Wicked Sexy(5)

He smiled, and as he leaned in she forgot to breathe. Every inch of her was focused on the man holding

her, bringing her mouth toward his mouth. His kiss. The pleasure was all consuming. She hadn’t known

she could feel this way.

His mouth found the edge of her jaw, a soft brush of skin on skin. Was he waiting for her to do

something? Tempting. His lips pressed a wicked pattern of kisses along her neck. She wasn’t sure what he wanted, but she knew she wanted to give it to him.

“Don’t tease,” she murmured. Her eyes drifted shut, closing against the last fiery rays of the setting sun.

“Not for too long,” he promised, and then his mouth found hers. Oh, this man knew how to kiss. His

lips covered hers, exploring and tasting with every lick and stroke. His hand angled her head backward until she opened up for him and his tongue stroked inside her mouth.

Skin to skin, as they were, there was no missing that thick erection. But Daeg was taking his time. Her

soldier was being a gentleman. She appreciated that, but she also wanted him, his heat and his strength. She wanted more than just his kisses.

His tongue dipped deeper, teasing her. The moan slipped from her throat before she could stop it. The

raw, unfamiliar sound was shocking to her. She was losing this battle. The weakness in her legs warned her she had to stop before this went too far. But he felt so good.

Her soldier didn’t look bored—no, he looked 100 percent aroused.

Hungry.

For her.





DAEG HAD DIVED beneath icebergs and into plane wreckage where sharks were circling, but none of

those missions had ever given him the adrenaline rush he felt when Dani licked the last bit of ice cream off her lips and proceeded to kiss the hell out of him. He was shocked—happily so—but he was also navy

search and rescue to the bone. So he hadn’t thought—he’d reacted and kissed her right back.

And in the ten years since he’d last seen her, held her, Ms. Andrews had mastered the art of kissing. She was intense. Passionate. She didn’t give him her tongue right away. All that heat, right there, but she made him work for it, work for her. Coaxing. She wasn’t shy. She just knew what she liked now—and she

hadn’t made up her mind about him.

He was going to make all her dreams come true.

When she slipped her hands from around his neck, he ignored the disappointment and the urge to keep

her close.

“I need to go. I can’t—” she said, clearly at a loss for words. Good to know he wasn’t the only one that kiss of theirs had rattled.

“Dani...” he whispered, tracing her bottom lip gently with his finger. He wanted to kiss her again, and then he wanted to do more. Wanted to take her somewhere and make love to her until he couldn’t

remember who he was or what he was doing here. That was a good plan, he decided, tightening his arm

around her. An excellent plan, in fact. As a general rule, he didn’t take a woman to bed after a first kiss, but this was different, the exception.

“No,” she said and stepped away from him. His arm dropped to his sides.

Before he could say anything—or worse, not say anything—she began walking down the beach.

He let her go, but much to his surprise, he could still feel her, sense her presence. It was as if their kiss had branded him. And the taste of her. Sweet heat and all woman.

But what about her nerves?

Someone or something had spooked her badly. Recently. He’d like to fix whatever problems she had,

smooth away the furrow she got right there in the center of her forehead as she stared at him. As if she was trying to figure out how she’d ended up in his arms, kissing the hell out of him.

He could have told her he didn’t know, either.

But he was sure he wanted it to happen again. He wasn’t done kissing her. Not by half. She’d given him

a starting point and now he wanted more.

And he wasn’t waiting another ten years to get it.





3

DAEG PARKED THE motorcycle outside Deep Dive. He wasn’t in the mood for whatever his boys

would dish up tonight. Cal and Tag had watched him go after the blonde on the beach. They’d see him

come back soaking wet, and they’d demand details he didn’t feel like sharing. And that was the kicker,

wasn’t it? What should have been a simple walk on the beach and a summertime flirtation had morphed

into one of the sexiest moments of his life.

He couldn’t get over seeing Dani Andrews again after all this time.

