Mine for the Summer Read online

  Tess had never tasted herself before. Her taste buds were flooded by a salty flavor. Wow, it was … so dirty.

  Conner locked eyes with her. "You taste delicious."

  She smiled. "Better than you."

  Conner grinned. "Oh, yeah?"

  "Let me check," she said.

  A smirk formed on his face.

  She tugged at the belt buckle on his Levi's. She heard his breath quicken. After a few seconds of fumbling, she managed to undo the belt. She undid the button on his jeans and pushed them down over his muscular thighs to his ankles. Then she pulled down his designer boxer shorts.

  His dick sprang up, as solid as a coat hook. The tip was already shiny.

  She knelt down in the dirt. Stones and twigs scraped her knees. With one hand, she held onto his twitching cock. She put her tongue onto the end of it, then licked around the end in a circle.

  Conner groaned. "Oh. Sweet. Jesus."

  "I do taste better," she said, grinning.

  He grabbed her hair and wound it around his hand, so that he had her in position. Then he began to pump inside her mouth. He went so big and he was going so deep that she immediately gagged.

  Conner must have felt her gag because he let go of her. She climbed unsteadily to her feet. He reached under her dress, hooked his thumbs over her panties and, with one fluid movement, he pushed them down to the dirt. She stepped out of them. He pushed her against the truck and bunched up the dress around her waist.

  A tingle traveled through her. She was naked from the waist down. They could get caught at any second. Anyone could see them. A car could drive past at any second. One of the workers might step out of the field.

  Conner reached to the ground and pulled his wallet out of the pocket of his jeans. Soon, Tess heard the familiar rip of the silver foil packet. There was a few seconds' pause as he put on the condom. Then he lifted her up onto the hood of the Audi. She grasped her arms around his neck.

  "Wrap your legs around me," he said.

  She wound her legs around the sides of his muscular body. When he entered her, she gasped. He was filling her. She'd never believed that she could have something so big inside her. He groaned. His fingers dug into the skin of her buttocks. He'd often commented on her soft, peachy skin.

  He began to pump. Faster and faster. It was so much, so right. Tess couldn't hold it in any longer, and, with a sharp cry, she climaxed.

  Conner must have been holding back, too, because a second later, he found his own climax.

  They stayed together, caught in the aftermath of their lovemaking. Neither of them seemed to want to let go.

  Tess was the first to recover. She unwound her legs from Conner and lowered herself onto the ground. Conner picked up her panties and passed them to her. She put them back on.

  He looked at Tess. "How was that?"

  She grinned. "Oh, I don't know. A one out of five."

  His eyebrows shot up. "You're messing."

  "Maybe I was. It was ten out of five."

  "Only a ten?"

  She laughed. "Big head."

  "I'm going to miss you, Tessie," he said.

  ****

  When Tess climbed back into the car, the first thing she did was to check the clock on the dashboard. 1:22 PM. Phew. Her heart rate slowed. They were still okay. Although they were now cutting it fine.

  Conner must have picked up on her urgency because in no time at all, he had guided the Audi back onto the freeway. He sped along the outside lane, keeping just below the speed limit. He didn't speak. He seemed lost in thought, and Tess wondered what he was thinking about.

  The silence between them grew. It became thicker and thicker by the second until it was so unbearable that Tess felt like screaming. Conner turned on the radio. A bass-heavy house track pounded out of the speakers. He drummed his hands on the wheel in time to the beat. His thumb rings flashed sparks of silver up to the sun.

  Tess chewed the skin on the inside of her lip. Those hands. All those amazing things they'd done to her. Soon, she wouldn't have them anymore. In about twelve hours' time, she'd be back in London and would have to content herself with James Wand.

  When she'd phoned her mum the previous day, her mum had offered to pick her up from airport. But Tess had told her not to bother. Heathrow was such nightmare that she'd just get the Tube home.

  No doubt, it would be raining when she got back. August had become such a rainy month. Tess glanced at her arms. They were tanned with a smattering of freckles. They were summer arms. Summer holiday arms.

  Stop it.

  Conner turned off of the freeway, following the signs for the airport. The road split into three lanes. Conner followed the one that would take them to the International Departures area. The traffic slowed to a crawl. The Audi inched along, bumper-to-bumper between other cars, moving at little faster than walking speed.

  Tess glanced at the clock. 1:53 PM. Her pulse raced. She saw Conner check the clock too.

  "I'll drop you off outside," he said. "Then I'll park and come and find you. It'll be quicker that way. "

  Tess felt a lump build in her throat.

  "No," she said. "You don't have to come back and find me. I hate drawn out goodbyes."

  Conner's mouth set into a very straight line.

  ****

  They reached the front of the terminal. Connor pulled into the dropping off point behind a line of taxis and cars. People were getting out of vehicles and loading their bags onto trolleys. The place was a flurry of movement and noise.

  Conner clicked on the handbrake and went to turn off the engine.

  "Don't." Tess said. "You don't need to get out. I can get my own bag. Like I said, I hate long goodbyes."

  He switched off the engine anyway then swiveled in the seat to face her. She didn't speak. She didn't want to. She needed to use every atom of her being to make a mental blueprint of him, which she could store in her head forever. She stared at his perfect jawline, strong eyebrows, and incredibly dark eyes. Then she took in the things that she'd discovered about him over time, things that other people wouldn't notice, like the little mole on his left earlobe.

  "So this is it?" Conner's voice was wooden.

