Breakaway (13 page)

“Hey,” Jason said softly. “Open your eyes. The view is
awesome.”

She pressed her lips together, her skin crawling, stomach
jumping, but she opened her eyes.

“Are you afraid?” Jason asked, shifting closer to her.

“Um…yes. A little.”

He put his arm around her and tucked her close to him.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

She made a little choked noise. “Oh, no, not at all. We’re
just…how far off the ground?”

“About a hundred and fifty feet, I think,” he said calmly,
gazing around. “Look! Doesn’t the skyline look amazing?”

The sun was low in the sky and the buildings of downtown
Chicago all gleamed like tall, slender, silver cubes and cylinders.

“Yes,” she said softly. “It is beautiful.” She snuggled into
his warmth. The wind up here carried a crisp bite and her cheeks and nose began
to sting a bit.

She looked at Jason, his handsome cheekbones reddened from
the cold, eyes taking in the view, smiling. She clutched her bear in his Wolves
uniform to her and suddenly her throat tightened. God, she liked this guy. So
much.

He turned to look down at her, snuggled under his arm, and
his smile deepened. “See? It’s fine.”

They swung over the top and began to descend and her tummy
flipped over. “Mmm. Fine.”

He laughed. The yellow, red and blue canopy of the merry-go-round
grew larger as they lowered, and then they were swinging back up again. She
took in a deep breath.

“What’s that?” Jason pointed. She identified various
landmarks to him and by the time they slowed and stopped, she’d almost
forgotten she was nervous. At the very top, the gondola swaying gently, Jason
tipped her chin up with one gloved hand and kissed her.

His nose was cold brushing her cheek, but his mouth was warm
on hers, delicious and ardent. He drew back, rested his gloved hand on her
cheek and their eyes met and held, the world spread below them, and time came
to a halt. His dark eyes flashed, his lids lowered and they kissed again and
she pressed closer to him. He hauled her closer, up onto his lap and the
gondola swayed. Remi let out a little shriek, her stomach clutched and she dug
her fingers into his jacket. Jason laughed softly and they started moving again
and Remi grabbed tighter with a start, making him laugh again.

“Let’s go find some dinner,” he said after they’d
disembarked from the Ferris wheel. She wanted to fall to her knees and kiss the
ground, but instead held her bear tightly. “How about that Billy Goat Tavern?”

She smiled. “Touristy, but okay.”

“Come on, I’m new in town.”

They walked into the lively restaurant.

“What’s the biggest burger you have?” Jason asked the
server.

“That would be the triple hamburger.”

“Okay, I’ll have that.”

Remi grinned behind her menu. He could probably eat two, the
size he was. She ordered a hamburger. Jason sat her bear on the table, propping
him up against the wall, making her laugh again. God, she hadn’t laughed so
much in…okay, ever.

They’d just finished a dinner full of talk and laughter,
teasing and flirting, when three women appeared beside their table. “Jase
Heller!” one of them said with a big smile. “Can we get your autograph?”

“Uh…” Hell, he did not want to do this, but he was never
rude to the fans. “Sure.” He cast an apologetic glance across the table at
Remi.

“Here.” The woman dug in her purse and pulled out a pen. “I
don’t have anything for you to sign, so you can do it right here.” And she
pulled down her low-cut top so Jason could sign her chest, just above her left
breast.

He gulped and tightened his jaw as he tried to sign without
really touching her. It probably was no accident when she moved and her breast
brushed against his arm.

“I saw you play against the Bruins last week,” one of the
other women said, stepping up for her autograph. In the same place. “You got
two goals.”

“Um, yeah.” He signed again and turned to the third woman,
and when he’d finished signing her chest, she took the pen from him, took his
hand, turned it palm up and wrote a phone number on it. Jesus.

“I love watching you play,” she purred, making intense eye
contact, making her words sound dirty.

Jason swallowed, forced a smile and shot Remi a look. She
sat there, stone-faced, mouth tight, hands clasped around her drink. She lifted
one eyebrow at him.

The three women seemed in no hurry to leave and kept chatting
until he finally said, “Sorry, ladies, but my girlfriend and I are just
finishing dinner.”

The three women shot baleful looks at Remi, as if they hadn’t
even noticed her sitting there until that moment, and finally left.

