When she stepped into the water, though, he stopped her. “Aren’t you going to take those off?”
She glanced down at herself, then at him. Laughing, she told him, “I don’t think so. It’s not safe to be na**d around you, Justice.”
Since his erection was now pushing against the button fly of his own shorts, demanding to be set free, he had to silently agree with her.
She eased down onto the bench opposite him and with a sigh, tipped her head back onto the rim of the pool. “God, you were right. This feels amazing.”
Her lean, toned legs half floated in the water, directly in front of one of the jets, and Justice’s mouth watered as he watched her. He reached down and readjusted himself, hoping to ease his discomfort. It didn’t help. But he knew what would. Deftly, he undid the buttons on his shorts and pushed them off, shoving them to the floor of the pool. Instantly, his aching groin was eased, free of the constricting shorts. But he needed more.
He needed Maggie.
He moved closer to her while her eyes were closed. His gaze locked on her br**sts, bobbing just above the water’s edge, her dark, rosy ni**les perfectly defined by the wet silk. She might have thought she was protecting herself by staying semiclothed, but all she’d managed to do was tempt even more thoroughly. Wet silk clung to her skin, displaying far more than it hid.
When he was close enough, he reached out to slide one hand up her calf. Instantly, her eyes flew open and she floundered a bit, until she was again seated on the bench, gaze fixed on him. “What’re you doing?”
Justice moved closer still. “Helping us both relax.”
“I don’t think so,” she said, shaking her head and scooting farther from him.
“Don’t be so skittish, Maggie,” he soothed. “It’s not like we’re strangers.”
She held up one finger, holding him at bay. “No, we’re not strangers, Justice. That’s why we shouldn’t do this. It’ll only confuse things even more than they already are.”
“Impossible,” he countered, coming closer. The warm water felt great on his skin, the slide of his hand along her wet leg, once he took hold of her again, felt even better.
“Okay, maybe you have a point,” she said, nodding. “But I’m still mad at you.”
He grinned briefly. “Some of our best sex happened when you were mad at me.”
“Okay,” she admitted with a quick nod, “that’s true, too. But that doesn’t mean I want you now.”
“Liar.” He took hold of her foot and pulled her toward him, sliding his hands up her legs as she floated to him in the frothing water.
She hissed in a breath. “You’re cheating.”
“Damn straight.”
“Justice, this won’t solve anything.”
“Maybe it doesn’t have to,” he told her, his hands now gripping her bottom. “Maybe it just has to happen.”
She looked at him and squirmed in his grip, as if she were trying to get comfortable. “Maybe,” she acknowledged. “But maybe we shouldn’t let it.”
“Too late,” he whispered and moved off the bench so that he could turn her in his grasp, holding her floating body in front of the pulsing jets of water streaming into the tub.
“Cheating again!” she accused on a sigh as her legs parted and the thrum of the warm, pulsing water caressed her center.
While the hot tub worked its magic, Justice worked some of his own. Supporting her head with one arm, he used his free hand to undo the front clasp of her bra, freeing her br**sts, her hard ni**les. He dipped his head and took first one, then the other, into his mouth, rolling his tongue across their sensitive tips, feeling Maggie shudder beneath him as tumultuous sensations gathered within her.
He couldn’t seem to taste her enough. How had he lived these long months without her in his arms? He suckled her, and she whimpered, both from his attentions and the steady beat of the water on her tender flesh. He knew what she was feeling because he felt it, too.
The hunger. The need. The raw urgency racing through his bloodstream. He had to have her. Reaching down, he tore her panties down and off her legs and then held her thighs apart so that the warm water could caress her even more intimately.
She grabbed at his shoulders and groaned from deep in her throat as she lifted her h*ps into the water jet, aching, needing. He watched her face as her eyes swam with desire and her breath caught in her throat. Then she turned her gaze on him and whispered, “I want you inside me, Justice.”
That was all he needed to hear. He pulled her toward him, locked his mouth onto hers and eased them both down onto the bench. She straddled him, her knees at either side of his hips, and then lowered herself down onto him, inch by slow, incredible inch. She took him inside, into the heat. Into the heart of her, and Justice couldn’t look away from her amazing eyes while he filled her, pushing himself deeply into her body.
Their gazes fixed on each other, they moved as one, racing toward the inevitable finish that they both so desperately needed. Justice felt whole. Felt complete. Felt as if nothing else in the world mattered but this moment. This woman. She was all. She was everything. And when her lips parted and she cried out his name as her body trembled and shook with the force of her release, he knew he’d never seen anything more lovely.
Only moments later, he gave himself up to the wildness calling him and willingly followed her into a dazzling world that only lovers knew.
“It didn’t change anything,” Maggie muttered while she dressed Jonas in his pajamas that night. Her son smiled and laughed, a rolling, full-throated sound that never failed to tear at her heart.
She had him lying on her bed, since the two of them were still sharing a room. Thank heaven it was at the opposite end of the hall from the master bedroom. After what had happened between them that afternoon, she didn’t think it would be a wise idea to be too close to him.
“You think it’s funny, do you?” she asked her son, smiling at him as she bent to plant a kiss on his belly. “You think Mommy is making a fool of herself? You’re right, she probably is. And you know what? She’s still not sorry.”
The baby pulled at her hair, and Maggie gently untangled his fingers. She put first one chubby foot then the next into his footed blue sleeper, then swiftly did up the zipper, snapping the jammies closed at the neck. Jonas kicked and squirmed on Maggie’s bed until she scooped him up and cuddled him close.
Nothing in the world smelled better than a baby fresh from his bath. His skin was soft and warm and the heavy, solid weight of her son in her arms eased the ache in her heart substantially.