  Fighting back tears, she nodded.

  "You don't have to go," he said. "You could move in with me. I'm sure that Widget would love having you as a neighbor."

  "But what about my job?"

  Conner steepled his fingers together. "You're in the yoga capital of North America. I'm sure that with your qualifications and teaching experience that a company would snap you up straightaway. Come on, Tessie—"

  "No, don't," Tess wailed. "Don't do this to me. We made a pact, remember? A summer of fun, and then it's over."

  Conner blanched. "And that's your final answer?"

  "If I stay, you'll only hurt me."

  Conner shot her a stricken look.

  The door handle was swimming through Tess's tears. She fumbled for it, opened the door, and climbed out of the car. Then she got her bag out of the trunk, set it down onto the pavement and extended the handle.

  Her mum's voice rang in her head. Don't look back. He's a man. He's a cheat, a liar. It was the soundtrack of her life.

  Tess pulled her case through the crowd and the automatic doors. She stepped into the concourse. It was like rush hour at Waterloo Station. People with cases crisscrossed one another as they hurried this way and that. The air was filled with the sound of trundling wheels, the slap of footsteps and the tinny announcements over the PA system.

  Tess found an overhead sign. She located her flight to Heathrow, along with the number of the check-in desk. She jostled through the crowds, ducking and weaving around travelers until she came to the desk. A queue of people snaked back from it. Tess joined the end of the line.

  She'd done the right thing by walking away from Conner like that. She'd saved herself from being hurt. So why did every part of her ache? Why did it feel like she'd been plowed down by a car?

  Ahea
d of her in the queue stood a couple. The woman was about the same age as Tess's mum. She leant her head about her partner's shoulder. They stood in a companionable silence. It was like they never doubted that they'd be there for one another. Tess studied them for a while.

  She reached the front of the line and stepped up to the desk. A woman sat behind it. Her eyelashes were clogged with electric-blue mascara. The nylon strands in her uniform sparkled like crazy in the overhead light.

  She glanced at Tess. A look of concern flashed across her face. Then she managed to compose her features.

  "Sorry for the wait," she said.

  Her voice had a sing-song quality like she'd said the line a thousand times before.

  "Were you on vacation?" she asked.

  Hot tears spiked Tess's eyes. She tried to blink them back into her eyeballs.

  The look of concern reappeared on the woman's face.

  "Vancouver's such a wonderful place, isn't it?" she said kindly. "People say that once you've been to Vancouver, you lose a little bit of your heart."

  Her heart. Tess's mouth flew open. She stared at the woman's mascara-brittle lashes. Then her thoughts leapt to the couple in the queue.

  Tess turned away from the desk.

  "Excuse me," the woman called. "Excuse me, ma'am. Sorry, did I say something? Wait. Don't go. You need to check in your case first."

  But it was too late. Tess was already walking through the airport and the steady hum of noise. She was not prepared to lose her heart. Even a tiny piece of it.

  Chapter Twelve

  Tess hurried through the double doors and back out into the sunlight. Taxis were still setting down then pulling off again. She rushed to the front of the dropping off area. She hoped that once the driver had delivered his passengers, she could persuade him to take her to Conner's house.

  She walked up to the taxi and waited while the passenger, a paunchy man in a Hawaiian shirt, counted a fistful of notes out for the driver.

  Hands gripped her waist. She gave a yelp and turned around. Her heart did a loop-the-loop in her chest. It was Conner. He was panting.

  "I had to park miles away," he said, huffing between breaths. "What happened? Did you forget your passport?"

  Although his tone was joking, his face was serious.

  Tess gulped in a mouthful of air in the hope that the oxygen would steady her nerves.

  "I was just about to make the worst mistake of my life," she said.

  "Oh?"

  "I nearly left you."

  Conner's face lit up. Then it clouded over again. "But you said that you can never trust men."

  Tess groaned. "That was my mum's opinion. But you know what? You know what I've just realized? I worked it out while I was waiting in the queue. There are thousands of kind, decent men out there who make amazing, reliable partners. I can't let Mum's bitterness poison me. I love you." Saying those words felt so good and true.

  "I love you, too," Conner said simply.

  Tess's heart seemed to explode with joy.

  Conner reached out and cradled her face. He was staring at her like she was the most precious thing in the world.

  "I love how you look in the morning," he said, "when your hair is matted to the back of your head and when you have pillow marks on your cheek. I love your smell. I love how you laugh. I love that curl by your ear that's always sticking out the other way. When you're not around, I'm always thinking 'now what would Tessie think about that’. Things are more fun when I'm with you. It's like I'm seeing everything in color and not in black and white."

  He smiled at Tess. She felt giddy from the love that blazed out of his eyes.

  "I want you to be mine," he went on. "Not just for the summer. Forever and ever."

  "You've got it wrong, buddy."

  Conner looked scared.

  "You're mine," she said.

  He laughed. Then he leaned in and kissed her. The kiss was hungry and fierce. Tess kissed him back equally hard.

  Around her, she could hear engines revving and the honk of cars. She smelt the fumes from their exhausts. The sun fell onto her, warming her shoulders. It was a lot cooler than it had been a month ago.

  Normally, this thought would have sent her into a panic because she would have realized that time was closing in on them. Now it didn't matter. Not any longer. Because he would be hers. Forever. She could have Conner through the last gasp of summer and through the tumbling leaves of the fall.

  The End

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