Page 14 of Shiver Me Timbers

Without the storm raging around us, the ocean is calm and quiet. Starlight shines on the water’s surface, and puffs of lazy cloud drift across the moon.

Ellie trembles as I wrap her up in my arms. She really meant that speech? She’s really sure about this? Aboutme?

It’s undeniable. I can’t fight this anymore, nor do I want to.

Ellie is mine, goddamn it.

“I’m taking this cuddle as a good sign,” she says against my chest, her voice muffled by my shirt. My beard bristles as I rub my chin against her hair. “Though if this is your way of letting me down nicely, my threats from earlier still stand.”

No, I won’t let her down.

I’ll never push this woman away again. What was I thinking?

I’ve tasted Ellie’s skin on my tongue—and I’m hooked. Maybe it makes me a bad man, maybe I’m more selfish than I privately hoped, but I’m never going back.

Ellie sucks in a sharp breath when I grip her hair again. I tip her head back and tell her again, low and quiet: “Come. Here.”

Probably shouldn’t boss her around like this. Probably shouldn’t take control, slipping into a command role as naturally as I take that helm each morning, but there’s no one here to scorn us or say this is wrong.

“She’s gone, right?” Hovering my lips an inch above Ellie’s, this restraint pains me. It’s a physical ache. “The Wailing Woman. Is she gone?”

Plush lips twist. “Well, she’s invisible, Duncan. It’s hard to tell. But the humming has stopped and the storm has died down, so I’m ninety nine percent sure—”

Good enough for me. Ducking down, I seal my mouth to Ellie’s, pressing our bodies together with a groan. Heat spreads over my front, her softness molding to my hard planes.

It’s sorightwhen we’re close like this. The world rocks back onto its axis, and my racing heart settles to a slow, powerful thump.

And if the Wailing Woman gets an eyeful of the two of us… so be it. It’s not like she has Netflix up there to entertain her in the afterlife.

“Christ.” My heart booms against my rib cage, and I tear my mouth away to kiss a path down Ellie’s throat. Barely got to explore her here earlier; barely had any time at all. “I thought she’d never leave.”

“Shh!” Ellie’s breath hitches as my teeth scrape her earlobe, and small, greedy hands slip between us and trace down my front. They map my chest, my stomach… my belt. She yanks on the leather, dragging our hips close. “Don’t be rude! You’ll set her off again.”

“Thought you said she’s gone, Ellie May.” She’d better be. I’m so hard I can’t see straight, and my blood is simmering in my veins. My scarred hands roam hungrily over my girl.

“I said she’sprobablygone—oh, god. Do that again.”

No fear. Rubbing my cheek against her hair, I pinch her hard nipple through the layers of sodden sweatshirt. Her broken moan is the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard, and I’m gone for her. So gone.

Want to touch Ellie all over. Want to rub my scent on her skin.

Want to suck bruises on her throat and taste between her thighs and feel this angel shudder and moan as she comes on my shaft, over and over, milking me dry. Want her dripping onto the deck.

“So goddamn sweet,” I tell her, baring my teeth against Ellie’s hair as she fumbles my belt undone with a clink. My abs tremble with the effort of holding still and not pouncing on her already.

One lifetime won’t be long enough together. We’ll need an afterlife too. An eternity of making each other moan, as buildings rise and fall and generations come and go, and the town of Belladonna Bay makes its eerie way into the future.

“You deserve a bed,” I grit out, the words pained, as Ellie draws my length out into the cool night air. Her hand is so much smaller than mine, her grip delicate, and as she pumps me gently, I nearly topple forward like a felled tree. “We could wait and do this properly on a bed, Ellie May.”

She snorts, her thumb spreading a bead of moisture over the head of my shaft. Oh, Jesus H. Christ, that feels too good, and I can’t help rocking up into her grip, hissing between my teeth. “Would you scatter rose petals for me, Duncan? You don’t seem like the type.”

That’s what she thinks. “I’d do anything for you.”

The words come too easily, my low confession spilled to the stars. And Ellie was teasing but I’m deadly serious; she’s smiling but I’m not.

I’d do anything for this girl. Anything.

That was already true before today, but now that she’s mine…

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