Fire Me Up (18 page)

Her heart pounded in her chest, fast and dangerous. “Okay,” she whispered, her breath catching as he moved his hand back underneath the hem of her shirt.

“You like this, don't you?” Adrian asked, his voice a dark rasp. “When I touch you here.” He curled his fingers around the lowest part of her rib cage, stroking her back with his thumb.

Teagan's nipples tightened into aching peaks, but it was the skin already under his hand that demanded more of his touch.

“Yes. Oh God, yes.” She rounded her back toward him, greedily pulling her shoulder blades away from the column of her spine to offer him the sensitive skin there. Keeping his left arm firm around her waist, he slid her shirt up so she could pull it over her head.

“Your skin practically hums with it.” Adrian guided her body into a gentle lean on the breakfast bar, giving himself unimpeded access to the now-bare skin of her back. Using his hands and mouth, Adrian traced his way from the small of her back upward, laving attention on every inch as if she were a four-course meal and he wanted to savor every taste of her. By the time he made his way to her shoulders, the juncture between Teagan's thighs was impossibly hot and aching with need. She arched her hips into him, giving a soft groan as he pressed his rock-hard cock into her back.

“You're just not going to slow down until you get what you want, are you?” Adrian rasped into her ear, and the words alone made her want to come. He slipped those able hands up over her bra to cup the weight of her breasts, and her nipples pebbled even harder beneath the dark silk.

“No. I don't want to slow down.” Teagan swung around to face him, kissing him with ravenous need. Her hands found the edge of his T-shirt, and with one seamless yank, it was over his head, on the floor.

Her mouth found his again, craving his heat. “I want you
now
.”

His laugh was a slow, sexy rumble that only seduced her closer to the edge. “You're tough to refuse, you know that?” Adrian nibbled her bottom lip with just enough pressure that Teagan wanted to scream. “But I have plans for you. And they're so much better slow.”

Without another word, his hands shot to her shoulders, moving her backward through the empty living space as he kissed her long and deep. He expelled a hot breath against her collarbone when she slid her hand down low over the hard length behind his button fly, but it didn't deter his purpose. With a handful of even strides, they crossed the threshold of his bedroom, and Teagan inhaled the dark, spicy scent of his skin that lingered on the bedsheets as he lay her on top of them. Adrian dropped his mouth to her neck, shuttering his eyes closed and breathing in deeply.

“You smell like rosemary. Just a hint of sweetness right . . . here.” He paused where her neck flared down into her shoulder, grazing his teeth along her collarbone, and the husky tenor of his voice sent a jolt of lust arrowing through her.

“And you taste even better.” Again, Adrian curved his hand around her breast, and again, she sighed in pleasure, her nipple pearling under his movements. When he slipped the navy blue silk from her shoulders, the brush of his stubble against her sensitive skin ratcheted her sigh into a soft moan.

“Adrian,” she said, dizzy with want.

“Say it again.” He lowered his mouth to one nipple, sucking just hard enough to make her want to scream.

“
Adrian.
” Teagan barely recognized the throaty whisper as hers. She knotted her fingers in his hair, and he responded with hunger, teasing her into a frenzy with his mouth. The exquisite tension mounting between her legs crested higher, and she rocked against him in search of desperate release.

“You want me to touch you,” he said, his voice like honey, and she nodded, capturing his stubbly face between her hands.

“I want to touch
you
.” Teagan drew him up so that he hovered over her, bracing his weight on his thickly muscled uninjured arm as she opened her knees around the strong angle of his jeans-clad hips. “You're not the only good listener around here, you know.” So slowly she thought she'd lose her mind, she canted her hips up, brushing against his cock with the seam of her body.

Adrian breathed a curse that colored Teagan's face with want.

“Let me listen to you.” She slid one hand between their bodies, and stroked him against her sex.

“Teagan,” he grated out, his voice hoarse with want as he thrust against her in rhythm with her movements.

“Adrian,” she answered, each syllable its own reverent call.

He shifted to his side, just enough to fit his hand over hers. “You have to stop doing that.”

