Seven
“This is not what I expected you to show me.”
Adam hooked the helmets on the back of the bike, turning to watch Tess as she paced the length of the long patio behind the Lick Observatory. It was clear tonight, the stars brilliant against the dark sky, so bright that you didn’t even need the huge telescope housed in the observatory building just to the right of where they stood to see them.
“Well, one of us needs to get their mind out of the gutter,” he said, sputtering out a laugh when she whirled around, green eyes wide and hands on her hips in indignation.
“Oh really?” Tess sauntered toward him, her stride half dangerous swagger and half sensual invitation. “If you haven’t noticed, this place is closed. Are the cops going to show up and arrest us for trespassing?”
Now it was his time to swagger, and it was easy when being with Tess made him feel ten feet tall. He moved toward her, meeting her in the middle of the patio, reaching out to pull her flush against him. Adam loved her curves, her breasts, hips and ass reminiscent of the pin-up girls of the 1940s. But what made her absolutely mouthwatering was the way she owned her body, the utter confidence she had in her power as a woman.
Women in his family’s wealthy circles lived as though their money or connections gave them what Tess had naturally. They hid behind designer labels and expensive vacations that were handed over to them on a platter and never had to fight or scrape for their place in this world.
But Tess was a self-made woman, independent and strong, and he didn’t even have to know all of her story to know that she’d had a rough time of it. She was everything he wanted and even more than he was sure he could handle.
But he’d be damned if he wouldn’t give it his best try.
“We don’t have to worry about the cops.”
“Sure about that?” Tess asked, running her hands up his chest and over his shoulders, her fingers tangling in his hair. Her touch was electric, lighting him up from the inside out, brighter than any star in the sky.
“I’m as sure as a half-million-dollar donation to the observatory foundation last year.”
“And I thought my twenty-five-dollar donation to the fire department was living large.”
“Did I tell you that this is one of my favorite places?” Adam asked, taking her hand and leading her over the stone wall running along the edge of the overlook that led to the wooded valley below. He stood behind her, one arm wrapped around her waist and the other gesturing toward the broad swath of sky surrounding them.
“I used to come here and stare at the stars. We came here on a field trip in school and I fell in love with the way this sits so high above everything. It reminded me of the mountains where I lived when I was little and how you could hike to the top of the ridge and the stars seemed like they were so close you could reach out and touch them.” He pointed to a different area as he named each constellation in turn. “The Big and Little Dipper. Orion’s Belt. The North Star. I could come here and I knew that the stars I saw here were shining down on my family...wherever they were.” Adam kissed her neck, noticing her little shiver at his touch and ramping back his surge of anticipation. Tess was here and there was no hurry. He buried his face in the soft fall of her hair, pressing kisses and tiny love bites over the exposed skin of her throat. “Pretty sappy, I know.”
“Not sappy,” she replied, nuzzling back. “Have you talked to your brother and sister?”
He nodded, resting his chin on her shoulder and his cheek against the silk of her hair as he recalled the phone calls it had taken him three hours of psyching himself up to make.
“Yeah. Roan was cool, running off to some gallery thing so he couldn’t talk long. We set up another time later this week.” Adam had been relieved to hear the genuine interest in his brother’s voice. “He sounded really glad to hear from me.”
“And Sarina?” Tess asked, the tentative edge to her voice betraying her worry.
“Sarina wasn’t an easy call.” He sighed, voicing the concerns that had almost kept him from hiring Tess to find his siblings. “When I first started looking for them, I was worried that they were dead, that I was too late. But, since I heard that you found them, I’ve been up nights worried that they wouldn’t want anything to do with me.”
Tess’s fingers wove together with his own, a squeeze that let him know he wasn’t alone. “Did Sarina say that to you?”
“No. No.” Adam replayed the very brief phone call with his sister. “She was just...flat. I’ve had more interest from Siri.”
“Keep trying. Sarina has had a hard life, built ways to protect herself.” Tess leaned back and pressed a kiss to his jaw. “She’s worth the extra work.”
“Have you met me? I’m never giving up on her. She’s my sister.” He paused, wondering how they’d swerved onto this topic. This wasn’t what he’d had planned and it wasn’t a place he wanted to be right now. Not when he had Tess in his arms under the stars. “Sorry. Pretty sappy.”
“You’re not sappy,” she repeated, her ass pressing against his rapidly hardening dick. “Pretty sweet and crazy sexy.”
“Sexier than being a rock star?” he teased, ghosting a kiss over her lips and relieved to be back on track for tonight’s planned events.
Tess chuckled at that, the laugh evolving into a moan as his lips grazed her earlobe and his hand traveled up her stomach, cupping her breast at its final destination. Her nipple was hard, jutting against the soft material of her dress, and he could not resist rubbing the pad of his thumb over it, softly pinching it and grinding his erection against her when she gasped and dug her fingernails into his thighs. The pinch of pain was electric, sending the aftershock of pleasure racing along his nerve endings, emphasizing every rub of his own hard nipples against the softness of his T-shirt, the press of his zipper against his long, stiff length.
This moment was the manifestation of a fantasy he’d lived on for months. His need for Tess had been there since the first meeting and he’d worked so hard not to give in and so had she; both were aware of the high-tension wire attraction that sizzled and snapped between them at every interaction. And here they were, on the verge of a moment that would destroy all of the carefully created walls that kept them apart for very good reasons. And while they’d agreed earlier, agreed to set everything on fire and contain the blaze, he wanted to be sure. They needed to be sure.
“Tess, I’ve got to know if this is still what you want,” he growled against the curve of her jaw, surrounded by the sweet scent of her citrus perfume and the arousal-fueled aroma of her skin. She was writhing against him, falling with him into the enticing bliss of their pleasure, and he needed to hear her say yes just one more time before he let them both fall over the edge. “We can stop if you want to. No repercussions, no fallout.”