High-Stakes Bachelor Read online

  That shower had really relaxed her. Not to mention she was dreading talking with Jackson about today’s accident. She closed her eyes. She would rest for just a minute....

  Hands kneading her shoulders into jelly roused her slowly from her unconscious state. It was dark outside. She lurched, or would have if the hands on her back hadn’t held her down.

  “How long was I asleep?” she mumbled.

  Jackson answered, low and soothing, “A while. I figured you needed the rest or else you wouldn’t have crashed like that.”

  “I’ll never sleep tonight.”

  “I can think of other things you can do all night.”

  She smiled reluctantly. “I’m sure you can.”

  He shocked her by tossing a leg across her hips and straddling her backside to continue her back massage. She’d be alarmed if she couldn’t chalk it up to the “getting comfortable touching each other” conversation from yesterday. As it was, she was too sleepy to think of a reason why he shouldn’t give her a back rub and too bonelessly mellow to care. It felt great to let his big strong hands work out the kinks in her shoulders.

  “To what do I owe this special treatment?” she eventually murmured when her body had melted into a boneless puddle.

  “No reason. You just looked like you could use it.”

  “Mmm. I’m in heaven.”

  Silence fell between them as she drifted between sleep and waking, luxuriating beneath his magical hands. But gradually, consciousness returned. And with it, memory of this afternoon.

  “What did you find out about why that lighting rig came down?”

  His hands tensed. Stilled on the small of her back. He resumed massaging her, but the magic was gone from his hands.

  “Jackson?”

  He exhaled audibly. “Sabotage.”

  She partially rolled over between his thighs to stare up at him. She’d suspected that was the case, but hearing him say it seemed so much more real. Someone was definitely out to harm her. A cold chill chattered across her skin.

  “How?” she asked reluctantly.

  “A series of small cutting charges were set to blow out the key bolts holding the thing to the ceiling,” he explained grimly.

  “Any hints at who did it?” she mumbled.

  “Maybe someone’s got it in for me or Adrian, or for our studio in general,” Jackson muttered.

  “That’s nice of you to say, but what if that lighting rig was aimed at me?” She failed to keep a tremor out of her voice when she stated the obvious. “I’ll totally understand if you and Adrian want to take me off this movie for the safety of the rest of the crew.” She took a deep breath and then added in a frustrated rush, “I just can’t figure out who’d want to hurt me.”

  “You’re not exactly the kind of person who attracts crazy stalkers.”

  She snorted. “I’d have to have a social life to do that.”

  “After dinner, I’d like to sit down with you and talk about your life in detail. See if we can come up with any ideas of who might be out to hurt you.”

  She nodded, staring up at him, and he stared back down at her. Gradually, it dawned on her that they were lying crotch-to-crotch in an extremely suggestive fashion. It was so easy to imagine him naked like last night, straddling her body. Taking her. Making her his...

  He pushed away from her and stood abruptly, clearing his throat uncomfortably. Dang it. Had he seen what she was fantasizing? Her face heating up fast, she mumbled, “Where’d you learn how to give such a great back rub?”

  “Dated a masseuse once,” he bit out. He turned away from her and, sure enough, shoved a hand through his hair. He left her room without even a backward glance. The door thunked shut solidly behind him.

  Seriously? He massaged her into a horny mess and then just walked out on her? Was he that massively disciplined, or was he sending her mixed signals? She was inclined to open that door, pick up the nearest heavy object and chuck it at his head.

  Almost as curious as she was hot to trot and irritated, she rolled out of bed and powered up her laptop, which had thankfully been in her car when her motel room was trashed. She typed Jackson’s name into a search engine and sorted the results from oldest to newest. She browsed through newspaper articles about his sports accomplishments in high school and early acting accomplishments. She hadn’t realized he’d been acting since he was sixteen. She thought he had burst onto the scene all at once a few years ago with his first big action-adventure movie.

  But then a hit popped up that shocked her. An engagement announcement from about five years ago in a Florida newspaper. His fiancée, Vanessa something, was blonde and beautiful...and petite. Crap. Did she remind him of Vanessa? Although Vanessa was stunningly beautiful whereas she tended toward wholesome or even cute.

  Ana typed the fiancée’s full name—Vanessa van Buren—into a search engine. Hits started scrolling down her computer screen almost faster than she could scan them. She was from a rich East Coast family. No surprise, Vanessa van Buren had attended a snooty women’s college. Wow. Not once had she ever heard of Jackson being married. The divorce must have been kept really quiet.

  She kept scrolling. A YouTube video popped up. Of Vanessa’s wedding. It was as grand and over-the-top as Ana would have expected. She watched reluctantly as the camera panned across the wedding party.

  Whoa. Rewind. Who was the guy in the tux grinning like an idiot? The groom was not Jackson. What the heck? Who had Vanessa ended up marrying? The video title called him Dr. George Bostick. What had happened to Vanessa and Jackson?

  Ana checked the time-date stamp in the corner of the wedding video and frowned. Based on what she’d gleaned about his film career, Jackson would have been on location at that time shooting the movie that would go on later to make him famous—

  Oh. That. Bitch.

