The Sweetest Thing (11 page)

“What?” he whispered when she went still.

“You…” Tara had an image of him making love to her all those years ago, how he’d taken the time to learn how
to pleasure her. She’d always loved having the undersides of her breasts kissed.

And he’d remembered. He remembered after all this time how she preferred to be touched.

“I what, Tara?”

“You remember me.”

“Vividly.”

Tara sat up and helped him shove his Levi’s off. His skin was warm, and he engulfed her senses, making her sigh into his next
kiss. She sighed again when he rolled her beneath him, kissing and nipping his way down her body until he was at the apex
of her thighs. Holding them open with his big hands, he smiled. “My favorite part,” he said, and then dipped his head and
proved it.

He proved it until she was helplessly shuddering and panting for air. “In me,” she whispered, pulling him up. “Right now.”

She was rewarded with a full-wattage smile as he tore open a condom, rolled it on, and slowly slid inside her, their twin
gasps of pleasure echoing around them.

“God, Tara.” His voice was so low as to be nearly inaudible. “It’s been so long.” He pulled out slightly, then flexed his
hips and thrust back in. “So good.”

The sensation of being filled by him stole her breath. She tried to rock her hips against him but his body was like steel
and he had his own pace—which was set to drive-her-out-of-her-mind slow. There was no rushing him. Ever. She knew this about
him but still her hands roamed over his smooth, muscular body, urging, coaxing, demanding. When that didn’t work, she tugged
him down and bit his lower lip.

With a growl low in his throat, he finally set an agonizingly measured rhythm, his hips moving in a delicious circle, making
her moan with every thrust. But he didn’t speed up, even when her fingernails dug into his back and she whispered a desperate
“please,” arching up and bending her legs, angling him deeper within her.

“Oh, Christ.” He dipped his head to kiss her. “Christ, that’s good.”

“Then go faster!”

“Not yet.”

“Dammit—”

“Let go for me, Tara.” He cupped her face. “Let someone else have the control for a little bit.”

No, she wasn’t good at that. “But—”

“No buts.” Ford tangled his fingers in her hair and made sure she shut up by kissing her thoroughly, his tongue sliding against
hers.

Probably if anyone else had tried this, they’d have ended up walking funny tomorrow, but when Ford kissed her, she always
lost track of her senses, not to mention the time and place. Every. Single. Time. She lost track of
everything
as he moved within her, bringing it all to a slow build that started low in her body and spread.

It took all she had to keep her eyes open and on his. Normally, she needed to close her eyes to concentrate, but with Ford,
concentration wasn’t necessary. He took her where she needed to go with seemingly no effort at all, and she didn’t want to
miss a single second of it. Even when her eyes were beginning to flutter shut on their own, she forced them open, unwilling
to tear her gaze off his face, not wanting to miss the pure pleasure etched on his features.

Pleasure she was giving him. It was seductive, erotic, and she was burning with need, her entire body throbbing with it.

“Tara,” he said, voice rough and thick with desire. “Now.”

With nothing more than the demand, he sent her skittering right over the edge. A low, keening cry tore from her throat that
she couldn’t have held back to save her own life.

She’d given him control after all, she thought dazedly. And as she burst, pulsing hard around him, he pressed himself deeper,
then deeper still, coming with a raw, rough, very male sound of gratification as he followed her over.

Ford was still buried deep inside Tara’s gorgeous body when they heard the front door of the cottage open and then shut.

“Tara?” a male voice called out, one that had Tara jerking beneath Ford.

“No,” she whispered, then shoved Ford off of her and sat up, the sheet clutched to her chest, her eyes wide and horrified.
“It can’t be.”

“Who is it?” Ford asked, frowning.

“Tara? You here?”

Galvanized into action, Tara leapt out of the bed and started yanking on her clothes. “Give me a minute!” she yelled. “I’m
coming.”

“Yeah, you did,” Ford murmured. He had the nail marks on his ass to prove it. “Who’s out there, Tara?”

She shoved her feet back into her heels, then did a double take as she realized Ford was still lying in bed.
Naked
. “Oh my God.
Get dressed!
”

She was attempting to work her hair back into submission as he rose and pulled her against him, stilling her frenetic movements.
“Talk to me.”

“It’s Logan,” she choked out and shoved at him.

He held on. “Logan,” he said, searching his memory banks. “Logan, the ex?”

“Yes. Wait—” She stilled in the act of getting back into her dress. “You know him?”

“Only that he likes to be plastered all over the papers and magazines. And once upon a time, you were plastered there with
him.” He caught her arm before she could run off. This had been supposedly just sex—but that didn’t mean he was happy to find
her ex-husband sniffing around. And actually, he was distinctly
un
happy about that. “Why is he here?”

“I don’t know.” Tara clapped her hands to her face. “And you’re still naked.”

“Yes, and less than three minutes ago you were enjoying that very fact,” he said grimly. “You don’t know what he wants?”

She dropped her head to his chest. “No idea.”

Ford wrapped his hand around the bulk of her silky hair and gently tugged until she was looking at him. “You asked who was
in my bed. Maybe I should have asked who’s in yours.”

“No one’s been in mine! For two years!” She closed her eyes. “
Two years
, Ford.”

He stroked a finger over her jaw. “You were overdue,” he murmured. Okay, so she and Logan weren’t still having sex. That was
good. Not that he should care one way or the other. “Why so long?”

“Because I couldn’t find anyone I wanted to be with,” she said a little defensively. “And now there are
two
men, and one of them is naked and smells like me, and—”

He kissed her, long and deep. Crazy. Stupid. And Christ, so fucking good.

“—and
tastes
like me,” she whispered with a moan when they broke apart. “Oh my God, Ford.”

