When Jonathan trails off at the end of the song, Blake pulls back and looks down at me, cupping my face in his hands and wiping my tears away gently with his thumbs. “Hi, Sam.”
I press my eyes closed to stop the last of the tears and sniffle. “Hi.” When I open my eyes, he’s still here. Real. For now, anyway. He still has my face in his hands, and he watches me as he leans in slowly. It still surprises me how my body reacts to the feel of his lips brushing across mine. He twists his fingers into my hair and deepens our kiss, and afterward it’s as if I’m finally able to exhale the breath I’ve been holding since the morning he left.
He pulls back a few inches and gazes down at me with hungry eyes. “I need you alone.”
I take his hand and tow him toward Izzy, who’s dancing close with Hot Hispanic Guy.
“Hey, Iz. We’re gonna go. Can you tell Jonathan we’ll talk tomorrow?”
She grins at me, a slash of white in the dark of her face. “Told you.”
Blake takes my hand and wends us through the press of bodies toward the door, and we escape into the cool San Francisco night.
“What now?” I ask, turning to him.
Slowly, he lifts a finger and traces the scar on my cheek. It’s hardly visible through my makeup, but he knows exactly the spot. His touch sends a shudder through me. “I’m going to take you back to my room and love you all night long,” he says, his gaze burning into mine.
“Okay,” I say, totally mesmerized.
He hales a passing cab and we climb in.
“No Escalade?” I say after he gives the driver an address.
He pulls me against him, both arms holding me tight to his side. “No Escalade,” he says into my hair.
I sink into him, savoring the feel of his arms around me, and focus on the steady beat of his heart. I watch the city pass by, not even caring where we’re going if it means we’re going there together. But when the driver turns down Market Street, I sit straighter. “Please tell me we’re not going to the Federal Building.”
He gives me a small shake of his head and presses a kiss to my forehead. “Never again.”
We pass the Civic Center and turn onto Haight, and not long later, the driver pulls to the curb in front of an old Victorian house.
Blake pays the driver and helps me out.
“Where have you been?” I ask as he takes my hand and tows me up a set of stairs to the door of the house.
He slides his key in and opens it. “There were some things I needed to handle.”
“Why didn’t you call?”
He pulls me through as if he’s on a mission. “Because I didn’t know how things were going to turn out, and there was no way I was going to drag you into the middle of anything else.”
There are only wall sconces lit, but in the dim light I see we’re in a foyer, with parlors overflowing with antiques off to either side. Ahead and to the right is a staircase that Blake tows me toward without slowing down. He jogs up the stairs, pulling me behind.
“Cooper told me about Nichols,” I say, a little winded, when we reach the second floor, but he’s already got me pressed between him and the wall.
He crushes me in a kiss, then pulls away and stares fire into my eyes. “Can we talk later?”
His kiss leaves me breathless. And speechless, apparently, because all I can do is nod.
He hikes me off the ground and I wrap my legs around his hips as he carries me up the short hall and unlocks a door. He throws it open, then kicks it shut. Navigating us past an antique chest, he sets me down on a four-poster bed and proceeds to waste no time undressing me. He slows down then. Kneeling between my knees at the side of the bed, I watch his hands flow over every inch of my skin as if worshiping me, pricking goose bumps to life everywhere he touches.
“You promised to love me,” I say, my voice breathy, but thick with need.
His fingertips caress my nipple, feather light, and his gaze lifts from my body to my eyes, burning through them. “I am.”
I let him continue loving me in his way as I work the buttons of his shirt loose, one by one. When I get to his jeans, he stands and lets me slide them down his legs. He moves us into the center of the bed, then continues his soft exploration, this time with his lips and tongue.
He works his way up from my ankle, past my knee, to my inner thigh, and there’s not an inch of me that’s not thoroughly ablaze by the time his mouth finds the sweet spot between my legs. It’s not a minute later that I’m crying out with my climax.
He fixes his condom in place and settles his weight between my legs. He takes a few more minutes with his mouth to make sure my breasts don’t feel neglected before rocking into me.
“I’m going to make this last forever,” he whispers as I moan.
And he does. He takes his time with me, and anytime he gets close, he withdraws and makes another slow exploration with his hands and mouth. If his kiss or caress gets a moan, he stays there awhile. I lose count of how many times he makes me come before he finally gives in to his own release. And after, his kiss is so deep that it turns me inside out. Everything I’m feeling swells and overflows, and I can’t stop the tears that spill over my lashes.
He kisses them away. “I’m sorry,” he whispers over and over as he drops kisses along the line of my jaw and down my neck, and I’m not totally sure what he’s apologizing for until he says, “I’ll never leave you again.”
I cling to him, my whole body shaking and exhausted, as I recover from the emotional high of having him back. When my nerves finally settle to where I feel like I can speak, I pull myself up onto his chest. “What happened with the review board? Did you have to tell them about us?”
“It was none of their business,” he says, propping his head in a hand. He cups my chin in his palm and brushes his thumb over my swollen lips. “And thanks to you putting together the pieces, I didn’t have to.”
“I can’t believe it was Nichols.”
He shakes his head, disgusted with himself. “With everything that happened at the cabin, I’d forgotten I gave her the code that night.”
“It couldn’t have had to do with severe blood loss or anything. You were shot, Blake.”
He shrugs it off. “It was my error.”
“But everything’s straightened out now, right? I mean, you’re not in trouble for . . . what we did?”
“I wasn’t willing to tell Navarro and the review board what I was doing when Arroyo’s man gained access at seven-fifteen that morning . . . and when the review board pushed, I told them to take their job and shove it.” He grins. “So, yeah. All straightened out.”
“Oh, no!” I say, sitting and staring down at him. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I was done. I was there for all the wrong reasons.” He props himself on his elbow, gazing at me with a mix of exhilaration and trepidation. “Come with me to Houston.”
My eyes go even wider. “You’re going back to Texas?”
“Back to Johnson. They’ve taken me back into the training program.”
I smile. “You’re going to be an astronaut after all?”
He pulls me down and swirls his tongue in my belly button. “I’m all for exploring the undiscovered,” he says, peeking at me from under his long lashes and trailing his lips lower.
“Don’t let me stop you,” I say, feeling the ache build between my legs again.
“So, you’ll come.”
I shudder with the movement of his hands over my body. “In about five minutes, if you keep that up.”
“And after that, you’ll come with me with me to Houston?” he asks, his hand slipping between my legs.
“I’ve been thinking about going back to school.”
He sits back on his heels and I watch as he changes out his equipment. Smiling so sexily it hurts my heart, he kneels between my legs and scoops me off the mattress so I’m straddling his lap. “I think you should. As a matter of fact, I have a few things I’d like to teach you right now.”