Chapter Four
Erik
“We need to head back, Astrid.”
Her face falls at the words, and it takes real effort on my part not to give her the one thing she wants right now—a few more hours on the ocean.
But it’s dangerous to stay out here so late, and it will only make it harder to get back to the island as the tide comes in and hides the shoals.
Still, I can be sorry for pulling her away when she's spent the entire day tagging sharks, none of which were Moon.
Every evening for the last four days, I’ve watched her spirit plummet after failing to spot her shark, and despite my best efforts to distract her when we get back to the cottage, there is no ignoring the sadness on her face every time she thinks of him.
“Maybe I missed him,” she says, turning those beautiful brown eyes at me. “Or maybe he didn’t come here like I expected. We’ve been tagging sharks for days, and I still haven’t seen Moon.”
“He’s a juvenile shark. Maybe it’s just taking him a little longer than the others to figure it out.”
“You think so?” she asks with so much hope in her eyes that I decide not to mention how many other juveniles have made it this far or how late in the season it’s getting.
“You still have three days left. He’ll find you.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right.”
“There’s still plenty of time left,” I say as I help her pack up her equipment. I try not to think of my own troubles as I begin to ferry us back to the island.
Time.
I've convinced Astrid that there's still time when I don't believe it.
Not for me at least. For months, I've been fighting to come up with funding that will allow me to keep my position on the island year-round, as it has been for years.
A few months ago, I was warned that due to budget cuts, the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service is considering making my position seasonal.
This would mean leaving the island during the off-season and moving back to the mainland and the general population.
Hell, I could fund this myself, seeing as I have the money, and I have considered doing just that, but there are roadblocks.
They won’t use any funds I donate if the researchers’ interest isn’t there to keep the island active.
I can’t pay them to keep me in a job. Before Astrid and her team, the last scientists to visit were here several months ago.
It’s too bad I don’t have enough funds to just buy my own private island.
Without interest from researchers, there’s no reason for the island to keep a caretaker year-round.
“Do you think there were ever pirates around here?” Astrid’s voice pulls me back from my depressing thoughts even as I navigate the boat around the rocky shores.
“Sorry?”
“Pirates. You know, like the ones we see in the movies. Do you think there were ever pirates around the Farralon Islands?”
Despite my previous depressing line of thought, I find myself smiling at hers. At least she’s not thinking about her pet shark anymore. “Are you interested in pirates, Astrid?”
“No.” But her cheeks betray her as she blushes. “Maybe.”
“The Farallon Islands can be vicious when they choose to. But pirates were a stubborn breed. I’ve heard stories of pirates in the area during the time of the Gold Rush.”
“You speak of the islands like they’re alive.”
“You don’t believe so?” I ask as I dock the boat. “Eight years ago, I would have scoffed at the same idea, but you live out here long enough and you see things even science can’t explain.” She takes my hand when I offer it to help her off the boat.
“Do you think pirates ever came to this island?”
““I know this island better than anyone, and I’ve never seen anything to suggest they came here. Anything’s possible, though. Fortunately, we haven’t had to worry about pirates for several hundred years. But if one chooses to show up, I’ll protect you.”
She blushes at my teasing, and I lean in to kiss her softly. I catch the flush on her cheeks as I turn away to secure the boat.
“Do you miss your family?” she asks when I join her again, and we start heading back to the cottage. “Have they ever come to visit you here?”
“I miss them,” I confess, letting out a shuddering breath when my chest clenches at memories of people I will never see again. “But I can’t go to them, and they can’t come to me.”
“Why not?”
“They’re all dead.”
The words seem to put a damper on the easy mood we’ve shared all day as her eyes widen with alarm. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Erik, I didn’t—”
“It’s alright,” I assure her. “They’ve been gone a long time.”
“Doesn’t make it hurt any less.”
Her words stop me in my tracks, and she follows, her brows furrowing with concern. “No, it doesn’t make it hurt any less,” I say, angling my head to study the woman I’ve spent the better part of three nights with. Every night, we kiss and touch before falling asleep wrapped around each other.
It’s the most at peace I’ve felt since the accident that stole my brother. Just being with her and talking to her is a balm to parts of my soul I didn’t realize needed soothing. But then she touches me or I touch her, or she says the right thing—the perfect thing—and a part of me yearns for more.
