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  Lost in His Kiss

  A Lost Series Novella

  Tracie Douglas

  Copyright © 2019 by Tracie Douglas

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover Photo: Depsoit Photos

  Editor: Diamond in the Rough Editing

  Cover Design & Formatting: Dark Water Covers

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  More Books By Tracie

  To Lisa,

  You inspire me every day with your courage and your friendship. Thank you for always supporting what I do and being one of my biggest fans.

  I love you.

  Prologue

  Annabelle

  Six Months Ago

  The front door to Cole Security opens, and air in the room shifts, making every nerve in my body go on high alert.

  There’s only one person who has the power to do that to me.

  One man who makes me burn for his touch.

  Detective Jordan Lockwood.

  “Good morning, Bella,” his deep gravelly voice confirms what my body has already told me, and I glance up at him from my computer screen.

  “Good morning, Detective,” I greet him warmly, taking in the sight of his male perfection. His tall, lean body is accentuated by the casual wear of his black and white button-up, strategically rolled up to his elbows. His large tan hands rest lightly on his hips, and he smirks down at me as if he knows exactly how he affects me. “Can I help you with something? Is King expecting you?”

  “No, I’m not here for him.” He steps around my desk and leans against it. I catch the scent of his aftershave, and warmth floods my body.

  “Sneak isn’t in today,” I say, almost breathlessly, because the only other person he has stopped by to visit is King’s younger brother.

  “Not here for him either.”

  “Then why are—”

  “Have dinner with me,” he cuts in, and the air in my lungs freezes.

  “Detective—”

  “My name is Jordan, and while I like hearing you call me Detective, I think I’d like to hear my name fall from your lips more.”

  “Oh,” I breathe, feeling slightly lightheaded. He leans closer now, and I feel the temperature in the room rise.

  “We’ve been playing cat and mouse for far too long, don’t you think?”

  “I didn’t know we were playing a game,” I admit, realizing I haven’t imagined what has been happening between us. His dark eyes pin me to my seat, and he chuckles.

  He’s right, of course. This little game has been going on for over a year, but up until this moment, I thought it was one-sided.

  “Bella,” he whispers my name, and all I want to do is feel his lips against mine. “I don’t beg.”

  “Neither do I,” I admit without hesitation. Although, right now, the way my body is keyed up to his nearness, I’m tempted to.

  “Be ready at seven.” He lifts a hand and reaches out to caress a knuckle against my resting hand. I watch the small gesture, feeling a spark of electricity shoot through my body, hitting my click with a hard pulse. I clench my thighs in response. “Prepare, Bella, because this isn’t going to be just one night.”

  “No?”

  “I’ve waited too long to take what is mine, thought you needed more time to grow comfortable with me, but I’m done waiting you out. Instead, I’m going to show you just how good we can be together.” He leans even closer, placing a soft kiss against my lips, taking whatever breath I had left.

  I feel him shift away, but before I can gather my wits, his voice is the last thing I hear before the entrance bell rings, signaling his exit.

  “I’ll be at your door at seven sharp. Don’t make me wait.”

  Holy shit, I’m in trouble, is all I can think as I struggle to form a coherent thought after one simple kiss has turned me to mush.

  Later That Night

  “Yes,” I gasp, as his fingers plunge deep inside me, pushing me closer to oblivion.

  “Such a greedy pussy,” he purrs into my ear. The warmth of his hard body is pressed against my back. I move with the rhythm he has set, desperate to feel the burn of pleasure shooting throughout my body.

  “Stop teasing me.” The words spill from my lips, leaving me lightheaded and wanton.

  “Patience, Bella.” His husky voice sends a delightful shiver down my spine as his thumb presses against the sensitive bud in between my legs.

  “Fuck patience,” I growl, sucking his fingers deeper into me with a sharp thrust. I need more than his fingers. More than he is giving me. I reach for his wrist, missing his fingers the moment I withdraw them, but it’s not his fingers I want. And he knows it.

  This isn’t our first rodeo of the night.

  His body tenses behind me, and I turn in his arms, lifting a leg to give him access to what we both want. And with a quick thrust of his own hips, he gives me what I need. I feel every inch of him with each thrust, and it’s pure heaven.

  His mouth captures my nipple. The sting of his teeth nibbling causes a guttural moan to escape my throat. Fuck, he knows how to work my body. It won’t take long this time. I’m too wound up from months of torture.

  “Bella,” he breathes against my skin, thrusting once more before pushing me onto my back and taking control. His lean, hard body hovers over me, and the light dusting of hair across his chest teases my sensitive nipples, giving me the friction I need to find my pleasure in his movements. My body quivers, signaling the end.

  “J… I’m going to—”

  “No,” he orders, thrusting harder and faster into me. “Not yet, Bella. Not until I tell you to.”

