Chapter Fifteen

“You can hear me?” Pete stood, his face alight with joy, and immediately crossed the room to her.

“Every single sexy baritone syllable.”

He wrapped his left arm around her waist and kissed her.

“Good. Then listen very, very closely,” he murmured in her ear. “I love you, Shannon.”

“I love you too, Pete,” she answered, her heart flooding with joy as she wrapped her arms around his waist. “I love you too. And let me guess. Now we need to wait until you’re all healed up?”

He leaned down and pressed his lips against the pulse point just under her jawline.

“I don’t think I can wait that long,” he growled. “Can you?”

“That would be no,” she confirmed. “So how about you let me lead this time? I promise to be very, very careful with that right arm.”

He stood upright again and looked into her eyes, a smoldering smile beginning to curve his lips.

“I’m intrigued,” he murmured. “And seriously turned on by that.”

“I can tell,” she murmured back as she giggled, feeling his arousal pressing against her.

“Come on with that paperwork, Mabel,” he called out. “We’ve got somewhere we need to be.”

Shannon laughed.

“You wait right here,” he told her. “I’m gonna get out of this damn gown.”

He kissed her again, then scooped up the clothes she’d brought him and stepped into the bathroom to get changed.

***

Twenty minutes later, Pete had the papers signaling his freedom in his possession and they were heading to his truck.

“I’ll drive,” she volunteered, and climbed behind the wheel. “You need to save your strength.”

The seductive look she threw his way sent his pulse into overdrive.

“Yes, ma’am,” he drawled, searing her with a sultry look of his own.

To assist him with keeping his hands to himself while she drove, he got out his cell phone and called Larry.

And when Larry answered on the sixth ring, out of breath, he grinned.

“This a bad time?”

“Um… yeah. Can I call you back?”

“Sure. Sometime tomorrow, please,” he said to his friend as he cast a glance at Shannon. “Tomorrow works better, actually.”

She nodded, holding back a snicker.

Still grinning, he hung up the phone and looked her direction again.

“I think I might have interrupted something,” he told her.

“Good for them,” Shannon replied, then added, “and nice call, telling him to wait until tomorrow. Today, you’re all mine.”

The flames of desire she saw in his eyes when she looked over at him made her want to break the speed limit to get back to the cabin.

***

Pete was dismayed to see that Montie and Lynda’s car was parked at the cabin when they pulled up.

“We have visitors. Guess we have to behave ourselves,” he observed.

Her nose crinkled up when she said, “Yes – but hopefully not for long.”

Pete roared with laughter and told her, “If it helps, honey, I feel the same way. They’re sweet people, but I need some serious alone time with you.”

Lynda stepped out of the cabin as they approached the door.

“Hey, Pete! Glad to see you back,” she exclaimed as she moved forward and hugged him. “I was just dropping off some fresh towels and some groceries. You two are all set, and you’re welcome to stay as long as you need. How’s the arm?”

“Better all the time, Aunt Lynda,” he replied. “Doc said no lifting, pushing or pulling for a while, but other than that, it’s going along pretty well.”

“Good! Well, I’ll get out of your hair. You two need some quiet time alone together,” she said, and winked, then left.

“My thoughts exactly,” Pete murmured as they waved to her from the porch.

He turned to Shannon.

“After you,” he said softly.

***

As they walked in, Shannon’s hands felt clammy.

I sure talked a big game earlier, but now, I’m nervous as hell. And it’s been so long…. what if I don’t do something right?

Pete picked up on her nervousness.

“We don’t have to do this now, if you’re not feeling comfortable with it,” he told her. “We can wait. The last thing I want to do is pressure or rush you in any way, Shannon.”

“It’s not that, it’s just that… um…”

“What? You can tell me.”

“Um… I haven’t done this in a really long time,” she admitted, flushing a deep scarlet.

Pete’s eyebrows raised.

“Oh,” he said. “Well, I haven’t either…. and I just realized something. I don’t have any protection with me.”

She went into the bedroom and came back with a small box.

“I… I… went and got these,” she stammered, and showed him.

“Honey,” he murmured, and closed the distance between them. “Only if you’re sure.”

“I’m sure,” she told him softly, then looked into his eyes and felt her nervousness dissipate. “I’m sure. I want to be with you, Pete. Make love with me.”

He reached out, took her hand, and led her to the bedroom.

***

Later that evening they sat in the hot tub on the back porch, watching the sunset disappear behind the mountain to their west.

Shannon glanced over and saw Pete watching her intently.

“What?”

“Just enjoying the view.”

“You must be talking about the sunset. I’m just…. average,” she said, and shrugged.

He moved toward her through the water.

“You are most definitely not average. Let me prove it to you.”

“Pete, your shoulder…” she began to say, but he kissed her.

“I’ll be careful. Now then, where was I? Oh, I remember,” he said as he placed his hands on her shoulders.

“Soft creamy skin,” he began, as he ran his hands up and down her arms.

“High cheekbones, delicate features,” he continued as his hands mapped out the journey he was narrating.

“Inviting, full mouth.” He brushed a thumb over it.

“The most mesmerizing aquamarine eyes I’ve ever seen, with long lashes.”

“Next, a supple neck.” His fingers trailed down her throat as he continued, “and collarbones that beg to be nibbled on. Leading down to amazing breasts, God given, not too big, not too small.”

“Slender frame into a tiny waist,” he spread his hands around her midsection, measuring, to prove his point.

“Curving out into great hips. Toned legs,” he announced, and noticed her breath hitching as his hands slid toward her inner thighs.

He cupped her and watched her head loll back, lost in his touch. He saw the passion ignite again in her eyes.

“I love the way you respond to me,” he told her, teasing her with his fingers as he brought his left hand up to support her head. “I love the way you feel, the way you taste and sound, the way you tremble like you are right now.”

Now Shannon arched toward him, breath coming in gasps as she rode the wave of feeling, her arms circling his neck.

“Let’s continue this outside the tub so we don’t drown,” Pete suggested, and she nodded.

He stepped out, helped her out, wrapped her in his robe, then led her inside to the living room. Once she was lying on the thick rug in front of the fire, he opened her robe and pounced.

The flickering flames cast their shadows on the far wall as he teased her and tasted her before he filled her. The pace was slow and languid, their bodies relaxed, floating in the feelings of just being one. Reaching the peak was both exhilarating and deeply peaceful, an understood and expected bliss between them, and she sighed with pleasure, fulfilled.

As they lay together afterward, her head on his chest, Pete murmured, “Shannon.”

“Hm?”

“Marry me.”

She turned her head to look at him.

“Come again?”

He looked down at her, his eyes brimming with emotion.

“I’m in love with you, Shannon Rivers, and I want to spend forever with you. I don’t have a ring to give you, but we can take care of that anytime you want. Will you marry me?”

She smiled, warm and slow, her eyes sparking with happiness.

“Yes, Pete Jenkins. I will marry you.”

***

Seven months later, on the third weekend of May, Pete Jenkins and Shannon Rivers stood in front of friends and family and exchanged vows and rings. The beaming smiles on their faces when they were pronounced man and wife almost brought Leah, Shannon’s maid of honor, to tears.

After a sweet, earnest kiss, they joined hands and walked back down the aisle as those in attendance clapped and cheered.