Luci’s face softened and her lips smiled before she said quietly, “It’s lovely, cara.”
“Uh… thanks,” I muttered then slid my heels off the chair and stood, saying quickly, “I’ll e-mail Paula after I get ready.” My eyes moved to Sam. “Is my stuff upstairs?”
He shook his head, put his coffee cup down and then his hands to the arms of his chair as he muttered, “I’ll get it.”
He didn’t push up.
This was because Luci announced, “Kia thinks she’s normal.”
My breath clogged and I was pretty sure my eyes bugged out.
Sam’s gaze cut to her.
“Come again?”
“She told her French friend she was normal,” Luci explained. “Not like us.”
Sam’s gaze cut back to me.
I wondered if there was additional sentencing if you were tried and convicted for clobbering ex-supermodels.
“Kia, cara mia,” Luci said to me and I tore my eyes from a perplexed Sam to her, “the pictures of your future home are lovely. It’s much like Travis and my home in North Carolina.”
Oh yeah. I forgot Sam lived in North Carolina; he’d stayed where he’d last been stationed.
Wow. That was a long way away from me.
“Except smaller,” Luci finished.
“Uh…” I mumbled.
“Girl, give us a minute,” Sam said to Luci and Luci turned to him.
“How many minutes with Kia are you going to need, Sam?” she asked tartly, clearly wishing to be in on finishing the intervention she’d instigated after outing further pieces of my dramatic conversation with Celeste she’d eavesdropped on.
His eyes cut to her and they stayed locked on her as he stood, his head tipping down to hold her gaze as he straightened and hers tipping back to hold his.
Then he rumbled, “A lot.”
“Right,” she whispered, turned to me, bugged out her eyes then she glided away.
I watched her go then looked to Sam.
“You’re not like us?” he asked.
“That was taken out of context,” I explained. “Luci only heard my side of the conversation.”
“So, baby, tell me, how did she take it out of context?”
“Well –” I started but didn’t finish.
This was because Sam cut me off to ask, “I thought we got past this last night.”
“Actually, I was telling Celeste about last night. That was how it was out of context.”
“Okay, then, why did you look like you were holding back the urge to grab Luci’s laptop and throw it over the balcony when she turned it so we could see pictures of the place you’re thinkin’ of buying?”
Okay, now, seriously.
Did the man miss nothing?
I glared.
Sam waited.
I kept glaring.
“Baby,” he growled.
I threw up my hands and cried, “What do you want me to say, Sam? Look at her.” I threw an arm out in the direction where Luci disappeared then swung it out again and went on, “And this place. And her cars.” Then I flicked a hand out to him. “And you. You’re hot, you’re famous, you’re rich and, if that wasn’t enough, you kiss really freaking well. I mean, God granted you more talents than just playing football and being an excellent commando, Sam, trust me. Clearly, He does not have an even hand. And I’m, well…” I threw up my hands again and said kind of loudly, “Me. So, okay, I got a little weirded out by you guys looking at my possible new pad because it isn’t Malibu or Lake Como or whatever. Put yourself in my shoes. How would you feel if you were me?”
I barely finished with the word “me” before I found myself not standing three feet from Sam but instead plastered against his body, one of his arms tight around me, the other hand in my hair cupping the back of my head and his face an inch from mine.
I had not recovered from this maneuver, like, at all, before Sam asked, using his sexy, rough-like-velvet voice, “God granted me more talents than playin’ football and bein’ an excellent commando?”
Oh man. I totally needed to learn when to shut up.
“Sam –” I whispered and he grinned and he did that in a sexy way too so I (way too late) shut up, my mind took that opportunity to remind me what his mouth tasted like, and his skin, and I shivered.
His grin got bigger and sexier.
Then his eyes heated, his eyelids lowered a sexy centimeter and he muttered, “Fuck.”
“What?” I pushed out on a breath.
“You wearin’ anything under this?”
Uh-oh.
“Uh…” I mumbled but that too was breathy.
Sam was clearly feeling impatient with the flow of information so his hand went on a voyage of discovery and trailed light as a whisper over my behind.
Even light, that felt so good, I sucked in breath, shivered again and my knees got week.
“Fuck,” he repeated on a mutter when his voyage of discovery gave him confirmation on the intel he’d assumed and now his voice was heated which meant I heated, like, all over.
Oh man.
“How bad you wanna take this boat trip, honey?” he asked, his voice now low as well as sexy and rough.
“What boat trip?” I asked back, my voice was still breathy.
Sam grinned again.
I blinked. Then it came back to me.
“Uh, Sam, I’m only here three more days and I’ve got to fit Celeste and Thomas in there and Luci is going to take me to buy a robe like this and, uh…” You! “Anyway, I might never get back here so I should pack everything in that I can so I kind of want to take this boat trip, like, bad.”
Something changed in his eyes, flickering then fading away, taking the heat with them but not the warmth before he whispered, “Right.” Then his hand still resting light on my ass glided back up, his arm wrapped tight around my waist and he continued, “Then go get dressed, the sooner I give you your boat trip, the sooner I can bring you back, feed you and then have you all for me.”
Oh man.
I was rethinking how bad I wanted the boat trip.
But I whispered, “Okay.”
He gave me a squeeze as his head dropped and he also gave me a mouth touch.
Then he let me go.
Then I concentrated on walking away without him cottoning on my legs were still trembling and not holding out much hope at succeeding.
But when I turned to go into one of the many double doors that opened onto the terrace, I looked back at Sam and stopped, most of my body inside the house but my head leaned back and turned his way.