Dream Huntress (A Dreamseeker novel) (Entangled Ignite) (16 page)

She clipped through the parking lot and was halfway to the stairwell when someone fell in step behind her and closed his hands around her waist. In a move that was pure instinct, she threw her head back, slammed her skull hard into the face of the idiot behind her and stomped on his instep. A satisfying grunt erupted as she spun around and crouched, lowering her center of gravity in preparation for a fight.

“What
the
fuck?” he said.

Shit. She straightened her stance. It was Ty. Of course it was Ty. Who else would it have been?

“Damn it, woman,” he said bending over, putting his hands on his knees. He spit some blood from his mouth and stood back up.

She’d split his lip good. “I’m sorry, but you should know better than to sneak up on another cop.”

“I wasn’t sneaking up on another cop. I was walking up behind my girlfriend to kiss her. And I said your name. Didn’t you hear me?”

The girlfriend comment momentarily threw her but she didn’t comment on it. Or run in the other direction. “No, I didn’t hear you…I…”

Ty turned his head and spit a little more blood. She felt bad. Really bad. Nothing about it was funny, really. His lip was puffing up and still dribbling blood. Yet she was fighting a grin. She looked down at the purse that had tumbled out of her hand. She grabbed it, stuck her hand in, and rooted around for a tissue. Glancing left and right to make sure no one was near, she shifted her Glock out of the way and tugged the tissue free.

“You gonna shoot me now? The head butt wasn’t enough?” He stared at her as she stepped closer and dabbed at his lip. “You think this is funny, don’t you?”

“Shut up, you big baby,” she said around a smile. “I’m pretty sure you’re going to make it.”

His lip had mostly stopped bleeding, but she gently smoothed a finger back and forth across the tiny cut anyway. She was dying to do the same thing with her tongue. Everything about Ty was big and rugged, from his masculine jaw with just enough growth to make him look badass to his firm and fine backside. But he had the softest damn lips she’d ever tasted. And he certainly knew how to—

“You’re not listening to anything I say, are you?” he asked.

Nope.
“Of course I am. We just need to get inside,” she said, nodding to the speeding cars racing by on the road next to them. “Someone could see us.”

“Hey, you’re the one who pulled a Jackie Chan on a poor, unsuspecting soul in the middle of a parking lot.”

“Come on.” She rolled her eyes and tugged on his hand, but he didn’t move.

“For someone who was paying attention, you don’t seem to have any idea what I just asked you.” He fisted her coat in his hands and pulled her close, kissing his way up her neck to her ear. “I asked you to come home with me. I thought since we couldn’t spend today together, maybe we could spend tonight. Thanksgiving dessert, so to speak.”

The deep timbre of his voice murmuring in her ear caused heat to radiate through her veins like a good shot of tequila. She barely had the brainpower to tilt her head back and eye him suspiciously, but she finally managed to pull it off. “Will there be actual dessert? Or by dessert, do you just mean sex?”

“Real sugar and real whipped cream.” He wiggled his eyebrows.

“Well then, looks like tonight we’ll be going to your place.”

Chapter Twelve

They stepped up to the door outside Ty’s apartment. He pulled the scarf from his neck and tied it around her eyes.

“What in the world are you doing?”

“No questions and no peeking.” He guided her inside and left her near the door.

He started some soft, romantic music and fumbled around for several minutes. Finally, he walked back to her and pulled the scarf from her eyes.

No lights, just candles. Everywhere. And flowers. Four huge vases were placed around the room, with a mountain of roses in each.

“Why, Tyler McGee, I believe you have a romantic side.” Her eyes started to sting. She fought the foolish sensation as she walked to the roses and took a deep, appreciative sniff. The man certainly knew how to set a scene. Realizing that no one had ever given her roses or cared enough to create any kind of romance made her breath catch. She pivoted slowly, taking it all in. There must have been a month’s rent tied up in flowers and candles.

He walked up behind her, slid her coat off her shoulders, and wrapped his hands around her waist. “Happy Thanksgiving.” He trailed soft kisses behind her ear.

She turned in his arms and honestly was a little embarrassed at how his thoughtfulness affected her.

“Hey, hey, I’m sorry. It was supposed to make you happy, not make you cry.” He pulled her close and kissed the top of her head.

She squeezed her arms around him. “I am happy, Ty. It’s just that no one has ever done anything like this.”

“I told you I could be downright romantic if you give me a chance, city girl. I realize this isn’t a hot night out on the town or anything, but my options were limited considering you’re undercover, and we can’t be seen together.”

“Ha.” She laughed and pulled her head from his shoulder long enough to smile up at him. “Cowboy, your options were limited, because we’re in a town the size of a peanut, and the most interesting thing here is a strip club.”

He chuckled. “Perhaps, but what any self-respecting small-town boy knows,” he whispered, moving them both to the music, “is that it’s not where you take your dates that’ll rock their world. It’s what you do to them once you get ’em there that’s important.”

She stopped moving and stroked his cheek. “Thank you. Everything is beautiful.”

