Arrogant Neighbor: A Navy SEAL Romance (16 page)

R
achel woke
the next morning with an intense hang over. She didn’t want to open her eyes. Instead, she rolled away from the tall, bright windows that overlooked the back garden and the gorgeous expanse of ocean beyond it, burying her head under her pillows.

Last night had been one embarrassing story after another. After they managed to practice the ceremony that was due to take place in a few short hours, they settled on the loggia and ate amazing pastas and breads and olive oil that was like honey straight from a bee hive. During dinner, Franco asked what Sam was like in high school. Georgia started it with a retelling of the night they all snuck out of their respective homes and drove to a party a couple towns over, only to discover the kid throwing the party had gotten the dates his parents would be out of town mixed up. They were all busted, the kid and all the people who showed up to party.

Of course, they couldn’t stop there. Soon someone told how they used to break into the art room early in the morning to peek at everyone’s projects—and to steal a little time in the art closets with the boys of their choice. And then there was the story of how Rachel dented the bumper of the car only Sam wasn’t supposed to be driving because it was her dad’s work car.

Story after story after story. And the drunker they all got, the more elaborate the stories became.

Rachel remembered Josh sitting across from her, sipping water and listening to the tales, adding a detail here and there when he knew one. But somewhere toward midnight, he slipped away from the party. She might have been the only one who noticed. Maybe that was because she no longer felt the heat of his eyes on her, burning into her like the heat of the sun on a Texas summer afternoon.

Rachel picked up her wine glass and went to find him when everyone else was engrossed in yet another story.

“I have a couple of stories I could tell about you,” she said as she approached him where he stood, against the fence that separated the bottom terrace from the beach. “I bet that’s why you left. You were afraid someone finally would remember you were there.”

“Exactly,” he said.

Rachel joined him against the fence, leaning into it a little as she took a small sip from her glass. “I noticed your dad isn’t here.” She knew it was a difficult subject, but she couldn’t help but ask.

“He probably couldn’t have made the trip if we asked. He’s been in and out of the hospital, something to do with his stomach.”

It was his liver, actually. Rachel’s mother had told her. Jack Carver became a raging alcoholic after the death of his wife. “I’m sorry.”

Josh shrugged. “It’s not like he’s been that big a part of our lives these past few years. He just…it’s like he forgot Sam and I existed after she died.”

“He loved her.”

“He should have loved us, too.”

Rachel rested her wine glass on the top rail of the fence and turned toward him. He was facing the ocean, his jaw clenched in that familiar way he had when he was trying to contain some sort of emotion.

Maybe she was drunk, or she was just tired of fighting the impulse that threatened to overrun her every time she saw him, but she didn’t stop herself when the desire to touch him overtook her this time. She began at his chin, pressing the tips of two fingers there before allowing them to glide slowly over the low edge of his jaw, following that tight line all the way to hinge that jutted out below his ear.

Josh reached up and took her hand in his. He didn’t look at her, not then, but he pressed her hand tight against his skin as though he really wanted to feel her there, to absorb the gentleness of her touch.

When he did turn, it was so quick that she didn’t see it coming. One second, he’s got her hand pinned to the side of his face and they’re listening to the waves crashing against the beach. The next, he’s got her pinned against the fence and he’s kissing her like it’s the last kiss he will ever experience.

Rachel could remember wanting it to last forever. She could also remember how cold she felt when he abruptly broke off and walked away.

* * *

“
R
achel
? You awake?”

Rachel peeked out from under the pillow and found Sam standing in her doorway, dressed only in the shorts and t-shirt she’d worn to bed the prior night.

“Is it time?”

Sam began to nod, her whole face lighting up as her nod turned from the cautious movement of a hung over woman to the enthusiastic, brain-sloshing excitement of a child. “I’m getting married in three hours!” she cried, rushing to the bed. “Can you believe it?”

“You’re going to walk down the aisle without a maid of honor if you don’t stop bouncing this bed,” Rachel groaned. “Hung over? I have a cure for that.” Sam rushed out of the room as quickly as she had entered.

Rachel managed to pull herself out of bed and make it to the bathroom. She washed her face, catching her reflection in the mirror. Jet lag really was a bitch…her eyes were so swollen it was a miracle she could see out of them at all. She looked like she’d been on the losing end of a welter weight boxing match.

No wonder he broke off the kiss like he did. She wasn’t anything like all those model thin, high society women he dated these days. She had never been his type. He liked cheerleaders in high school, girls with legs up to their chests and the perkiness and popularity that seemed to go hand in hand with their enthusiastic cheers.

