old boat at the top of Australia was probably a bit of a stretch considering where she’d come from. But here, so far away, made her realise how much of her life she spent trying to sort out her parents’ lives. And the seed was now sown; to find her place. It would be hard. It would mean unravelling a decade’s worth of ties before weaving them into something new. Something better.
Later, she thought as her throat began to constrict with the thought of it. Right now, the summer was hers. All hers. Nobody else’s. And she no longer had any doubts about how she wanted to spend the time she had left.
Avery slipped off her stool and slipped under Jonah’s arm, finding a perfect spot for herself between his knees. She rested a hand on his chest; the other took the cap from his head. His slow intake of breath and the darkening of his eyes created pools of heat low in her belly.
“So, Jonah North, what do you say we put all that behind us and just have some damn fun? No promises. No regrets. Do you want to be the man who makes my summer holiday one to remember?”
A muscle ticced in his jaw a moment before he grabbed her by the waist and drew her into him, covering her mouth with his. No finesse this time, no interminable teasing, just pure unleashed desire.
Lust rushed through her, unfettered, thick and fast, and she kissed him back, the heat of his mouth, the slide of his tongue driving every thought from her head but more, now, yes!
She threw his hat away—the man was hot but kissing a Sox fan would be sacrilege—and tucked her hands under his T-shirt, revelling in the warm skin, the rasp of hair, the sheer size of him. He was so big and hot and so much man he made her feel so light, like a breath of fresh air. As if nothing else mattered but here, now, this.
He tugged her closer, the ridge of his desire pressed against her belly, and her head fell back as anticipation shivered through her with the surety of what was to come.
“What time do you have to have the boat back?”
Holding her close with one hand, Jonah grabbed his phone with the other, punched in a message, waited a long minute for a response, then with a wolfish grin said, “Never. The boat’s mine.”
Avery’s knees near gave out. In her life she’d been wooed with bling, with tables at impossible-to-get-into restaurants, never had she had a man want her so much he’d bought the real estate under his feet in order to have her.
In one swift move he lifted her floaty top over her head, taking the hat with it. “Hell,” he said, spying her bikini top which was made of mostly string a shade or two paler than her skin.
“You like? I found it in this wicked boutique in the Village—oh...”
Jonah proceeded to show her just how much he liked it by yanking it down to take her breast in his mouth. When she thought herself filled with more pleasure than she could possibly bear, his mouth slowly softened, placing gentle kisses over the moist tip.
And the thumb at her hip dipped below the beltline of her shorts. He found her button, snapped it open; the slide of her zip rent the quiet river air like a promise.
His hand slid an inch within. Her breath hitched, then he lifted his hand to run the backs of his knuckles over her stomach and her breath trembled out of her.
When his hand sank into the back of her shorts, the calloused pads of his palm cradling her backside with such gentleness, such reverence, she bit her lip to stop from crying out.
Using his teeth, he pulled the other half of her bikini top free, and took her nipple in his mouth, his tongue circling the tip but not quite touching. Right as his hand dived into her shorts and a finger swiped over her, once, then twice, then found her centre with the most perfect precision.
She gave in then, crying out. The crocodiles, wherever they might be, would just have to deal.
The gentle moans that followed sounded as if they were coming from a mile away but they were all her. Coming as they did with every slide of his finger, every lathe of his tongue.
Warmth spread through her, building to a searing heat where he touched, where he caressed, where he coaxed her higher, higher, till she reached a peak of insane pleasure. And there she stayed hovering, aching, for eons. And as she felt herself tip, as she began to spill over the other side he took her mouth, his tongue and touch guiding her all the way until she was left shaking in the strongest arms.
He held her there long after while she found herself gripped by mighty aftershocks. He pulled back only when she had stilled. Lifted her face with a finger to her chin, and kissed her. Eyes open. Such deep, absorbing eyes.
She reached between them, caressed the impressive length of him, wondering how on earth she’d coped with all that the night before. Her pulse quickened with anticipation at doing so again.
Grunting, he pulled his wallet from his back pocket, produced a small foil packet, which she snapped out of his grip. And with as much reverence as he’d shown her, she peeled away his pants and sheathed him, stopping every now and then for a sweet kiss, a swipe of her cheek, a lick.
With a growl he pulled her back upright, turned and backed her up against the dash. His eyes were like mercury, all slippery silver as he rid her of her bikini top and her shorts, leaving her naked.
The sun beat down on her shoulders, the dials dug into her back, and there was the occasional splash, the occasional bump of the hull, a possible deadly beast coming to say hello—but she didn’t care.
All that mattered was Jonah, eyes roving over her as if he couldn’t quite believe it. His hands followed, running over her so gently, tenderly, as if he was memorising her shape.
With a hand to his shoulder, she pulled him close, lifted a leg to hook around his hip, and then with a bone-deep sigh he was inside. Filling her slowly, achingly slowly, a sweet scrape that built till she couldn’t stand it. He pulsed inside her, deeper, deeper, deeper than she’d ever been touched.
He came with a ferocity that made her head spin, and half a second later she followed right behind. Sensation imploding until all she could feel was the pulse between her legs. In her belly. In her heart. And Jonah’s heart, thundering beneath her ear as she rested her head on his chest.
As they both struggled to drag in breaths, Jonah laughed, and Avery joined him. She lifted her head to find something fleeting and warming lighting his eyes.
Before she could pin it down he shook his head, hitched his shorts into place, then slumped back on the floor of the boat and lifted his face to the sun. “You’re not the only one having a summer to remember, Miss Shaw.”
Avery kneeled down to kiss him, then stood and spun about the boat butt naked. While Jonah lifted onto one elbow to watch, appreciation and wonder playing about his face.
And Avery wondered where she’d been her whole life.
* * *
Jonah took his time heading back.
One hand on the wheel, the other resting on Avery’s lower back as she leant over the dash in her wild bikini top and short shorts. Sunlight flickering over her through the trees lining the marshy bank; her eyes otherwise cloaked in shadows from the brim of his ancient Akubra, her lush mouth tilted up at the corners.
It was so quiet out on the river, the scenery so rugged and raw they could
