Graceless - Page 38

The two of them dive bombed into the cool water and shoved and played as the darkness fell. Then, out of the fading light, Cassidy appeared. She was wearing a bright red bikini that honestly just didn’t seem to be playing fair. She slid into the water and came over to greet her nephew.

“Hi!” Tucker looked excited to see her.

“Hi!” she replied. “What are you playing?”

“Hungry dinosaurs,” he told her.

“How does it go?”

Tucker explained the rules he’d just made up on the spot three seconds ago, and Cassidy embraced them with enthusiasm. Her squeals competed with Tucker’s, causing him no end of delight and by halfway through the game he was clinging to her like a monkey, Lane suddenly chopped liver.

“Tucker!” Brynn called from the front porch. “It’s time for bed.”

“Noooo, Mom!” he protested, and Lane detected the gathering storm of a total meltdown. They went to take him from Cassidy but to their surprise, she hugged the little boy to her tightly.

“Are you ready?” she asked him, then plunged him down under water with her. He came up giggling, then she whooshed him up out of the pool and ran with him, making him chase her up the steps to his mother. “Quick, go to sleep!” Lane heard her tell him. “Then it’ll be tomorrow and we can play again!”

Somehow it worked because Lane heard a chorus of goodnights and the door close, before Cassidy padded through the darkness and reappeared at the pool. Lane’s heart began to bang in their ears. The moon was still rising behind the trees and the pool was in shadow, but her wet body gleamed as she slipped back into the water. Lane swallowed.

“Thanks for playing with him.” They tried to act like there was nothing interesting about the two of them being alone together, semi-naked, in the dark. “He’s so excited to get to know you.”

“He’s adorable,” Cassidy replied. “And he’s fun to hang out with.” She was drifting closer and Lane’s chest was getting tight.

“Still,” they jibed, “that was almost sweet of you. It’s so weird to see.”

Cassidy was in front of them now, barely a foot away, her body between Lane and the pool wall. Lane should definitely be moving away, but they very much weren’t.

“I think,” Cassidy said, her eyes dark in the dim light, “given the right context, you might find I can be extremely sweet.”

“And what context is that?” Lane took the bait. A wet, slender thigh slid straight around their hip and Cassidy wrapped her legs around their body, both in invitation and demand. Lane’s hands slipped greedily around her bare waist to hold her and already they were kissing. They’d been left alone for less than a minute. Lane should be better than this, but resisting her felt insane, impossible, beyond their basic human capabilities. Already, little soft sounds tumbled from Cassidy’s throat as their tongue slipped urgently into her mouth.

She pulled back after a moment of heated kissing, her expression hungry as she ran first her eyes and then her fingers down over Lane’s slippery pecs, scraping her teeth over their small rigid nipples. Lane’s breath caught hard, sharp gratitude flaring for the skill of the surgeon that had left their sensation intact, Cassidy flicking over them with her hot tongue. She bit Lane’s pec, none too gently, making them gasp, then pulled back further to look down at their abs.

“God, Lane,” she whispered, her fingers exploring the hard ridges of muscle. “Honestly, these are so unnecessary.” Her voice was practically a moan. She bit her lip as her fingers eagerly teased and roamed. “How dare you,” she whispered, tracing along their obliques to the front of their waistband. Lane’s whole body clenched.

They’d known since last night that Cassidy very much wanted Lane to touch her. But it was another thing altogether to know that she very much wanted to touch Lane, too. Oh god, this lust was mutual. So mutual, too mutual, Lane’s fingers were already pulling at the ties to her flimsy bikini top.

“Oh, fuck.” The curse spilled from Lane’s lips as they bared Cassidy’s body to their hungry eyes, the wet scrap of lycra sliding down her waist. God, how was she even more beautiful tonight than she’d been the first time they’d seen her? Her skin was gleaming with tiny drops of water, her nipples hard in the night air. This was stupid, they were out in the yard, anyone could come by but Lane couldn’t seem to stop, instead filling their mouth with her, listening to her gasp and cry out as they nuzzled and teased her soft breasts.

Her legs gripped tighter, and they were both grinding their lower bodies into the other, Cassidy rocking her center against Lane’s groin and Lane pressing back just as hard, cursing the bikini bottoms and board shorts between them, feeling desperate.

“Hey, Lane!” Brynn’s voice rang out, the patio light flicking on simultaneously, spilling light onto the edges of the pool. Cassidy ducked underwater, entirely disappearing from view, and Lane whirled around with a splash. “Have you seen Tucker’s green dino? He’s losing his mind.”

“Uh…” Lane’s brain took what seemed like an hour to process those words into a sentence that made remotely any sense. “I’m not sure.”

“Can you please help me go over his tracks? I think Savannah might actually die if we can’t figure this out.”

Cassidy emerged from under the water, her bikini top back in place, smoothing her wet hair out of her face.

“Sure,” they replied distantly, staring at her helplessly. Her eyes were sparkling with slight shock and intense mischief, the same way that they had in the alleyway in Nashville and Lane desperately wanted to kiss her crooked smile. Instead, they shook their head at her and dragged themself out of the water to go find a dinosaur. When they returned, only minutes later, the pool was empty and still.

Lane looked toward the guesthouse, remembering Cassidy’s plain insistence of the night before, but, to what they had to admit was their intense disappointment, there was no blonde wet beauty waiting inside to ambush them. All evening they half expected a knock at the door and by the time they were laying in bed, staring up at the ceiling, they had to hand it to Cassidy. She really could give as good as she got.

Chapter Fourteen

It was early the next morning when Lane entered the main house, realizing they were out of milk for their coffee. They were still in the boxers they used as pajamas, a loose tank top thrown on in case Annabelle was already in, but as they entered the kitchen, the only person there was Cassidy.

“Morning,” they said, their voice slightly gruff, making her turn from where she was heaping sugar into a steaming mug.