Free At Last by Ella Stone Page B

could already feel himself taking her in his arms, crushing her curves against himself, feasting on her mouth, on her flesh, being inside her...
    But she was in pain. That was her exact word for it. How could she be ready to sleep with him if she was still in pain over shit-head Mark! It had to be something like a one-night stand, a rebound thing. And that was empty. That was always a mess. And if he was just her rebound guy, then...
    Then he wouldn’t be her friend anymore. He’d be the guy she used to get over Mark.
    And he’d lose her.
    Kevin took a deep breath of the unbelievably clean tropical air. Everything about this place was pure and beautiful, and not worth a damn if Susan wasn’t with him. Somehow he’d have to find a way around this. Some way to make Susan forget trying to bed him. Because it was a bad idea. She needed time to heal, not a one-night stand. She needed her friend Kevin, not his horn-dog evil twin.
    He couldn’t chance losing her, no matter how badly he wanted her.
    Pussy!
    Suddenly there was a rustling behind him, on the other side of the clearing, and Kevin’s eyes widened as he turned to see Susan drop through a stand of young palm trees and land flat on her face in the tall grass.
    Kevin gave a quick snort of laughter. “So, I can’t even get a couple of minutes to think?” he grumbled to God under his breath. “You had to send her all the way up here just to screw with me.”
     
    ~*~
     
    The trail had gotten steep and rocky, and then littered with fallen trees, and finally covered in vines until there was no trail left. And just when Susan was about to freak out, wishing hard for a big machete or an industrial strength weed-whacker, she unceremoniously tripped and fell. Her life flashed before her eyes, for she was sure she was about to fall right over The Virgin Drop, and to her death. But her life was short and whizzed by far too swiftly to comprehend. When she hit the nice solid ground and didn’t go tumbling head over heels, or simply pitch down into the seething ocean, she sent a hysterical Thank You up to heaven.
    She looked up to see Kevin staring at her, hands crossed over his chest, and then he snorted. Kevin didn’t snort. So Susan was pretty sure she looked ridiculous. As she stood, and tangles of dead vines and bits of palm and grass fell out of her hair, she rescinded her Thank You, replacing it with Asshole !
    She realized Kevin had turned away from her and hadn’t so much as lifted a finger to help her. “Thanks for the helping hand.”
    He didn’t move a muscle, but Susan could tell he stiffened all over. “I wanted to be alone. Is that so hard to understand?”
    Well, yes...Susan had to rein herself back. She couldn’t just start yelling at him
    “A plane could’ve gotten you.”
    Kevin’s head jerked. “A plane?”
    Susan felt silly. She made it sound like an airplane was some sort of ghoulish monster out of a B movie.
    “I’m a paranoid former jilted bride with abandonment issues,” Susan paraphrased Liz. “Give me a break.”
    Kevin grunted and shook his head. “I wasn’t going to leave. I just needed...”
    “Some space?” Susan said to utter silence. “Some time?”
    “To think.”
    “That’s never a good idea.” Susan tiptoed over, trying to get closer without scaring him off.
    “You have room to talk,” Kevin said, still not looking at her. “When your thoughts don’t have you jumping your best friend, they’ve got you in a coma.”
    Ouch . But Susan pushed that barb right out of her head. She had to fix what she’d done. She had to get him to forgive her.
    “Funny,” she grumbled. “So, can I buy you a drink or a shiny new car to make up for it?”
    She could tell Kevin was smiling, and it made her heart skip a beat. He was going to forgive her.
    “Since you attacked me last night after a couple of margaritas, I think I’ll go for the car.”
    Susan found herself standing right beside Kevin, looking out at the ocean, at the