Rachel ran her fingers through her hair, getting them caught in tangles every few inches, trying to convince herself she wasn’t that bad looking. She had auburn hair with gold highlights and blue eyes that a guy once told her were as clear as the sky after a thunderstorm. She wasn’t model thin. She had curves, though she didn’t think they were unflattering to her petite frame. She’d gotten her share of male attention over the years.

She was pretty. But she wasn’t his type.

So why had he kissed her?

“Drink this.” Sam shoved a glass filled with something that resembled tomato juice, but smelled like a bad Mexican restaurant. Rachel took it, but there wasn’t any way she was going to drink it.

“Is everyone else up?”

Sam nodded. “They’re all in my room, moaning and groaning about their heads while they wait their turn with the hairdressers and makeup artists Josh hired.”

“He hired hairdressers to come here?”

“Yeah.” Sam’s expression adopted a wistfulness. “He’s really gone out of his way to make my wedding perfect.”

Rachel glanced at herself in the mirror one last time. “Why don’t we go join them?” She set the glass on the counter as she led the way. Sam didn’t seem to notice that she never drank the hangover cure.

* * *

I
t couldn’t have been a better
day for a beach wedding. The waves were calm, the wind was almost nonexistent, and the sky couldn’t have been bluer or less choked with the big, fluffy white clouds that had filled it the day before.

Rachel stood beside her friends—the bride’s maids—trying not to laugh each time Franco rolled his eyes back in his head and then jerked forward, as though he was struggling not to faint. He caught her watching and offered a scared grin, a grin that turned more into a painful grimace than an expression of pleasure. But when the music changed and he glanced down the aisle, it was like his nervousness vanished into thin air.

“Here we go,” Elena whispered in Rachel’s ear.

Rachel turned and her heart jumped into her throat.

Sam was a vision in her satin gown, her perfect figure accented by the mermaid design. There was no hint of nerves on her face. She had the biggest smile on her face, so big that Rachel was pretty sure her jaws would ache tomorrow. Her dark hair was twisted up onto the back of her head, small sprigs of baby’s breath poking out here and there. And her dark eyes—there might as well have been no one in front of her other than Franco.

The same could be said of him. There was no one else in the world for either of them.

But it wasn’t just Sam that caught Rachel’s attention.

In lieu of their father attending the ceremony, Josh had agreed to walk his sister down the aisle. He wore a tailored tux that fit him more than perfectly. It made his waist look tight, narrow, his shoulders broader than a man had any right to be. The dark color with the contrasting white of his shirt and pink of his tie only made the color of his hair, the tan of his skin, pop. And his eyes, those amazing green eyes, seemed so full of emotion that her heart felt permanently lodge in her throat.

His throat was deep, commanding, when he answered the priest’s request to know who presented Sam to Franco. “I do.”

After handing her off to Franco, Josh stood back and seemed to survey the scene. When his eyes fell on Rachel, she expected them to flick away as quickly as they landed, but they didn’t. His eyes lingered on her, taking in the low cut of the sweetheart bodice, the tight, lace belt around her ribcage, the flare of the skirt over her hips. She couldn’t have missed the appreciation in those expressive eyes even if she had wanted to.

And then the ceremony began and Rachel was forced to turn away. All she could think about while her best friend vowed to love, honor, and cherish the man she had chosen to spend her life with was how badly she wanted her best friend’s brother to kiss her again.

I
t was sweet at first
. Now it was just annoying.

“My beautiful, little wifey.”

“My gorgeous, devoted hubby.”

Rachel was ready to kill them after six hours of that. Thank goodness it was finally time for them to leave for their honeymoon trip to London.

“Do you think it ruins the honeymoon because we’ve already slept together?” Sam asked as Rachel carefully buttoned up the back of her linen travel suit.

“No. I think it probably makes it better. There’s none of that awkwardness you sometimes get the first time with a new lover.”

“Maybe.” Sam studied herself in the mirror for a long second and then broke into a wide, dreamy smile. “But there never was any awkwardness for me and Franco.”

Rachel bent her head and pressed it into Sam’s back, swallowing hard to keep from groaning. “I’m so glad you’re happy,” she said softly.

Sam turned and grabbed Rachel’s hands. “I wish you were getting married too. I don’t suppose there’s anybody…”

Rachel shook her head. “The last guy I dated with any regularity still lived with his mother and had his name written on all the tags of his clothing.”

Sam groaned, and then burst into laughter. “Oh, honey…”

Rachel smiled. “Yeah. I’m kind of a loser when it comes to men.”

“No. You’re just picky.”

“Picky? Would you have gone out with a guy with his name written on his clothes, like he was a ten year old on his way to camp?”

“Depends on how cute he was.”

Rachel shook her head slowly, her eyes never leaving Sam’s. “You really are hopeless.”

