Her eyes went round and she tried to wiggle back up.
It made things worse, and her bottom pressed firmly against him.
“Red,” he choked out. “I’m not a saint. If you want my help, please let me see your foot.”
She swallowed but stilled. “I didn’t ask for your help.”
“Well, you’re getting it.”
She glared at his chest and he shifted, lifting her higher. Some of the tension in her shoulders eased and a moment later, her foot bobbed to the surface. He slipped his hand from beneath her legs, causing her to tighten her grip. God, the contact was amazing. He forced himself to ignore the cool press of their flesh together and examined her foot.
When his fingertips slid along her sole, she jerked it back with a snort. His lips curved. Ticklish. He pressed on and found a small shard of shell jutting out.
“Here we go.” He pinched it between his fingers and yanked it free.
“Ouch!”
A tiny drop of blood welled from the spot and he pressed his thumb over it. He held her that way for a long moment, savoring her nearness. The last orange sliver of sun dipped below the horizon and shadows wound their way around the two of them. Too soon, she slackened her grip and he released her.
As soon as she got her feet beneath her, Red turned from him. This was when he should return to shore. But he couldn’t.
He stood behind her, watching her hair swirl around her shoulders. The soft blanket it created obscured her body and his hands yearned to part it. He clenched them at his side as silence stretched heavy between them.
He took a step closer, tugged forth by an invisible tether, and she angled her face toward him.
“Do you feel it?” she whispered, searching his eyes.
Did he feel it? God, every inch of his body buzzed with feeling. He reached out with his hand and paused inches from her.
“May I?”
She nodded and he swept her hair to the side, over one slender shoulder. And he feasted on the curve of her sides, all the way down to where they blended with the dark water. With deliberate slowness, he set his hands on her shoulders, rubbed his thumbs in circles just above the water.
Her sigh was his undoing.
He dropped his hands, slipping them along slick skin. When he closed them around her waist, she turned to him. Nibbled on her bottom lip.
She’d hunched so that her breasts remained underwater, but he couldn’t miss the soft swells. Nor the dark points of her nipples blurred beneath the surface. He groaned and tugged her to him, pressing her belly against his cock. She didn’t try to wiggle away this time, just stared at him with parted lips.
He rocked his hips against her. “Feel what you do to me?”
Even in twilight’s shadows, he could see the color rise on her cheeks.
He lowered his lips, set them on one cheekbone. “I wonder, do you blush everywhere like this?”
His thumbs swept out, brushing against the curls between her legs, and she made a soft noise in the back of her throat. And then her hands were on his chest, tentatively traveling up. He growled his pleasure and caught her mouth with his.
It was like unlocking Pandora’s box. She leaned into him, sweeping her hands up to his neck, tangling in his hair. When he slid his hands around her bottom, she pushed off the seabed and wrapped her legs around his waist. Her tongue met his eager strokes and she made the sweetest little muffled cries.
He pulled his mouth away and she dug her nails into his scalp, trying to pull him back. Ignoring the pain, he lifted her and dropped his face to the valley between her breasts. Her back arched as he closed his lips over one pert nipple, grazing his teeth over the taut skin.
This time, she cried out aloud, grinding her core against him, inches above the throbbing tip of his erection. One hand delved between her thighs, parting the folds there and he grinned. Slick heat surrounded his finger. So wet.
Her hips tilted into his caress and he sank a finger into her. So soft. His breaths came in pants against her skin as he lapped his tongue over the salty drops beaded across her breast. She clung to him, muscles deep inside her velvet softness clenching around his finger.
Need pulsed through him in an ever-stronger crescendo, bordering on pain as every inch of his cock strained to reach her.
He withdrew his finger and she shook her head. “Please, don’t stop.”
