Oh, Beck. Unbearably touched by the words that had once broken her heart, she gripped his shoulders and dug her nails into his skin, needing an anchor. The staccato of her beating heart thudded in her ears and telegraphed an unnamed need for more.

She moaned deep as his finger rubbed through her seam, every return hitting her clit with the perfect amount of pressure. Two fingers breached her body and found a hot, steamy haven. Heat coiled tight in her belly. He was watching her, waiting for her to go over, so she held on desperately because the longer he trapped her in his intense gaze, the better the release would be. His other hand curled around her neck in a possessive, wildly sensual spread.

“More, Beck. Please.”

A finger soaked in her slick heat circled the nerve-packed nub of her clit, just like before, just how she liked it, and she shattered. His hand cupping her sex and the wall at her back were the only things keeping her upright.

And then his hand was gone.

Which left the cool tile. Slumped against it, she watched in a daze as he did that one-hand-over-the-head thing with his tee and reached in to turn on the shower. The tightly loomed muscles of his back moved like cogs under chocolate silk. Everything about him screamed pleasure.

Her spine had dissolved, leaving her useless, so thank God he took over. Holding her steady, he pulled off her boots and socks, divested her of her pants, sinking to his knees as he pulled them down. On the journey back up, he kissed the blue roses along her calf, languidly running his tongue over her damp, heated flesh.

“Where did you get this one?”

“Wh-what?”

“The roses. Where?” He christened the cerulean flowers with scorching hot kisses.

“London,” she panted. “It was the first big piece I got. The first one I was brave enough to get.”

He rewarded her bravery with more brain-destroying flicks of his tongue.

“Beck,” she whispered into the vapor, feeling like she had entered a fevered dream. Feeling a reckless abandon she had never before experienced.

No, wait, she had. With him. Only with him.

Nudging her thighs apart, he splayed those blunt hands over her soft skin. Oh, God, oh, God. The throb built inexorably the closer he moved to the well of her sex.

“Just a little taste, Darcy. You always tasted so sweet.”

As if she could deny him a single thing.

Mouth set to torture, he tongued her blooming folds, scooping up the intimate moisture, creating more with every luxurious sweep. She was flagging, her legs weak as the steam, her body a quivering mess. Any moment now, she would be knocked out of time—

Damn. He stood, giving her a chance to catch her breath (not necessarily a good thing) and appreciate his glistening mahogany chest (most assuredly a good thing). Dark hair arrowed down to his groin, blazing a trail she yearned to follow with her fingers, her lips, her tongue. He was perfectly formed, all steel flesh, so beautiful that it simply hurt to look at him. But she suspected it would hurt more when she no longer could.

“I need a condom. I need to be inside you when you come again.” He stepped back with the intent to grab protection, leaving her boneless against the wall.

“My purse,” she pushed out. Now wasn’t the time for coy.

“Atta girl.” He handed over her purse and she rummaged for the three-pack among the rest of her crap. After what seemed like an eternity, not helped by Beck sucking the delicate juncture where her neck met her shoulder, she found the Trojans.

Within two seconds, he had shucked his shorts, smoothed the condom on, and lifted her off the floor with little effort apparent in his raw, fireman strength.

Then he dawdled.

Teased and rubbed.

Drove her mad with anticipation.

Only when she begged did he enter her slowly in one consuming thrust. Their united groan reverberated against the tile, such a satisfying sound.

Such a loud, satisfying sound.

Panic about how public this was warred with bone-melting desire. “Beck, someone might come.”

“I guarantee it.” He stroked her long and deep, massaging her swollen clit with every return of his thick, sleek length.

“I mean—”

His mouth fitted over hers, choking off her words. A brutal, uncivilized kiss. The steam from the shower—the one they were not taking—added a skin of moisture that made her hands slip off his shoulders. But she never doubted his ability to hold her safe as he took her higher and made good on that guarantee for both of them.

After her world had been rocked—two more times—Beck still held her close, protectively and possessively, wedged deep inside her.

“We just had hot shower sex outside the shower,” she said with a giggle.

“Find ’em hot, leave ’em wet,” he murmured. “Well-known firefighter maxim.”

A stray thought cut through her mind fog. “What’s CPF? Gage said it before he left.”

His grin was wry and about the sexiest thing she had ever seen. “City Property Fuckable. It’s against the rules, so if you’re going to do it, you need to make sure it’s worth losing your job over.”

“And I’m CPF?”

“You know it, querida. You’re my first.”

His first, just like he had been hers all those years ago.

There was that rare smile on his lips but, also, in his lake-blue eyes she saw his determination: the inner strength that helped him survive those early, dangerous years in a life he hadn’t chosen. The same strength that powered him in the ring and on every call in this life he had made his own.

Maybe it was delayed shock, or the power of the O, or the fact she was standing in a firehouse shower room with her hot Latin lover impaling her to the tile, but it suddenly hit her like a two-by-four.

He could have died.

And she would never have known.

She would have popped into Dempsey’s bar with Mel and assumed it was his night off. Might even have silently cheered the bullet she had dodged by not running into him. Only two days later, the idea of a world without him—her world without him—turned her blood to ice.

Tears sprang into her eyes. Goddamn him.

“Darcy, what’s wrong? Am I hurting you?” He made to withdraw, and she clasped his perfect, tight ass to preserve the physical connection as if it could minimize the emotional.

“You’re a good man, Beck Rivera.”

He looked unconvinced. “I’m not. I’m selfish and greedy.”

“No, no.” She kissed the knotted bridge of his nose. “Look at what you do, at what you’ve become. I’m so proud of you.”

He drew back with the expression of a stern angel, and when he spoke it was like he gouged each word from a deep, dark place.

“This won’t be enough for me.”

Thoughts toppled like dominoes, and her heart seized in her chest, not unpleasantly. But her walls had walls, so she said the first thing that popped into her scrambled brain.

“Let’s not complicate it.”

“No, Darcy. Let’s.”

His kiss cut off all argument, making her blood pound, her heart soar, and consuming her utterly and completely whole.

chapter

7

Have I told you lately how sexy you are?” Darcy tiptoed up to kiss him, then moved her lips along the edge of his ear, eliciting a shiver.

“You’re just sayin’ that ’cause it’s true, querida.”

Damn, she looked fine in a long coat and cream scarf, like a pristine present he wanted to unwrap slowly. And the backdrop could not be more perfect. All around them, the twinkling trees and festive atmosphere at Zoo Lights in Lincoln Park painted the scene in the brushstrokes of a fairy tale. Each year, the zoo—and ComEd—draped the trees in colored lights, blasted tunes from the sound system, and scared the shit out of the animals. A most excellent Chicago holiday tradition.

Darcy had said she didn’t want to complicate what was happening between them, but Beck had quickly kiboshed that idea. Knowing that shock-and-awe tactics were needed to break down her barriers, he had planned a romantic date with holiday lights and hot chocolate and frickin’ polar bears, followed by a horse-drawn carriage ride down Michigan Avenue where he’d hoped to cop a feel under a warm tartan blanket. The fact that this magical space was home to their first kiss years ago made it just that much sweeter.