He’d suggested she grace him with a watery lap dance. "Research," he’d said with a straight face. She’d suggested he fuck off. After that, it had been two bad kids screwing around in a hot tub until Edward gave her a leg and foot massage that had fried her brain.
He was smiling as he pulled off the PCH and stopped the car. In the darkness with just the dashboard lights, he looked so darkly handsome with his long hair and facial scruff that Paige had to give it up for that whole America’s Sexiest Guy nonsense. There was no denying the man was hot—and those eyes. Oh, my god. How could she keep her shit together with those sexy blue eyes watching her every move?
“Okay, sweetheart.” His voice was heavy with indulgent humor, reminding Paige that she was calling all the shots. Mmm. Now there was a delicious thought.
“What’s swirling in that head of yours, hmm?”
“I’m not ready to call it a night, is all.” She squirmed in the plush seat, the sound of her bottom moving on the leather punctuating her words. Putting her head on the backrest, Paige turned her face toward him. “My thoughts were drifting, and I remembered when we went to that place in Santa Fe. The hot tubs. That’s why I was thinking about a Jacuzzi.”
Edward’s expression visibly softened. His smile grew from a smirk to a teeth-baring grin.
“We said we’d go back,” she murmured. “Try and catch …”
“A snowfall,” he cut in. “I remember. Ten Thousand Waves.”
He remembered! She was stunned. Her smile got so big it hurt. On sheer impulse, she sat forward, ran her fingers through his shaggy hair, and rubbed her knuckles on his stubble-covered cheek. She liked being able to touch him whenever she wanted. Her heart was racing with excitement.
“Sweetheart,” he growled. “If you’re gonna look at me like that, there needs to be some kissing.”
Laughing was the easiest thing in the world.
“Yep. Kissing. I demand some kissing, Miss Turner, and then we can talk about where we go next.”
Well, shit. She knew exactly where she wanted them to go next. Somewhere private where they could lose their clothes in a hurry.
With her hand cradling his jaw, she purred, “Kiss me then, big guy … and make it good.”
And oh, hell yeah, did he ever make it good. The things he did with his lips made her giddy with want. She liked when he kissed her fast and deep. It felt like a claiming. But then there was this slow, seductive approach that claimed her in a different way. By the time he slid his tongue against hers, she was already so far gone that all she could do was whimper and moan. She’d have crawled through glass to hang on to his kiss.
“Better?” he quipped when he’d finished taming her mouth.
Yeah. She couldn’t speak, so Paige bit her lip and nodded her head while her eyes stayed glued to his magic mouth. Dammit. She wanted more.
“So I take it that you don’t want me to take you home. Right?”
And there it was. The crossroads. She’d be an idiot to pretend she didn’t know the importance of what this was. Did she want to go home? Spend the rest of the night in her pjs, attacking a pint of Chunky Monkey in front of a TV she didn’t watch? Or did she want to throw all caution out the window and see where this thing with Edward took her?
Her brows furrowed. Why the hell was her stomach churning like a washing machine? Good lord—she was nervous. Dammit. She never got nervous and didn’t know which coping skill to employ to get her through.
“Babe,” Edward murmured softly.
Without moving a muscle, her eyes swung to his. His expression was hot enough to activate a fire alarm. Paige’s breath caught in her chest.
“I’m not asking for your panties.” He smirked and laughed at his jest. “Well,” he teased, “at least not yet.”
Typical Edward. The wisecrack was enough to break her tension.
“We can head to the beach house and go for a walk on the sand. How’s that sound?”
Okay then, so what we just learned was that he could read her mind and knew just what to say so she didn’t jump ship. Now that was what she called a coping mechanism.
“Oh, crap.” Why was there always a practical fly in the ointment? Tugging at the hem of her dress, she snapped, “I always keep a go-bag in my car, but you picked me up so … no bag and no change of clothes.”
He looked her over for a long minute. With a finger lightly tracing the exposed skin around her neckline, he licked his lips twice then pinned her to the spot with his eyes. “I like this dress …”
She protested by letting out a deep grunt. The dress so wasn’t her.
“I know it’s not your usual preference, which,” he hurriedly assured her, “I find delightful. Quirky Paige as a style choice totally works for me, but this bad girl ensemble of slinky black seduction has shown me a whole new side to you that I didn’t know about.”
What was he doing with his voice? Was this some kind of magic sex mojo or something? With every word, her senses filled until a shocking heat fired off in her core. Mesmerized, she didn’t know what to make of the strange response.
“So, you keep the dress on, and I’ll lend you one of my hoodies if it’ll make you feel better.”
He could have offered her a cup of steaming vinegar topped with whipped cream, and she would have taken it.
“Deal,” she drawled. Oh, my god, what have I done?
Looking rather pleased, Edward gave her another head-to-toe once-over, pausing on the peaked nipples barely concealed by the stretchy fabric of her dress.
Back on the road, she willed her anxiety away as they drove the short distance to the exclusive gated beach road leading to Casa Shaw. Shit was about to get real.
“Ready?” Edward asked with his hand held out for her to grab. “I turned off the light at the bottom of the stairs so hang on to me and be careful.”
Guiding Paige down a flight of wood steps took but moments. The girl didn’t know the meaning of being careful and bounded down to the sand like a kid who’d just heard the recess bell ring.
“Oh, wow.” Flinging her arms wide, she whirled around with her face shining in the moonlight. “I love the beach at night.” She was whispering as if it was some deep, dark guilty secret.
“Come on, Moon Babe. Let’s walk.”
When she eagerly took his hand, a veritable Wikipedia page fell out of her mouth as she rambled on about tides and lunar cycles. Edward felt a surge of happiness so overwhelming, he had to wonder how he’d gotten to thirty-two without ever knowing such contentment.
They’d strolled from the warm sands down to the wetter part of the shoreline and had taken maybe a dozen steps when Paige shrieked and started dragging him away from the surf. “Your pants will be ruined if they get wet.”
What? His pants? Fuck his pants. He couldn’t care less, not when he was enjoying himself so much.
Without warning, she dropped to her knees and started methodically rolling up the hem, enough so the bottoms didn’t end up seawater soaked and caked with wet sand.
When she finished the first leg and shimmied in the sand to the next, Edward swallowed hard. Paige on her knees at his feet was too fucking much for his brain to comprehend. Especially when she kept looking up at him with an expression that confirmed, yes, she knew exactly how provocative their positions were.
Resting on her feet, she surveyed her handiwork then so slowly he was sure time stalled, she quite boldly looked him over. The amount of time Paige spent studying his thighs made him light-headed. She wet her lips over and over, a sure sign that she was struggling with some impulse or another. He wondered what it could be.
And then her gaze lifted to his rather obvious erection. He couldn’t help it. Just being around her when she was so at ease and lighthearted turned his flesh hard and aching. No one but Paige had ever been so free-spirited and authentic around him. It was fucked up in some way. There had been plenty of women in his life—all of them temporary and quite a few just for the moment. Those ladies, willing and capable to the last one, simply played a part that did not require an actual connection. Or emotion.