  Vanessa must have dumped Jackson, or at least started cheating on him, as soon as he’d left to shoot his movie. She’d snagged herself a doctor and gotten him down the aisle as fast as her Jimmy Choos would haul her greedy, disloyal ass.

  No wonder Jackson was a confirmed bachelor who didn’t take relationships with women seriously. She moved over to the adjoining door and knocked on it. “May I come in?”

  “It’s open.”

  She stepped through and into a bedroom similar to hers except for darker, more masculine décor and the big armchair and ottoman facing the ocean. Jackson sprawled in it, feet up, beer dangling from his fingers. A six-pack stood on the floor beside him, mostly empty. Had her mention of the woman who’d taught him to give massages driven him to drink away the memories?

  “How did Vanessa dump you? Dear John letter? Email? Phone call?”

  Jackson scowled in her general direction and took a long pull from his beer. “None of the above.”

  “How then?” Ana stepped farther into the room so she could look him fully in the face.

  “Didn’t dump me at all.”

  “But I saw the wedding video. You were overseas shooting a film.”

  “I saw it, too,” he snapped.

  “I don’t follow—”

  He surged to his feet in front of her, fury abruptly rolling off him. “She never broke up with me. I happened to get onto the internet in some downtime—with the intent of writing my fiancée a love letter—and I found the video of her wedding.”

  Ana’s jaw dropped in shock.

  He added lightly, bitterly, “Imagine my surprise. That’s how I found out she and I were no longer engaged.”

  “Ohmigod, Jackson. I’m so sorry. Do you need me to go to Florida and kill her for you?”

  He gripped her shoulders almost painfully tight. “I need you to stay the hell out of my private life,” he ground out. “Don’t dredge up crap you’re not willing to deal with.”

  “
Who says I’m not willing to deal with it?” she retorted.

  “You like inheriting other women’s crap? She made a head case out of me. Run screaming while you can, Ana.”

  “I’m still standing here.”

  “I’m serious. I’ve got issues regarding women.”

  “You’ve been nothing but decent and kind to me.”

  “We’re not in a relationship,” he snapped.

  Okay, that hurt. But she was the one who’d poked into his past and put it out there between them. “Just because Vanessa was a liar and a cheat doesn’t mean all women are. Take me, for example. Once I give my affections to someone, I’m committed all the way. Loyal to the end.”

  “I thought you don’t date at all. And why is that, exactly?”

  “We’re talking about your hang-ups, here.”

  “Sucks when the shoe’s on the other foot, huh? Why do I have to talk about my crap if you don’t have to talk about yours? Tell me the truth, Ana. Why don’t you date? Ever? It’s more than just that one attack.”

  The truth exploded across her brain as he stood there glaring daggers at her and she glared back. He’s right. I’ve had issues with men since before the attack. Since my father was cold and unloving my entire childhood. Stunned, she managed a shrug. “This isn’t about my issues. This is about yours.”

  He snorted. “You can’t handle mine. Or me, for that matter.”

  “How do you know that?” she demanded. “You won’t engage with me enough to tell. Every time things get interesting between us, you walk away.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded.

  “At the beach two nights ago. I told you not to stop. But you did, anyway. Last night, I freaking told you to take off my clothes and got more naked than not, and you still walked away from me. I don’t think you’ve got anger issues toward some chick who dumped you years ago. I think you’re scared of women.”

  “Am not.”

  “Prove it.”

  She’d seen men like him before. Men who didn’t take kindly to being called a coward. Who never backed away from a dare. She’d known men like him plenty long enough to know better than to throw down a challenge like that in front of a man like him. Particularly not after he’d been drinking enough to be a little more reckless than usual. No, it probably hadn’t been the smartest thing she’d ever done to say that to him. But she’d be damned if she’d take the challenge back.

  They stared daggers at each other, electricity crackling and popping between them, building until she thought they were both going to explode. How could one man be so attractive and so damned infuriating at the same time?

  Jackson’s arms swept around her and he picked her up, carried her over to the bed and dumped her on the mattress. It hadn’t finished bouncing before he followed her down, pressing her deep into the soft comforter. How their clothes got off so fast, she wasn’t quite sure. But in about ten seconds, she was sprawled out naked beneath him, and his equally naked body pinned hers into immobility.

  “Do you just like angry sex?” he growled. His teeth closed on her shoulder and he bit her hard enough to leave marks tomorrow. It felt glorious.

  “Not especially,” she panted. But it turned out she did like it hot and heavy, apparently. Her leg crept up around his hips, guaranteeing he wouldn’t walk away from her this time. She kissed him with abandon, shocked by the wildness he’d unleashed in her.

  Her fingernails raked down his back and one of his hands grabbed a fistful of her hair, pulling her head back and exposing her neck to his voracious kisses. Determined to have her due, she turned her head and grabbed his earlobe in her teeth. She bit down hard enough to let him know she wasn’t without weapons of her own. Yup, she’d had a secret wild side waiting to come out all along, apparently.

  He laughed darkly and rose up over her, kneeling between her widespread thighs. He gripped her knees in his fists, spreading her even more for him, allowing her no escape into modesty. His member was huge and ready, a drop of moisture glistening at its tip. He glared down at her and she glared back up at him.

