Page 23 of Operation K-9 Brothers
“If we keep that up, we’re going to forget why we’re here.We need the song.”She messed with her phone for a moment, and then “Unchained Melody” sounded from a Bluetooth speaker on her worktable.“I have it looped, so it’ll play as long as we want it to.”
“That’s good.”
She stared at him for a few seconds as her cheeks turned pink.She was blushing, and it was adorable.
He smiled as he trailed his fingers over the pink.“I’m nervous, too,” he said.Not really, but he wanted to put her at ease.
“So...”She glanced around.“Um, I’ll sit at my pottery wheel, and you can come in behind me.Just wait until—”
“I got this, Nichole.”He brushed his lips over hers.
“You know what?We don’t have to do this.I know you must think it’s silly.”
“We are so doing it.”At seeing the uncertainty in her eyes that he wasn’t just humoring her, he said, “Surprises me, too, that I want to go up against that Swayze dude in your fantasy, but he has smaller feet than I do, so I’m not worried.”She repaid him with the laugh he was going for to put her at ease.
“Big shoes to fill,” she said through her laughter.
“Those I got.”He brushed his fingers over her cheek.“Do your thing.”
He positioned himself at the door, then waited a few minutes, and when she had a lump of clay on the wheel formed into an impressive duplication of the thing that had looked like a phallus in the movie, he moved behind her.Pulling a nearby stool over, he sat behind her.
“Couldn’t sleep?”he murmured, remembering that line or something close to it.
She tilted her head, looking up at him with the hint of a smile.“No.I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“Can’t sleep without your warm body next to mine.”He was adlibbing now, but the words felt right.He slid his hand under her hair, lifting it, then put his mouth on her neck, smiling when she shivered.“Your skin is so soft.And you smell so damn good, like vanilla and almonds.Makes me want to lick you.”
“Jack.”
That was it.One word.His name spoken on an exhale of breath, enough that he was the one shivering now.As he peppered kisses over her neck and shoulder, he trailed his hands down her arms until they covered hers.
“Messy,” he said as clay and water turned their skin gray.
She grinned up at him, and the happy light in her eyes was his undoing.He was making this woman’s fantasy come true, and in return she was breathing new life into his troubled soul.It wasn’t an equal exchange, what she was giving him compared to his only acting out a movie scene.But when she looked at him like that...
“I need to kiss you long and hard,” he said as he brought his messy hand to her face.
Unfortunately, he hit her giant phallus, causing it to bend over in a perfect replica of a limp penis.They both stared at it, and he could feel her shaking as she tried not to laugh.
“That’s not me, I swear.”That did it.She laughed so hard that she fell back on him.“Ah, now I have you where I want you.”He pulled her from her stool onto his lap.
She laughed so easily, something he’d noticed from the first when she’d been tangled up in Rambo’s leash.Instead of losing her temper with the puppy, she’d stood there, her eyes alight with amusement as she’d laughed.He wanted to soak up this joy of life she seemed to have.
As she stared up at him, he lost himself in her eyes, in the desire he saw in them, in her intoxicating scent, in the soft smile curving her lips.He felt like he was falling under a spell, that some kind of magic was swirling in the air around them.
“Nichole,” he said, his voice as rough and raspy as that of a lifelong smoker.
She softly smiled.“I know.”
How could she know what was in his mind, but he saw in her eyes that she did, that maybe she felt the magic, too.He closed the space separating their mouths, and when his lips touched hers, he moaned from the pure pleasure streaking through him.Wanting her closer, he wrapped his arms around her back, holding her tight against him.
She slid her hands around his neck, then up into his hair.She was probably smearing clay all over him, but he didn’t care.As the passion between them grew, she met every one of his demands, gave back as good as she got.Their tongues tangled, tasted, and explored.
Jack thought he was either having an out-of-body experience or perhaps a heart attack.The damn organ was beating so fast and hard that it sounded in his ears like a jackhammer hard at work tearing up the asphalt of a street.
He didn’t want to stop, but he forced himself to pull away.Any other woman, and he’d go for what could happen next between them, but Nichole wasn’t a one and done.He wanted something more with her, and despite his earlier declaration to himself, he wondered if they could sustain a relationship after he returned to his team if they worked at it.
How he was even thinking that so soon was surprising to say the least, but he felt a connection with her that he’d never experienced with another woman.The thought of walking away from her when it was time to return to his team...No, maybe somehow they could make things work.