She tightened her fingers around him just slightly, and the groan that escaped from his lips told her all she needed to know. “I want you, Adrian.” Teagan let go of him just long enough to replace her hand with the aching space between her thighs, sliding against him with electric friction.

Adrian's eyes flashed over her in a liquid stare, and he thrust against her, hard. “And I want to take care of you. Let me take care of you, Teagan.”

His hands moved over her with singular purpose, unbuttoning her jeans with deft fingers while she returned the favor. The plane of his chest flexed and squeezed as he knelt between her hips and slipped her jeans from her body, and Teagan felt something hot and tight break free in her chest as Adrian stared at her with an expression she'd never seen on his face before.

“Sweet Jesus, you are perfect.” He lowered himself to her side, running one hand over her skin from hip to shoulder and back again. “I could spend all night showing you how beautiful you are.”

Teagan let out a moan as his hand drifted to the center of her belly, then lower to cup her through her panties, her legs starting to tremble with anticipation and want. “Don't stop.”

He traced a slow circle over the triangle of silk between her legs before moving it aside to find her heat.

“I haven't even started,” Adrian said, lowering his face to hers. He parted her mouth with his, swallowing her wanton cry as he slipped a finger into her folds. Every one of her muscles bore down with hot intensity.

“Oh my
God
.” Teagan's hands curled into fists, her nails digging into the soft flesh of her palms as she rushed toward release, every part of her begging for him. He caressed her with sweet intention, circling and thrusting and daring her until she lost her breath on a broken cry.

“I've got you, Red. Let me take care of you.”

With his words as the final trigger, Teagan tumbled right over the edge, exploding into such an intense orgasm that it left her gasping for air. Adrian smiled into the column of her neck, lining her skin with soft kisses that pricked at her senses.

Something inside of her snapped free, rising up to meet his commanding demeanor with her own boldness.

“Now let's see if you can take it as well as you dish it out.” With a swift maneuver, Teagan hooked one foot around the corded muscle of Adrian's leg, using it as leverage to push him to his back.

“Wait . . .” he started, but she put one finger on his lush lips, shushing him.

“No. No more waiting.”

She freed him from the rest of his clothes as quickly as he'd undressed her, reveling in the sculpted muscles of his abs and the trail of dark hair that led from his belly button down to his strong, angular hips. Dauntless, she swung one leg over his waist, squeezing her thighs tightly enough to hover over the heat of his body.

“I want you inside me, Adrian.” Teagan leaned forward, stroking him with light fingers, leaving no expanse of his shoulders or chest untouched. Driven by the glint of pure desire in his eyes as he watched her, and she stretched over him to press her lips to his ear. “I want to take care of you, too.”

He was on her so fast that she barely registered his movements, the hard grip on her hips to remove her from his lap, the flurry of movement at his bedside table that yielded a condom. Within seconds, Adrian's body was back over hers, tantalizingly close.

“You're coming with me when I go.”

He plunged into her with slow strength, and Teagan thought she would absolutely die from the pleasure of him inside her body, finding her and filling her up all at once. Desire sparked in her core as they found a flawless rhythm, both deep and desperate, and he rocked against her again and again.

“So
beautiful,
” he grated, his hot breath fanning over the bare skin of her neck and rushing over her collarbone. Her nipples tightened at the seductive stroke of his chest on her soft curves, and with every hard thrust, the delicious tension between her thighs increased, daring her to come.

“Oh God, so are you.” Teagan reached low to wrap her arms around Adrian's hips, gathering him right into her center before she unraveled beneath him with a sharp cry. With nothing but dark, uncut intensity on his face, he lowered himself to cover her body, thrusting into her faster and harder until he finally shuddered out her name as he followed.

They lay together in the last fading strains of twilight for a while, and although Teagan knew time was passing, she had no concept of how much. Minutes were somehow different, altered slightly by Adrian's nearness, by the spicy-cinnamon smell of his skin on hers. He moved to her side without breaking contact, pulling her close and kissing her temple, her hair.

