Smart Girls Think Twice (16 page)

A bolt of lightning was instantly followed by a clap of thunder so loud her ears rang. The storm wasn’t over yet. Maybe it was just getting started.

Jake set her free, moving away from her.

“I can’t do this right now,” she said unsteadily.

“Yeah, you’re right.” He handed her an unzipped sleeping bag with a soft fleece interior.

“You might as well try and get some rest.”

Emma was sure the storm would keep her awake, not to mention the fact that Jake was mere feet away from her, but exhaustion caught up with her and she dozed off.

Jake watched her sleep. He was no stranger to tussles with Mother Nature. This wasn’t his first storm by any stretch of the imagination. But Emma wasn’t a pro at this sort of thing—

at weathering storms or at making out in the back of a Jeep. He knew that, yet he couldn’t seem to resist her. He’d set her free the minute she’d asked him to. He hadn’t lied when he’d told her that he didn’t take women against their will. He’d had more than his fair share of hot hookups with women who’d been more than happy to have sex with him.

But Emma was different. He reached out to gently pull the sleeping bag over her shoulder.

She had her back turned to him.

The rain continued. At first Jake thought the sound of it pounding on the Jeep’s roof was causing Emma’s restless movements. Then he heard her muttering, “No, no.” He immediately realized that she was having a nightmare. He’d had enough of them himself to recognize the signs.

He didn’t know whether to wake her or not. She jerked awake on her own.

“It’s okay.” He kept his voice calm. “You were just having a nightmare.”

“It was the mugging,” she said, her voice husky with sleep. “I was back in Boston and I knew he was waiting for me, coming for me, but I couldn’t seem to move. I was just frozen.”

“You’re okay now. You’re safe.”

“Am I?”

“What do you mean? You don’t think I’m going to hurt you, do you?”

“I just meant that it’s hard to feel safe when the fear won’t go away. I want to be bold and fearless.”

“You are. Lightning strikes mere feet away from you and do you burst into tears? No way.

Instead you recite lightning trivia for me.”

“I didn’t think you heard me.”

“I always hear you.”
Sometimes even when you’re not talking
, he wanted to add but thought it too sappy to say aloud.

Emma loved the way his voice rolled over her like a warm hug. Which would seem to indicate a nonsexual thing, but that wasn’t the truth at all. He made her feel safe and sexy at the same time.

Even his silence had a powerful effect on her.

“Kiss me,” she whispered, pulling him down to her.

This time she didn’t panic when his mouth and body covered hers. Instead she urged him on, responding with the boldness she’d hoped for earlier. She didn’t resist when he shifted his hand to her bare thighs.

The rain continued relentlessly as he slipped his fingers between her legs, stealing beneath the edge of her silky panties and enticingly searching out the folds of her sex. He explored her body with exquisite care and skill until she was slick with desire. Only then did he ease one finger inside her damp core. His erotic strokes set her afire with a passion that stunned her. She’d never felt this way before.

Jake built her pleasure, taking his time, focusing on what movements brought her the most intense surges of delight. He brushed his thumb against her clitoris until her entire being pulsated. When he added a combination move, the silken friction had her gripping his shoulders and arching her back as powerful wave after wave of bliss signaled her climax.

He muffled her shout of release with his mouth, his tongue mimicking the thrust motion of his fingers.

Emma was stunned and awed by what had just taken place. She was even more awed when Jake repeated the erotic seduction again with his fingers and later with his tongue. Bold and fearless had never felt so good.

Once again Jake watched Emma sleep. There was nothing like a good seduction to keep the nightmares at bay. But since she was the only one who’d been seduced, he wasn’t immune to the nightmares that prowled through his restless nights with stubborn insistence.

Not that Emma had been selfish. She’d wanted to give him the same kind of pleasure he’d given her. But somehow that smacked of taking advantage of her. He had his own sense of honor, and it called for him to make tonight all about her and not him.

This was a first for him. And he had the feeling that this was a first for her. Her body had been so responsive to his touch while her movements had indicated her delighted surprise at reaching her orgasm each time. It had just about killed him not to make love to her, but she deserved better than a roll in the back of his Jeep. She deserved the fancy stuff—scented candles, rose petals strewn across the bed. Which would be another first for him. He’d never gone in for that romantic stuff. Never had to. He didn’t have to now. But he wanted to. He wanted it to be special for her because she was special to him.

That didn’t mean letting down his guard enough to fall asleep with her curled beside him.

