As she watched, she noticed more faintly lit waves ahead of them. “That’s amazing. Beautiful.”
They walked another fifty yards or so in awed silence. Transfixed. Each glow started out as a thin blue outline of a forming wave, and as the water picked up momentum, the light show expanded with it, looking like a backlit waterfall, courtesy of mother nature.
They stopped and faced the water, with luminescent waves stretching up and down the shore in front of them.
“You’ve seen this before?” Zoe asked, her voice hushed.
“Been a long time. And never such a big display. The little algae guys must’ve known I was bringing someone special tonight.”
She turned toward him to call his bullshit, and their heads were closer than she’d realized. There was just enough moonlight that she could see the heat in his eyes. His familiar, beautiful eyes. Without allowing herself to think, she stood on tiptoe and kissed him. Something about the otherworldly spectrum of blue, glowing waves made it seem appropriate to do something completely reckless, and she lost herself in the man she knew so well at the very first touch of their lips.
Cooper’s arm was at her waist in a heartbeat, pulling her into his warmth, fitting her to his body as if she were born to be aligned to him. The yin to his yang.
When she expected him to deepen the kiss, he reined himself in, hesitated. Zoe dropped her shoes onto the sand and ran both her hands up underneath his shirt, kneading the muscles in his back, drinking in the feel of his skin. Cooper pulled away just enough to make eye contact, and the connection between them in that second was like nothing Zoe had ever experienced before. Intense. Intimate. And yet, at the same time, it was like coming home to her own bed after traveling. Comforting and comfortable. A respite. Her insides turned to liquid and then began a slow boil as Cooper breathed out shakily, as if he was in ecstasy and torment at once. His vulnerability in that moment drew her in, drove her to assuage all his doubts, to fulfill all his needs — and hers.
He leaned forward, closed that last inch again. Claimed her, with his mouth, his hands, and, Zoe knew instinctively, his heart. She sank into him, surrendered as if the spell of the night air and the magical glow in the water had erased all doubts from her mind.
Their kisses were filled with so much need, with a desperation like never before. Zoe fought to block out that nagging buzz in the deepest recesses of her mind that whispered this was the last time, that this was unwise.
Cooper solved the problem for her by driving her to distraction with his hands. He worked his fingers below the halter-top of her dress, his touch on her nipples sending a shock of need to her core. Hands dropping to his butt, she pulled him closer, gloried in the feel of his hardness where her pulse throbbed. The relief was fleeting though. Her body begged for more.
Cooper knew her well enough to read exactly what she needed. After spending some time teasing her nipples with his tongue, his lips returned to hers, and his fingers slid to her thighs and worked their way up beneath her dress. This short, sexy thing was exactly the right one to wear tonight after all, she decided. She was caught up in kissing him when she felt a tug at the side of her hip. It took a couple of seconds to realize Cooper had ripped her string bikini panties on one side and, judging by the trail of his hands, had the other side next on his agenda. In seconds, the warm breeze touched her skin where it shouldn’t have, and she felt the hot moistness of her own body in response. In response to this man and his roving, knowing hands and lips.
“Cooper, we should—” She broke off with a gasp as he slipped a finger inside of her.
“Come here,” he said, his voice thick and rough.
Right now, she’d follow him anywhere. Turned out she didn’t have to, though, as Cooper picked her up, grasping her backside and guiding her legs to wrap around him.
He glanced around as if searching and then took her to a place on the sand, farther from the blue-lighted water, where the tall beach grass formed the illusion of a barrier on three sides of them. Zoe slid down his legs, seeking out his lips again and keeping their bodies nestled together where she throbbed for him, but even though his hands were still on her rear, drawing her as close as possible, the contact did nothing to assuage her ache. A needy whimper escaped from her as he trailed his tongue along her jawline to her ear.
She arched her head back as he kissed a trail along her neck, the heat of his lips stoking the fire of need down lower. His hands again found their way under her dress to her thighs and higher, searing her bare skin and drawing a moan from her.
“Zoe.” He growled her name in her ear. “I need you. Right now.”
8
“Where?” she managed, keenly aware that standing flush to him was not enough. Could never be enough to quell the ache deep at the apex of her thighs.
She felt his hand on her stomach, between them, then lower again. Heard the snap of his shorts release, then his zipper. Before she could say more, before she had the chance to push his shorts out of her way and touch him, he broke the contact between them and kneeled in front of her. He bunched her short skirt up just below her navel, baring her to the stars above. Zoe tensed in anticipation of his touch. Silently begged for it.
His tongue found the very spot that pulsed for him. She gasped his name, her knees nearly buckling. Without his firm grip of her backside, she would have slid to the sand in a puddle of need.
He teased her with his tongue, his touch tender and careful. Too careful.
“Cooper, you’re killing me.”
“Good,” he said, the word vibrating against her skin.
She dragged her fingers through his hair and tried to convey her need by pulling him closer. She felt his wicked laughter teasing her flesh … his hand urging her legs farther apart … then his tongue flicking over the very heart of her, making her suck in her breath and nearly collapse. He took his sweet time exploring her, driving her wild, never quite giving her as much as she needed. On purpose, of course.
“When did you … turn in to a tease?”
His response was an indecipherable growl.
When she thought she was going to die, he lowered her so she was straddling his legs, and he leaned back on his feet to keep her rear off the sand. She made a mental note to thank him for that consideration later. When she could think straight.
Before he could find a new way to torment her, she kissed him and worked his shorts down a few inches. He groaned when she finally grasped him, and she grinned smugly as he met her gaze with heavy-lidded, lust-filled eyes. Her intent to repay his teasing with some of her own lasted only until she could feel the solid tip of him at her entrance. She slid him into her urgently, losing what little of her control remained, and closed her eyes at the ecstasy of him filling her once again. Loving the coarse moans she drew from him.