“I've got you, Red. I've got you.”

As she drifted off to sleep, it was the first time she could remember when the darkness around her didn't threaten to swallow her whole.

Adrian shifted his weight against the warmth of the mattress beneath him, trying his damnedest not to wake Teagan even though the sun had started to poke past his bedroom blinds two hours ago. She lay nestled in the bedsheets, flame-colored hair tumbling down her bare back in waves, face sweet and lax in deep sleep. For the tenth time this hour, Adrian let his eyes drink their fill, skimming the taut angle where her shoulder blade met her spine, memorizing the spray of light brown freckles on the bridge of her nose.

He was utterly, completely, unequivocally out of his league with this woman.

Moving as covertly as his big frame would allow, Adrian edged from the covers and skinned into the jeans he'd discarded last night. Stopping shy of the top button, he decided to forgo rummaging for a shirt so as not to risk waking Teagan. He'd meant to let her get more sleep last night, but after they got up for seconds in the kitchen, all it had taken was one hot little
dare me
smile before they were having seconds in his bedroom, too.

Right. Out of his league didn't even touch this.

Padding into the kitchen, Adrian went through the motions of feeding the coffeepot with enough grounds to get a rise out of the dead. The comforting, earthy scent, combined with the simple task, reminded him how good it felt to be in the kitchen again, and the sense of purpose sent a thread of ease through his chest. He might not be able to really cook for another four weeks, but helping Teagan at the Double Shot wasn't such a bad way to spend that time. She already knew he couldn't stick around for good, and anyway, when her father got better, he'd surely want his kitchen back. But for now, just maybe, he could spend some time around her with no regrets.

As if to shoot the idea full of holes, his cell phone chirped from his jacket pocket, signaling a new message. Adrian crossed the kitchen, digging the thing out of his pocket as dread wormed its way back into his gut.

“
You might only have a month left on parole, Holt, but answering your phone ain't optional.
” Big Ed's voice grated over the line, and even recorded, it raked over Adrian's skin like bits of broken glass. “
Your hotshot boss says she hasn't heard a peep out of you for over a week, but I know better than to think that means you been keepin' clean. Just because you got off easy doesn't make you any less of a felon. Don't tempt me to haul my ass to the mountains to find you to prove it. Believe me, if I show up on your doorstep, it won't be a pleasure visit.
”

Fuck.
Fuck
. Adrian should've known better than to think he could hide from this, even for a few weeks.

“Wow. And I thought I looked rough in the morning.”

Teagan's voice whipped him back to the reality of his kitchen, and he dropped his phone to the breakfast bar with a clatter.

“Hey,” he said, battening down his emotional hatches one by one. Damn, she looked so pretty, even with her sleep-mussed hair and wrinkled version of yesterday's clothes. “Sorry. I didn't want to wake you.”

“You didn't. Is everything okay at the Double Shot?” Her gaze locked on his cell phone for just a second before returning to his face.

“Yeah, everything's fine.” Big Ed's diatribe was the only message on his phone, besides the six collective voice mails Carly and Bellamy had left over the course of the last week.

Just like that, the tension in his shoulders did a great, big loop-the-loop.

“Everything doesn't look fine,” Teagan observed, sliding Adrian's only two coffee mugs down from the cupboard over the coffeepot. A seamless flick of her wrist had both cups filled within seconds, and she slid one across the counter in his direction before turning toward the fridge to take out the milk.

“Brennan texted me last night when he and Jesse left. Said it all went without a hitch.” Adrian tapped his cell phone to life, jamming his thumb over the
delete
button to purge Big Ed's message from the queue before scrolling to Brennan's text. He'd deal with Big Ed later. Just as long as the guy didn't actually make good on his threat to take his crotchety old show on the road.

“Mmm.” Teagan took the phone from his outstretched hand, the pads of her fingers brushing his palm, and yeah. Being this close to her shouldn't feel so easy or so good. “They're probably exhausted from closing shorthanded. I should have stayed.”