He stood silent and still for several moments. Too many emotions passed across his face for Jordan to figure out what he was thinking. His soulful stare never wavered from her, but he didn’t kiss her, didn’t pull her closer.

“You are, by far, the most beautiful thing in this room. I’ve pictured you here, like this. Candlelight. Flowers. Music.”

“Well then, I guess this just went from being my fantasy to yours. Because however you pictured me, I’m happy to oblige.” She lifted her sweater up and over her head, then tossed it aside, exposing a black camisole and bra. He wasn’t the only one who’d done a little shopping. After popping open all the buttons on his shirt, she wrapped her arms around him and nuzzled into his neck.

“Damn, woman. Way to play hard to get.”

“Mmmm, can’t help it,” she murmured while trailing kisses across his chest. “You’re smooth, McGee. Swept me right off my feet.”

They began swaying to the music again. The motion was too intimate to call dancing, but they were moving, caressing, and touching light, gentle kisses over one another.

“Wanting you here was mostly selfish,” Ty said, nuzzling her neck. “Didn’t think I could endure one more night on that horrible bag of springs you call a mattress.”

She laughed. “Bahan and his people picked out the apartment. I intend to pay him back for sticking me there. I guess he was able to find a furnished apartment in a good location, so he snatched it up.”

God, it felt good and right and natural to be in his arms. The comfort and peace of swaying to the music and resting her head against his chest was like stepping into a third dimension. A calming quiet she never realized existed.

“So you’re not responsible for any of the decorations inside the place?” he asked.

“Are you kidding? Everything is like a hundred years old. Supposedly, a ninety-two-year-old woman died, left all her stuff.” She rambled peacefully with her eyes closed. “I have no idea why they didn’t sell off everything, but there you go.”

“Thank God. I was seriously worried about your taste in interior furnishings. Plus, those roosters are just scary.”

She could hear the smile in his voice. “Oh, those are mine. I brought ’em with me.”

He tugged on her hair and pulled her head back. “Smartass.”

“But I had you scared there for a second, didn’t I? By the way, I’m more than happy to participate in any fantasy you’ve got, but if you want to do anything but this,” she said, tucking her head back against his chest, “you’re going to have to make the first move, because I could stay like this for days. Being here in your arms, with the candles and music, it’s like a little slice of heaven I never knew existed.”

…

She’d muttered the words without thought, without realizing how they’d power through him. He’d battled her reluctance long enough to know surrender. Little by little, she had opened up. When it happened, he couldn’t pinpoint, but somewhere along the way, they’d turned a corner. And her words were the proof.

Tilting her head back, eyes closed, she lifted her mouth in invitation.

God, how he loved those lips—covering his own, trailing across his skin, sliding up and down his…

“Are you gonna kiss me, cowboy? I’m feeling a little neglected.” Her eyes opened while his were fixated on her mouth. She smiled knowingly and like a little devil, leaned in and ran her tongue slowly up the length of his neck. Then she whispered, “Warm and moist, just how you like it.”

His control snapped. He took her mouth in a move much more urgent than seductive. Ravaging her hadn’t been in tonight’s game plan, but it was exactly what he was doing, and there wasn’t a chance in hell he could stop himself.

A smooth, sensual temptation was originally what he had in mind. Tonight was supposed to be about romance, about seduction, about driving her to the edge of madness with a slow, torturing flame. Now the only image he could summon was one of clawing her clothes off and dragging her to the floor. Her needy little growl did him in.

“Oh, God, that’s good,” she purred when he ripped her camisole and bra over her head and cupped both breasts. “So where is this mattress you claim to be so fond—hey!” she shrieked when he swooped her up and all but ran into the bedroom. He tossed her onto the bed and stripped while she watched.

Her head fell back with a low, sexy laugh.
Damn
, even that evil, teasing cackle stirred his blood.

She smiled like the cat who clearly had the canary dead center in her cross hairs. “Someone seems to be in a hurry tonight, and for once, I don’t think it’s me.”

He elicited another shriek when he grabbed her ankle and pulled her to the edge of the bed.

“Ty-ler,” she squealed as he pulled her up, tore open her jeans, and slid them—along with her panties—down to the floor in one seamless motion. Her breath caught as he captured her breast in his mouth.

Jordan was beautiful from across a room. With her long, blonde hair and slender figure, she turned heads. But the sight of her breasts staggered him like nothing else ever had. Touching her, making her shudder, hearing her moan as he worked her nipple into a long, hard peak nearly undid him. Every. Damn. Time.

“Oh, Ty.
Mmm,
” she purred, as her whole body vibrated against his mouth.

Pure male determination had him silently swearing he was going to make her come like this. Some day. When the ache to get inside of her wasn’t clawing a hole clean through him. Right now, he decided her other breast deserved the same careful attention, so he released the first nipple and began to lick a path across her chest.

But she flipped their positions and urged him up onto the bed. “Scoot up. Right here.” She patted the center of the pillow as she arranged it against the headboard.

He wasn’t a fool. He moved exactly where she directed him.

Tucking a knee on either side of his hips, she straddled his lap.

