Know Your Heart: A New Zealand Enemies to Lovers Romance (Far North Series Book 2) (20 page)

Fleeting embarrassment swept over her as his knuckle parted her folds and slid easily through her slick arousal. Instinct closed her thighs, immobilizing his hand.

“Let me touch you, Sav. Your body’s begging me to touch you,” he said.

And it was. Crying out, demanding, pleading for his touch—for the completion she so desperately needed. Her legs fell open, and his eyes hooded while he continued to stroke her wet and swollen flesh. He circled her clit, and she whimpered, thrusting herself against his palm. So he dipped two fingers inside her, and a cry slipped past her lips. Not even the flutter of wings as a small bird exploded from a nearby tree tempered the hot twinge of pleasure deep in her core. Driving her to higher peaks, his mouth returned to her breast to lick and suck in time with his steady thrusts. She bore down on his fingers and fisted the towel beneath her until she thought the fabric would tear.

So close, so damn close.

“Glen…”

His name anchored her, but before she could ask him to wait, to tell him how desperate she was to touch him in return, an explosive climax rushed through her. Flying high, flying fast, flying free.

The fall to reality felt like plummeting off a cliff, except instead of a rocky landing, strong arms cradled her close, and a warm mouth coaxed hers into more drugging kisses. It was pointless fighting him; she had the strength of a day old kitten.

She slid her fingers into his thick hair and managed to pull his mouth away.

“I need you. Please.” Her voice, husky with her heartbeat still pounding through it, garnered another wicked smile as he gazed down at her. “And why aren’t you naked already?”

“Just taking care of business, ma’am,” he drawled in possibly the worst cowboy accent, ever.

Definitely the worst, she mused, as he rolled off her and stood. Yet her heart jolted once in a seismic shift as she realized the aftershocks jittering through her body weren’t just from an incredible orgasm. Nor from the sight of his beautiful male body, naked once he’d removed his shorts, his erection straining toward her. It wasn’t even knowing that in moments he’d be deep inside her, a connection that would shatter the last of her resistance. The not-all-unpleasant shivers told her that when Glen made love to her, each and every mask she wore to hide the real Savannah would become transparent.

He dug into the pocket of his shorts and pulled out a small foil packet. “You’re thinking so hard, I can hear wheels grinding.”

She swallowed, propping herself onto her elbows and allowing the pleasure of studying the length of him to distract her from her thoughts. “Maybe it’s because you’re taking forever to suit up.”

The corners of his eyes crinkled, and he ripped open the little packet as he knelt beside her. “If making love to you on a rock wasn’t going to be so uncomfortable, I’d show you just how long I could make you suffer.”

Glen stretched out beside her on the towel. “Come here.”

He traced a finger over her breast, circling the nipple until she squirmed into his side. He tugged her on top of him, her legs sliding over his still-damp skin to straddle his hips. The hard wedge of him pressed into her swollen flesh and she gasped, rocking herself along his length. He groaned, the muscles in his neck standing out in stark relief.

Unable to resist, Sav bent and licked a collection of water droplets pooled in his collarbone. He tasted deliciously of sun-warmed male and the faintest hint of earthy minerals from the river water. Close enough to his throat to hear his sharp inhale, she smiled. She straightened and reached behind her, raising her hips and settling him into position.

Their gazes locked, held fast and caught fire as she lowered herself onto him. He filled and stretched her, foreign to her body and yet so welcome, so perfect, all she could do was hiss out a slow breath. Neither one moved…or breathed. A light breeze skimmed over her shoulders, ruffling her hair. Somewhere in the distance, Java’s deep bark rolled down the valley, and a
tui
trilled its musical song from a nearby tree branch.

Glen didn’t need to speak for her to read him. Years of studying and mimicking expressions in her work told her everything. He wanted her desperately. He cared about making it good for her. He relinquished control because he somehow knew she needed it. Only she didn’t know who was really in control. She was as much ensnared in his power as he was in hers.

His hands smoothed up her legs and gripped her waist. She tightened her internal muscles, and he squeezed his eyes shut.

“You’ll be glad to know”—his Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed then opened his eyes—“that you’re killing me here.”

She rose a few inches, delighting in the sensual friction. Then sank down. Squeezed him tight again.

He moaned, fingers digging into her flesh.

“And you call me dramatic.” She moved on him again.