Since she looked so adorably miserable and confused, and sounded so panicked to boot—all a rarity for her—Ford let out a breath
and stroked a hand down her hair. “I can fix the naked part. You’re on your own for the rest, unless you want help encouraging
him to get the hell out.”

“What?
No
.”

Ouch. But a good reminder of what this was. And what it wasn’t.

“Ford. I can’t do this with you,” she whispered.

“Do what?”

“
This
. It didn’t work back then, and it won’t work now.”

Yes, he knew that. So he had no idea why he backed her to the wall and kissed her again, hard and ravishing, until she was
clutching at him. It might have been a stupid, macho, asshole thing to do, but that she looked so dazed when he pulled back
helped a lot. “I don’t think we’re done,” he said with a calm he didn’t come close to feeling.

“We have to be.” She chewed on her lower lip. “I’m working.”

“Everyone works, Tara.”

“On myself,” she blurted out, hurriedly, with a quick
glance at the door, anxiety level clearly high. “When we were together last time, I was young, and I didn’t know—I didn’t
know how to be in a relationship. I was bad at it, at giving myself.”

“And with Logan? Were you bad at giving yourself then too?”

“No.” She stared up at him, leveling him with those whiskey eyes. “With him, I did the opposite. I gave too much. I gave everything.
Don’t you see? I have to figure it all out so I don’t just repeat my mistakes.”

“So that’s what you’re working on?” he asked. “Figuring out how to give yourself and not lose yourself at the same time?”

“Yes!”

Ah, hell. Out of all the things she could have said, this was the one that got to him, and he stroked a hand over her jaw.
“How’s that going?”

“Right now? Not so well, actually.”

“Tara—”

But she backed up and shook her head sharply. She didn’t want his help, or his sympathy. Fair enough. He didn’t want to get
tangled up in this again anyway.

At least not outside of the bedroom.

“
Tara
?” Logan called from down the hall.

Ford tensed.

Tara closed her eyes. “Just a minute, Logan!”

“Remember my condition,” Ford said softly.

“Don’t ignore you.”

“That’s right. And another.”

“Ford—” She started to pull away but he grabbed her.

“Don’t pull what you did last time,” he said. “The running away thing.”

“We were seventeen and stupid.”

“I’ll give you the stupid part.”

Her mouth tightened. “I didn’t exactly just run off.”

“Bullshit.” He risked her temper by pulling her in close. He couldn’t help himself.

Her breath caught in panic. “Ford! I mean it, I can’t do this with you. The first time nearly killed me. Let’s just learn
from our mistakes, and cut our losses now.”

Yeah. Excellent plan. Cut their losses. It made perfect sense, especially given that the last time Tara was here in Lucky
Harbor things didn’t exactly work out for her—in no small part thanks to him. Chances were good that she’d get the hell out
of Dodge sooner than later anyway. And that was okay. He knew she deserved a hell of a lot more than to be stuck in a place
with nothing but bad memories.

Of which he was one. The biggest baddest memory she had, no doubt. He pulled on his clothes and without another word gave
her what she wanted, what he told himself he wanted as well. He walked out the door and down the hallway, nodding as he came
upon the man he recognized from the racing world.

Logan Perrish was just shy of six feet, dark-haired and dark-eyed. He was in more than decent shape and looked designer ready
for a cover shoot. A good match for the elegant, sophisticated Tara, which made Ford want to shove the guy’s ass out the door.

Logan looked at Ford, then purposely switched his gaze to where Ford had come from, obviously the
bedroom. “Are you… a guest?” he asked. “I didn’t think that the inn was open yet.”

Ford opened his mouth to answer, but Tara, coming from the bedroom as well, beat him to it.

“It’s actually going to be a B&B,” she said. “But no, he’s not a guest. And neither are you. You can’t just show up. Did you
even knock before you broke in?” She wore her now-wrinkled dress, no shoes. There was a definite glow about her, one Ford
took some pride in since he’d put it there.

“Yes, I knocked,” Logan said. “You didn’t answer.” He was staring at Ford. “I didn’t realize you’d have company. I was going
to wait for you to get home.”

Ford stared back.

Tara let out a sound that was part disbelief and part irritation. Ford recognized the irritation since he tended to bring
that out in her a lot.

“You didn’t realize I’d have company,” she repeated slowly. “Even though it’s been… what,
months
since we last talked?”

“We always go that long.” Logan looked confused. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” Tara said. “I’m only having flashbacks to why our marriage failed.”

Logan jerked his head in Ford’s direction. “Who is he?”

The guy who just did your ex-wife, asshole
, Ford thought. Maybe he didn’t have a future with Tara, but it would appear he wasn’t a big enough man to want her to have
a future with Logan, either.

Tara looked at Ford and opened her mouth. Then
closed it again. Clearly she had no idea how to explain him. “Ford Walker,” she finally said. “Ford, Logan.”

Logan held out his hand. “I’m Tara’s husband.”

“
Ex-
husband.” Tara smacked Logan in the chest. “What’s the matter with you? And why are you here again?”

“I missed you.”

Tara shocked Ford by bursting out laughing. “Come on,” she finally said, still smiling. “Truth.”

Logan returned the smile with good grace and some chagrin. “I did miss you.” He stepped close, but Tara put up a hand and
took a step back from him.

“Logan, when I left you, it took you a month to even realize I was gone. A month, Logan. So what’s this really about?”

Logan looked at Ford.

Then Tara looked at Ford, too. Clearly the public forum portion of the evening was over.

Fuck it. If she didn’t want to kick her ex-husband to the curb, it was none of his business, and he headed to the door.

T
ara heard the door shut behind Ford as he left and felt a quick stab of pain in her chest. What would it take for him to fight
for her, she wondered. For him to take a stand and stick?