Skintight (15 page)

It was Treena who crossed her hands over her chest and peeled the garment off over her head.

“God,” he said, and his voice sounded as if it had been shredded with a cheese grater. “They're even prettier than I imagined.”

Her mouth quirked up on one side. “Yeah, why is it tits are such a magnet for men? Even the two gay guys in our troupe comment on them.”

“It's because we don't have any.” His fingers stole along her diaphragm to cup the underside of her left breast. “If we did, we probably wouldn't get a damn thing done for messing with them all day long. They're just so aesthetically pleasing.” He gave her breast a slight shake, then sighed in pure pleasure at the resultant jiggle. “Action and reaction,” he muttered, then looked up at her with a sheepish smile. “This has got to be the most rewarding reaction of all.”

Her eyes had started drifting shut, but she widened them for a moment. “Careful. I just got a glimpse of that geek factor you warned me about. I mean, please, action and reaction? It's a boob. It's got jiggle.” She flashed him a smile. “Still. The reaction's not too shabby from this side of the road, either.”

“Yeah? Let's give that a closer study.” He bent his head, but on his way from her chest to the spiky little nipples calling his name he got sidetracked. “Hey, you've got two, four, six,
seven
freckles,” he said counting the tiny specks sprinkled across her modest cleavage like a curmudgeonly serving of vanilla bean in ice cream.

“What is it with you and freckles? That's the second
time today you've commented on them. Are you a fetishist or something?”

“I never thought so.” He grinned up at her. “But it's like stumbling across sudden treasure, so maybe I am.” He leered at her. “Show me a freckle, and I'll show you uncontrollable lust.”

“Ooh.” She wiggled against his hard-on.

He drew in a sharp breath. “Okay, that does it. No more Mr. Nice Guy.” He pushed up her breast, lowered his head and locked his lips over her nipple. It poked his tongue, and he pressed it toward the roof of his mouth and sucked.

“Oh, my gaaaw—” Her head dropped back, which shoved her breast deeper into his mouth. He licked, and she inhaled sharply. He blew against her damp nipple, and she shivered. He sucked, and she went insane.

The latter reaction was his favorite. He liked her panting and blurry eyed, and he forgot all about his own need for release as he set about seeing just how far he could tease her before she fell off the end of the earth.

He released her breast, pleased when she promptly placed her own hand beneath it and lifted it to his mouth. Her other hand speared through his hair.

He smoothed his freed fingers down her diaphragm, over the smooth skin of her abdomen, down to explore the deep dimple of her navel, lower still to tease beneath the waistband of her cutoffs, which rode the swell of her hips. His erection beat time to the “Hallelujah Chorus” when her legs fell apart.

This position wasn't working, though, and he eased her off his lap and onto her back on the couch, turning to lie on his side beside her. She blinked up at him and, prop
ping his head in his hand, he smiled at her flushed cheeks, slumberous eyes and swollen mouth. “You comfy? That was getting a little awkward.” Without awaiting an answer, he lowered his head and kissed her again.

She moaned softly and ran her hand down his chest. Fingers plucking at the fabric of his T-shirt, she made a dissatisfied sound and disengaged her mouth. “No fair. I'm topless and you should be, too.”

He wrestled his arms out of the shirt and pulled it off. It was still covering his face when her hand spread against the bare swell of his pectorals. Then he felt her shift, and a moment later her mouth replaced her fingers. He yanked the enveloping folds of the shirt over his head.

It felt so good, but fearing for his control, he sank his hands into her hair and, wrapping the soft curls around his fists, pulled back until her lips left his chest and she looked up at him. “I've been thinking about this from practically the minute we met,” he admitted. “And we don't want it to be over before it even begins.” Exerting force to bring her face closer, he bent his head to reach her lips, but it was a futile attempt, for they were no longer on an equitable level.

She laughed and scooted up, her breasts rubbing against his diaphragm before flattening against his chest. Curving her long, strong arms around his neck, she kissed him.

And just like that, heat flared between them again, burning even hotter than before.

