Hard as Stone (Passion in Paradise: The Men of the McKinnnon Sisters) (53 page)

“When the sun comes
up, I’ll be on the couch.  Until then, there’s no place else I’d rather be than
your bed, Harmony.”

He felt like he’d
roped the moon when she nodded slowly.  Following her out of the bathroom, he
paused long enough to flip off the lights before following her into her
darkened bedroom.  Dropping his jeans and shirt beside the bed within easy
reach if Heaven came into the room, he watched as she shrugged off her own robe
and climbed, naked, between the sheets.  Tugging off his towel, he threw it
over the arm of the chair in the corner before joining her.  Settling by her
side, he felt her roll toward him.  With no small amount of relief, he wrapped
an arm around her and pulled her soft body flush against his until her breasts
rested against his chest and her head nestled his shoulder.

He was dragging his
fingers up and down her arm, enjoying the way her body seemed to fit naturally
against his, when she shifted in his arms, her head tilting back to stare at
him in the dark.  Seeing her small hand lift, he felt her fingers tracing his
lips and he stopped breathing.

“I feel it, too,
you know.  It’s not just you,” she whispered as her fingers moved over his firm
parted lips.

“Feel what, baby?”
Jacob asked against her fingers.  He thought he knew.  Christ, he hoped he
knew, but he needed to hear her say the words.  He needed it like he needed his
next breath.  “Harmony?” he urged, dropping one hand behind her neck and
kneading gently.  “Tell me what you meant.  What do you feel, darlin’?”

Crap, what was she
doing?  Harmony chewed her lower lip as she felt Jacob’s eyes on her in the
darkness.  She knew she should just spit it out.  Tell him the truth and get it
over with.  Of course, the last guy she’d given that gift had made it seem
worthless, but as he’d reminded her countless times, Jacob wasn’t Tanner.

He’d protect what
she gave him.  He’d cherish it and care for it as carefully as a mother would a
baby, wouldn’t he?  He’d never use her love like a weapon the way her
ex-husband had. 

“Harmony?”

She felt him
squeeze her neck again and her eyes drifted over his face.  Swallowing hard,
she whispered, “Everything changed in the blink of an eye, Jake.  In a
nanosecond, six years ago, everything I thought I knew was turned upside down. 
In the time it took me to flutter my eyelashes, I learned that my husband was a
monster.  The man that I’d thought I loved was worse than what I’d found in my
worst nightmares.  Tonight, I learned that he was worse than even that because
I’ve
never
dreamed anything as bad as what Honor told us.”

“Baby…”

“The crazy thing
is, even hearing everything I heard this evening, in my heart I still only
wanted one thing when I walked out of Honor’s bedroom.”

“What did you
want?” he asked into the stillness, his hand sliding against her jaw.

“You.”  Gripping
his wrist, she took a deep breath.  “I wanted you.”

“You’ve got me,
Harmony,” Jake assured her softly.  “Body and soul.  You’ve got me.”

“I know,” she
whispered.  “I guess what I need you to understand is that you’ve got me, too. 
I can’t fight what’s between us anymore.  I don’t want to fight it,” she
confessed as tears stung her eyes and her shoulders shook.  “I’m scared and
you’ll have to be patient because I’m sure that I’m going to slip into old
habits and compare you to Tanner, but…”

“Harmony, enough.”
Jake stopped her by placing a gentle finger over her lips.  “You had me at ‘I
wanted you’, baby.  That’s all you need to say.  That’s the only answer I
need…the only answer I’ll
ever
need.”

“No, I need to get
this out before I lose my nerve,” Harmony denied, shaking her head almost
frantically as she yanked his fingers away from her mouth.  Swallowing hard,
she pushed past the panic and blurted, “I love you.  I do.  I probably
shouldn’t and it’ll all probably blow up in my face because I have crap luck
when it comes to relationships and shit taste when it comes to men, but I do. 
I love you.”

There!  She’d said
it.  Or, more accurately, she’d expelled it with the force of a cyclone, but
the important part is that she’d gotten it out and shared how she felt.  As she
waited for him to respond, she felt like a huge weight had been lifted off her
chest.  She could finally breathe again.  Well, right up until his arms
contracted around her like steel chains and his bigger body rolled on top of
her, pinning her to the bed with the warm, hard heat of his body.  “Uhmmm,
Jake?” Harmony gasped when his heavy bulk seemed to grow even heavier and his
face lowered to hers.  “Honey, you’re crushing me.”

