Butterfly Cove (20 page)

As if she had sensed his thoughts, Olivia’s head tilted. Her eyes opened, half-dazed.

She cleared her throat. “I guess this is that part.”

“What part?”

She took a slow breath. “Where you say this changes everything.” She turned to face him, her eyes huge. “Go on. Say it.”

“No.” Rafe picked up on her mood. Her insecurity was returning, but he wouldn’t let that happen. “I won’t say that, Livie. Because good sex doesn’t change everything. It’s just the start. I want more.”

Olivia’s eyes darkened. “As in...a relationship?”

“Something like that.” Rafe smiled slowly, tracing the line of her cheek.

Olivia was still wobbly, and she rested her arm around his shoulders for support. “But we agreed. It wasn’t...supposed to happen.”

“It
did
happen. Are you sorry?”

She swallowed hard. “No. Of course not. But where do we go from here? This is all—well, it’s new to me, Rafe. But I guess you noticed that.”

He slanted her face upward in the moonlight. “How new, Livie?”

She looked away. “Enough for this conversation to be embarrassing.” When she shivered, Rafe draped her knitted shawl around her shoulders.

He slid his palm under her chin, his eyes intent. “How many relationships have you had?”

“Does it really matter?” Her voice was muffled.

“Oh, it matters a whole lot.”

She gave a little shrug and reached for her nightgown. “A few. I forget.”

“How many, Livie?” His voice was rough.

“I don’t
know.
Three. Maybe a few more. Can we drop this subject now?”

“Fine. Where’s your bedroom?”

“At the top of the stairs.”

Rafe caught her in his arms, cutting her questions off cold. She felt her tension and awkwardness grow, as if the slow passion and surrender had been no more than a dream.

“You don’t have to worry about intruders. I’ll be right downstairs.”

“You aren’t...sleeping up here with me?”

“I think we both need a little space tonight. Besides, I need a clear head. If you’re beside me, that won’t be possible. And just for the record, I don’t believe there were three men.” Rafe pushed open her door with his foot. “I’m guessing not even two. Someday you’ll tell me why there weren’t more. You’re a beautiful woman. Men must have been lined up at your door.”

“Hardly.”

Rafe slid her to the floor, his hands gentle. “We’ll discuss that in the morning. It’s going to be a long day. You’d better get some rest.”

“I need a plan. So what is our plan?” Olivia sank onto the bed, her hair a dark cloud around her head. “Do we act like nothing has changed? Do we let everything turn moody and emotional? I just need to know.”

“I’m working on a plan. Now get some rest. We have to leave early to visit that place up the coast. Tomorrow we can make sense of all this.”

She looked at him and blinked. “Does that mean you’re not going to...” Her fingers twisted at her waist. “That we aren’t going to...”

“No, we aren’t. Not tonight. I meant what I said, Livie. We’re different now. I don’t know about you, but I’m playing for keeps. I want more than a few hours of reckless sex on the sofa.”

And he was going to get it, Rafe thought fiercely. This was the distant dream that had kept him focused on life during the grim decade he had spent surrounded by the violence and chaos of war.

Olivia looked confused—and a little wary.

“Trust me, Livie. This is the best way. Get some sleep.”

Rafe had a sharp instinct that tomorrow could bring discoveries she wasn’t going to like. Though he hadn’t been a police officer for long, he had picked up a few things already. One of those was that you didn’t keep a boat secret from friends and family unless you were doing something on that boat that you didn’t want anyone else to know about. If that was true, Rafe would be right next to Olivia when she found out. She wouldn’t face any painful discoveries alone.

He turned out the light and walked to the door.

“Rafe?”

“Right here.”

“There weren’t three.” Olivia’s voice was a whisper in the darkness. “Or two. There was only one man in my life. For all my life.”

He stood in the doorway, feeling as if he had been kicked. He wanted to sink onto that big bed and teach her a wilder kind of passion. He wanted to wear the sweat of her body when he drove her over the edge.

But he didn’t.

Tonight they needed to figure out where they had come from and where they were going. They needed ground rules and a plan.