He tightened his fist in her hair and kissed her more roughly, reached deeper with his tongue in a bid to lick up every single flavor. Need rode him hard, and he
swept his other hand down to her breast, then ripped his mouth free an instant later and, disentangling her arms from around his neck, he slipped down the couch to replace his kneading fingers with his lips. His freed hand insinuated itself between her legs, and he curved his fingers and pressed his palm against her mound.

“Oh, God, Jax.” Treena's hips bucked into his touch. She slicked her hands across the width of his shoulders, squeezing the rounded muscles where they flowed into his arms when he rubbed the seam that ran between her thighs. He took his hand away, and with a shaky little exhalation she smoothed her hands over his chest.

But he wasn't finished, not by a long shot. Releasing her nipple, he turned his head to watch himself unbutton her cutoffs and pull down the zipper. The low-cut jeans immediately sagged open, the two sides falling apart to display lacy purple panties. He eased his fingers beneath the scalloped waistband and watched his hand disappear. His fingertips slid over a small, silky V of hair, then glided between plump lips of baby-smooth skin that was slick with desire. A sound suspiciously close to a growl escaped his throat, and he kept pushing downward until his middle finger found the opening it sought and entered her.

“Oh!” She reached for his zipper, as well, but between his finger striving for her G-spot and his palm flattening over the slippery pearl of her clit, she kept fumbling the task. She continued to clamp the small golden tab between her fingers even as it became evident her impending orgasm rendered her unable to recall what it was she was supposed to do with it once she had it in her grasp.

He could wait. Barely, it was true, but still, he could do it. He wanted her to come first; then, like the Marines, he was going in. The mobility of his hand was restricted by her cutoffs, but her arched back thrust her breasts ceiling-ward, and he hunched over to lap one stiff, straining nipple.

And that did it for her. She was amazingly tight around the single finger he'd buried in her, and the hot satin vise snugged around it clamped against his forefinger's breadth over and over again as low, breathy wails stuttered out of her throat.

“That's it, sweetheart,” he whispered, looking up at the pure bliss on her face. He scraped his teeth over her nipple and felt another, harder contraction tug at his finger. “That's it. Come for me. Ah, Treena, yes! God almighty, that's a thing of beauty.”

She collapsed a moment later, all the tension that had arched her body like a hard-strung bow fully released. He felt amazingly great for someone with a raging hard-on who hadn't got his, but there was just something so satisfying about having gotten her off. Or—perhaps more specifically—having watched and felt her getting off. Besides, his time had come.

He eased his finger from her body and his hand from her pants and stretched to kiss her, smiling against her lips at the laziness of the kiss she returned. When the girl came, it clearly depleted every store of energy she had. Reaching one-handedly into his hip pocket, he extracted his wallet and fumbled out the condom he'd been carrying in it ever since he'd met her. “You okay?” he whispered, removing her hand from where it rested limply against his fly.

She blinked. “Um-hmm.” But she didn't move, merely blinked some more. “I don't seem to have any bones in my body.”

He laughed. “Take your time. I'm not planning to start without you.”

Her eyes widened and her gaze flashed downward to where his erection pressed against her hip. “Really?” She seemed surprised by that, and as if not quite trusting the veracity of his words, she struggled to get all her limbs moving at the same time. “Oh, man.” She fumbled the condom from his fingers. “Here. Lemme give you a hand with that. Get this show on the road.” She reached for him.

Jax intercepted her hand. “Whoa. Slow down. There's no rush.”

She looked confused and he studied her, trying to figure out what the hell was going on. She acted as if this was some huge new marvel she'd never experienced, and damned if it didn't feel new to him, too. How did she get him so mixed up, he barely knew up from down?

Not that this was the time to think about it. That became crystal clear when Treena brushed her hand against his erection. He jerked, his dick suddenly insistent as her fingers stroked his erection once again. The lady was clearly in the mood for action.

He lowered his head again to give her a let's-kick-this-up-a-notch kiss.

Things were just beginning to heat up nicely once more when the phone rang. Treena's lips stilled beneath his for an instant, then she relaxed against him. Looping one arm around his neck, she unzipped his fly with her free hand and reached into his pants. He
sucked in a fierce breath at the feel of her hand wrapping around him.

The phone stopped ringing and the machine kicked on. Treena's message murmured in the background. Then Carly's frantic voice interrupted his mindless haze of pleasure.