  “Go ahead, Jackson. I dare you.”

  “You really shouldn’t have said that.”

  Oh, yes. She really should have.

  “Protection. Dammit. There are condoms somewhere in my bathroom—”

  “I’m on the Pill, and I haven’t had sex in forever. I don’t have an STD.”

  “Ditto for me.”

  He hadn’t had sex in forever? That surprised her. “Well, then. We’re back to ‘I dare you.’” She barely recognized the brazen woman she’d turned into. Had all this lust been bottled up inside her for her entire adult life? Or was it just Jackson who brought it out in her?

  He made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a growl. He positioned himself and her internal muscles clenched and released convulsively in anticipation of his invasion. He eased about the first inch into her. Paused. And then plunged all the way to the hilt inside her. Her hips lurched up off the mattress and she cried out at the incredible sensation of being filled to bursting by him.

  He started to withdraw and her legs whipped up around his hips to grip him for all he was worth. “Don’t you dare walk away from me this time,” she ground out.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” he muttered, driving home again. Powerfully. Completely.

  “Again,” she panted.

  He obliged and she cried out once more. Her hips rocked forward, meeting him thrust for thrust as he set up a deep, driving rhythm that drove her out of her mind. She reached up, grasped his biceps in her fists and hung on for dear life as they flew to the moon and back.

  It wasn’t pretty or elegant or romantic. It was fast and hard and sweaty. Slapping flesh and pants and grunts. The bed banged into the wall and her head banged into the headboard until Jackson grabbed her hips and yanked her down the mattress.

  What it was, was glorious madness. She hadn’t the slightest doubt they were going to regret this sooner rather than later, but no way was she pushing him away. Oh, no. She hung on to his big, muscular, sweaty body, surging up against him, crying out, “Yes. Yes. Oh, yes, Jackson!”

  It would have made for a horrendously bad porn movie, and she prayed no one else in the house could hear her. But she felt fantastic as he plundered her body, mind and soul. He wasn’t afraid to be a man. To treat her like a woman, and to make it clear in no uncertain terms that she was his. She’d had no idea she needed this so badly. She needed to feel small and fragile and utterly possessed, and yet totally safe. And he did all of those things to her.

  He grabbed the headboard above her head with one fist as their frantic race slowed. He stared down at her, his eyes blazing with emotions that were too raw to be named, as his body stroked hers more slowly now, more deeply.

  Their joining was wet and slippery and hot, and even though her body had relaxed and stretched to accommodate him, he still filled her not quite to the point of discomfort and totally to the point of screaming-holy-cow-right-there-ohmigosh perfection.

  Zinging sensations shot around inside her like frantic atoms seeking a way out, gathering and building where their bodies met until she could hardly stand the pressure. “More,” she gasped.

  Maddeningly, though, he held back. He kept to his steady rhythm, refusing to go harder or deeper or faster no matter how much she begged. The lightning storm climbed her insides until she nearly cried with need.

  And then, all of a sudden, without warning, her entire being exploded. An orgasm ripped through her so hard she thought she’d actually disintegrated into billions of individual molecules. She cried and screamed and shouted all at once, and Jackson’s mouth was wet and hot on hers, capturing every bit of it greedily for himself.

  And still his body moved like a piston inside hers, relentlessly driving her onward. Incredibl
y, new fireworks started to crackle within her. Sharper this time. Even more electric. Clawing for release, tearing her apart from the inside out.

  “I can’t hold it back,” she gasped.

  Jackson grinned darkly. “Don’t even try. Give it to me, Ana. Give it all to me.”

  She arched up into the hard wall of his body, helpless to hold back the explosion that tore through her. Her entire body convulsed around him. He stilled, taking it all in as she came apart around him.

  She groaned, “I can’t take any more.”

  “Wanna bet?” he growled. And then he did let go of all that vaunted self-control of his. He pounded into her, and she surged up into him, and they attacked one another like wild animals. Her hair tangled in the perspiration on her face and his lips drew back from his teeth in a grimace of pleasure so intense it looked nearly painful to him. She wrapped her entire body around him, arms, legs, internal muscles, heart and soul, and held on to him like she was never letting go.

  He threw his head back, tendons and muscles cording in his neck, and shouted as he surged into her one last time and stayed there, his entire body shuddering violently against hers. She absorbed his orgasm into her own, shuddering along with him and crying out wordlessly.

  His elbows landed on the mattress on either side of her head. His chest heaved against hers. She breathed every bit as hard as him as he lifted his upper torso off her to let her gasp for air, too.

  Her hands loosened on his biceps and her legs relaxed around his hips, but she didn’t let go of him. The expression in his eyes was dazed. He looked nearly as stunned as she felt. What the hell had just happened between them? Something unfettered and fantastic had overtaken both of them. It was...

  The only word that came to mind was magic. Totally untamed, raw, blazing magic.

  “Dammit, Ana. Did I hurt you?”

  Her gaze narrowed as she glared up at him. “If you apologize for what we just did, I’m going to have to kill you, Jackson Prescott. Slowly and painfully.”