“Sorry,” he muttered, reaching across the table for her
hand. “That never happens.”

“Really.”

She didn’t sound convinced.

“Well, it happens sometimes. I’m sorry, Remi.”

“Don’t apologize. It’s not your fault.” But she looked
pissed. “And I’m not your girlfriend.”

“I had to get rid of them somehow. Let’s go,” he said,
getting up from the table and holding out a hand to help her up. They emerged
from the restaurant to a flash bursting in front of their eyes.

Oh, no. Not again.

Chapter Eight

“It’s okay,” Jason said, turning her from the photographers.
He muttered under his breath. Jesus. What were they doing hanging around Navy
Pier, for God’s sake? He never would have anticipated they’d be there, looking
for someone to photograph. And Remi was already annoyed.

“I guess we’re done here,” he said. Damn. They’d been having
such a great day.

“Yeah. I guess.”

He shot her a sideways glance, walking down the sidewalk,
holding her hand, remembering the last time he’d tried to take her back to his
place. “Will you come home with me?”

She stopped. They faced each other. She looked so pretty
with that big scarf wrapped around her neck. “Will the paparazzi follow us
there?” she asked.

“I don’t know.” He glanced over his shoulder. They seemed to
have dispersed. “I don’t think so.”

“Will you wash that phone number off your hand?”

After a blink of his eyes, he burst out laughing. “Yes.”

She inhaled a long slow breath, then nodded and relief slid
through him. “Okay.”

The elevator pinged and the doors slid silently open. They
stepped in and he punched a button for his floor, then as the doors closed, he
lifted her against him, effortlessly, and kissed her.

If she’d been standing, her legs likely would have given
out, it was such a turn-on to be held aloft like that, against his chest, his
mouth hot and hungry on hers. His strength turned her on. His mouth turned her
on. His everything turned her on.

They kissed like that, wet, sliding, open-mouthed kisses
until the elevator opened onto his floor and he carried her down the carpeted
hall to his door. Only then did he gently lower her feet to the floor and she
leaned against the wall, panting, while he unlocked the door.

He shoved the door open and they practically fell into the
foyer, grabbing for each other, frantic, hot, hungry.

“It’s been so long,” he panted.

“I know.”

He unwrapped her scarf, shoved her jacket down over her
shoulders and she wrestled out of it as he got rid of his jacket, tossing it
into a pile on the floor. Then he picked her up again, this time straddling
him, and she wrapped her legs around his waist as he walked to the bedroom.

She caught a glimpse of his apartment—stunning and modern
with a wall of windows overlooking the glittering Chicago skyline, a couple of
pieces of black leather furniture and a big screen television—before it disappeared
from view as he strode into the bedroom. Dark. Shadowy.

He carried her over to the bed and stood there kissing her,
hands beneath her ass. She tightened her legs on him and kissed him back,
threading her fingers through his soft, dark hair.

Their mouths devoured each other over and over in hot hungry
kisses. She needed more. She arched against him, bumping her center into his
stomach. He groaned. He shifted her higher. She wrapped her arms around his
head while he nuzzled at her breast, but damn, there were too many clothes in
the way, her sweater and bra. She let go of his head and reached for the hem of
the sweater and he clutched her tighter, shifting his feet to balance better as
she straightened and tugged the sweater off over her head.

He made an appreciative noise in his throat as he looked
down at her chest. “Very nice.”

She remembered that he’d liked black lace, this one very
sheer and edged with velvet. Breathless, she looked down at his head as he bent
and pressed a hot kiss to her chest between the curves of her breasts. Her
heart thudded madly.

“So sweet,” he murmured. Then he tipped her back. She
squealed and clutched onto him tightly with both arms and legs and he laughed, holding
her suspended over the bed.

“Jason!”

He held her like that for a moment, just looking at her,
then dropped her to the bed. She gave a tiny bounce and he reached for the lamp
beside the bed, a warm glow spreading instantly around them.

He lifted one of her feet and tugged off the sheepskin-lined
boot, then did the other. Then his fingers went to the button and zipper of her
jeans. “Let’s get these off,” he said, and drew them down over her legs. “Oh
yeah, that’s pretty.” He gazed at her matching panties, sheer black lace and
velvet too, and she lay there clad in black lace and nothing else.

