. She…
“Hello?” a loud voice called. “The child is awake and looking for you! Are you in the garden?”
Startled, Lilly pushed Austin away. He released her. She slid down him until her feet touched the bottom of the pool and the water reached her shoulders.
“Hello?”
Shit. It was Devreaux. It was…
“I’m swimming!” she called back. She forced her voice to be steady, her eyes fixed on Austin. “I’ll be right there. No idea where Austin is.”
“Maybe he’s on a run,” Devreaux replied loudly. “That guy’s a machine. I don’t know anyone who gets that much done before 7:00 in the morning. I’ll feed the kid, okay? She wants chocolate cereal.”
He apparently didn’t wait for an answer because the next moment, she heard the patio door close.
Relieved, she sagged into the water. God, thank goodness the backyard was huge and the pool wasn’t visible from the living room.
She stared at Austin, who was still breathing as heavily as she was. His lips were red, as were his shoulders where she had just been digging her nails while she…while he…
Oh God, what had they done?
“No idea where Austin is?” he echoed tonelessly.
“Would you have preferred I answered: Austin’s next to me and almost inside me?”
He raised a corner of his mouth. “I’d prefer if you didn’t rhyme, but otherwise…”
“Shut up, Austin!” she interrupted angrily. “Shit, I can’t believe we…” She narrowed her eyes as she shook her head and hurriedly pushed past him toward the ladder. “This is ridiculous. Ridiculous. A mistake of epic proportions. What if Delfina had caught us?”
Hearing those words, Austin’s smile finally evaporated. “Fuck.”
“Yeah!” she hissed. “And…no! This won’t happen again! It can’t happen. Do you understand?”
“Yeah, yeah. You’re right,” Austin muttered, running a hand over his face. “It was an extreme situation and I revived you in time…”
“I wasn’t dead!”
“In my mind, you were,” he replied roughly. “It’s… It was habit, I guess.”
“One night ten years ago doesn’t make a habit!”
“No, probably not. Okay. You’re right! I don’t know what happened. Don’t take it personally, Lilly, but I don’t even like you.”
“Your body likes me well enough,” she snapped, annoyed, because she wasn’t going to start from that point again.
“Well, my body is confused. The whole night has messed it up…”
At least she could relate to that problem.
“I know!” She hurriedly climbed out of the pool — relieved that her t-shirt was black, not white, and therefore see-through.
“Staying up all night together is obviously our Achilles’ heel.
We’re going to put a stop to that.” She closed her eyes briefly before inhaling deeply.
“Austin, I want us to get along, just not too well, okay?”
“Same here,” he said, nodding. “I know I was angry. I still am, but I want what’s best for Delfina.”
“I feel the same way,” she whispered. “And I’m glad we’ve grown closer.”
Austin raised an eyebrow.
“Not like that!" She clarified. "Yesterday. I felt like we could…communicate. And I want to keep it that way. For Del. It’s obvious there’s still some attraction between us…”
“Nope,” Austin countered dryly, foregoing the ladder and swinging out of the pool as easily as a leaf in the wind. “No attraction. That just gave the wrong impression. I haven’t had sex in a long time and you were half-naked and then there was the adrenaline rush because I thought you’d drowned…”
What a complete idiot.
She pressed her lips together but nodded. “Fine, if that lie makes you feel better, fine.”
His expression darkened. “Maybe I was just trying to shut you up. That certainly seems like a possibility.”
She smiled sweetly. “I have a feeling we’re heading for another argument, but since I don’t want to argue…
” She held out her hand. “Can we just agree that what happened just now will never happen again, and we’ll do our best to be polite and friendly to each other so it’s as easy as possible for Del? ”
“Deal,” he said, ignoring her hand and walking past her.
She was almost grateful for that. They should make it a rule to simply not touch each other.
Yes, they had taken a step forward. They had talked, they had shown that they understood each other…at least in one area — everything was fine.
Well, as long as they weren’t near a pool.