  I nearly choke on his words as the sensation builds and I try desperately to hold off the mounting orgasm. He grunts before capturing my face in one of his large hands. “Look at me.”

  My eyes open to his demand, and his dark orbs stare down at me, trapping me in a torturous limbo.

  “Jordan,” I gasp, desperate to give in to the wave of pleasure I’m holding back. He doesn’t relent though. “Please…”

  “Not. Yet,” he grunts, enunciating each word. I watch under a haze as his teeth clench and the vein in his neck protrudes. He’s close. I can feel it in his arms as I cling to them, slowly beginning to fail at his demands as I feel the seep of warmth begin to flood my limbs.

  One.

  Two more thrusts, and he can no longer hold back his own orgasm.

  “Now, Bella, come with me,” he says, holding my eyes as the high hits us both simultaneously. and our descent begins.

  His thrusts slowly as he milks his release into me, and my body trembles from exhaustion.

  He leans down, breaking the connection of our eyes, to place a soft, sated kiss against my lips.

  “Never enough,” he whispers before withdrawing from my body and scooping me into his arms. “I’ll never get enough.”

  Interesting, I think to myself because I d
on’t think I can ever get enough of him either.

  Chapter One

  Annabelle

  Present Day

  The ringtone of my cell phone plays at the edge of my mind, sounding closer and closer with each second.

  What the fuck?

  I moan groggily, cracking an eye open against the bright sun streaming in from my bedroom windows. The sound of Sam Hunt’s voice fills the air like my own personal concert, only to stop at the end of the next verse.

  Closing that same eye, I reach for my pillow, ready to bury my head underneath it as protection from the light.

  But before the sweet remnants of sleep consume me, Sam’s voice blares into my room again, and I reach for the phone ready to tear whoever’s on the other end a new asshole. It’s too fucking early for this shit.

  “This better be an emergency, or someone’s going to lose their balls,” I croak into the blasted contraption.

  “Well, good morning to you too, sunshine,” Missy’s unusually chipper voice responds.

  “Missy, why the fuck are you calling me so early? You know I’m not a morning person.” It’s true, but give me cock first thing in the morning, and I can be. Since Jordan couldn’t stay over last night, that isn’t going to happen.

  “Early? Babe, it’s, like, one-thirty in the afternoon,” she chuckles.

  “You’re kidding me, right?” I ask, sitting up in bed, feeling a rush of panic fill my body, but it settles when I remember that it’s Sunday and I don’t work on Sundays.

  “Since when do you sleep this long?”

  “Huh?” I respond dumbly as flashbacks of the previous night fill my mind, causing my body to flush in remembrance of Jordan and his insatiable cock. He might not have stayed the night, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t work my body into utter exhaustion.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever known you to be in bed this long. Unless you’re coming down with something. Shit, are you? Do I need to make some soup for you?” She sounds like an overbearing mother hen, one that I have a few years on still.

  “What? No. I’m fine. I didn’t sleep too well last night.” I glance around the room, noticing the disarray.

  “Everything okay? Something you want to talk about?” Missy pushes, and I realize she’s a little more than concerned for me.

  She’s suspicious.

  Fuck.

  “Yes, it’s fine. Just a good book, one I had a difficult time putting down,” I explain quickly, hoping to appease her curiosity, but I know better.

  She’s been sniffing around since Christmas Eve when I called to let her know I wouldn’t be around for Christmas. She knew my daughter, Evie, wasn’t going to be visiting as I had hoped, instead opting to spend the holiday with her fiancé, Adam, and his family. My son, Eli, is Special Ops and is deployed somewhere in the world. But Uncle Sam was kind to my boy this year and allowed him to send a special Christmas message home.

  What she doesn’t know is how I actually spent my day.

  No one does.

  Except maybe God, but I doubt he was peeking in too often on me that day.

  I was with Jordan.

  “I see,” she murmurs, but I know that tone. She isn’t going to let go of this any time soon.

  “I’ll have to send it over to you. It’s the new Sophie Samuels novel.” I name the first book I can think of, hoping to throw her off somehow.

  “Okay,” she deadpans. “If you’re not ready to tell me, I get it, but don’t lie to me, Anna. We’ve been friends for a long time. I know when something is up.”

  “Missy…” I trail off, taking a deep breath. “I’m just not there yet.”

  “Look, I get it, but I hope you realize as your best friend, I’m always here for you. Rain or shine. Whatever you’re going through, I’ve got your back,” she explains, making me feel like shit in the process.

  It isn’t that I don’t want to tell her, or that I can’t, but rather I’m not ready to admit what’s happening between Jordan and me.

