“I f**king love it. Tell me his name now.” Hot blue eyes watch me as I pour the oil into my palms and rub my hands together to warm the liquid before sliding it slickly along his chest and shoulders.
“But . . . he’s . . . complicated,” I whisper, curling my fingers around his collarbone and throat. “I know him very well, and yet . . .” I pause and rub the arnica oil all down the solid length of one muscled arm. “And at the same time, he’s always still a mystery.” Sliding back up his arm and to stroke the oil across his trapezoids, I whisper in his ear, “He goes by Riptide sometimes, but I call him Remy. And I’m crazy about him.”
His chest rumbles with a chuckle, and I see the little stars of delight dancing inside his eyes as he looks into my face and tweaks my nose. “You’re good for my ego, Brooke my-pregnant-beauty Dumas.”
“But don’t let that ego get even bigger,” I warn him, now rubbing the warm oil along his pecs as I drop my voice and tell him, “You’re mine.”
Smiling, I slide my fingers down his forearm, I stroke down to his palm, then I impulsively lift his hand and kiss his knuckles, looking into his blue eyes, which shine with tenderness as he watches me. “This is mine, too?” I ask uncertainly.
He lowers his voice to a playful rasp as he runs the back of a finger along my cheek. “Depends, little firecracker. Do you want it?”
“I want it.”
“Then it’s yours, baby girl.”
Taking his other hand, I repeat what I did with the first one and kiss his knuckles. “And this one?”
“Do you want it?” He raises his eyebrows and happily jerks his head in the direction of the door. “All those ladies out there wanted it.”
“But I want it,” I protest.
He smiles indulgently and runs the back of a finger down my jaw again. “Then it’s yours.”
My voice thickens when I jerk down his towel so I can slick the oil into his calves and powerful thighs. I admire his sexy smile, those dimples and that rumpled hair. I ask, “What about you? All of you?” As I slick my oily hands up his eight-pack, I lift my head to search for his lips. He groans when I lick the seam of his mouth. Softly. I continue massaging his flesh as I start moving my lips over his. He’s a fighting machine and he’s mine, and my eyes briefly slide shut as I tend to him and breathe, “What about you, Remington? Are you mine?”
His thick rasp makes my ni**les bead. “Do you want me?”
God. My adorable big man of a boy. A boy with the strength of a thousand men. Playful and possessive. I am dying from need and love as I whisper, “I want you,” in his ear. “All of you. Black and blue and any other shade you come in.”
Groaning, he draws my head down to his lips and kisses me, hard and deeply. “I’ll answer that to you in bed.” He grabs my hand as if ready for the bed part, but I laugh and pull back.
“Five more minutes!”
He shakes his head. “Two.”
“Four.”
“Three, now take it or I’ll toss you up on the bed right over there, right this second.”
“Done.”
“Done, I toss you up on the bed?” he prods.
“Done, three more minutes!” I cry laughingly, speeding up my hands as I rub them along his hard pecs. My laugh fades when my thoughts drift back to the Scorpion’s men. “She used to slip into my bed at night when she had nightmares. She had such a vivid imagination, she’d see things, good and bad, where there weren’t any.”
“What are you talking about?” he asks huskily.
“Nora,” I say, unable to hide the sadness in my voice. “I just want you to know why I . . . I don’t know. Why I’ve always protected her. She seemed to need me, and we fell into those roles. She’s always needed protecting. But now I wonder if I don’t let her solve her own problems, will she ever learn a lesson? I’ve always wanted to protect her but now nothing will ever make me risk the baby and you, not even her.”
His expression is so gentle and understanding, a little knot of emotion winds in my chest. “Shh. Relax,” he says, stroking a hand down my hair. “He’s not getting the championship, or the prize, or your sister. He’s not winning. I. Get. It all. Do you hear me? I get the gold, the championship, the sister’s freedom . . . And I get to protect, and please, and love my girl.”
SEVENTEEN
AUSTIN IS A WHIRL
A group of deer leap across the greenbelt area behind the sprawling gardens of the Austin rental home. I point at them and say, “Look!” but Remy just grunts; he’s a little busy flipping a gigantic tractor tire over, again and again.
It’s so hot here in Texas, sweat trickles down my neck and dips into my cle**age.
Squinting in the afternoon sun, I ask Remy and Coach if they want anything from inside, and Coach shakes his head, while Remy grunts and starts turning the tire in the opposite direction.