Immediately taking
some of his weight on his forearms, Jake lifted his torso from her body,
letting her take a deep drag of air into her burning lungs as his gaze burned
into hers.  “Jake?” she wheezed, lifting a hand to touch his stunned face. 
“Are you okay?”

“Okay?  No, I’m not
okay.  I had no fucking idea how much I needed to hear you say those words
until just now.  Now that I have, I feel like I just heard a miracle.”

“Trust me, Jake,”
Harmony snorted, shaking her head against the pillow behind her head.  “I’m no
miracle.  You’ll learn that fast enough, I suspect.”

“You’re wrong,” he
muttered against her mouth, dipping his head to catch her lips with his. 
“You’re my miracle, Harmony.”

Harmony returned
his kiss eagerly, the stresses of the day dissolving as his tongue swept across
the seam of her lips and coaxed her mouth into opening.  Gripping his neck as
he deepened the kiss, she let herself get lost in the moment, her other hand
moving up and down the sinewy muscles in Jake’s back.  Tearing her lips from
his when one of his hands slipped between their bodies to cup her breast,
Harmony moaned, her body arching underneath his.  “Jake,” she gasped as he
rolled her nipple between his fingers. 

“I’m here, darlin’
and I’m never leaving you,” Jake muttered between hard, bruising kisses as he
shifted restlessly against her.  He’d had her less than twenty-four hours ago
in most every way a man could have a woman, but he still wanted more from her. 
She was like a thirst he couldn’t quench or a hunger he couldn’t sate.  No
matter how many times he had his fill, he knew he’d always want more from her.

Harmony moaned
softly as his calloused palms coasted over her body, their touch spreading a
trail of fire wherever they touched.  This is what she wanted, the mindless,
raw passion she’d experienced in his arms last night.  Whimpering when he
rolled away from her, his heaviness suddenly disappearing and leaving her
bereft, she clutched at his arm.  “Jake, what…”

“Need to love you,
Harmony, and to do that we need a condom,” he answered back hoarsely as his
hand went over the side of the bed in search of his jeans.  “But swear to God,”
he grumbled as his fingers finally latched onto the denim pocket he needed and
pulled out his wallet, “as soon as humanly possible we’re finding a doctor and
getting you on birth control pills.”  Pulling loose the small packet he’d
placed in his wallet, he rolled back toward her, his dark eyes fierce as they
met hers.  “Don’t like having anything between us, Harmony.  I want you and me
and warm wet heat.  Not a fucking layer of latex separating us,” he muttered,
ripping the foil packet viciously with his teeth as she giggled beside him. 

“Don’t laugh at
me.” He growled, rolling the thin latex over his steely length.  “If it wasn’t
for this damn rubber, I’d already be buried balls deep inside you,” he
complained, leaning toward her to steal a kiss from her smiling lips.   “Roll
on your side, baby. I want to take this sweet pussy from behind tonight.”

“But I like feeling
you on top of me,” Harmony said, her cheeks burning with embarrassment at her
admission.

“Sweetheart, I love
being inside you any way I can get in there, but if you’re on your side, I can
give you my dick
and
my finger on that slick little love button of
yours.  Trust me, darlin’, you’ll love it when I push that button,” he promised
against her lips, nipping her chin with his teeth.

Harmony’s breath
caught at the rough edge in his voice and she wasted no time doing as he bid,
sighing when his warm lips dropped a kiss against the side of her neck to lick her
delicious flesh.  She knew the reward that could be found in Jake’s arms if she
took her cues from him, and he didn’t disappoint her when his hand dropped
between her legs and two fingers explored her saturated folds.

“So wet, baby,” he
growled his appreciation, swirling his finger through her slit and over her
swollen clit.  “I love that,” he encouraged against her ear when her legs
spread and her hips bucked against his hand.  “Love how soaked and ready you are
for me.  Let’s see if your luscious little body is ready to take my cock yet,”
he muttered, twitching his finger against her nub again as he pierced her with
two fingers and pulled a low cry from her lips.