“There’s only been one woman in my life, too. She’s been in my blood so long that she’s almost part of me now.”

“Have you told her about this?” Olivia asked softly.

“Nope. I’m afraid I’ll scare her off.”

Olivia sighed. “I think you should tell her.” Her voice was sleepy. “You never know. She might be tougher than you think.”

* * *

T
HE OLD HOUSE
creaked and settled.

Moonlight worked through sheer lace curtains. But Rafe didn’t move, watching Olivia drift off into dreams.

This time he was going to do everything right. Rafe
did
have a plan, and seeing that Olivia Sullivan didn’t get hurt was the most important part.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

P
ALE SUNLIGHT FELL
across Olivia’s face. She blinked, pulling the pillow over her head. Still half-asleep, she yawned, her body oddly relaxed as she stretched slowly. She couldn’t remember the last time she had slept so well. And her dreams...

They had been silent, hungry, full of yearning images.

Olivia sat up sharply, remembering Rafe.
He
was what was different now.

All the things she remembered, the images that still burned through her head, had been far more than dreams. Last night—she had reached for her passion. And he had been expert and implacable in helping her to find it.

Her face flushed at warm memories of his callused hands sliding into urgent skin. The rough, hungry way he had said her name.

The way he had sensed her response and pulled her out of herself, encouraging her to take exactly what she wanted.

Dizzy with those memories, Olivia covered her face. It was almost too much to imagine. She had dreamed those moments again and again over the years, drawing comfort and hope from their hot, rich possibilities, and now that the reality was here it was too enormous to fit into her calm, organized little world.

Oh, yes, she definitely needed a plan for
this.

She heard a light tap at the door and yanked the quilt up to her neck as the door opened slowly.

“Livie, are you up? We need to leave in an hour. I made coffee.”

Olivia recognized the heavenly smell that had been teasing her senses. She sat up slowly. “Okay—I’m up. I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

“Is everything okay?” Rafe stood outside the door. He hadn’t looked inside.

Olivia realized he was giving her the time and space that he seemed to put such value on. “I’m fine.”

It was a lie. She was in turmoil. One part of her was delirious with happiness, determined to make sure that Rafe had the happy ending he deserved. But the dark, unhappy voice from her girlhood simply sneered. This
wasn’t
going to work. It never did.

Olivia took a deep breath. No more negative talk. Her hands clenched on the quilt. First she needed coffee.

Then she needed a plan. “I’ll get in the shower. Then I’ll be right down. And then...I have a plan.”

Actually, she didn’t have a plan. But Olivia swore she would by the time she got downstairs.

* * *

M
ORE THAN A
little giddy, she washed her hair, showered quickly and then stood, letting the water beat down on her face while she tried to come up with mature, sensible possibilities.

Only one made any sense.

They were going to have an affair. A dark, sweltering out-of-control affair. That’s what they both needed. No soul-searching. No moral homilies or dreamy questions.

Just an affair. With no limits and no conditions placed on it by either of them.

She wasn’t planning any further than that, Olivia decided.

With her eyes closed, she turned, searching for her towel. She met strong fingers instead.

“I’ve got your towel over here. That one fell and got soaked, so I brought you a new one.”

Olivia’s eyes were wide-open now. She was painfully aware of the long line of Rafe’s body just beyond the shower curtain.

She discovered it was one thing to be rational when he was two floors below, but it was entirely different when he was standing close enough to touch. She watched his tanned fingers slide back the shower curtain and hold out a fresh towel.

“Is that coffee I smell?”

“Right here on the sink.”

“Then forget about the towel. I need caffeine a whole lot more.”

He gave a dry laugh. “It’s not as good as Jilly’s, but it’s guaranteed to wake you up.”

Olivia peered around the shower curtain. Rafe was leaning against the wall, one hand in his pocket. His chest was bare, hazed with steam from her shower. Olivia was pretty sure that she lost use of half her brain cells when she saw the top two buttons of his jeans were unsnapped.

Hot possibilities hammered through her head, as seductive as the warm, damp steam playing over her naked skin. They had just put the space of a night between them. Surely that was enough time for reflection and calm.

