“Yes,” Sharon said on a sigh, getting to her feet now as well. “Come on, John, your boys will be knocking on the bedroom door at dawn demanding you take them fishing as promised.”
John Corby groaned. “I forgot about that.”
“Well, I can guarantee that the kids haven’t,” Russell said with a chuckle as he stood as well and picked up his cooler. He glanced to Paul. “Do you and Livy want to come along, Paul? There’s room for two more in the boat and Jeanne Louise can go shopping in London with the girls. That’s what they have planned for the morning.”
Jeanne Louise stiffened at the offer, but needn’t have worried. Paul chuckled, but shook his head. “Thanks for the offer, Russell, but I get seasick, and Livy takes after her old man. Besides I promised the girls a trip to the ice cream shop tomorrow morning.”
“All right then,” Russell said easily, turning away. “Maybe we’ll see you tomorrow afternoon. It’s ‘loll on the beach and watch the kids swim’ time in the afternoons.”
“Sounds good,” Paul said. “Night.”
A chorus of good nights followed as the other two couples moved away from the fire, headed for their own cottages.
“Do you really get seasick?” Jeanne Louise asked curiously.
“Fortunately, yes,” Paul admitted wryly.
“Why fortunately?” Jeanne Louise asked with surprise.
“Because I’m a terrible liar and would have had trouble coming up with an excuse to avoid it otherwise.”
“Not keen on fishing?” she asked with amusement.
“Jeanie, I’m a science geek,” he said dryly, as if she may have forgotten it. “Give me blood, cell cultures, and petri dishes to play with and I’m happy. But worms and hooks and scaly, slimy fish are just gross.”
She burst out laughing at the claim, and then glanced around with a sigh. “I guess I should gather our stuff together and head in too. Livy will probably be up early.”
“Yeah,” Paul said with regret, and then stood up, using his hold on her hand to pull her up as well. She wasn’t expecting that, and came up with a gasp and sort of stumbled against him. Paul immediately closed his arms around her, one of her hands still in his as he caught her close, the action unintentionally making her arch against him, her hips grinding into his.
They both froze briefly at the contact, and then Jeanne Louise leaned her head back to peer up at him.
“You need to feed yet.” The reminder was a bare growl of sound on the night breeze. If Paul had been immortal, she was sure his eyes would be glowing, and knew hers probably were.
Jeanne Louise just stood still for a moment, allowing the heat to build in her, and then she reached up with her free hand, slid it around his neck and drew his head down until she could reach his lips. The kiss was at first tentative and questing, but then Paul released her hand to cup her face and deepened the kiss, his mouth becoming demanding, his tongue slipping out to lash her.
It made her groan, and Jeanne Louise slipped her arms around his waist, fingers scraping hungrily up his back, and then dropping to slip beneath his T-shirt and touch the flesh it covered. Paul moaned at the contact, and then urged her head back to allow his mouth to travel over her chin and down her throat. He then released her face and let his hands travel, sliding them over her shoulders and down her arms in a tantalizingly light caress. Then he reached for the hem of her T-shirt.
Jeanne Louise glanced down, and then instinctively raised her arms as he tugged the T-shirt up and off over her head as if undressing a child. The shirt was floating to the ground and Paul’s hands had found and cupped her breasts through the strapless swimsuit top that remained before she could even lower her arms.
Moaning at the caress, Jeanne Louise grabbed his shoulders and rose up on her tiptoes in response, her upper body arching up and away while her pelvis pressed tighter against him.
When he released one breast and reached around behind her, she began pressing kisses to his throat, and licking at his salty skin. She felt him work at the clasp of her bathing suit top, and then the scrap of black cloth slipped away, leaving her bare to his attention. Jeanne Louise gasped and nipped at his neck as his hands fondled and kneaded the firm globes now revealed.
She heard Paul murmur her name and leaned back to peer at him, only to have him cover her mouth with his. His kiss was hungry, his kneading of her breasts becoming almost painful, and then he broke their kiss to begin trailing his mouth down her throat again as his fingers found her nipples and tweaked teasingly.
Jeanne Louise cupped his head and moaned, her upper body leaning back to give him better access as his mouth continued toward the slope of one breast. His tongue laved her along the way and then curled around her erect nipple as his mouth closed over it. That made her gasp and clutch at his hair and then she gasped again as his hands dropped to find her bottom and urge her tighter against him.
When one hand then slid down the back of her shorts to clasp her behind, Jeanne Louise groaned and rubbed herself against the hardness between his legs. Paul groaned in response and retrieved his hand to catch the waistband of her tight jean shorts and push them down, trying to force them over her hips without undoing them. They weren’t going, of course, and he growled with frustration against her breast, then gave up trying to push them down and instead cupped her between her legs through the heavy cloth, nearly lifting her off the ground as he did.
Jeanne Louise cried out and clutched at his shoulders, then gasped in surprise when she felt his other hand at her waist and the snap of her jeans suddenly gave way. In the next moment, his hand slipped from between her legs and her jean shorts slid over her hips and slid down her thighs.
“Paul,” she breathed, the vague thought that they should take this inside dancing at the edge of her mind, but not fully taking root before he was pushing down the scrap of her bathing suit bottoms and replacing the material with his fingers, sliding them between her legs to cup her again, but this time without the cloth to hinder him.
Gasping, Jeanne Louise tugged viciously at his head, pulling his mouth from her breast to claim it in a kiss that was hard, hot, and somewhat frantic as his fingers slid between her folds and began to play over her slick skin. When her legs, already trembling, began to give out, Paul dropped to his knees in the sand with her, his kiss and caresses unrelenting as he sent wave after wave of heat and passion surging through them both.
“Christ,” he growled suddenly, tearing his mouth from hers to press heated kisses to her cheek and neck as he muttered, “I touch you and I go up in flames.”
“Yes,” Jeanne Louise gasped, though she wasn’t so much answering or agreeing as urging him on as she released her hold on his shoulders to reach for the snap and zipper of his jeans. She undid both and pushed the material down until his eager erection popped out, hard and hot, surging with delicious blood.