He felt it building, harder, faster, stronger than anything he had ever felt before. Spider held back, he wasn’t coming until Abigail had. Her breathing had quickened, and her fingers clawed at his back, her lips never leaving his.
Then it hit her, her internal muscles clamping around him as she came on a scream that was swallowed by his mouth.
Letting himself find his own release, Spider continued to thrust into her, drawing out both their pleasure as white dots danced in front of his closed eyes and he felt like he had traveled to a whole different dimension.
“You know how we talked about going several rounds? I don’t think I’m going to be able to move for about a day, that orgasm touched every part of my body,” Abigail said with a contented sigh.
“Uh-uh, baby, no way I’m waiting to do this,” he said as he moved down her body, closing his lips around her sensitive bud, making her gasp and then moan as her hips came off the bed. She was going to come on his tongue, and his fingers, before he entered again, then they would fall asleep in each other’s arms.
Chapter 11
June 24th
10:12 A.M.
Abigail yawned and turned over in bed, then froze.
She was alone.
The sheets smelled like Ryder, but they and the pillow beside hers were cold, it was clear he had left her bed some time ago.
But where had he gone?
Panic gripped her hard. Had he gone? Left her again?
“Hey, Abs, you’re awake and just in time to get ready to meet everyone for lunch.”
She spun around at the sound of Ryder’s voice and sagged in relief when she saw him standing in the bedroom doorway. He hadn’t left, hadn’t abandoned her again, he must have just woken up a while back and decided to let her get some more rest while he got up.
“I didn’t leave, Abby,” he said, quickly covering the hurt that flashed through his eyes. “You were just so peaceful, and I know how tired you’ve been, I wanted to let you sleep while I went for a run.” He pointed at his sweaty t-shirt and shorts as though she might need more convincing.
“I’m sorry,” she said, already feeling bad for having doubted him. “I shouldn’t have thought that you would leave, not after how wonderful you’ve been the last few days and what we shared last night.”
“It’s okay,” he assured her.
“It’s not,” she countered.
“No, it is, my past behavior has given you no reason to expect anything but me leaving you. I guess we both just have to accept it will take time for you to trust me again.” Ryder crossed the room and sat down on the bed beside her, curling an arm around her shoulders and pulling her against his chest.
“I don’t mean to not trust you, it wasn’t a conscious decision to believe you’d left, I just woke up and you weren’t there, and I panicked,” she explained.
“We’ll get there, it will just take—”
“Time,” she said for him. “Yeah I know, I just don’t like it.”
Ryder kissed her forehead. “Well, we have lunch with our friends to look forward to today, so why don’t you grab a shower, get dressed, and we can head to the beach.”
Shoving away her frustrations, Abigail kissed him and then stood up. “It won’t take me long to get ready.”
“Take as long as you need, I’ll shower when you’re done.”
“If you hadn’t let me sleep so long we could have showered together.” She winked, then headed for the bathroom.
“Oh, we’ll be doing that tonight,” Ryder called after her, and she heard his groan which she knew meant his body did not want to wait until tonight.
Less than an hour later, they were both showered, dressed, and piling into the car along with the couple of apple pies they had made the day before after their walk along the beach. Ryder’s SEAL team would be there today, along with the team who had saved her life, and she wasn’t sure if any other teams were coming as well. She’d wanted to bake more pies but Ryder had said two was enough, he hadn’t wanted her to wear herself out. Although she was getting stronger each day she did tire easily, which is why she hadn’t fought him on it, but she was anxious to get her life back.
Today was the next step.
She had Ryder back, she and her friend Veronica had talked about her starting her own studio, and now she was going to do something completely normal and hang out with her friends.
Practically as soon as Ryder parked the car, her door was thrown open, and she was being pulled out and wrapped up in the arms of her friends. Matthew’s wife Caroline was there, and Christopher’s wife Alabama, there was Hunter’s wife Fiona who had been through something a little like what she had, and Summer, Cheyenne, and Jessyka. All of these women had become her friends when they’d joined the SEAL team family, a family she had been born into and then continued to be a part of because of her brother. A lot of these men were like surrogate big brothers to her, and although they didn’t always spend a lot of time together, she knew that if she needed help any one of them would be there for her.
They had been there for her.
If it wasn’t for them she would still be lost in Mexico, stuck in that concrete prison.
“Are you okay? Let me look at you,” Caroline said, holding her at arm’s length. “You’ve lost too much weight,” she tutted unhappily.
“My captors weren’t real big on feeding me,” she said wryly.
“Is Ryder taking good care of you?” Alabama asked, her tone making it clear he would be in trouble if he wasn’t.
“He is,” she assured her, looking over her shoulder to find Ryder watching her with that dreamy smile she’d missed so much since they broke up.
A big smile broke out on Summer’s face. “Are you two back together?”
“Yes,” she acknowledged, then wondered if maybe she shouldn’t have said that. Did Ryder want his friends to know they were together again? She assumed he’d been as open with them as he had with her so she thought he probably wouldn’t mind.
“That’s great.” Caroline beamed.
“Thank you so much for everything you did. Sending clothes for me to wear while I was in the safehouse, and cleaning my apartment, filling the fridge, it made coming home so much easier,” she told Caroline.
Caroline waved off her thanks. “Of course, you would have done the same for any one of us. Come on, let’s go get you something to eat and then we can talk. You have lots to get caught up on.”
Allowing Caroline to take her arm and lead her across the parking lot and onto the beach, she saw where everyone had gathered. There were a couple of tables full of food, towels scattered about, some kids were building sandcastles, and there had to be at least three dozen adults standing around talking and laughing.
Panic settled in her stomach.
So many people.
More people than she had been around since she’d come home.
Had it really been only ten days since Ryder found her?
Abigail stumbled over her feet as she tried to force them to keep moving instead of digging in and refusing to go any closer to all those people than they already were.