“Oh, shit, oh, shit, you're not there. I cut myself washing dishes, and oh, God, Treen, it's bleeding like crazy and I can see the
bone.
”

The next thing he knew Treena's hand was gone, his ass was kissing the hardwood floor, and she was bounding off the couch, leaping over his prone body. She hit the floor running, one hand clutching her sagging cutoffs as, swearing like a trucker, she sprinted for the phone.

B
Y THE TIME
Treena snagged a nurse who had paused at the E.R. desk to make a notation on a chart, the sun was definitely headed for the horizon. “Excuse me,” she said to the woman. “Can you give me some idea when they're going to get Carly Jacobsen in? She's been waiting for over two hours.”

“Sorry, miss, it's been a busy evening. We triage for most life-threatening traumas first.”

“But she cut herself to the bone. She's bleeding!”

“Let me see.” The nurse came around the desk and followed her over to where Carly and Jax sat waiting. Squatting in front of the injured woman, she gently peeled back the cloth Carly had pressed to her wound. “Oh, boy. Washing a glass, were you?”

“Yes. How did you know?”

“We see a lot of these.” She covered it back up and rose to her feet. “But you've stopped the bleeding yourself, so I'm afraid you'll just have to wait to have it stitched up until a room is clear. There's been a turf war and the cops brought us several gangbangers who are also bleeding. Only their wounds were caused by knife and gunshot wounds.” She gave Carly's arm a little pat and turned on her rubber-soled heel and strode away.

“I'm sorry,” Treena said, looking at her friend, who had tipped her head back against the wall and closed her eyes. She reclaimed her seat beside her.

“It's okay, Treen. She's right. This may be a big deal to me, but it's hardly in the same category as a gunshot wound.”

“Does it hurt?”

“No, it's kind of numb right now. I'm just hoping they get me in before the numbness wears off.”

“They will,” Jax assured her, speaking for the first time in quite a while from the other side of Treena.

She turned to him gratefully. “See. So says a guy who's probably been in hospitals all over the world.”

“Well, that might be overstating the case a bit, but I've had an encounter or two with the sort of injuries that start out numb then hurt later—and the numbness usually lasts until the anesthesia kicks in.”

He gave Treena a do-you-think-she's-buying-it grimace, and she knew he was just making it up as he went along. But it seemed to be working, for Carly nodded wearily without opening her eyes. She even smiled slightly.

“That's good to know,” she whispered. “I'm a baby when it comes to pain.”

“Then you'll want to be sure to ask them to prescribe something you can take before the numbing agent wears off,” Jax advised gently.

His thigh brushed Treena's as he settled back in his chair and her nipples immediately beaded and she went all tight and achy inside. That was a first, she thought. She didn't usually feel this way about a man after making out. But then she'd never experienced anything quite
as intense as the time she'd spent on the couch with Jax. Nor had men ever stuck around long once she'd disappointed them. And if they didn't take off,
she
wanted nothing more than to run for the hills. She'd certainly never actually anticipated round two.

She reached out and took Carly's free hand in her own, lacing their fingers together in hopes of anchoring her thoughts in something more appropriate to the situation and setting. But she couldn't seem to quit sneaking sidelong glances at Jax. Before the phone had blasted everything else from her mind, she'd been in post-orgasmic bliss. She'd had her hand boldly down Jax's pants and for the first time in ages she'd felt the throbbing heat of a hard penis beneath her palm.

Then she'd been jerked from the boneless, lethargic haze of her own pleasure into Carly's kitchen, with its trail of browning droplets spattered across the light vinyl floor between the sink and the phone. Her friend had been on the verge of hysteria, the dogs and cats had all been milling about adding to the confusion, and she'd had next to no time to pull her scattered wits together. Only Jax's calming presence had helped ground her as she'd settled Carly down and pressed a clean towel to her deep wound before bundling her friend into Jax's rental car for the drive to the hospital.

And now that she had the leisure to sort through her emotions, she couldn't. So many scrambled through her system. She felt satiated, because she had never experienced an orgasm that was even close to the one Jax had given her. Guilty because she'd left him high and dry. Sorry, considering how great the preliminaries had been, they had missed the main event. Worried that it
would have been every bit as disappointing as she'd come to expect if they
had
brought it to the conclusion they'd been steaming toward before the interruption.