And again—the bliss she felt reflected on his beautiful face. His hands slipped off her waist and slid between her thighs, touching where they were joined, his knuckle pressed firmly to her clit and making her squirm.

She rode him faster, control—both given and taken—forgotten. There was only Glen, guiding her body on his, his gaze never leaving hers as she drove them mercilessly toward the edge. They would fall, they would both fall, because together they flew too high. Her thigh muscles trembled with the strain, her knees aching from the hard rock. Her body slowed, but he smiled, tugging on her arms and pulling her onto his chest.

“I’ve got you.” He thrust up his hips, driving into her from an angle that shot a bolt of pure sensation deep inside.

He arched his neck, meeting her mouth with a demanding kiss as he continued thrusting. His abs shifted and strained under her belly. He pinned her hips with his hands and drove into her, over and over, until she cried out, the climax sucking her under with whirlpool force. Through the waves, he growled out her name, shudders raking through his body as he followed her down into the depths.

***

Acting as Sav’s pillow was the gentlemanly thing to do.

Glen lay close to dying after the most insanely amazing sex ever, on the world’s most insanely uncomfortable surface. He rolled his head to check if his sex-goddess had regained consciousness. She groaned as his body shifted beneath her, then he groaned as his tailbone pressed against the solid resistance of a million years of evolution.

Ouch. But so totally worth it.

“Are you smiling?” Sav’s face rested somewhere in the region of his right armpit, so her words came out muffled.

“Hell, yeah.” He re-tightened his grip on her peachy bottom. “I’m going to be smiling like an idiot for the rest of the afternoon.”

If not the rest of the week.

If not always.

That sobered him up and went so far as to kill the stirring in his groin currently contemplating round two. “Always” and “Savannah” didn’t belong in the same sentence. They didn’t have an always; they had a now-and-for-the-next-few-weeks.

Small, sharp teeth sank into his biceps. “Stop fidgeting. I’m trying to decide whether I need a defibrillator.”

Warmth curled through him, washing over any irritating thoughts of tomorrow with the prospect of more loving today.

“So good it stopped your heart, huh?” He kissed her hair, the only part of her his lips could reach since her face was still buried against his skin. “You’re welcome.”

“Cocky bastard,” she said and bit him again.

He laughed, rolling her off him. He climbed to his feet, looking down at her as she lay back on the white towel, long-limbed and stretching like a cat in the sun. God, she wasn’t the only one who needed a defibrillator.

“Sav…”

She blinked up at him, her face open, her gaze filled with sleepy satisfaction and…affection.

Words jammed in his throat. What exactly had he planned to say? The classic post-coital faux pas of
I love you
?

Glen mustered a cheeky grin and held out a hand. She took it, and he pulled her upright, tugging her enough off balance that her warm body stumbled into his, forcing her to wrap her arms around his waist.

“What were you going to say?” She snuggled into him, soft breasts smooshing into his chest.

Ahhh…he had nothing.

No game, no convenient lie to convince her she didn’t hold his heart in one of her manicured hands. He would’ve sucked big time had he chosen criminal law. Or possibly it was only around Savannah that his brain stopped functioning at full capacity.

“Glen?”

She’d pulled back to look at him, her brow crinkled in concern. Concern that would at any moment turn to suspicion, and suspicion to pitied understanding.

Get that sappy expression off your face
, he ordered himself.
Divert her attention! Do something
!

He picked Savannah up and jumped into the pool.

They surfaced in a tangle of splashing limbs, with Savannah’s hair tangled over her face. She shoved it off with one hand and smacked his shoulder with the other.

“I thought we needed cooling off,” he said.

“Glen Cooper, you are a dead man.”

She pounced, but he was ready, catching her in his arms and taking them both under the cool green water again. He let her wriggling body go and swam around her, copping a view that would’ve dropped him on his ass if he wasn’t buoyed by water already. He pinched her bottom before gliding underwater to the other side of the pool. When he surfaced, she faced him with a determined glint in her eyes.

He laughed. “Did an eel nibble on you, baby?”

She shook her head, and her mock fierceness slipped. “This has to be the weirdest after-sex kink I’ve ever heard of.”

“It’s foreplay.”

“Oh, you are
so
not getting any more today.”

“How about tonight?”

When she grunted and rolled her eyes, he swam back to her.

“What if I told you you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

She flicked water at him, her lip curling. “Seriously? Is that the best you can do? You’ll tell me I look like a mermaid next.”

