Crickets and night crawlers added an acoustic accompaniment to the flickering light of the fireflies in the undergrowth and the hushed lap of the water. She kicked off her sandals, picked them up, and let her toes seep into the damp sand.
The walk in the moonlight he’d promised went past in a blur, neither of them speaking, the only sound the sea, the insects and the rhythmic bump of her own heartbeat. A one-storey shack raised over the beach on a wraparound deck appeared as if by magic out of the undergrowth on the edge of the sand. A lamp suspended from the porch rail shone like a homing beacon, illuminating the rudimentary clapboard structure.
He dropped his arm from around her shoulders, to lace his fingers through hers and lead her up the steps onto the porch.
‘You live here?’ she asked, enchanted by the spartan dwelling.
‘Yeah, mostly.’ He held open the screen door to reveal a large, sparsely furnished, but tidy room. A sofa with well-worn cushions made up the living area, while a large mattress, the sheets neatly folded across the bottom, stood in front of the open deck. A tiny kitchenette cordoned off by a waist-high counter took up the hut’s back wall, next to a door that she deduced must lead to a bathroom.
But it was the open deck, blending the hut’s interior with the beach outside, that took her breath away. The silvery glow of the moon dipped over the horizon, shimmering over the water and making the dark sand look as if it disappeared into oblivion. The fresh scent of sea and salt and exotic blooms only added to the feeling of wild, untamed freedom that was so like Cooper himself.
‘It suits you,’ she said.
He huffed, the half-laugh both wry and amused. ‘Why? Because it’s cheap?’ he said and she heard the cynical edge.
‘No, because it’s charming and unpretentious and unconventional.’
He turned up the lamp, giving the modest hut a golden glow.
Walking to the open deck, he closed two large shutters and then slid the screen door across, cocooning them in together against the Caribbean night. Only the sparkle of moonlight and the sound of surf and chirping insects seeped through the slats.
‘Don’t want to risk getting our butts bitten off by mosquitos,’ he said, crossing the short distance back to her.
She laughed, the rough stubble on his jaw ticklish against her neck as he gripped her hips and nuzzled the sensitive skin beneath her ear.
‘Especially such a cute butt,’ he added, giving the butt in question an appreciative squeeze.
She wrapped her arms around his lean waist and slipped her fingers beneath the waistband of his jeans, to caress the tight muscles of the backside she had admired that morning in wet denim. ‘I can totally get behind that sentiment.’
He chuckled, warm, callused palms sneaking under her camisole to glide up to her ribcage and send a series of tremors through her body.
‘Flattery will get you everywhere,’ he said. Before placing his mouth on hers at last.
Releasing his bum, she lifted arms lethargic with lust and draped them over his broad shoulders; driving her fingers into the soft curls at his nape, she let him devour her. He angled his hips and the thick ridge in his pants rubbed against her belly.
Oh, yes, I want this so much.
To be taken, to take. She wanted to let her body do the asking and have his answer, in the primordial mating ritual of two animals in need of an endorphin fix. The fact that she liked him, that he seemed a genuinely nice guy, didn’t hurt. But right here, right now, as the building firestorm made the pulsing ache in her sex unbearable, and her nipples tighten into hard, swollen nubs, all she really cared about was satisfying the driving hunger.
His large hands rose from her waist to frame her face and she revelled in the primitive need making his eyes darken and the muscle in his jaw flex and release.
‘Before we take this any further...’ he trapped her against the hut’s wall, the heavy ridge thickening even more ‘...I need to know if you’re on the pill.’
Crushing disappointment cut through the fog of rum and arousal. ‘You don’t have any condoms? I don’t either, I didn’t think—’
‘Hey, don’t panic,’ he interrupted. ‘I’ve got condoms.’
‘Oh, thank God.’ Relief gushed like molten lava between her thighs.
‘But I’m a belt and braces kind of guy. Condoms break.’ He scooped her hair off her neck, pressed those clever lips to her collarbone, shattering her concentration. ‘That’s how I happened. I’m not looking to father another me.’
She heard the note of regret, and had the sudden urge to soothe. ‘But you’re so beautiful.’ She cradled his lean cheeks between her palms, drew her thumb over one tawny brow and grinned into those piercing emerald eyes—which had crinkled at the corners with amusement. ‘Your mother must have been so pleased to have you,’ she said, loving the rasp of the manly stubble on his cheeks as all her inhibitions happily dissolved in the sweet buzz of Rum Swizzles and pheromones. ‘Even if you were an accident.’
She heard his chuckle. Had she said something funny? She hadn’t meant to.
‘Not really.’ He sent her the secret hey-there-gorgeous grin that he’d sent her when they were underwater and exploring the reef. Then it had flattered her, as if they were the only two people in the whole ocean allowed to explore its treasures; now it made her heart muscle squeeze and release, exciting her.
‘Has anyone ever told you you’re great for a guy’s ego when you’re hammered?’