Harmony moaned as
his fingers impaled her, fucking deep.  “Oh, God, Jake,” she choked, rocking
her hips back into his pelvis as his fingers withdrew only to sink in again a
heartbeat later. 

“Oh, yeah, all this
sticky sweet honey says you’re more than ready for me, Sweetness,” he growled against
her neck as he pulled his fingers from the tight heat of her pussy.  “You want
my cock, darlin’?  You want me to fill you up and take away the ache?” he
asked, his words vibrating against her skin as one hand curled around her
breast and squeezed the firm globe gently.

“Yes,” she
whimpered, pushing her head back against his throat as his fingers stroked
through her swollen folds again and teased her clit.  “Do it, Jake,” she
begged, wriggling her ass against his hardness.  His cock rimmed her entrance,
offering her just a taste of heaven, but never truly delivering on the
promise.   

He sucked the
vulnerable flesh at her neck; she felt his teeth scrape the shell of her ear. 
“Tell me first, Harmony.  Who do you belong to?” he asked her, plucking her
nipple with his thumb and forefinger before tugging it gently and sending a
white hot pulse of pleasure from her stomach to her pussy.  “Who does this
gorgeous body belong to?”

“You,” she managed
in a voice strangled by pleasure.  Plying her nipple with one hand and her clit
with the other, she felt like she was one long exposed nerve ending.  “Stop
teasing, Jake, and fuck me.”  She panted roughly as she wriggled against his
onslaught.

Holding her firmly,
he shook his head against the crook of her neck.  “Mmmm, you know that’s not
how it works, darlin’.  You take it as I give it,” he chided, using his teeth
to nip her rounded shoulder. 

“Please,” she
gasped, churning her hips against his hand as she tried to bring his touch
where she needed it. 

Pushing just an
inch of his cock into her snug channel, he groaned, but held himself still. 
“That what you need, Harmony?” he rasped against her neck. 

“More,” she
whimpered as she tried to press backward and bring him more deeply inside her. 
She felt empty and achy, and he was driving her crazy.

“You’ll get more
when you say what I need to hear,” he replied, his own breathing uneven as her
pussy pulsed around the head of his dick, caressing his cock in a velvety tight
grip that made his balls ache. 

“Please, baby,”
Harmony whined, turning her head to look at his shadowy face over her
shoulder.  Lifting her hand, she touched his hard jaw.  “I need you.  Please?”

“Love hearing you
beg, Sweetness, but those aren’t the words I’m lookin’ for when I’m inside the
woman I love,” he murmured, bending his head to touch her lips to his.  “Give
them to me, Harmony.  Give them to me and I’ll give you everything your body
needs.”

“I love you,”
Harmony breathed, her eyes softening on him as pleasure suffused his face.

“That’s it, baby,”
he whispered, surging inside her with a powerful thrust.  “You just gave me
everything I’ve ever wanted,” he rasped, palming her hip and pumping deep,
burying himself inside her searing heat from root to tip.  “Fuck, I love
feeling your pussy wrapped around me.   Wet and tight.  And mine, Harmony. 
It’s mine.”

“All yours,”
Harmony agreed breathlessly as he thrust inside her, setting a hard rhythm that
hit her sweet spot every single time he sank into her.  Lifting an arm, she
reached back, wrapping it around his head as he fucked her harder, planting
himself deep with every lunge of his hips.  “I love you, Jake.”

“Yes,” Jake
growled, his fingers tightening possessively around Harmony’s hip.  “Lift your
leg and brace one hand against the wall, Harmony.  I wanna go deep, baby.  So
deep you feel me in your heart.”

“You’re already in
my heart, but feel free to give it your best shot,” she invited huskily even as
she pulled one knee toward her chest and reached out to prop a hand on the
wall.  Turning her head, she screamed into the pillow as the angle of his
thrusts changed and he pierced some magical spot deep inside her.  Lifting her
ass to receive him, she felt his cock slide deeper and she shuddered.

“Fuck, yes,” Jacob
hissed, bottoming out deep inside her.  “Sweet Christ, it’s never been like
this before.  I’ve never been so deep inside somebody that I swear to God I
feel like I’m touching the heart of them.  Love you, Harmony.  Love your sweet
body, love your sweeter mind, love your sassy attitude,” he panted between
hard, almost savage lurches of his hips, “Love it all, darlin’.”