He chuckled and stood in front of her, water swirling around his hardening cock. So much for the river cooling him off.

“I never understood the fascination with mermaids. Sure, they have amazing racks”—he wriggled his eyebrows at Sav’s breasts floating sweetly just under the surface—“but far too many scales. And their only defense is a wet tail slap and singing. They’re weak.” He braced his hands on the sun-warmed rock either side of her shoulders. “But you…there’s nothing weak in you. And anyone who’s ever thought otherwise doesn’t know shit. You’re a princess—a warrior princess,” he clarified as her eyes narrowed. “Dressed in black leather with a bad-ass sword and the wind blowing in your hair.”

Her gaze softened, and she slid cool hands up his chest to cup his face. “I like that you’re thinking about me in black leather.”

He dropped his hands to her waist and hauled her flush against him, causing little eddies of water to slosh around them.

“I think about you in your yellow dress, in your running clothes, even in those striped gumboots.” He pressed his forehead to hers and closed his eyes. “I also think about you like this.”

“Naked?”

He heard the smile in her voice and smiled back, keeping his eyes shut still.

“Yeah. Guess I can’t stop thinking about you, period.”

“That’s mutual.” She wrapped around his body like waterweed, grinding her softness against him. “So let me show you some things mermaids can’t do.”

Chapter 12

A week after their impromptu skinny dip at the river, Glen alternately felt as if he’d won the lottery, and then as if he’d had his ass handed to him after a brutal fencing session.

Living with Savannah would never be easy, but it sure was
fun
. She challenged him on everything. Sav offered a unique perspective on social, environmental, and spiritual issues that he’d never considered. She lit up the room just hanging out with him and Tom, and he’d never been so, damn, happy.

But the thing that blew his mind? He’d never found it so easy to get thousands of words onto the page every day. It was as if she’d neutered his SEAL-Ninja and taken its place as his muse. Except he figured he probably wasn’t meant to dream about making crazy-hot love to his muse at every opportunity.

He was completely, utterly, hooked on the woman.

Case in point
. Glen shut down his laptop and decided to check out what Savannah and the kids were up to in the barn. He’d kept a low profile the two times Lauren arrived this week with a car-load of five-to-twelve-year-olds ready to be Tom’s audience for a few hours. Tom’s groupies, as Sav teased him. Only somehow the sessions turned into an informal confidence-building lesson for
all
the kids—with Sav as the teacher.

Drew, of course, came with his mum as the youngest. Glen also spotted eight-year-old Sophie, Lauren’s niece, and Sophie’s nine-year-old cousin, Riki. The other gap-toothed, flip-flop wearing, excitable bunch…? He had no clue. The hell of it was, going by Sav’s flushed cheeks and bright eyes at the end of each session, she was having as much fun as the children.

Glen followed the path down to the open barn doors. He paused at the entrance, opposite Nate lounging on a wooden plank placed on two concrete blocks. Glen had been forced to move the bench, so the kids had somewhere to sit with their juice boxes instead of wandering around his deck and waving at him through the window.

He sat next to Nate and slanted him a glance, before turning his gaze inside the barn. The group of ten kids sat in a semi-circle on the floor around Savannah. She stood, a queen resplendent in front of her subjects, her voice spilling rich and pure into the silence. Not one child moved while she spoke, caught up, as he soon was, in the emotion of her words. Most of them were too young to understand Shakespeare’s tale of two star-crossed lovers, but each of them understood Juliet’s grief and yearning.

She finished her monologue and swept her arms wide in a curtsying bow. Applause exploded from her little audience, as did whoops and whistles.

Savannah rose from her curtsy and cupped a hand behind her ear. “And how should we finish up?”

“Dance party!” shouted the kids.

“And what’s the best way to kick our nerves to the curb?” She cocked her finger at Tom. “Tom’ll answer this one, guys.”

Tom grimaced like Savannah had jabbed him with a fork, but his eyes shone with the same adoration as the other kids. “Dance party.”

“Hit it, Sophie.”

The beaming, dark-eyed Sophie ran to the workbench and cranked up the music. A thumping beat blasted out of the speakers. Glen couldn’t have named the song if his life depended on it, but Savannah captivated him. The kids crowded around her in a mini mosh-pit, jumping, yelling, laughing up at her with pure joy. Even Tom’s normal, teenage self-consciousness at being seriously uncool had disappeared, and he bounced in the thick of it, waving his arms around.