The hard flash of guilt on her face had Adrian's feet in gear before he could even register the movement, and he covered the space between them to pull her in close. “Don't. You can't do all of this by yourself, and you needed a little breathing room. They'll get a chance to rest too, I promise.”

To his absolute surprise, she softened, leaning her forehead against his bare chest. “I know. It's just . . . taking care of myself is difficult for me. I'm not trying to be a hard-ass. I'm just not very good at any of this.”

“You've got a lot going on, Red.” Adrian brushed at a tangled wisp of hair that had escaped from her low ponytail, letting his fingers run the length of the strand before tucking it behind her ear. “Just take it one thing at a time.”

“Is that what we're doing, me and you? Taking things one day at a time?” she asked, lifting her chin to serve him with a look so devoid of drama or pretense that the honesty just flew from his mouth.

“I don't have much more than that.”

He wanted to give her more—hell, she
deserved
more. But one slip-up with Lonnie or Big Ed, and Adrian wouldn't just land in deep trouble.

He'd end up back in prison, and his pregnant best friend would be sanctioned up to her elbows for trusting him to be a decent guy.

“I'm okay with one day at a time, Adrian. I know this is temporary, but I want to be with you. In the kitchen and out.” Teagan pressed up on her toes to slant her mouth against his, and suddenly everything else felt like an echo, fading out as it got further and further away.

“Hmm.” Adrian slid his tongue over the curve of her lower lip, coaxing her mouth open for more. Which was crazy, really, because no way would he ever get enough of her mouth, so full and red and flawlessly perfect. He kissed her again, swinging her around with every intention of taking her right back to his bedroom for a proper good morning, when a loud rumble vibrated against his hips and stopped him midstride.

“Was that . . . are you hungry?”

“It can wait,” she murmured into his neck, her hands coasting lower toward the waistband of his jeans, but he pulled back.

“It can't wait.” Despite the absolute tirade his cock leveled at his frontal lobe for the judgment call to put breakfast first, Adrian broke from her grasp. A cursory scan of the kitchen linoleum turned up his shirt from the night before, and he yanked it over his head before turning to pop open the fridge. He might not be able to give Teagan much, but at the very least, he could keep himself in check long enough to make her something to eat.

Teagan exhaled, pressing her eyes shut even though a smile tipped her lips upward. “You're taking this care-for-myself thing to the extreme, you know that?”

“Yup.” He rifled through the refrigerator, grabbing a package of bacon and a half carton of eggs from the narrow shelf. “You helping?”

“Sure.” When Adrian turned to fasten her with a brows-up stare, she added, “You're not going to let me get away without a food lesson, and anyway, I'm hungry.”

“Fair enough.”

For a few minutes, they gravitated around each other in the tight confines of his kitchen, with her getting situated on the left-side burner with the bacon, and him putting together the few simple ingredients for his secret-recipe scrambled eggs. She moved fluidly next to him, one hand giving the skillet in front of her a gentle shake while she plucked a wooden spatula from the utensil drawer at her side with the other, and he fell into a rhythm with her that felt as easy as breathing.

“So did you get some bad news this morning?” Teagan asked, her eyes darting back to his cell phone on the counter. So much for easy.

“Sort of.”

“Anything I can help with?” She leaned one denim-wrapped hip against the kitchen counter, looking right into him with those warm brown eyes that managed to see freaking everything, and the words were out before Adrian could bite down on them.

“My parole officer called. He's kind of militant about keeping tabs on me, so he's a little pissed I didn't answer. He'll get over it.”

“Sounds a little above and beyond for a parole officer,” she said without pushing, and damn it, here came the landslide.

“Big Ed's not exactly the forgiving type. Which wouldn't suck so bad, except he thinks I got special treatment on top of being a felon, so he rides me pretty hard. And by pretty hard, I mean he'd rather find me in violation of my parole than win the goddamn lottery. I've learned to deal with it, but I'm not gonna lie. It's not easy.”

“So did you?”

Confusion jerked his chin upward. “Did I what?”