The warm, moist heat of her slid against his dick. Oh, yeah, he liked that.
A lot
. It was enough to make him growl. He wrapped his hands around her waist to position her more to his liking.

She giggled and shifted slightly off center. “Forgetting something?” she asked and reached into his nightstand for a condom. “I thought you were the master of patience, king of seduction, Mr. In-Control.”

“I have every intention of controlling you.” Which was just a damn joke. He barely had enough control to keep from coming as she rolled on the condom. But to be fair, Jordan never just
rolled
on a condom. Not without a significant amount of teasing…tasting…torture.

“You think so?” She moved back into position, slid against his length again, but pulled back before he could arch into her.

Taking a deep, sexually frustrated gulp of air, he dropped his head back against the headboard.

She laughed again, then pierced herself in one quick thrust, burying him to the hilt.

His breath exhaled on a hiss. “God
damn
it, woman, you’re gonna kill me.”

Her lips curled into a wicked grin. “No way. You’ve become irreplaceable. Some parts more than others, of course.”

She rocked against him, one hand braced for leverage against his leg, the other stroking her nipples, teasing and taunting as she watched his face.

He didn’t stand a chance of taking his eyes off of her. But as he watched, he knew the exact moment her mood shifted from carefree and playful to one of uncontrolled need. Her eyes drifted closed, and her head tilted back. Lost to pleasure, she rode him with single-minded focus.

Sitting up straighter, he pulled her close so that they were chest to chest. Her breasts flattened against him, and he moved his hands down to the globes of her ass, digging in, holding her firm so he could thrust deep enough to make her moan.

He kissed her neck, her chin, her ear. “Jordan” rolled from his lips in a whisper over and over. Dipping his head to her breast, he closed his teeth around her nipple.

Sliding his fingers between them, he stroked her where their bodies were joined.

He couldn’t have said who trembled more at that hot, thrilling slide of his fingers against her sensitized flesh. When she jerked and cried out, control was just a distant memory. He roughly anchored her hips and drove as deeply as possible with several quick, frenzied thrusts.

Her core pulsed. She moaned, and her body trembled viciously as she clung to him. “What the hell, cowboy?” She cried out, and jerked him just as brutally over the edge. “Holy shit,” she managed as her breathing shuddered in and out. “Do our bodies fit together like puzzle pieces or what?”

Her words said it all. It had become better, hotter, and more intense every single time. But he hoped Jordan didn’t analyze it too deeply. Because if she figured out what he had—that it had nothing to do with their bodies, and everything to do with their hearts—he had no clue how she’d react.

…

They stayed quietly tangled for more than an hour. Jordan drifted on a contented high, although she sensed reality was going to bite her in the ass soon. She rolled over to face Ty. His eyes remained closed, and his breathing stayed deep. She took the opportunity to study his handsome profile.

His dark hair had grown long enough to look well tumbled after a healthy round of sex.
Thank you very much.
And the whiskers she affectionately called scruff looked more like a full-blown beard than a couple days of overgrowth. She’d teased him about shaving and offered up her razor, but the truth was, she’d come to crave the coarseness of his whiskers against the tender skin of her breasts. Who knew that a sensation she’d never ever contemplated could be so powerful? It was one of those erotic little surprises you just never thought about until you were in a…Her breath escaped on a rush.
Shit.
Was she in a relationship?

She watched his chest rise and fall, and another unexplainable sensation waved through her. A warm, twisting rush that momentarily turned her insides to liquid.

“If you take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Ty murmured with his eyes still closed.

She damn near jumped out of her skin.

“What are you thinking about?” he grumbled again. “How good-lookin’ I am?”

Since he wasn’t that far off base, her face scorched hot for a quick second before she decided how to best play it off. Not a snowball’s chance in hell she was going with the truth. She reached over and pinched a few chest hairs between her fingers and yanked.

“Ouch. What was that for?” His eyes popped open, and he rubbed a hand across the spot missing a few hairs.

“Because you’re a liar,” she answered, poking him hard in the chest.

He sprang up on an elbow and grabbed her when she moved to roll off the bed. “What? I’m sorry. What did I do?”

“You promised dessert. I knew that was just your sneaky way of getting me here for sex.”

He fell back on the bed. “Christ, woman, you scared me. I thought you were really pissed about something.”

“I
am
really pissed about something,” she teased, pulling on his shirt. “You don’t promise a girl sugar and then fail to deliver.”

“I never fail.” He chuckled.

Lightning fast, he sprang forward and tugged her down on top of him. “I delivered something a hell of a lot more enjoyable than dessert.” Rolling them, he pinned her beneath his body. “Didn’t I?”

Damn, the weight of him felt good, both arousing and comforting. “That depends. Was this fictional dessert just a little generic ice cream or something really great like…well, say…Antonio’s cheesecake?”

“What? There’s a sliding scale or something? Now you’re really starting to hack me off.” He slammed her hands above her head. “I’m better than ice cream but not as good as cheesecake?”

“Exactly. But you do rank high. I’d put you at the very top of the scale. Somewhere between German chocolate cake and cheesecake.”