He laid his big palms on her thighs. She quivered at his
warm touch, her body heating under his attentive gaze as he studied her laying
there sideways on his bed.

Which was wide enough to sleep on sideways. The bed was
huge, but she supposed a man the size of Jason needed a king-size bed.

“Next time I’ll wear white lace,” she told him.

He grinned. “I like black, but you could wear anything and
it’d be hot.”

Her nipples tingled and tightened beneath the lace, her
breasts swelling and aching. Boldly, she slid a hand down her tummy and cupped
her pussy, hot and damp and pulsing.

“Damn.” His eyes darkened and he yanked his long-sleeved
T-shirt over his head. He quickly got rid of his clothes and fell to the bed
beside her, rolling her beneath him, mouth on her again, ravishing and warm and
delicious.

He kissed the side of her neck, sending sweet shivers over
her body, rolled again so she lay top of him and laid a firm tap on her butt.
The sting sent a wave of heat over her and her pussy wept.

She moaned again.

He patted her again with a sharp caress, one cheek then the
other.

She hid her hot face against him and his hands gentled on
her ass, stroking up and down, fingers trailing along the sensitive crease
where cheek met thigh. Then he pushed aside the narrow band of fabric that sat
over the crease between her cheeks and stroked there too, up then lower, where
he found her wet center.

“Remi, God. You’re so wet.” He stroked there with his broad
fingertips, over her pussy lips, between, then probing deeper inside her. She
felt the slickness, and muscles clenched around his fingers. Her clit quivered,
her breath suspended. “I love how wet you are. How hot you are.” And he
withdrew his fingers to lay several more stinging little slaps on her ass.

God, that just turned her body liquid, flames of pleasure
licking from his touch over her skin, burning her up. She’d never been with a
man who’d known she wanted that, needed that. Even last time, he’d been so
afraid of hurting her he hadn’t really let loose.

“I love that,” she gasped, and then he shocked her even more
by tangling his fingers into her hair and tugging her head up. The pull on her
scalp tingled and sharp and hot sensations sizzled from her head to the base of
her spine. “Oh, god.”

“That too?” He held her head and gazed into her eyes. She
looked deeply and saw what she needed to see—not hesitation or doubt, but
caring and a desire to please her.

“Yes,” she moaned. “That too.” She licked her lips. His
fingers tightened and he tugged her head back even further, arching her back so
her breasts thrust out. He lifted up—abs of steel, that man—and kissed each
curve, then licked and sucked gently on her sensitive flesh. “Like the black
lace,” he muttered, letting go of her hair to reach for the clasp of her bra. “But
I wanna see your nipples. Want to taste them.” He flicked it open and she sat
up, straddling his hips, and let it fall off her shoulders. She sat there,
fingertips on those eight-pack abs. His gaze wandered over her, eyes warm with
admiration. Her breasts tightened, nipples throbbing, aching to be touched.

And then he did, cupping them, brushing his thumbs across
the tight tips, and she let her head fall back, let her breasts fill his palms.
Ripples of exquisite pleasure stroked over her, centering between her legs.

“So pretty,” he murmured, her sensitive nipples leaping to
his touch, needing more. Again as if he knew her body, he grasped them between
thumb and forefinger and gave a firm nip.

She cried out, arched more, flames shooting from breast to
womb, and he did it again and again until her nipples were hot points of
sensation. “Oh, Remi.”

His hands went to her waist and he lifted her—actually
lifted her—off him, his big hands spanning her narrow hips. He set her on the
bed, then moved over her, dragging her panties down over her thighs. She bent
her legs so he could pull them off over calves, then feet, then tossed the
panties behind him.

Jason stroked his hands down over her calves, her ankles,
her feet, sending warm shivers over her, then back up and between her knees and
he parted her legs. He kneeled before her and she bit her lip as she studied
him through heavy-lidded eyes. His torso was sculpted of gleaming bronze skin
and hard muscles, broad rounded muscles over his shoulders, slabs of muscles on
his chest and ripped abs. Only a dusting of hair darkened between his pecs and
arrowed down toward the thick nest of hair between his legs, where his cock
jutted, enormous, dark and beautiful.