which was usually hidden, even during their ardent lovemaking. She’d thought she knew every luscious detail of his face, so this discovery was thrilling.
And that’s what she was thinking about when he turned and brought her through the doorway, the last couple to make their way across the patio, across the dance floor to the corner of the stone wall near the large cascading fountain. At the sight of Colin’s face, his eyes sashaying between the two of them, his lips raised in a private grin, she and Luke drifted apart and took their respective positions at the end of the procession on either side of the ceremony center.
A lute player began playing an old English hymn and the minister instructed everyone to rise and turn to see Stephanie standing at the edge of the patio with Julie’s dad proudly at her side. There was a collective gasp, and for a second Julie thought the audience would break into spontaneous applause.
Though Julie was focused on the bride, and frequently bringing her warm, loving gaze back to Colin, she felt Luke watching her. She could feel the heat of his smoldering gaze, the attraction that was still so strong, especially since it had been given a little encouragement earlier with the snag of her dress and the gentle brush of his fingers against her. She hadn’t flinched or stepped back at his subtle touch. Her heart still pounded at the closeness to him, at the feel of his eyes perusing her body carefully while everyone else’s was focused on the bride. She was doing her own private lap dance for him though she barely moved.
When Stephanie approached her future husband, Julie allowed Colin’s head to obscure Luke’s face. She noticed the SEAL stayed put and then moved slightly to the side so she got a clear look at his questioning blue eyes. She rocked back on the heels of her slippers and he was obscured again, and she turned her eyes downward as if she hadn’t noticed what she’d done.
In an act of boldness rising from somewhere deep within her, she licked her ruby red lips, raised her chin and stared straight into the blue heaven of his eyes. Her heart fluttered and protested the pain of needing him so much, but took solace in the equal need she saw in his.
Chapter 15
‡
D amn it! Luke’s inability to focus wasn’t helping today. He was tethered to the sight of Julie, like a big peach wad of cotton candy, ripe and exploding on his taste buds, the image of her delicate flower underneath all those petticoats and the way she would writhe beneath him.
Is she feeling it too?
Why couldn’t they just sit and talk first? Why did it always end up being about sex with her? He wanted desperately to plunge into her, but the need to be understood…to be loved…first was filling him with an angst which normally would make him incapable. Not today. He was drilling deep with his eyes, as if he could convince her he had the best of intentions, but couldn’t think until he was next to her, inside her, breathing her spice and tasting her juices.
At her fuckin’ brother’s wedding. He felt an unmistakable, and damned inconvenient, rock-hard erection. Maybe the pain of his need was spurring him on. Was it the PTSD, making it so he wanted to lose control, take her, lift up her skirts and bask in the glory of her pink, quivering peach?
God in heaven, I’m a fuckin’ dog. He made quick apologies to Mama Guzman’s God, the one they all prayed to on Team 3.
Help me out, here.
And then he saw her wet her lips. She was all pink and innocent except for lips the color of blood. The crack of the automatic, the feeling of warm liquid on his thighs, Camilla’s blood, the whisper from his beloved, the one he had held onto every night, in spite of how much pain it caused him, the familiar things of his memory and his life, slipping into the slots of his brain and one by one faded, until all he could see was Camilla’s lips saying, goodbye.
Black circles began to tighten around his vision, and he
And that’s what she was thinking about when he turned and brought her through the doorway, the last couple to make their way across the patio, across the dance floor to the corner of the stone wall near the large cascading fountain. At the sight of Colin’s face, his eyes sashaying between the two of them, his lips raised in a private grin, she and Luke drifted apart and took their respective positions at the end of the procession on either side of the ceremony center.
A lute player began playing an old English hymn and the minister instructed everyone to rise and turn to see Stephanie standing at the edge of the patio with Julie’s dad proudly at her side. There was a collective gasp, and for a second Julie thought the audience would break into spontaneous applause.
Though Julie was focused on the bride, and frequently bringing her warm, loving gaze back to Colin, she felt Luke watching her. She could feel the heat of his smoldering gaze, the attraction that was still so strong, especially since it had been given a little encouragement earlier with the snag of her dress and the gentle brush of his fingers against her. She hadn’t flinched or stepped back at his subtle touch. Her heart still pounded at the closeness to him, at the feel of his eyes perusing her body carefully while everyone else’s was focused on the bride. She was doing her own private lap dance for him though she barely moved.
When Stephanie approached her future husband, Julie allowed Colin’s head to obscure Luke’s face. She noticed the SEAL stayed put and then moved slightly to the side so she got a clear look at his questioning blue eyes. She rocked back on the heels of her slippers and he was obscured again, and she turned her eyes downward as if she hadn’t noticed what she’d done.
In an act of boldness rising from somewhere deep within her, she licked her ruby red lips, raised her chin and stared straight into the blue heaven of his eyes. Her heart fluttered and protested the pain of needing him so much, but took solace in the equal need she saw in his.
Chapter 15
‡
D amn it! Luke’s inability to focus wasn’t helping today. He was tethered to the sight of Julie, like a big peach wad of cotton candy, ripe and exploding on his taste buds, the image of her delicate flower underneath all those petticoats and the way she would writhe beneath him.
Is she feeling it too?
Why couldn’t they just sit and talk first? Why did it always end up being about sex with her? He wanted desperately to plunge into her, but the need to be understood…to be loved…first was filling him with an angst which normally would make him incapable. Not today. He was drilling deep with his eyes, as if he could convince her he had the best of intentions, but couldn’t think until he was next to her, inside her, breathing her spice and tasting her juices.
At her fuckin’ brother’s wedding. He felt an unmistakable, and damned inconvenient, rock-hard erection. Maybe the pain of his need was spurring him on. Was it the PTSD, making it so he wanted to lose control, take her, lift up her skirts and bask in the glory of her pink, quivering peach?
God in heaven, I’m a fuckin’ dog. He made quick apologies to Mama Guzman’s God, the one they all prayed to on Team 3.
Help me out, here.
And then he saw her wet her lips. She was all pink and innocent except for lips the color of blood. The crack of the automatic, the feeling of warm liquid on his thighs, Camilla’s blood, the whisper from his beloved, the one he had held onto every night, in spite of how much pain it caused him, the familiar things of his memory and his life, slipping into the slots of his brain and one by one faded, until all he could see was Camilla’s lips saying, goodbye.
Black circles began to tighten around his vision, and he
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