Stay for Me (12 page)

“Just us,” she said and tugged him from
their sitting position up onto his knees with her.

One.
Two.
Three.
Four.

She popped the buttons of his shirt
loose and slid it over his shoulders so it could fall to the floor. At the same
time, he felt his blood racing with adrenaline and he wanted to take her in his
arms and follow the path his clothes had just taken. But he stopped himself.
Not yet. His gut clenched in time to his breathing. The muscles he’d spent all
that time and energy on tensed and hardened. His whole body was ready to take
her in.

Sam whispered into her ear.
Just one final thing for her to think about.
“I’ve loved you
since the first night you took me to your home. No matter what…if this doesn’t
work…that will never change.”

Her breath hitched as he watched a tear
drop onto her cheek. He wiped it dry for her and waited for the next one to
fall then wiped that one, too. “Stop that, you’re
gonna
make me cry like a little girl,” he said,
then
put her
hands on his chest. Her palms stuck to his skin as they sat there kneeling in
front of each other, staring. With her deep brown eyes searching his, he felt
her fingers make their way to his nipples. She rubbed, spending an excruciating
amount of time making them even harder, more electric.

He was about to go for a kiss when her
hands reached down and cupped him. Sam was almost certain his eyes rolled back
in his head so he closed them just to make sure he didn’t look possessed. But
damn, her hand, squeezing him. Knowing this time it was an act that would take
them to making love, not just skirting around it. She held him in her hand,
like she had to have him. Wanted and needed him.
All the way.
He knew this. He knew Emma Chester. If things didn’t work out tonight, she was
just stubborn enough to believe in that crap about them not having been made
for each other. All he knew right now with her trusting him like
this,
was that they’d been made for each other.

Their hearts fit. Their souls were a
perfect match.
 

And if there was one thing he knew about
the human body, it was flexible. That’s what he clung to as her hands explored
more of him, and then she pressed her lips to his and waited for him to kiss
her back.

Chapter Eleven

Sam grasped her hips from behind and
pushed, gritting his teeth.

It felt amazing, just like he’d dreamed,
until she screamed that familiar scream.

Everything but that piercing noise went
silent. Sam froze.

Movement in the corner caught his eye,
and he remembered Gabe was in the room. Gabe, whose eyes were now
opened
. Damn.

“Tell me you are okay, Emma.”

The protective instinct in him to cover
her up now with an
awake
Gabe had him beginning to
pull himself out but she held him with her hand, grasping for his thigh as best
she could.

“I’m okay.” But she let out a whimper.

He could not do this. Sam took her two
hips in his hands and held them tightly as he began to ease out.

“No, don’t. Please. You said you’d
stay.” Her voice was different, but it wasn’t just tinted with pain, there was
a begging
plead
, too.

How could he do this, but how could he
not do this?

Sam hated, detested himself right now,
but he was desperate to soothe her. Dammit, that he couldn’t do that from
behind her right now. His hips enveloped her bottom cheeks, her face and her
eyes were too far away and hidden from him.

He watched, mostly choked up and hating this
idea, but he swallowed his pride and asked.
For her.

“Gabe,” it was all he had to say. Gabe
walked over to them, keeping his face serious and respectful. There was no
amusement, nothing that would say his friend thought this a joke. Sam loosened
his grip on her hips and as soon as he did that, he felt her body relax. She
kept her head tilted down and her hair angled down over the sides of her face
like curtains.

He was glad she had at least that much
privacy and the ability to hide her face at his idiotic brilliance.

He stroked a hand up and down her back,
following the line of her spine with his finger, trying for anything that would
be soothing from all the way back here. Gabe saw what Sam was doing but didn’t
react.

Sam mouthed to Gabe, “Help her for me,
please.”

Gabe had to see the desperation on his
face and nodded. Then he did something so natural but in no way sexual. Gabe
petted her hair and pulled her face into the crook of his shoulder. After a
second, he signaled Sam should keep going. But needing more assurance, Sam
eyeballed Gabe and lifted his chin, silently asking if she was really okay.
Gabe nodded.

Moving his hips forward and holding her
still, Sam searched for more access, a way inside her body. All he felt was
resistance. She was just so small.

“It’s not working. I can’t hurt her,”
Sam said over Emma’s beautiful back and mussed blonde hair.

“No,” he heard her pant.

And then to his complete surprise, he
heard, “Don’t quit now. Trust me. I know what I’m saying,” said Gabe, looking
Sam straight in the eye. “She’ll be able to get past this if you just keep
taking it slow.” Gabe then cleared his throat.

Could he trust Gabe’s tolerance for pain
where Emma was concerned? Sam knew Gabe was bisexual and had had a boyfriend
not too long ago before his last girlfriend. But Gabe was tough.

So
is she.

Would it have hurt him to do one more Internet
search first on this stuff? He’d have asked Gabe, but even his friend would not
have known for sure if men could take more than a woman in this position. But
damn, women gave birth all the time. Still, fear clouded his every thought and
movement, which was why he’d gone stone cold. Just then, Emma swayed her hips
from side to side. She was trying, so hard. Yes, she was tough and so damn sexy
and beautiful.

He looked at Gabe who should be freaking
sainted, or at the very least knighted, for his efforts. His friend steadily
whispered into Emma’s ear, no doubt telling her to hang in there and that she
looked beautiful.

Jealousy shot through Sam.

This was a one-time deal, no matter how
thankful he was.

