Page 9 of Protecting Kelli (SEAL of Protection: Alliance #6)

CHAPTER FIVE

Flash was in hell.

A hell of his own making, but hell all the same.

And the kicker was, he was enjoying every second of it.

It was a little difficult to get settled when he and Kelli first got into the tube, but now that they were floating down the river once more, and she’d relaxed against him, he’d never felt anything better than this woman in his arms.

She might think she was too heavy, but to Flash, she was absolutely perfect. The sight of her in that black one-piece would be forever etched on his brain. It was a hundred times sexier than the tiny bikinis the other women were wearing.

The high-cut sides empathized her soft thighs, making him think about what they’d feel like wrapped around his hips. The back was nearly nonexistent, and it was all he could do not to put his hand on the small of her back and slip it under the material, down to her ass.

And her tits. Lord. They were a man’s wet dream…

wh ich was crude as hell, but Flash was almost beyond being a gentleman at this point.

Her nipples were hard from the cold, and every time she moved, the globes shifted.

He wanted to pull the material down and suck on her nipples until she writhed in his lap.

Forcing himself to think about something else, Flash looked around as they floated, but it was no use. The woman sitting across his lap held all his attention. Every molecule of his body was tuned in to her. Every flex of her muscles, every breath, every time she licked her lips. He noticed.

She was sitting on his lap sideways, so they made kind of a cross in the tube.

His legs out in front, hers to the side.

She had one arm wrapped around his shoulders, and her other hand sat on his leg just above his knee.

He thought they fit perfectly in the tube this way and wished he could’ve had her this close for the entire trip.

That rock in the river had surprised him, and he hadn’t been able to steer himself away from it.

Before he’d known what was happening, it had pierced the tube and he’d gone under.

He hadn’t panicked, even when he’d hit a few rocks under the water pretty hard.

He’d simply gotten himself turned around so his feet were facing forward and rode the current until he could get himself to the bank.

He hadn’t meant to scare Kelli, nor had he meant to swallow so much river water. He’d almost missed grabbing her as she floated by. Thank goodness he hadn’t.

The world was silent around them as they rode the now quiet current toward their pull-out point. He couldn’t hear anyone from their group ahead of them and realized he and Kelli had probably been standing on the riverbank for longer than he’d thought .

“Are you sure I’m not squishing you?” Kelli asked nervously for what was probably the tenth time.

“I’m sure. Are you uncomfortable?”

“No. You’re surprisingly comfy,” she said with a shy smile.

Flash’s dick twitched under her ass at her words. “Ignore that,” he told her.

“Kind of hard to,” she said.

“It’s hard, all right,” Flash murmured.

Kelli giggled, and he felt the movement throughout his body.

Yup. This was hell.

Staring at the woman he couldn’t stop thinking about last night, having her laid out in front of him as if she were a buffet and he hadn’t eaten in months…Utter torture. But he was obviously a glutton for punishment. Flash hadn’t felt this alive in years.

He’d gotten into a rut and hadn’t even realized it.

He did his job, came home, then went into work the next day.

Over and over. It was like the movie Groundhog Day .

He hadn’t wanted to come on this trip, but he was so damn grateful he did.

If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have met Kelli.

Wouldn’t be floating down the White River with a gorgeous woman on his lap.

Wouldn’t be feeling her fingers dig into his leg every time the tube bounced in the water.

Flash had been using both hands to steer the tube, but he couldn’t not touch her right now if his life depended on it. He put one of his hands on her thigh, and she jerked at the feel of his fingers, cold from being emersed in the water.

“Sorry,” he said. “I just wanted to reassure you. We’re okay. We’re going to get to the pick-up point without any issues.”

“Do your cuts hurt?” she asked.

“No.” The truth was, Flash had forgotten all about them.

“Good. Flash?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad we met. This trip would’ve sucked without you being here to keep me sane.”

He wasn’t too surprised they were thinking along the same lines. “Same,” he agreed.

If he had his way, Flash would’ve floated down this river until it joined the ocean, but like all good things, this too had to end. Ahead, he saw the spot where they would be getting out of the river.

But strangely, it was almost deserted. There was one man sitting on a bench and a minivan in the small covered parking area.