It’s dangerous.
To want her is to court heartache, but I can't help myself.
“Erik—”
“I want you,” I rasp, dropping all the gear to the ground as I move to her, lightning fast. Then my hands are cupping her face, and my lips crash hard against hers in a desperate kiss.
God, how she opens up for me. Her lips part under mine with a whimper and her hands move to my waist, gripping my shirt as I pour feelings I don’t dare say out loud into the kiss.
My cock hardens behind the zipper of my jeans, pushing against my fly. Begging for the one thing I’ve denied myself until this moment.
I want to be inside of her. Christ, it’s all I’ve thought about these past few days, but I fought with myself each time because, well…she’s a virgin.
I couldn’t have anticipated it the first time I met her but, then I touched her, and I knew. I just knew that she’d never been touched before.
Now I want that too. Her. Everything.
“Inside,” she whimpers into the kiss, linking her arms around my shoulders when I lift her. I groan deeply when her legs wrap around my waist, pressing her sex against my throbbing cock.
“I’m going to make love to you, angel,” I rasp against her lips as I carry her into the cottage. “Stop me if that’s not something you are ready for. I need you to stop me before I go too far, baby.”
“No, don’t stop.”
“Astrid,” I grind out, pushing back so I can get a better look at those melted chocolate eyes. “I’m saying I’m going all the way. I’m going to be inside you. My cock inside your—”
“I get it,” she says, the flush deepening in her cheeks. “I’m a grown woman, Erik. I know what sex is.”
“Do you?”
Her eyes narrow on mine in a way that tugs the corners of my lips up in a smile. “I understand the logistics…ugh, I don’t want to talk about it. What I don’t know, you’ll teach me, won’t you?”
She keeps her arms wrapped around me as I lower onto the couch, pulling me down with her. “Isn’t that what I’ve been doing these past few days?”
“Then think of this as yet another lesson. I’m an eager student.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, it is,” she murmurs before pulling my lips down to hers with such urgency that it makes me chuckle.
The humor shifts to need as I press into her lithe body, skimming my hands up and down her sides before slipping them underneath her sweater.
She whimpers against my lips as she arches into my touch.
“I…I’ve been hoping you’d do this. But you haven’t tried, so I waited. ”
“You didn’t say.”
Her lips part in a sigh. “I…I thought you didn’t want that. That maybe…”
“Maybe?”
“Maybe you were put off by my inexperience. I’ve heard guys don’t like—”
“Whatever you’ve heard doesn’t apply to me,” I say firmly, meeting her eyes as I cup her left breast, rubbing the pad of my thumb over her nipple and feeling it pebble against the cotton of her bra.
“I want you so bad, Astrid. Probably more than would be considered healthy. Can’t you feel how hard my dick is for you? ”
She gasps when I rock into her, pinning her to the couch. “I wanted my cock inside of you the first day I spotted you getting off that boat. Right there by the shore, I wanted to strip you bare and bury my cock in your tight little pussy.” I drop my face to her neck and lick down the silky skin.
“I wanted to press my face in your chest and lick the gentle swell of your breasts, taste the soft velvet of your nipples.” I tug up her sweater and drop my face to her chest, licking at her stiff nipples through the bra.
Her back arches off the couch when I gently bite at a bead before soothing the sting with my tongue.
“I saw no one but you for the first several moments.” I move to lick a path down her stomach, popping open the buttons of her jeans as I go down.
“And I haven’t wanted anything for years, as much as I want you. ”
I grab the waistband of her jeans then drag them down her thighs, along with her panties, before stripping her naked completely. “And now, I’m going to have you the way I’ve only allowed myself to imagine.”
“Yes, take me.”
Our eyes remain locked together as I slide down to the edge of the couch and kneel between her thighs, prying them apart to reveal her folds glistening with arousal.
It takes every drop of willpower I can summon not to climb back up her body and slam into her, take her hard and first and finally quench this thirst I have for her.
But I want this too.
I want it slow. Fuck me, but I want to worship her body, lavish her with touches and kisses until we’re both delirious with need. Then I’ll make love to her in a way that’ll have to sustain me for a very long time. Long after she’s gone off to another island.