“Hopelessly in love.” Sam turned back to the mirror. “I just want everyone to be as happy as I am.”

“I don’t think that’s possible,” a deep voice said from behind them.

They both turned and found Josh leaning against the door frame, his hands buried deep in his pockets and his ankles crossed. He looked a little like James Dean or Dean Martin, that cocky smile on his full lips and his jacket hanging open even though his shirt was still perfectly starched and tucked just right into his slacks.

“Sure it is,” Sam said, moving past Rachel to embrace her brother. “You just have to find your soulmate.”

“Easier said than done.”

“I just turned a street corner and mine was standing there with a cup of coffee in his hands.”

“Which you immediately spilled all over his expensive Italian suit,” Josh added, finishing the story Sam had been telling everyone who would listen since the moment it happened. He grabbed both her arms and kissed her gently on the forehead, genuine affection in the gesture. “I’m happy for you.”

“You’ve been so good to me,” Sam said, tears closer than anyone might have imagined, given the smile that had been steadfast on her lips all day. “I only want you to be happy, too.”

“I am.”

Josh pulled her into his arms and his eyes moved across the room to where Rachel still stood, watching an intimate moment between family. She started to turn, to carefully hang the wedding dress Sam had shed moments before, but when he looked at her, there was something that wouldn’t let her look away. It was like that look was answering a question she hadn’t asked.

* * *

“
T
hey’re gone
!” Jessie yelled, tossing the last of the birdseed that she had peppered the newlyweds with as they ran to their car. “Now the real party can begin!”

Rachel laughed as she followed what had been a wedding party of hundreds, but now just a handful and tried to keep from searching the faces around her for Josh. She saw him after a moment over by the garage. He was leaning against the stone wall beside the outward swinging door, sipping at something in a heavy tumbler as he watched the space where his sister had disappeared just a moment before.

She wanted to go to him and even turned slightly, beginning to point her feet in the right direction. But then she realized that this was a man who had just watched his little sister get married. This was a man who lost his mother nearly eight years ago, a man who had essentially disowned his father, a man who had no other family.

If anyone deserved a moment of solitude, it was Josh.

Music began again in the back garden where the reception had been held. Rachel paused at the corner of the house, peeking around to watch her friends straggle back to the makeshift dance floor or over to the bar, laughter coming from a dozen different directions all at once. She loved seeing them all again, loved the idea of friendships that had managed to survive the test of time. But she was also a little overwhelmed by all that had happened today.

She slipped into the house through a side door and tried to find her way through dark hallways and a maze of rooms she couldn’t remember having seen before. She definitely would have remembered this room—a library filled with the rows and rows of books.

She stepped inside and flipped a switch that illuminated the center of the room. She hesitated only a moment before making her way to the nearest shelf.
Gone With the Wind. Moby Dick. War and Peace.
There were original copies of almost every American classic ever written just sitting there on a shelf, waiting for some eager reader to stumble upon.
Wuthering Heights.
There were three…no, four copies of that. It reminded her of the summer she carried a copy around with her everywhere she went, determined to read it from cover to cover before the summer ended.

So many books. She walked along the shelves, running her fingers over the spines as though they were some sort of treasure. That’s how it felt to her. A treasure of knowledge and imagination, a million different places to lose herself. Inspiration for her own writing.

“Leave it to you to find the library.”

She picked up a copy of
The Odyssey
. “Do you remember when you asked me to read this out loud, because someone had told you it would be easier to understand that way?”

“I remember.”

She pushed the book back into its chosen space and turned. Josh was leaning against a long desk that stood in the center of the room. “You could have read it out loud yourself.”

“I hated the sound of my own voice. Besides, you were always so eager to read the books my English teacher assigned. I figured it was killing two birds with one stone.”

“Books were the one thing we always shared.”

“Not the only thing.” Josh began a slow amble toward her. “We liked the same music.”

Rachel nodded slowly. “Sam hated it when I would go in your room and borrow your CDs. She said that if she wanted to listen to that stuff, she would have borrowed them herself.”

“She never understood Alicia Keys or Nora Jones.”

“No.”

Josh moved close to her, making her step back until her hip hit painfully against the book shelf. “We had a lot in common when we were kids.”

“That was a long time ago.”

“Not so long.”

“You have a different life now.”

He pressed his hand against the side of her face. “So do you. But you still like books.”

“Do you still like Nora Jones?”

“Yes,” he sighed as he stole her lips.

Rachel pressed a hand to his chest, intending to push him away before he could. But once she felt the heat of his flesh warming the crispness of his shirt, once she felt the pounding of his heart, she knew she didn’t want this kiss to end. She pressed her fingers under the space between the studs that held his shirt closed, ran her fingers over the fine hairs that were like silk between his pecs, touched flesh that seemed to jump in response to her gentle caress.