Apparently that must be written all over
his face because when Gabe glanced back at him, he coughed and pulled back ever
so slightly, then nodded in understanding as if to say he was only doing what
he’d been asked to do.

Sam rubbed his fingers into her hip-flesh
and moved his knees, searching for a better angle to try. She wiggled her butt,
his heart nearly came. He was pretty sure that had to be possible because there
was no separation for him between sex and love when it came to her.

He pushed. She cried out. He stilled,
holding in his own cry at the possibility he’d have to break his promise to
her.

“Please,” she whispered.

Damn. “Bro, can you distract her with
something?” he hissed to Gabe.

For a second, Gabe looked down his own
body and then seemed to realize that wasn’t what Sam had been thinking.
Although at this point…

Gabe nodded and then whispered something
loud enough for Sam to hear, too. It was damn funny. Completely inappropriate
but the joke was good. Hell, they all needed a good laugh after this.

“You know what they call two nuns and a
stripper, don’t you?
Playmakers, little mama.
The tight ends and a wide receiver.”

A laugh rolled downward from her
shoulders to her spine to her perfectly cup-able ass cheeks. Sam chuckled
quietly along but couldn’t stop gazing at how beautiful and sexy she looked and
how incredible she was to be doing this with him.

He could never do anything to lose her
again.

Gabe told another joke, something about
the difference between a cocktail waitress and a stripper being one week’s
time. Her head gently rubbed against Gabe’s midriff. Sam needed her to himself,
and he wanted to leave this room thankful to Gabe, not hating the man and on
the verge of murder.

More importantly, Emma’s insides relaxed
around his cock, loosening enough to let him slide further inside. Hope sprang
up that this might work. If humor was the trick to their troubles, he’d learn
every joke ever known to mankind.

“There you go, baby,” Sam said, barely
out loud, not wanting to interrupt the happy place Gabe’s presence had taken
her to. One of these days, that would be his doing. He’d learn, now that he’d
seen it was possible.

“Good job, little mama,” Gabe said then
looked back at him. His friend and lifesaver mouthed the words, “I’m out. You
got this.” Gabe kissed the top of her head and then got up from his knees,
rubbed them, and quietly left the room. Sam heard the door lock.

“Sam?”

“Yeah, hon?”
He could get
used to calling her that and took the liberty to slide
himself
out an inch and then slowly push back in. She groaned, but deeper and with less
pain.

He watched her back rise and fall with
the breath she took. “I want to see your face,” she said.

“I want that, too.”

But what if it meant seeing the pain she
wouldn’t be able to hide were they face to face?

He’d made his decision.

Her giggling at Gabe’s jokes would
forever be engraved on these walls. As long as Gabe worked here, Emma would
have happy memories of
S
. Sam’s job
wasn’t to take care of her here anymore, it was to be that brave man she needed
outside these walls.
In the real world.

Chapter Twelve

He steadied himself by grabbing hold of
her hips and pulled out of her tight body. Once he was out, she took it upon
herself to roll over and lay on her back, over his military white dress shirt,
with her arms crossed over her chest, blocking his view. Her cheeks were flushed,
but he knew it wasn’t due to embarrassment.

When her arms opened wide, inviting him
down on top of her, he had to take a moment.
A moment to
commit so as not to take any of this lightly.
It was damn easy to do. He
hoped this didn’t hurt her feelings because he’d never felt more sincere about
making an invitation. Okay, it was going to come out more like an order.

“I’m taking you back to my place for the
rest of the night, Emma. And if you want, that’s where I’d like you to stay.”

She crawled up off the floor and stood
toe to toe with him even though her nose only barely made it to his
pecs
. Still, she was the strongest woman he knew, size be
damned.

“Let’s get dressed,” she said and handed
him the uniform top. “I have to finish my shift, but, after that, I can’t think
of anyplace I’d rather stay, or anyone else I’d rather stay for. Her smile
wrecked him. He loved it.

Coming out of
S
room hand in hand, they found the door was being guarded by Gabe.
Sam nodded to his friend, cementing the knowledge she’d be okay without him
here.

Back in the ER, he stood while she went
to her desk and thumbed through the unfolded piles of clothes stacked on top. She
plucked out his civilian clothes and handed them to him, a bit of sadness
hanging out in her pretty brown eyes. But the way she looked at him...

All of a sudden, with his departure
imminent, he had the crazy need to explain things, to reassure her he wasn’t
acting on foolish pride, or according to the size of his big toe that said he
was so stubborn.

“This is why I never quit construction.
I knew I wouldn’t be able to avoid you forever and that my time here would
eventually have to come to an end. I want to take care of you, Emma. I always
have.”

A look in her eyes told him one of the
ways she needed him to care for her. They hadn’t finished this night, not by a
long shot.

She was still quiet.

“Hey, what do you want me in when you
get home?” He called it that on purpose, eyes trained on hers.

She then handed him a cowboy uniform. It
wasn’t his and this one wouldn’t fit, but he’d decided then and there that the
first place he was going when he left here was to clean out his locker and
bring all his costumes with him, especially the vest and stirrups. With two
firm grips, she pulled him down by the biceps and kissed his cheek. She then
went to open the door to send him out. “Let’s try saving a horse tonight,” she
said, cementing his carnal death.

“It’d be my pleasure, ma’am,” he said in
his best country accent. God, he loved the way she loosened his too-serious ass
up. But then he thought seriously about his parting words, needing her to know
how much he meant them. “Please never let me find out you were in
S
room with anyone else. It would kill
me. Not even Gabe, Emma.”