  It’s been a very long time since any man has made me feel the things he does. A very, very long time. The last man I gave my heart to died and left me to raise our two children on my own. I never want to go through that kind of heartache again.

  But it’s more than that.

  What happened between Jordan and me was only supposed to be a fling, but it’s lasted much longer than I anticipated. We can’t keep our hands off one another, and when he isn’t around, I can’t stop thinking about him. I never expected to feel these things about him. The hardest part is not knowing what’s going on his head because I’m too afraid of the answer.

  “Do you have any plans for New Year’s Eve yet?” Missy’s voice interrupts my thoughts, pulling me back to the present. “Is Evie going to come up, since she missed Christmas? And don’t you dare tell me you’re going to stay at home again. Alone. Because I refuse to believe that again.”

  “No, Adam’s family decided to extend their trip to spend more time with their golden boy.” I roll my eyes, trying not to display the hurt I felt over Evie’s decision to spend the holiday with his family over me once again. Not that I blame her. I haven’t been the most supportive mother, but I can’t help being the kind of mother who thinks her daughter has lost complete perspective of her self-worth and deserves so much better than the man she’s chosen to saddle herself to.

  “Oh, geez,” she scoffs, and I can almost see her roll her eyes too. She doesn’t like Adam any more than I do.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Kingston and I were talking this morning, and we want to do something for the guys before the next wave of assignments hits their desks,” she explains. This is typical of Missy. For as long as I’ve known her, she goes out of her way to take care of each man working for her husband.

  “A dinner then? What do you want me to bring?”

  “Nah, we always do dinners. No, we’re thinking something a little wilder. Like Missy’s Margarita Monday, but bigger and louder.”

  “Wow, hard to believe boss man is on board with this.”

  “After everything that’s happened in the last year and a half, we need it. Besides, it was his idea.”

  “Hm, I can see that, I guess. Since Marley’s back, it would be nice to have everyone under one room after all this time,” I surmise, thinking about the Jason Momoa look-alike and the sad look deep in his eyes.

  “Yes, and that’s one of the main reasons he wants to throw the party.” She sounds worried about him, and I get it. The moment I laid eyes on the man, I’ve been worried. He’s nothing like the man who left us three years ago. This last mission did something to him.

  “All right, I’m on board. Tell me what you need me to do.”

  “I know it’s last minute, but I’m hoping to find someone who can cater it.”

  “Wait… did you just said cater? Did hell freeze over or something?”

  “I don’t want to be trapped in the kitchen all night. Besides, I need to take it easy.”

  “Why is that?”

  “We haven’t told anyone yet, but—”

  “Oh my God, you’re pregnant!” I cut her off excitedly.

  “Don’t say anything to anyone yet. We’re trying to hold off until I get the okay from the doctor.”

  “Missy, I can’t believe this. I didn’t even know you were trying. Not since they told you—”

  “We weren’t trying, Anna.” I can hear the emotion in her voice, the pure joy, and the absolute fear. They’d been trying for a while, but with the news that Missy might not be able to have children, they stopped ‘trying’ and worrying about it. They had Layla and Oliver, and Missy has always been more of a mother to them than their biological one. “This is just as much a surprise for us as it is for you.”

  “I’m happy for you both,” I gush, flipping the blankets back and throwing my legs over the edge of the bed. I stifle a grunt as I find my footing and stretch my sore body. “Layla and Oliver are going to freak out.”

  “
I know. They’ve wanted another sibling for so long,” she laughs. “But seriously, you’re the first to know, so please don’t say anything to anyone else.”

  “My lips are sealed.” I reach up to zip my lips for the hell of it. “As for the catering, I will make a few calls and see what I can make happen, but you might want to come up with a plan B.”

  “Right, which is why I’ve already started a grocery list.” She pauses, and I swallow hard, already knowing we’ve circled back to the subject I’m not ready to open up about. “I’m not going to pry, Anna, but if there’s a plus one in your life, you know they’re welcome to join us, right?”

  “Missy—”

  “You don’t have to say anything, Anna, but you deserve happiness and love too.” I let the words fall over me, wishing it was that easy but grateful to have a friend like her.

  Chapter Two

  Annabelle

  I spent the better part of Sunday lost in my thoughts, trying to figure out this thing between Jordan and me. Ever since my conversation with Missy, I haven’t been able to shake her words.

  I deserve happiness too.

  I deserve love too.

  But I had all of that once. A very long time ago.

  Darren.

  My husband. The man I never thought I could move past.

  Until Jordan.

  And now I’m second-guessing everything about my life and who I am.

  I’ve never told anyone about him, besides the basic facts.

  We married young. He was a Marine. He died after September eleventh, when he was deployed to Iraq. It was a roadside bombing. I raised our two children, Elijah and Evelyn, without him.