How long had she imagined a moment like this? How long had she wanted to give to him what she had recklessly given to another? How long…

There was this logical voice in the back of her mind that warned her that she knew too much about Josh. She’d witnessed the broken hearts he inspired in half a dozen girls in high school, listened to Sam complain about the girls who came to the house, begging to see him, begging just to be close to him for a brief moment. This thing he had, this way with women, it didn’t go away after high school. If anything, it grew more powerful.

There was an ocean of women drowning in his wake, and she never wanted to be one of them. But his hand was on her waist, pulling her tighter against him, pressing her into his slender hips, his rock hard abs. His other hand was working its way down her throat, his fingers seeking out the swell of her breasts. His lips tasted so much better than the fresh olive oil, the tiramisu that melted on her tongue the night before. And he surely knew what he was doing with his talented tongue. She snagged it between her teeth, gently drew it as deeply as it could physically go and drank from him in a way she had never done with another man.

She wanted to feel and taste everything he was willing to give her.

But just as she made that decision, he broke away.

Rachel stood against the shelf where he left her, one of his studs caught between her fingers. She looked down at it, unable to comprehend what it was, her mind was still so full of him, of his touch. She couldn’t even breathe, sucking in breath after breath but feeling as though it was doing nothing to nourish her overtaxed body.

“Why is it I always want what I can’t have?” she wondered aloud.

“Rachel—“

“I should go. I should—“

She took a step, but her knees had forgotten what their purpose was. She tumbled forward and he caught her, swinging her up into his arms like a groom carrying his bride over the threshold of their new home. He didn’t even pause. There was no transition from catching to walking. He strode out the door and up a flight of stairs that she had never noticed. She thought for a moment that he was taking her to her own room. It seemed right. Her head was spinning, the day had been too much on top of her hangover from the night before and the lack of sleep traveling to a place six hours ahead of her normal time could cause. She laid her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes.

It was okay. She was tired anyway.

The next thing she knew, she was flying through the air. She opened her eyes and found herself in a strange room filled with heavy dark furniture. She pulled herself up a little, glancing behind her at the silky pillows that were pressed against her bare back.

“I just wanted to move to somewhere a little more private.” Josh leaned toward her and pressed his lips gently to hers. “It wouldn’t want someone to walk in on us.”

“Doing what?”

He smiled that same cocky grin that always made her blood pump a little faster when they were kids. It seemed like—back then—when he flashed that grin in her direction, it was only for her, a secret only they shared.

It still felt that way.

“I want you,” he groaned in a voice that had grown deeper with desire. “I’ve wanted you for a very long time.”

“Not possible.”

It was meant as a protest, but it was belied by fingers that seemed to have a mind of their own. They slipped into the space in his shirt caused by the stud that had remained when he pulled away before. They slipped inside and moved wrist deep, seeking out the heat and the oh-so sexy configuration of flesh and muscle that was alive under her hands. More studs popped loose, falling to the bed like rose petals from a wilted stem.

“And you want me.”

She might have shook her head, might have tried to protest, but his mouth was suddenly against her throat, drawing moans from between her lips as he nibbled at flesh that seemed a million times more sensitive than it had ever been before. There was really no reason to pretend to fight. He was right. She wanted him more than she had ever wanted anything.

To hell with logic.

She fell back against the pillows—it was like falling back onto a cloud—and pushed at his shirt until it worked its way loose of his ties and slid over his thick, defined biceps. She buried her mouth against his shoulder, burying her moans there as she tasted his skin—the salty, spicy taste of him. She wanted to bite, to leave her mark on his flesh. She wanted the world to know that, for this moment, he was hers. It was the kind of thought a teenager would have, but she couldn’t help herself.

She was fulfilling a teenage dream, after all.

But he was not a child. Not anymore.

His hands were rough as they tugged at the low zipper on the back of her dress. She rolled onto her hip to help him, but there was no getting the dress off at that angle. He did manage to tug the bodice down just enough to expose one breast, one full breast with a nipple that was harder and stood stiffer than she had ever seen it. When he drew it into his mouth, it was both excruciating and so pleasurable that her hips came off the bed, her pelvis pressing hard into his.

Giving up on the zipper, he pressed one hand under her long skirt, taking a moment to search out her bare flesh underneath. God bless Sam for insisting on chiffon, or else Rachel might not have decided to forgo underwear. The silky feel against her naked thighs and hips was too much of a pleasure to pass up. It didn’t hurt that the lack of lines under the layered skirt allowed it to lie more naturally in those places where it hugged a little too closely. And now, the sigh of pleasure that slipped from Josh’s lips when he found her bare and ready for his touch made it all so worth it.