Finally she regretted that poor Carly had to sit in a crowded emergency room so long with a sliced up hand, and she was ashamed that her friend's welfare wasn't even close to the top of her concerns.

“Omigawd, the babies!” Carly's eyes abruptly snapped open, and she raised her head away from the wall, tension radiating from the suddenly stiff set of her shoulders. “I was going to feed them as soon as I finished the dishes, but seeing my own blood drove it clean out of my head. They're probably climbing the walls by now.”

Treena rose to her feet. “I left without my cell phone, but I'll find a land line and call Mack to see if he'll feed them for you.”

“Ask him if he'll take Buster and Rufus out to do their biz, too.”

“Gotcha.”

“Here.” Jax stood, as well, and pulled his cell phone from his pocket. He held it out to her. “You don't have to look for a phone. You can use mine.”

“Even better.” She studied his face, which was momentarily close enough to her own for their breaths to commingle, and her heart performed a slow roll in her chest. He hadn't whined once about being so abruptly cut off just when he was about to reap his sexual reward. He had been, in fact, nothing short of wonderful. But he'd also been much quieter than usual, and she wondered what he really thought about all that had happened today. Operating on impulse, she stretched up to plant a quick kiss on his lips. “Thank you,” she said, set
tling back on her heels. “For everything.” She took the phone. “I'll just take this outside where it's quieter.”

She talked to Mack minutes later and once she explained the situation he was ready to take care of the babies that very minute. With an admonishment to tell Carly not to worry about a thing, to simply take care of herself, he rang off, leaving Treena smiling.

He was a good friend.

And thinking how comforting a good friend could be in a situation like this, she dialed Ellen. The older woman was the closest thing she and Carly had to a mom—at least in this state. Moreover, Ellen
knew
Carly as Carly's own mother did not, and Treena felt a sudden desire to touch base with her.

The accident spilled out of her the moment Ellen picked up and Ellen's response immediately soothed her jangled nerves.

“Oh, darling! How awful for her—and for you, too. Where did you take her? Desert Springs?”

“Yes.”

“I'll be right there.”

“You don't have to do that.” She tried to sound as if she actually meant it, but in truth Ellen's stated intention sounded like the best idea she'd heard all day.

“Of course I do.”

“We could be here all night,” she warned Ellen. “They don't consider her injuries real high on their list of priorities.”

“I don't care how long it takes,” Ellen said. “Hang tight, sweetheart. I'll be there in ten minutes. Twenty tops, if traffic is bad.”

The phone went dead.

Treena turned to go back inside, then realized she needed to call work and let them know what was going on. It was unlikely she'd be able to make the eight-o'clock show—and God knew she wasn't in the greatest mental shape for it even if she could get there in time. But one didn't simply blow off a performance in
la Stravaganza
and expect to remain employed. Stepping away from the automatic door, she keyed in the general manager's number.

A few minutes later she disconnected, and with Vernetta-Grace's advice to take the rest of the night off, she went back through the E.R. doors, hit anew by the scents and sounds of humanity awaiting help. Codes were called over the loudspeaker, children cried or ran around un-checked, and adults yelled for attention or simply slumped quietly in their institutional chairs, as they waited to be taken back into the mysterious depths of the E.R.

She took her seat between Carly and Jax once again. “Mack said to tell you he's ‘on it' and not to worry about anything except getting yourself fixed up.”

“He's such a sweetie.”

“Yeah. And Ellen's on her way.”

“Oh, bless her, bless her,
bless her!
”

Treena laughed. “Now Carly, don't hold it all in where it can fester and spread its poison. Tell us how you really feel.”

The blonde smiled wanly. “You know that I regress when I'm sick or hurt. Well, I really need a mommy fix right now. Oh, not
my
mom's brand of mothering. But Ellen is just what the doctor ordered.” Her lips, more accustomed to smiling than sneering, curled witheringly. “Or would be, I'm sure, if I could only get in to see one.”

“Ellen's the best,” Treena agreed. She gave her friend a gentle jostle with her elbow. “Hey, maybe she'll bring cookies.”