Instead he sat here, fighting off sleep and the guilt-driven demons that resided there. He didn’t want her seeing him gasping for air, torn apart by grief for Andy, broken by the regret of what had taken place on that mountain. He wasn’t that bold or that fearless after all.

So Jake let Emma sleep while he found a flashlight and an ax in his gear. Quietly leaving the Jeep, he set to work on getting her back to safety. By the time he’d cleared enough of the fallen tree to get past it, the sky was brightening with the pearly gray light of impending dawn.

He returned to the Jeep to find Emma sitting up, her hair tangled around her face, her eyes still drowsy with interrupted sleep. “Time to get out of here,” he said.

He got her home in record time, whisking her upstairs to her apartment before anyone could see her state of undress and leaving immediately before he could give into the temptation to finish what they’d started.

A loud knock on her door later that Sunday morning woke Emma up. It was Jake. She just knew it was. He’d left hours earlier without saying a word, taking off as if the hounds of hell were at his feet. How could he give her such supreme bliss and then just run off like that? She yanked the door open, prepared to see Jake. Instead a skinny beanpole of a guy stood there wearing a
Star Trek
T-shirt, plaid Bermuda shorts, and white athletic socks with sandals.

She blinked. “Oliver!”

“You don’t look very good. What happened to you?” Oliver Howser asked.

What was the younger brother of her former boyfriend Ted doing on her doorstep?

“What happened to you?” Oliver repeated.

Emma moaned and pressed her fist to her forehead. She had a needs-more-sleep headache.

“I went to my sister’s wedding and almost got hit by lightning.”

“Really? Because each year the odds of a person in the U.S. being struck by lightning is three hundred thousand to one.”

“I’m telling you, lightning hit the tree right behind us and almost set it on fire. It split the tree completely in half.”

“Impressive. Did you know that a bolt of lightning is only an inch in diameter and is fifty thousand degrees Fahrenheit, three times as hot as the sun?”

“No, and I don’t need to hear any more of your science trivia right now, thank you very much. What are you doing here?”

“Visiting you. For a week or two.”

Emma tried not to groan aloud. Instead she did it silently. “This isn’t a real good time, Oliver. I have another sister getting married in two weeks.”

“Two weeks? Then we’ve got plenty of time to hang out together until then.”

“How did you know where I was?”

“You left a forwarding address at your apartment. My, this is a small space. What, eight hundred square feet?”

“I have no idea.”

“Not that I need much space. Just a place on your floor to roll out my sleeping bag.”

Sleeping bags reminded her of Jake in the back of his Jeep last night. The wedding and the storm were mere preludes to the really big event—him seducing her. Who knew that such pleasure could be had without even doing the deed?

“Earth to Emma.” Oliver waved his hand in front of her face.

“Sorry. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“Did you know that the Japanese sleep less than anyone else on the planet?”

Emma belatedly reached for a robe. “Why have you come here?”

“To see you.”

“Why now?”

“I missed you. And I’ve never been to Pennsylvania. I thought it might be fun.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “Did your brother send you?”

“No. I didn’t tell him I was coming.”

“Why not?”

“We had a fight. About Comic-Con. He said he’d get tickets and didn’t. I can’t talk about it.

It upsets me too much. Just let me crash here a night or two. If you want me to leave after that, I will. Come on, be a good friend.”

“Okay.” She was too tired to argue with him.

“Great.” He dumped his sleeping bag and backpack by the door. “I can help you with your research.”

“You’re studying to be a quantum physicist.”

“Yes, and I have an IQ higher than Einstein—not that I’m one to brag.”

“How is that going to help my sociology study?”

“I’m sure I can come up with something. Show me what you’ve got so far.”

“First let me take a quick shower and get some clothes on.”

“Sure. I’ll just check my e-mail.” He sat at the table and opened his laptop.

Emma was back in ten minutes, wearing a scoop neck Penn T-shirt over black yoga pants.

Oliver was eager to hear about her grant and her research project.

Talking with another academic, even one not in her own field, actually was invigorating.

The conversation went beyond her work as they discussed everything from various research methodologies to comparisons between the old-world interactions of an Amish gemeinschaft-type community and the high-tech dealings of the industrialized world around them.

“Ferdinand Tonnies speculated that the gemeinschaft style of local villages was disappearing—” Emma’s comment was interrupted by a knock on her door.

Jake stood there smiling at her—until he looked over her shoulder and saw Oliver and his sleeping bag. “Who the hell is he?”