“Where is everyone?” Kelli asked, obviously having seen the deserted area herself.

“Guess they got tired of waiting for us,” Flash said.

But inside, every nerve was on alert. Something felt off.

He tried to reason with himself that he and Kelli had been a ways behind the rest of their companions, and they were the last tour group to enter the river that morning.

Still…they couldn’t have missed their one o’clock pick-up time by that much.

“I guess we should be glad someone actually waited for us. It would’ve sucked to have to hitchhike back to the resort.”

Flash shivered at her words. That would’ve been the worst-case scenario for sure.

There was no way he wanted to hitchhike in this country.

He was sure most of the people who lived here were perfectly nice humans.

But it was the small percentage of people who were desperate enough to do anything for a buck that worried him.

He steered them as close to the edge of the river as he could. “I’ll help you out,” he said.

After Kelli nodded, he easily lifted her off his lap and held onto her arm as she got her balance in the knee-deep water. Well, it was knee deep for him; on her, the water was lapping at her?—

Nope. He wasn’t looking there. Wasn’t going to stare as the water gently caressed her pussy while she waited for him to get out of the tube.

Fuck. Now he was hard again.

“Go on, I’ll bring the tube,” Flash said in a raspy tone.

She smiled at him, then nodded before turning and wading out of the water.

For a second, Flash stared at her ass, imagining what it would look like as she knelt in front of him on her hands and knees, waiting for him to take her.

Moving quickly, Flash rolled out of the tube and into the chilly water. It had the effect he wanted, shrinking his cock.

Shrinkage. Thinking about George Costanza and the Seinfeld episode once more, he grinned.

Standing, he whipped his head from side to side, flinging water in all directions, before running a hand through his hair to get as much moisture out of it as he could.

Then he picked up the tube and followed Kelli onto dry land.

She was smirking as he came toward her.

“What? ”

“You totally looked like a hair commercial when you did that.”

“Did what?”

“Shook your head. Water sparkled in the sunlight, and after, when you ran your hand through your hair? If I had that on camera, I could sell it to some shampoo company and make a million bucks.”

He snorted. “As if.”

“You two ready?” the employee asked.

Flash turned. The man had an impatient look on his face.

“Your stuff is over there,” he said, pointing at a plastic crate sitting off to the side.

Flash wanted to ask what the guy’s hurry was but held his tongue. He quickly walked over to the crate and pulled out two towels. Kelli followed him and without a word, they dried themselves off as best they could, then got dressed.

Flash could admit he was sad to see Kelli’s curves covered up once more. Out of habit, he double-checked his wallet to make sure everything was still inside. The last thing he wanted to deal with was his credit card being stolen.

He approved of Kelli doing the same thing with her purse, looking inside to make sure all her things were still there. “Ready?”

“Ready,” she said with a firm nod. “I’m ready to hit the buffet. Even though I don’t think we burned many calories today, I’m still starving.”

“Me too,” Flash agreed, then held out his hand.

Kelli glanced at it, then at him, and for a second Flash thought she’d blow him off. But to his relief, she wrapped her fingers around his.

They walked toward the minivan hand-in-hand…and any contentment Flash might’ve felt disappeared as they climbed into the vehicle. He had no idea what it was that had him on such high alert. But something just didn’t feel right.

It wasn’t until the driver pulled out of the dirt parking area that he realized this wasn’t the same minibus they’d taken to the tubing place. It was more run-down. There was trash on the floor and the seats weren’t nearly as clean as the ones in the other vehicle.

Flash sat next to Kelli in the seat behind the driver.

He remained ramrod straight as he watched out the front of the minivan.

Driving on the left side of the road always seemed a bit disconcerting.

Seeing cars come at you from the “wrong” side of the road felt as if they were always two seconds away from a head-on collision.

They’d been driving for five minutes when Flash realized they were going in the wrong direction. They were headed away from the resort instead of toward it.

The bad feeling intensified.

“Hey, where are you going?” he asked the driver.

“To the resort,” the man answered tersely.

“This isn’t the right way.”

“Of course it is. You aren’t from here. I know a shortcut to get you back faster.”