Storm Watch

was with someone who could hold their own. “On three,” he said. “One. Two. Three-” He shoved, and she got it into Reverse and hit the gas, steering out of the ditch. He ran after her, slogging through the water to hop into the passenger seat. “Nice.”

“This is probably a good time to tell you, I haven’t driven a stick in ten years.”

Laughing, he swiped the water from his face. “Then extra nice.”

The water was rushing down the road with them, almost faster than the Jeep. He knew they didn’t have much longer before any car on the road wouldn’t be drivable, this vehicle included. In fact, he’d consider them damn lucky if they made it to Cece’s. “We might have to stay at the condo and ride this out.”

“Yeah.” Her attention was on the road. “If she’s not in labor that won’t be a problem.”

And if she was, and they had to evacuate quickly…“We’ll handle it,” he promised, just as he saw another huge tree, this one down across the road ahead. Lizzy saw it, too, and hit the brakes and the clutch together.

“Not so hard,” he said quickly. “Let up a little.”

Too late. The tires didn’t grab, and they went into their second slide.

“Ohmigod,” she gasped. “I’m sorry, hold on…”

“Steer into the slide, Lizzy. Steer into it-”

“I’m trying!” They spun in a full three-hundred-and-sixty circle and missed their second tree by inches.

In the ensuing silence, Lizzy blew out a breath, unhooked her seat belt and crawled over the console toward him.

His mind went absolutely blank, but his body knew what to do. It reached for her, hauling her into his arms and holding her tight. “You okay?”

“Peachy fine. Just trying to reassure you in case you’re scared.” One of her knees was dangerously close to unmanning him but when he went to shift her, she couldn’t be budged.

“Are you?” she whispered. “Scared?”

“Terrified,” he murmured, and she burrowed right in, curling into him, pressing her face to his throat as her arms snaked around his neck so tight he could scarcely breathe, and he didn’t care. He ran his hands up and down her back until she lifted her face enough to bump noses with him.

He slid his hands into her hair to hold it back so that he could see into her face, but she wasn’t freaking out as he’d thought. She was staring at him with an awareness that stirred his own, straddling him, her legs on the outside of his so that the core of her was pressed up against the part of him suddenly very happy with the arrangement.

“Jase,” she whispered, and then swallowed, staring at his mouth, her breasts mashed into his chest, her fingers in his hair. “I want to…”

He stroked a loose strand of hair from her temple and dropped his gaze to her lips, which she licked. “Want to…what?” Drive him crazy? Done. Make him hard? Also done. Make him want things he had no business wanting? Done and done.

“Trade positions back,” she said.

“Okay.” He was hard as a rock, and he knew she felt it because her hips made the slightest motion, as if she couldn’t help it.

“Jase?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re…”

“Yeah. It happens when you-God,” he expelled when she shifted her hips again. “That. When you do that.”

“I never used to turn you on in the old days.”

“I was a teenager, the wind turned me on.”

A snicker escaped her, revealing surprise and delight, which didn’t help his situation any. She really hadn’t known she could excite him, and God, the look on her face, as if she’d just discovered she’d held all the power… which of course, she did. He wanted her, God he did, but then what? It’d be amazing, and he’d want more. He’d want all the spare time they could manage until either he left, or she did, and then…then he’d hurt her. Because he was not long-term material, not in his current condition. “Lizzy-”

She did that thing with her hips again and he let out a helpless, low groan, gripping her still. “Okay, enough of that,” he said a little thickly.

“Sorry.”

But she didn’t look it. He was strong, he reminded himself. Physically and mentally. He’d had to be. He was certainly strong enough to set her away and get them back on track, before either of them took this too far.

And yet when she rocked her hips one more time, her eyes filled with marvel, he let her. Let her slide over the part of him now fully erect and straining for attention.

Yeah, because as it turned out, he wasn’t strong enough to push her away after all. No way in hell.

“Mmm,” she whispered in his ear, just a soft murmur when he hugged her in, and he nearly melted. Her hood had fallen back, leaving her hair a little wild, and her poncho gaped enough that when she leaned forward he could see down the sweatshirt she wore beneath.

She had on a pink bra with a little red heart nestled between her breasts. A pink bra with a little heart that stole his. Ah, man. “Lizzy.”

She bent her head, and the tip of her nose grazed his jaw. She inhaled deeply, as if she loved the scent of him, as if she couldn’t get enough, and his hands tightened on her. Everything tightened.

“You smell good,” she whispered so softly he could barely hear her. “How is it you smell so good?”

“I don’t know, but we-” Another arch of those hips, and God. He turned his face into her, burying it in her hair, closing his eyes, his hands running up and down her slim spine. Then they slid lower, feeling the curve of her ass through the rain gear and the sweats, and he forgot that they weren’t doing this-instead he wished like hell that they were back at his place, in his bed.

She pressed her lips to his throat, dragged them slowly upward, heading toward his ear, and his eyes actually rolled in the back of his head. “Okay, that’s-”

She nibbled on his earlobe and he sucked in a hard breath. Going to turn me on and upside down and inside out. He dropped his head to her shoulder and gulped for air like a man going under, and while he was at it, he gave in to the temptation and squeezed her sweet ass. “I can’t remember what I was going to say. Hell, I can hardly remember my name.”

She laughed. “I have a confession.”

Oh, Christ, no. Not a confession.

“In high school…” She cleared her husky throat. “You didn’t know this, but I had a big-time crush on you.”

He lifted his head and met her gaze, and realized she expected a response. “Yeah.”

“Yeah?” she repeated. “You knew?”

“A little.”

“Oh.” Her smile froze, faltered. Her hips stopped their deliciously slow assault on his senses.

“Lizzy-”

She climbed over him to get back to her seat. “We should go.”

“Did you want me to lie?”

“No.” She closed her eyes. “No. Look, it was a long time ago. I had a helpless, hopeless crush on you and hid it by being rude.”

“You were never rude.”

“No? And apparently I didn’t hide it, either.” She put her hood back up, hiding. “Come on. Before it gets worse.”

He was pretty sure she didn’t mean the storm. “It was a weird time,” he said.

“Really, Jason? Were you socially awkward and gawky and geeky? Oh, wait, that was me. You were beautiful and perfect and popular.”

“And you were smart, so damn smart. No, dammit, listen.” He took her shoulders so she’d look into his eyes. “You were different-”

She snorted her opinion of that and pushed away his hands. “Different. You mean, I had a good personality.”