Lindsay McKenna - Never Surrender

“Good,” he crooned, giving her a boyish smile. He eased his fingers beneath the soft, silky material around her waist.

“Ummm.” Bay sighed, her knees already growing weak. He must have sensed her instability because one hand left her silky boxers and curved gently around the small of her back to hold her steady.

He sighed. “Good having you here, having you standing so close to me, almost naked...”

His dark voice fell over her, and Bay closed her eyes, easily seduced by his hands, the soft shorts falling away from her thighs. She leaned against Gabe’s powerful chest. She could smell his sweat, the scent of sagebrush and hot sunlight on his sun-darkened flesh. She wanted to move closer, but he held her away from him.

“Not yet, baby... Your camisole has to go...” And he lifted it up and over her head. As it dropped to her feet, white-hot heat plunged through his entire body. Bay was five foot ten and a large-boned woman. Her breasts were perfect and her hips wide, the kind a man could hold on to. She was in top shape, her body taut and firm.

Gabe slowly slid his hands from her proud shoulders, skimming her strong arms and finally grasping her fingers. She opened her eyes, and he smiled down at her. “You’re so damned beautiful. I don’t know what I did to deserve you, baby, but I’m glad you’re mine. Ready to shower?”

She drowned beneath his hooded eyes that glinted with desire for her alone. Her fingers curved around his. “Let’s go, Frogman...”

He chuckled and opened the door, the steam escaping momentarily from the enclosure. “You have such a way with words, woman.”

The gentle water rained down upon Bay. She groaned as Gabe led her to a small seat, her hair becoming wet. In moments, he’d applied jasmine-scented shampoo throughout her hair, the fragrance swirling around in the steam surrounding them.

“Tip your head back a little,” he coaxed, standing near her left shoulder, kneading the soap gently across her scalp. He saw her lips part, her eyes closed, a look of utter pleasure on her face. Gabe always wanted to see that look. He loved Bay so much. There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for her to always keep her happy.

“Ohhhh, Gabe...” Bay uttered with a sigh. “That feels so delicious...what you’re doing....” She trembled as his strong fingers wreaked relaxing magic across her scalp, the water softly drizzling warmly around her. The way he massaged her scalp, she was putty in his hands. The soreness in her shoulders disappeared. The tension she’d been carrying dissolved beneath his slow, sensual ministrations. As he took a large cup, catching the water from the showerhead and rinsing the shampoo out of her hair, Bay made a soft sound in her throat.

“I think your hair’s clean now,” Gabe said later, setting the cup on the shelf. When she opened her eyes, her long lashes framing those incredible blue irises, he felt himself grow even harder. It was always a balance and a matter of control on his part. He loved her, wanted to pleasure her, hear her soft, husky sounds, watch her expression melt into utter joy.

“You always come first, baby.” Gabe leaned over, brushing his mouth against her wet, parted lips. A moan vibrated in the slender column of her throat, and he absorbed the happy sound into his body, his soul.

In one smooth motion, he lifted her and brought her into his arms, the raindrops surrounding them. Gabe didn’t want to leave her lush mouth, meeting her tongue as it shyly danced with his. Her breasts pressed against his chest. He felt her belly taut against his erection. Easing his hand down her spine, his fingers splayed outward, cupping her hips, pulling her more tightly against him. Now, he groaned. He had to have the control and wait. But her sleek, wet body sliding against his was undoing him.

Bay eased from his mouth, stepped back and picked up a bar of soap. “My turn...” She lathered the soap between her hands and skimmed her fingers across his scalp. Next, came his hard, weathered face. Gabe rested his hands lightly on her hips, and he closed his eyes. There was such trust between them as Bay gently began to remove the dirt and sweat encrusted in his short, gleaming hair. The dirt dissolved, and she lathered more soap, tracing his deeply lined brow. A brow of a man who thought a lot, said little, but had a mind like a steel trap. Her fingertips moved lightly across his straight, black brows and feathered across his closed eyelids. She felt his hands grip her hips a little more firmly, and she smiled, wanting to give him equal pleasure.

Gabe gratefully absorbed her healer hands as they washed his face, neck, arms and chest. Every touch was building a fire within him, stoking his need for her until he wasn’t sure he could last beneath her tender foray. As her soapy fingers glided toward his narrow hips, he drew in a sharp breath, clenching his teeth. Her fingers wrapped gently around him, and his entire body locked up on him. Gripping Bay, he hauled her against him. He drowned in her wide blue eyes that were filled with love for him. Her lips were parted, and she licked her lower lip. It was damned near his undoing.

“Just a little longer,” she pleaded huskily. “You want to be clean, don’t you?”

He sucked in a ragged breath of air, feeling her clean him slowly, thoroughly. Gabe thought he was going to lose it. Her hands skimmed his hard thighs, sliding down to his knotted calves and finally, his large feet. Every stroking touch of her fingers was healing. At every scar, Bay stopped, kissed it gently and then moved on. Gabe didn’t know whether to cry or scream. No woman had ever loved him with her hands like Bay did.

The first day Gabe had met Bay, he’d noticed her long narrow hands. Her fingers were tapered and beautiful, nails blunt cut. He remembered thinking how much he’d wanted to feel her touch on him. And when he learned she was a medic, it had made even more sense to him. Healing hands. Loving hands. Compassionate hands that knew...they just knew...and Bay knew he needed this...needed her touch like this. But by every name in his book of life, Gabe couldn’t stop loving her for who she simply was: a very kind, sensitive and caring woman. Who loved him.

What the hell had he done to deserve Bay? Gabe hadn’t led a stellar life. It had been ugly and dysfunctional throughout his childhood. He knew abuse. He knew a man’s fist, his belt lashing his flesh until it welted and bruised. He’d never known the tender touch, the loving touch that she now shared with him alone.

Bay watched all the tension drain out of Gabe’s face, out of his hard body. The sexual tension that replaced it was as it should be. She washed herself as he stood beneath the streams of water, soap sloughing off him, his flesh clean and glistening. Gabe looked at her beneath hooded, burning eyes, not making a move toward her. Simply watching her.

The dark desire was evident in his eyes. And he loved her. She gave him an impish look as she approached him, placing her hands lightly on his powerful shoulders. Leaning up, she whispered in his ear, “I’m ready to swim with the sharks, Frogman....”

Her smile dazzled his senses as she eased away to see his reaction. “You’re mine,” he rasped, and he began a slow, sensuous path, starting with her mouth.

Bay leaned into him, the water nestling in nooks and crannies between them, liquid flowing heatedly down her body as he took possession of her mouth. At the same time, he brought her hard against him. His other hand moved toward her breast, cupping it, moving his thumb languidly across the hardened peak. She uttered a small, fierce cry into his mouth as an electric shock bolted from her nipple straight down to her womb. Her entire body convulsed.

“Easy, baby, easy,” he coaxed, moving his hand even farther downward, exploring her waist, her hip.