There was no need to wait any longer.

The old Olivia, the awkward girl who had always thought too much and acted too little, would have stayed safely behind the shower curtain.

The new Olivia said
the hell with that.

In one smooth movement she took the towel from him, swept it over his shoulders and circled his neck, pulling him toward her and kissing him with slow, searching heat. Her tongue played over his and Olivia smiled when his breath caught in a low, murmured curse.

His breath was ragged as he studied her face. “Livie, are you sure—”

“Shut up and kiss me.”

And he did. The calm focus of the night before was gone. His hands slid all over her, damp with her dampness, and his mouth was hard, just on the edge of rough.

Olivia wouldn’t have had it any other way.

She drove her nails along his back. She lifted her knee and wrapped it around his thighs, pulling him against her. Rafe’s eyes darkened. He picked her up, while she tightened her legs around him.

Slowly he pinned her against the steamy bathroom wall.

“Livie.” He ground out the word hoarsely. “You know where we’re headed. Any longer and we won’t be turning back.”

He was giving her a choice. A part of Olivia’s dazed brain was moved by the thought. But the rest of her was irritated, frustrated by the delay. So she didn’t bother to answer. She simply drove her body against him, slick, needy skin against slick, needy skin.

Olivia shuddered as she felt his jeans inch lower, pushed downward by the friction of their bodies. She heard the sound of her own breath, rough and fast as she raked her hand down his chest and then lower, into the gaping V at the waist of his jeans.

Touching him was heaven. Taking him within the circle of her fingers was the stuff of all her hot fantasies. Except Olivia was grown-up now. She knew exactly what those fantasies meant—and what would come next. She wanted
all
that.

“Livie, give me a minute.”

She didn’t want to give him a minute. Not a second. She needed this right now.

Then she realized she had said the words out loud. And to her shock, Olivia realized she didn’t care a bit. She was tired of pretense. The need that held her, wrapped around the two of them, was all that mattered.

She felt him pull something from his pocket. His breath was harsh and labored. His jeans slid down and Olivia used her foot to shove them to the wet floor of the shower. She felt his body against her, chest to knees, chiseled with muscle. He was more beautiful than she could have imagined, and his need touched a lifetime of memories.

She took a broken breath and drove her body against him. She felt the hot pressure at her thighs, heard Rafe mutter, and then felt him push inside her. The taste of him was on her mouth and she felt the hammer of his heart beneath her hand, still pressed against his damp chest.

His arm locked around her waist. He slid the wet hair out of her face, his eyes very dark. “Look at me, honey. Look at me and know exactly what we’re doing. I’ve wanted this longer than I can remember, and we’re both going to have it now.”

Olivia felt heat rip through her, swallowing reason and thought and planning. She wasn’t ready, though she had thought she would be after all her years of fantasies.

She wasn’t ready at all. Not for the heat. Not for the hint of pain that quickly gave way to a hot blindness as he moved inside her, deep and slow.

A wave of pleasure caught her, and she arched back in his arms, locking her hands on his shoulders. She felt his lips at her forehead as he whispered her name and the world tore away beneath her.

* * *

O
LIVIA’S HEART HAMMERED
. Her breath was hoarse. Her legs locked around Rafe’s waist as pleasure continued to spasm through her.

Even then Rafe didn’t move.

He was too busy being a damn gentleman, Olivia realized. Even when he was deep inside her, so close to his own passionate release, he waited.

To hell with that,
she thought.

She lifted her leg and pushed against him, shivering to feel the passion begin again. She drank in the darkness of his eyes at the moment that his control gave way. Olivia wouldn’t give either of them time for more questions or obstacles. She gripped him with tight, intimate strokes and felt him lift her legs higher. “Livie, if I hurt you—”

“You’re not. You’re everything, Rafe. Just—don’t stop.”

He took a hitched breath. His hand opened on the wall, muscles clenched for control. Olivia felt him, smooth and hot and huge as he drove up, deep inside her, while fantasy wrapped trembling fingers around hot reality and their bodies became one, the way she had always dreamed they would.