She didn't, but she did bring immediate comfort. Striding into the E.R. waiting area a brief while later, Ellen promptly zeroed in on their little threesome. Clad in one of the colorful tops she'd bought during their shopping spree yesterday—this one a pretty purple with enough gray in it to accentuate the silver in her salt-and-pepper hair—she swept up to Carly and leaned forward to give her a careful hug. As she straightened she brushed a spike of the younger woman's hair back from her forehead. “Are you all right? You're terribly pale.”

“I'm kinda freaked,” Carly admitted. “But I'm not too bad, really. It doesn't hurt, and Jax says it probably won't if they give me something to take before the numbness wears off. Anyhow, I'm doing okay as long as I don't think about it too closely. I don't like blood, and I
really
don't like seeing skin split open to reveal the inner workings. Especially my own.”

“I'm sure you don't.” Ellen took a seat on the other side of her. “If you'd cared to view that sort of thing you probably would have become a nurse instead of a dancer.”

“Exactly!”

Treena had known Ellen would be the antidote they needed. The older woman brought a natural warmth and bedrock common sense to every situation.

Jax suddenly climbed to his feet, and she swung around to stare up at him.

“Look,” he said, thrusting his hands in his pants pockets as he looked back at her. “As long as Ellen is here, would you mind if I took off?” He glanced beyond
her at the retired librarian. “That is, if you don't object to seeing them both home?”

“No, of course I don't.”

Treena climbed to her feet, as well, feeling uncharacteristically awkward, as if she were suddenly all arms and legs without a flexible joint between them. Damn. He
was
angry with her. He'd simply been too well-mannered to leave her and Carly to cope on their own.

“Don't look like that,” he commanded and, wrapping his fingers around her arm, led her beyond earshot of the other two women.

She stood stiffly within his grasp. “You're mad at me.”

“No. I'm not. I know what you're thinking, but this has nothing to do with what happened—or I guess more accurately what didn't happen—earlier. It's just that tomorrow is the first day of the tournament, and I need to psyche myself up for it.”

“Oh, my gosh, is that starting already?”

“Yeah. And my process before it begins is to spend a quiet evening dealing with everything that's been going on in my life so none of it's on my mind when I play.”

“Uh-huh,” she said, and she couldn't prevent the slight edge of cynicism that crept into her voice. “So what were you doing at my place, then?”

“I never intended to stay there long. I just thought maybe we could go for a ride or something. Blow the cobwebs free.” He rubbed his hands up and down her arms. “Believe it or not, jumping your bones wasn't in my game plan. And I really didn't plan on this.” A tip of his head indicated the teeming waiting room.

Even though she suspected it made her pathetically
needy, she was nevertheless soothed by the explanation. It robbed her of the fear that, once again, her sexual performance had driven a man away. “Okay, then.” She tried to step back, but his hands tightened on her arms, and she tilted her head back a bit to look up at him. “Good luck on getting your karma in tune, or whatever. And good luck tomorrow, too.”

“You wanna wish me luck?”

“Of course.”

“Then I'll take this.” He lowered his head and kissed her. She was barely able to stand on her own two feet by the time he raised his head again. “For luck,” he said, then smiled down at her. “I love seeing that look on your face.”

“Hmm?” She blinked up at him, then made a concerted effort to focus. “What look?”

“That blurry-eyed, ‘Do me' look.”

A sputter of laughter escaped her, but she jabbed stiffened fingers into his hard gut and faked outrage. “My God, nothing wrong with
your
ego, is there?”

“Ego's got nothing to do with it. I just recognize the signs when I see them. And, honey, you've got more postings than a military installation. Do me,” he crooned softly in her ear. “Do me, do me, do me.”

She bit the inside of her cheek to forestall the grin she felt building. “Be sure to turn that fat head sideways when you go through the doors,” she advised. “We wouldn't want you to give yourself a concussion trying to get it through the exit head-on. Though come to think of it, you're in the right place for it.” She stepped back to study him. “Still, you've seen how long it takes to get attention for anyone who's not bleeding to death, and
sitting around while your brain swells against your skull probably won't improve your game any.”