“Get special treatment,” Teagan said, nudging the sizzling bacon in the skillet without moving her eyes from his face.

“Oh. No.” He shrugged. “Carly spoke at my hearing, then again when I petitioned to leave New York so I could take this job with her at the resort. I guess Big Ed felt like I got off too easy when the judge granted me permission to leave the state to come here to work with her. But everything was on the up-and-up.”

“I don't get it. She's your boss, and you guys are friends, right? Why would her testimony be preferential?”

“Carly's made a hell of a name for herself, both here and in New York. She had a cooking show on local TV for a while, and we were always booked solid at Gracie's, where we used to work in the city. Anyone who knows food in New York knows her.”

Teagan's face lit with understanding. “So your parole officer felt like it was celebrity bias.”

“Yeah. He's always jawing about my hotshot boss getting me off the hook. I know Carly really put her reputation on the line by vouching for me, but no matter what Big Ed thinks, I never asked her to speak at those hearings. All I ever wanted was to do my time and get back to the kitchen where I belong.”

As if to hammer the sentiment home, Adrian ground some white pepper over the egg mixture he'd assembled as they talked. He hooked his forearm around the bowl as best he could with the stupid frigging cast in the way, sending the whisk in his opposite hand through the eggs with a rapid-fire
tat-tat-tat
.

“You never said what you did that time for.”

Teagan's statement was clearly a question, and one he knew he should answer. But his egregious lack of judgment five years ago wouldn't change with a good airing out, and anyway, he wasn't about to repeat his mistakes.

He'd learned the all-too-hard way about the damage of falling for the wrong woman.

“I did my time for a stupid mistake. But you don't have to worry. I'm not ever going to make it again.”

“I'm not worried,” Teagan said, her hard-edged demeanor making an appearance in her tone. “I'm just trying to help you.”

Well,
hell
. Of course she'd go and be matter-of-fact about it. “I know,” he said, blowing out a slow breath. “Look, it happened a long time ago, and I'm straight now. I just want the whole thing behind me.”

For a second, Teagan looked like she'd throw on her armor and argue, but then her eyes softened with a warm-whiskey flicker. “Okay.”

His expression must've betrayed the shock rebounding through his system, because she continued with, “Look, I can sympathize with having things in your past that you want to let go of. As harsh as it sounds, I'd love to forget my mother even existed. So as much as I want to help, if you don't want to talk about it, believe me, I understand.”

“Thanks.” Adrian's shock gave way to something deeper, something that lodged in good and hard behind his sternum, and he lowered a skillet over the burner in front of him with a metal-on-metal clang. But instead of letting the conversation smother under a thick blanket of awkward, Teagan stayed true to her word and shifted the subject with ease.

“Your shoulder looks like it's healing nicely. To be honest, you have more mobility than I thought you might.” She watched as he dropped some butter into the skillet, and he gave the joint in question a quick stretch and roll before following the butter with the eggs.

“It's still a little sore, but I'll live.”

“With how much you love the kitchen, it must be hard for you to take a leave of absence,” Teagan said, and even though her voice steered far clear of pity-party levels, it snapped a thread in Adrian's chest.

“Might've stung less if Carly hadn't kicked me out.”

“Wait . . . she kicked you out? I thought you were on leave.” The words slipped from Teagan's mouth on a shocked breath, and even though he knew he shouldn't give his emotions any room to move, he let them loose anyway.

“Okay, yeah, I probably could've stood a little bit of a rest after this.” He nodded down at his cast with a tight jerk of his chin. “But clearly, I'm not a total waste of space. She could've let me come back to La Dolce Vita, at least to help, but instead, she kicked me out for the entire six weeks.”

Teagan lifted a brow, her expression betraying nothing. “She give you a reason?”

The thread in his chest went for the full-on unravel. “Carly's in this happy-honeymoon phase of her life. Don't get me wrong—she's earned every second of being in a good place. But now she thinks anyone who puts work first is missing the bigger picture. She doesn't get that for me, the kitchen is always going to be the bigger picture.”