It Takes Two (27 page)

“Absolutely. I’m not sure why people haven’t discovered how great sex can be in a bed.”

She giggled at that and cuddled in closer to him. “We’ve done it in a bed before.”

“I seem to remember
two
dildos and some mango motion lotion one time,” he said.

She kind of liked the motion lotion and had definitely liked the dildos, but still,
this
bed thing was the favorite.

“And then there were the three or four times when we started on the bed but ended up on the floor,” she said.

“And the time we played that sexy board game.”

She smiled at the memories. They were hot but, yeah, they’d done fine with just a bed.

And a pair of handcuffs. She turned to her back. “So that was vanilla?”

He grinned. “Let’s call it the root beer float.”

She laughed. “And what about the handcuffs? That’s actually a little kinky, right?”

He thought about that. “Okay, we added a twisty straw to the float this time.”

She put her hand against his cheek. “This was…amazing. Thank you.”

He captured her wrist and pressed a kiss to her palm. “My pleasure. It was for me too, you know.”

She nodded. She did understand that. This had been good for them.

She grinned at that thought. Yep. Sex with Shane was good for her. Like taking her daily vitamins.

“You’re not too sore?” he asked, running his hand over her hip.

“I’m fine,” she told him, moving to kiss him.

He kissed her sweetly, then sighed. “I guess I better check the phone call.”

“I’m going to shower.”

Chapter Ten

Shane didn’t recognize the number of the missed call, but he wasn’t surprised when the person on the other end answered, “Police department,” when he returned the call.

“This is Shane Kelley.”

“Hold please.”

A moment later he heard, “Officer Kelley.”

He recognized the voice of Kyle Henson. “Officer Henson.”

“I wanted to let you and Ms. Dixon know that we were able to get a hold of Big Time and they verified everything. Someone is coming to retrieve the pendant. You’re free to go. Thank you for staying in town until we could clear things up.”

“Thank you. I appreciate the call.”

They disconnected and Shane shoved his phone into his pocket and looked around the room. They hadn’t gotten as far as unpacking. Isabelle had pulled a few things from her bag for her shower, but otherwise they could just zip up and head out.

He heard the shower stop and thought about going in to help her dry off, but he held back. A month ago—hell a week ago—he would have done exactly that. They would have had hot sex on the bathroom counter or on the floor or back in the shower—or all of the above. But now… He ran a hand over the back of his neck and looked at the bed. Now things were different.

Shane felt a tickle of unease and scowled. His first reaction was that he didn’t want to have to hold back and analyze every urge he had for whether or not it was something that would work or be good for Isabelle. And it wasn’t just sex—it was how late they stayed out and what they did when they were out, it was where they went to dinner and what they bought grocery shopping. It was everything. His impulses and whims, his habit of doing what felt good in the moment would now need to be examined each time. It was going to be a big shift.

He looked at the door to the bathroom. It was Isabelle. He was a selfish ass if he wasn’t willing to give up a few things here and there to be with the woman he claimed to love.

He looked at the bed.

That
certainly wasn’t all bad. He hated to give up some of his favorite positions, to be sure. It would be hard for him to hold back some of his cravings for hard, fast, do-it-anywhere sex. He would miss being able to flip her over, spread her out and go at it. But he loved that she’d let him handcuff her. Sure she’d complained, but if she hadn’t wanted it—
really
hadn’t wanted it—she would have let him know and he would have released her.

Instead she’d trusted him.

He felt his chest get a little tight. This was big. He’d needed her to know that he could take care of her, but
he
had needed to know it too.

So he needed to take things down a notch or two.

He could do that.

Isabelle opened the bathroom door, wrapped only in a towel. When she saw him her lips stretched into a huge, bright grin.

His chest got tighter. He had to do this or he was going to lose her.

“We’re free to go,” he told her, coming up off of the windowsill.

“Yeah?” she asked, bending over to rummage in her bag.

Shane watched, curling his hands into fists. He couldn’t go over there, push the towel out of the way and do her from behind. She’d said hands and knees were okay, but she was probably a little sore, considering they hadn’t even been apart for twenty minutes, and maybe standing up wasn’t the same as hands and knees.

He had a lot to learn.

“Yeah, they apparently got in touch with someone at Big Time and now we’re free to leave.”

Her towel slipped slightly, exposing the upper curve of one breast, and Shane breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth. Up against the wall would probably be uncomfortable for her and again, it hadn’t been very long since he’d stretched her out.

He hadn’t ever realized how horny he was around her.

Maybe it was the dieter’s dilemma he heard girls talking about—you didn’t crave something as intensely as when it was off limits.

Yeah, that’s what this was—he was going on a sex-with-Isabelle diet. He wasn’t giving it up entirely, just cutting back.

He sighed. Everyone knew diets sucked.

“Should we go on to the cabin tonight then?” she asked, heading back into the bathroom to—hopefully—get dressed.

It was after eight at night, but he was thinking that staying here in the motel room wasn’t a great idea. It was an hour yet to the cabin, but he could drag that out. Maybe by the time they actually got there, she’d be too tired and they could go to bed. To sleep. Then they could deal with everything in the morning.

“Yeah, might as well.” He paced across the room, determined
not
to think about her dropping that towel and shimmying into her panties and bra again. “Do you want to eat something here before we leave town or do you want to grab something on the road?”