And Savannah…hair flying, hips shaking, and spinning the shyer kids in a twirl. She lit up the barn like a super-nova.

Nate nudged Glen’s arm. “She’s good with them, isn’t she?”

Glen still couldn’t drag his gaze from Savannah, who’d scooped up Drew and pretended to Tango with him across the floor.

“She is. The kids’ll never forget this.”

“No.” A thoughtful pause from beside him. “Neither will you, I suspect. Does she know you’re in love with her?” Nate asked in a conversational tone.

That captured Glen’s attention big time. He turned, ready to deny everything, but Nate studied him with his steady, see-all eyes.

Glen sighed, scratching a hand down his jaw. He’d forgotten to shave—again. Forgotten a lot of things, apparently, the most important being,
don’t fall in love with Savannah
. “No. She doesn’t know.”

The music had changed to an old
Journey
hit, and now the kids jumped in unison, shouting, “Don’t stop, believing,” loud enough to blast the roof off.

“You don’t think she feels the same?”

Glen shot Nate an
are you really that thick
look. “I haven’t asked her, if that’s what you’re getting at. Seems a little premature, when I’ve only known her for a few weeks.”

“You’ve known her a lot longer than that.”

“Yeah, well.” He wouldn’t admit he’d probably been in love with Savannah since the first time he’d seen her all those years ago. “I have no idea what she’s thinking half the time. She’s an actress, and a bloody good one, as we’ve just seen.” Glen waved a hand toward the barn.

“Then ask yourself if you’ve seen the real Sav behind the actress. I’ve faith that you’re not as stupid as you look. And I’ll tell you one thing”—Nate nailed Glen with a stare—“her feelings for you won’t be an act, so tread carefully.”

Glen should’ve been pissed that Nate assumed he’d hurt Sav, but instead, his heartbeat quickened. “Think she has feelings for me?”

Nate pulled a face and bumped Glen’s arm, nearly knocking him off the bench. “What are we? Still in high school? Ask her yourself, man.”

***

Savannah twirled with Drew in her arms, joining in with the boy’s contagious giggles.

She lowered him to the floor, groaning. “Next time you can pick me up for a dance, okay?”

“Or Daddy could,” said Drew. “He’s outside with Glen.”

Savannah’s gaze shot to the open door and the shadows beyond. Sure enough, Nate and Glen sat on the bench, their heads angled together in deep discussion.

“I think they should join the dance party, don’t you?” She took Drew’s hand. “Let’s go and make your dad and Glen get their groove on.”

“Yeah!” Drew towed them both across the floor.

Nate swiveled toward her, moments later followed by Glen. Arrogant to assume they’d been talking about her? One look at Glen’s laser-like focus and the wry twist of his mouth told her she was right.

Drew let go of her hand and pounced. “Come on, Daddy!” He pounded Nate’s knee with a little fist. “You can dance with me, and Glen can dance with Savannah.”

Drew shot a glance over his shoulder, and wouldn’t you know it? The little imp had a gleam in his eyes.
Huh
. Savannah fisted her hands on her hips. Their feelings for each other were that obvious that even a five-year-old had spotted her
I’m-crushing-on-Glen
vibes?

And if Drew could spot it… Nate gave her a sleepy-smug smile. Yeah, Big Cousin was no fool, either.

“How about it, Glen?” She held out a hand. “Gonna show me more of your fancy footwork?”

He slipped his hand in hers, his big palm almost engulfing her smaller hand, the quick stroke of his finger along her inner wrist shooting sparks through her tinder-dry libido.

“I’m not much of a dancer,” he said.

Nate choked out a cough sounding suspiciously like “bollocks”.

“Don’t believe him,” Nate said. “Mr. Smooth, here, puts the rest of us left-to-right shufflers to shame.”

Savannah arched a brow at Glen. “Really?”

He walked with her into the barn. “My mother made Jamie and me take dance lessons for a couple of months before the school ball.” He pulled a face, but his eyes glittered as he bent close to her ear. “She said women love a man leading them on the dance floor. She wasn’t wrong.”

A shiver worked its way down her spine as his warm breath brushed her throat. “I’ll try to resist sexing you up against the wall while we have an underage audience, then.”

He pulled back, delivering a wicked grin she felt to the soles of her sneakers, then led her into the barn’s center.

