her head on his chest, the deep thundering of his heart more than a match for hers.
* * *
Whether it was the cocktails Claude was knocking back or Avery’s sudden rose-tinted view of the world, she couldn’t say—but the rest of the night Luke and Claude seemed to get along without sniping at one another. Which was nice. Or it would have been if Jonah hadn’t kept finding ways to touch Avery. The slide of his foot against hers, resting his hand on her knee, drifting a finger over her shoulder. At that point nice was no longer in her vocabulary.
When the last dessert plate was cleared, and the bill had been paid, Claude sat back with a hand over her stomach. “Who’s going to roll me back to my big beautiful home that I adore so very much?” She glanced at Avery before her gaze slid to Jonah. “Forget that. I’ll be just fine on my own.”
With a sigh, Luke pushed back his chair before collecting Claude with a hand under her elbow. She whipped her elbow away as if burned. But Luke took her hand and threaded it through his elbow and locked it there tight. “Come on, sunshine. Let’s get back to our crumbling white elephant before it falls into the sea.”
“She’s not crumbling. She has...elegant patina.”
Luke shot Avery a smile, Jonah a told-you-so look, then, with Claude babbling about fresh paint and passion, they disappeared through the door.
Jonah stood and held out a hand. This time there was no hesitation as Avery put her hand in his.
Outside the air was still and sweet, the road back from the beach devoid of crowds, the moon raining its brilliant light over the world. And as soon as Avery’s eyes met Jonah’s they were in one another’s arms.
The moment their lips met, she felt parts of herself implode on impact. Heat sluiced through the gaps, her nerves went into total meltdown until she was a trembling mass of need, and want, and unhinged desire.
The sweet clinging kiss of the day before was a mere memory as Jonah plundered her senses with his touch, with the insistent seduction of his lips, the intimate rhapsody of his tongue.
Desperation riding them both, Avery’s back slammed against a wall, the rough brick catching on her top, her hair, her skin. But she didn’t care. She merely tilted and shifted until the kiss was as deep as it could be.
It wasn’t deep enough.
All those clothes in the way. She tugged his shirt from his jeans and tore the thing open, her eyes drinking in the sight of him as her hand slid up his torso, through the tight whorls of hair, palming the scorching-hot skin, loving the harsh suck of his breath and the way the hard ridges of muscle jumped under her touch.
With a growl he lifted her bodily, till she wrapped her legs around him, her head rolling back as his mouth went to her neck, to her shoulder, the sweet spot behind her ear.
When he tugged her top down an inch, his nails scraping her soft skin, his tongue finding the edge of her nipple, she froze, the tiniest thread of sense coming back to her from somewhere deep down inside. It might be near midnight, but they were in a public place, her legs around his waist, one arm cradling his head, the other beneath his shirt and riding the length of his back.
“Jonah,” she said, her voice a whisper on the still night air.
She felt him tense, then relax, just a fraction, but enough that he lifted his head to rest it against her collarbone, his deep breaths warming her bone deep.
Avery opened her eyes to the sky.
When Jonah had asked her to dance Luke hadn’t been surprised. He’d been waiting for it. Which meant it hadn’t been spur of the moment. Hadn’t been some kind of He-Has-Girl-So-I-Want-Girl reaction.
This big, beautiful, difficult, taciturn, hard-to-crack man had staked his claim.
And scary as the feelings tumbling about inside of her at that knowledge were, the brilliance of them won out.
“Take me home, Jonah.”
He held his breath, his chest pressing hard into hers so that she could feel the steady thump of his big strong heart.
“You sure?”
She slid a hand into the back of his hair, the tight curls ensnaring her fingers.
He growled, and she trapped the sound with her kiss as she strove to make the best mistake of her life.
Avery’s first glimpse inside Jonah’s place—a shack tucked away in the hills behind the cove—held no surprises; the place was a total man cave.
Surfboards and a kayak lined up on hooks in the entrance hall. Battered running shoes lay discarded on a small pile of sand under a top-of-the-range road bike. A slew of mismatched barstools shoved under an island bench in the utilitarian kitchen the only dining option, and along with a big dark sprawling lounge were a recycled timber coffee table covered in boating magazines and mug rings and a projector screen taller than she was.
Avery glanced back towards the front door; but as the last time she’d checked there was still no sign yet of the man himself.
Right in the middle of a pretty full-on make-out session on his porch, Hull had let out a gut-curdling yowl before taking off into the forest. And if Avery’s heart hadn’t already been racing like the Kentucky Derby from that kiss, the sight of big brawny Jonah staring in distress after his dog—sorry, not his dog—had made her heart flip twice and go splat.
She’d given him a shove. “Go.”
After a brief thank-you kiss he’d gone, leaping off the porch, grabbing a man-sized torch from his big black muscle car, and run off into the forest like some kind of superhero.
No telling how long he’ll be, she thought as she distracted her nerves by scoping out the rest of his home. Down the solitary hall was one seriously cool bathroom with a fantastic sunburst mosaic covering an entire wall and an old brass tub—the kind you sat in with your knees up to your chin. Leaning against the doorjamb of his small office, with its big wooden desk, a wall of shelves filled with books and knick-knacks, another covered in old maps, star charts, pictures of boats, she admitted that, while the house might be a total bachelor pad, with not a feminine touch in sight, it was seriously appealing. Simple and raw, woodsy and warm. Lived in.
It was Jonah.
Pushing herself away from the wall, she walked unthinkingly through the last door to find herself standing in a bedroom.
Jonah’s bedroom.
Her next breath in was choppy, her palms growing uncommonly warm as her eyes skittered over the chair in the corner covered in man clothes. The bedside table—singular—had at one time been a beer barrel, and now boasted a lamp with a naked bulb, a book—pages curled, face down—and a handful of loose change. No curtains shielded the windows, which were recycled portholes looking out over what would no doubt be a spectacular Pacific view.
Her heart beat wildly as her eyes finally settled on the biggest thing in the room: Jonah’s bed. It was big. Huge. And unmade, the white sheets a shambles. It wasn’t hard to imagine his long brown limbs twisted up in