And there was another thing he was going to have to think through—where should they stop for food? Was any burger joint along the interstate okay? He wished he could ask her, but at this point—six chapters into
Living and Loving with Fibromyalgia
—he knew more about it than she did. Which frustrated the crap out of him, but he understood that she needed to figure this out her own way, in her own time.

He couldn’t do it for her. He wanted to. He definitely wanted to. He was a one-hundred-and-ten-percent kind of guy. Once he started, he didn’t stop until a project was done. If someone asked him to pick up a case of beer for a party, he brought three. If he thought a bouquet of balloons would cheer someone up, he’d send balloons via singing-telegram clown. It stood to reason then that if he finally knew everything he needed to know about Isabelle and their relationship, then he’d jump in and work on it full-throttle. He’d read six chapters in the book in a few hours. He could take in a few books in a couple of days.

And in that moment, it hit him.

To make this work they had to figure out how to fit what they both needed with what they both wanted.

They
both
needed to figure out how to fit what they both needed with what they both wanted.

Sure, he could read a few books. He could read a thousand books. But Isabelle also needed to read a thousand books. Or even one book. And so far that wasn’t happening.

He needed to know that she would make that happen. To be with him.

“Yes, let’s eat,” she said enthusiastically, buttoning her last button as she came back into the room.

God she was beautiful. She was sexy and funny and sweet and confident and if she chose to take this thing by the throat she’d kick its ass and they could live happily ever after.

If she wanted to.

He sure as hell hoped she wanted to.

He cleared his throat so he didn’t sound like he was about to swear or beg or cry. “Sounds good.” They’d find a place with salads. Until he could read more, he’d err on the side of healthy. No one shouldn’t eat salads. At least, he was pretty sure that was true.

Shane loaded their stuff up and checked them out. Then they headed farther into town to a basic family restaurant after Isabelle said she didn’t care where they went or what they ate. That wasn’t especially helpful, but Shane resisted pointing that out. They ate without much talking, both hungry and starting to feel the effects of a day-long road trip with the rollercoaster of excitement and emotions.

Finally, Isabelle put her fork down and looked at him across the table. “Are you still leaving tomorrow?”

Ah, the question he’d been avoiding even asking himself.

Lying beside her in the hotel room, he’d thought some things had shifted. He could be a part of this now, knowing everything, helping her adjust and learning right along next to her. But now, away from her naked body and a soft horizontal surface, he admitted that he was still edgy. Because he was afraid the hotel room had maybe made things worse.

He’d had to handcuff her. If he hadn’t, she would have taken over with—god knew what. She was always surprising him with the sexy and creative stuff she came up with. But there was no way she would have just laid there and let him pleasure her like that. She wouldn’t have answered all his questions, telling him where and when it hurt. He still wouldn’t know that it was painful when she was on top and he took over the rhythm.

And she would have kept doing it. She would have kept climbing up and letting him do what he wanted to do.

Sex wasn’t everything in a relationship, but in theirs it was turning out to be very representative of nearly everything else.

He didn’t want to have to handcuff her—literally or metaphorically—to get her to open up about what was going on with her and how she was feeling and what he could do to help her. He didn’t want everything to be about her making him happy. He wanted it to be a two-way street.

Shane leaned in and looked her directly in the eyes. “I want you so bad right now.”

Her eyes widened and her lips parted.

“I want you to go into the ladies room and take your panties off. I’ll be there in two minutes. I want you up on that counter, legs spread when I get there.”

She glanced in the direction of the bathroom. “Um.” She looked back at him. He could see that her breathing had changed slightly and her cheeks were flushed. “Okay.” She started to slide out of the booth.

He loved that he could turn her on so easily. He loved that she
wanted
to do what he’d suggested. He hated that she shouldn’t do it and he hated that she wouldn’t tell him that and he
hated
that he had to think twice about everything now.

“Dammit, Isabelle.”

She paused on the edge of the booth bench. “What?”

“We can’t have sex on the bathroom counter.”

She looked around the restaurant. “Why not?”

“Hard, cold, stretching in awkward positions.”

Her shoulders slumped and she slid back into the booth. “I guess.”

“And
you
need to be the one saying no.”

She frowned at him. “But I
want
to have sex on the bathroom counter.”

“Me too.” He did. The sex-diet-plan was already sucking a little bit.

“I don’t like saying no to you.”

He nodded. “Yeah, I know.”

“Why do you say it like that? You want me to say no?”

“You need to say no to me.” He sighed. This was all fucking confusing as hell. “You need to be able to say no to me without worrying that I’ll be mad or that it will mess things up.”

She tipped her head to the side, watching him. “Are you sure you won’t be mad and that it won’t mess anything up?”

He wanted honesty from her. He had to give it back. “I don’t know. People don’t say no to me very often.”

She couldn’t argue with that. He had a long track record with a lot of people she knew personally. Her brother had a drunk-and-disorderly charge on his record because he hadn’t said no to Shane.

“I’ve noticed,” she said. “It’s really easy to say yes to you. Fun too. There aren’t a lot of reasons to say no.”

“Except that I need to calm the hell down sometimes. And think about consequences. And consider other people.”

Her eyebrows climbed. “You don’t do the things you do because you’re selfish, Shane.”

“You sure about that?”

“You do most of what you do because it gives the people around you a good time.”

Yeah, that’s why he thought he did the things he did. But it was a good time for him too. “I still think you need to feel able to say no to me.”