Someone changed the music from a fast beat to a country one.

Glen scrunched up his face. “You actually do like to listen to this stuff? You weren’t just messing with my head?”

She poked his flat stomach. “It’s not that bad.”

“It really is,” he said but extended his arms to her.

She stepped into them, and as her palm connected with his, her skin tightened everywhere with delicious tingles. His touch on her waist was light, because he didn’t need brute strength for her to relinquish control. Oh no, Glen didn’t need much at all to melt her into a gooey mass of
do-me
hormones. His mum had been right about that.

A wolf whistle cut through the music, then one of the older kids, who sounded a lot like Tom, yelled, “Old school.”

“Old school, huh?” Glen said. “Watch and learn, kiddies.”

Blue eyes locked with hers, the hard edge of his grin transforming to silky seduction. “You ready to educate these little barbarians?”

“In a dance-off?” She tried to pull her hand from his, but he wouldn’t allow it. “I haven’t got moves like yours.”

“Just follow my lead, angel.”

His words triggered little land-mines of memories deep in her subconscious. She had a two beat window to gawk at him before he spun her out and back again, somehow managing to keep her from falling on her butt. Somehow managing to make her laugh while she stumbled, trying to keep up with his direction changes. The song ended, and Glen dipped her over his arm in a dramatic flourish, to the whoops of their audience.

She stared into his face, at the mussed hair tumbling over his forehead and the flush of color in his cheeks from the effort of her uncoordinated dance moves. Her heart thudded painfully fast, sprinting for Olympic gold. Twice she tried to speak and couldn’t. The knowledge rose in her, hot enough to burn her words to ashes.

“It was you that night.”

Faint frown lines appeared on his brow. She didn’t need to clarify which night.

“Yeah.”

He brought her upright and let go. She desperately wanted to fire a hundred different questions at him, but a small group of chattering kids, led by Sophie, inserted themselves between her and Glen.

“Later,” he said.

Glen met her gaze over the crowd, and emotions roiled through her like the approach of another spring storm.

***

After dinner, Savannah asked Glen to accompany her on a run.

Damp mist closed in on them as they set off down the driveway, their footsteps muffled by the trees on either side.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she puffed as they turned onto the road. “You had the perfect humiliating evidence to throw in my face.”

Even now, her flushed cheeks couldn’t solely be attributed to exercise. She’d acted like a brat that night, wild and reckless, hurt and anger feeding the blazing fire inside. The next morning, she’d woken with a big brass band playing their greatest hits inside her head. Beside her bed were piles of cigarette-smoke stinky clothes—tinged with the acidic remains of vomit. She’d staggered to the bathroom and discovered finger-shaped bruises on her wrists and arms. Hadn’t that been a
holy-shit-what-happened
moment?

“You didn’t remember me.” Glen’s gaze remained on the road. “The humiliation was all mine.”

They ran in silence for another few minutes, their ragged breathing settling into a similar rhythm. Passing the lights through the trees belonging to Nate and Lauren’s house, Glen slowed his gait to a brisk walk.

“What do you remember?” He tugged up the hem of his shirt and wiped his forehead.

Savannah couldn’t help but sneak an appreciative peek at the play of muscles across his bare stomach. She’d rather ogle Glen than take an unwelcome trip back into her past. But she shook her head and glanced away. If nothing else, Glen deserved an explanation for her behavior that night.

She sucked in a few deep breaths, hoping to steady her voice.

“It was my last night performing as Eliza. I remember creeping onto the school auditorium stage and peeking through the curtains to the first row, seat 12A. I’d left the ticket at the front desk, just in case my dad had a change of heart and caught a later flight.”

“He was going to come?”

“I made him promise when I stayed with him earlier in the year during a seventeen-year-old’s worst school holidays, ever.”

“Worse than what I’m subjecting Tom to?” He offered an encouraging smile.

“Oh, yeah. I thought I was only a built-in baby-sitter for my two half-sisters—Brianna, age three, and Lucy, still a baby. Dad taking me shopping on Oxford Street, or his new wife, Rachel, paying for mani-pedis, barely wiped the scowl off my face.”

A sigh shuddered out of her. Viewing those two weeks through adult eyes, she could admit her dad had done the best he could under the circumstances. She’d been awkward and stiff, her former position in her father’s affection usurped by his two little girls. His newer model little stars. His new
little divas
.