She was even more gorgeous today. Back then, she’d been just a girl, no matter how mature she’d

pretended to be, all long hair and longer legs. Those big, brown eyes filled with hopes and dreams. When he’d met her on the beach that night, he’d picked her up and dusted her off—metaphorically speaking. Part of him had wanted to go after the guy that had hurt her feelings. Another part of him, though... That was the part that had done the kissing. The same part of him that had shown up again today.

He should leave her alone.

Problem was, she was sweeter than sweet and no doubt far too nice for a guy like him. She was exactly

what he was not—all white picket fence and happily ever after. Meanwhile, he’d be leaving Discovery

Island—again—in a few weeks, and that was nowhere near enough time for a woman like Dani.

And yet he didn’t want to leave her alone. Not this time.

As he crossed the wooden porch, the weathered boards creaked beneath his boots. The door opened

fast and silent when he got a palm on it and pushed. Sure enough, Cal was waiting for him, feet propped up on the counter. The familiar smell of Neoprene and dampness filled the air. The front part of the building was dedicated to the diver training portion of Deep Dive’s agenda, holding racks of wet suits, tanks and weights. Whatever was needed to swim in the ocean, Deep Dive had it in spades.

“You all done with the blonde?” Cal eyed the wet jeans but, good man, he kept the observation to

himself.

Daeg rummaged in his duffel and came up with a change of clothes. He had to smile, remembering that

walk on the beach. “She’s finished with me.”

“Bad luck.”

“True enough.” Ignoring the commiserating grin, Daeg headed for Deep Dive’s command center before

Cal could get the next question out of his mouth. Sometimes a tactical retreat was the only way to go.

The steel-and-concrete-reinforced interior room was the heart and soul of Deep Dive’s operations. With

bad weather inbound, today’s focus was on maintaining situational awareness, but that would switch to

command and control when the storm hit. A floor-to-ceiling monitor displayed weather and radar maps,

tracking both inbound and outbound vessels and weather. Cal had been granted permission to link into the local coast guard command center for incident notification and infrared cameras posted strategically around the island delivering real-time information about conditions on the ground.

Surrounded by a bank of computers and monitors, Tag’s fingers flew across the keyboard as the man

fed data into the geographic information system that would map the approaching storm and identify

problem areas in Discovery Island’s sector. That was Tag. He’d catalog every weather front, every current and navigation chart. The ocean held no surprises for Tag.

“You got a room booked for me?” While he waited for an answer, he shucked his wet denim and pulled

on the dry pair of jeans.

Tag nodded and pushed away from the desk. The chair wheels rolled over the cement floor with a

squall of protest.

“You sure you don’t want to stay put in Cal’s spare room?”

Cal knew everyone and everything on the island. His loud, crazy family, complete with numerous aunts

and uncles, a mother and father and four sisters, still lived just up the road from Deep Dive, and Daeg had wondered if the appeal of diving for Cal was the silence. Not that Cal didn’t love his family—there was no getting around the fact he was fiercely protective of them—but getting a word in edgewise was a challenge,

particularly in the big, rambling house with what seemed like a hundred rooms jammed full of people.

The Brennans had all but adopted him when he and Cal had met on the mainland at swim meets. He’d

been an inner-city kid swimming in community pools. No dad in the picture and his mom working two jobs

to make ends meet. When a car accident killed his mother, the Brennans took him in. No questions asked.

Daeg appreciated that. He really did. They were the closest thing to a family that he had, but he didn’t want to field questions about his leg and his future, and they’d ask. Cal’s family always asked. Then they

advised, argued and discussed. At length. Daeg needed some space.

“I see you’re camping out here in the back room,” he pointed out, and Tag grinned, acknowledging the

hit. Tag might not have visited the island before this summer, but even he had guessed the dangers of the Brennans’ good intentions.

“It’s as well furnished as our San Diego place was,” he pointed out. The three of them had shared an

apartment near the San Diego base, but the place had been little more than somewhere to crash between

missions and none of them had bothered with decorating. The only furniture was a couple of futons and the racks where they stored their gear bags. They’d lived ready to roll out at a moment’s notice, and that had always worked well for Daeg.