“The cabana,” Joss whispered urgently, every bit as breathless as Sarah.
“Yes.” Sarah let Joss precede her out of the pool, then help her up and onto the pool deck, before tugging her the short distance to the cabana.
The reticence that had seemingly paralyzed Joss mere seconds ago had vanished. With hurried efficiency, she spread their towels onto the canvas floor, pulled Sarah down and wasted no time in moving on top of her. She kissed her with surprising fervor, insinuating a rock-hard thigh between her legs. Please, Sarah thought, do not stop, do not pull away from me with talk of agreements and rules and cautions against becoming too emotionally entangled. Right now all Sarah wanted—needed—was to come. For Joss to make her come in the most exquisite, most wrecked way possible. Yes, she thought, wreck me, destroy me, ruin me for anybody else, I don’t care, just take me. She could think of nothing but sweet release. Blood pulsed wildly through her veins as Joss’s lips left hers and began exploring her throat, trailing down to her chest, her breasts. Sarah wanted no barriers between them. Frantically she pulled the fabric of her bikini top over her head. When Joss’s mouth found first one nipple, then the other, Sarah pushed her entire body more intensely into her, wanting friction, wanting the persistent throbbing between her legs answered.
“Oh, Joss, I want you so badly,” she squeezed out between heaving intakes of breath.
That mouth, Sarah realized, was talented beyond expectation. Joss’s tongue on her nipples was driving her wild, driving her nearly to orgasm. But she didn’t want to be cheated of…other things, she thought desperately, pushing herself against Joss’s hand, which continued to cup her, to stroke her lightly.
She was going to come fast, hard, and found herself hoping this wouldn’t be their only time. If it was, she thought dismally, it would never be enough, because she needed, wanted, to experience everything Joss had in her lovemaking arsenal. Joss’s hand had found her beneath the wet cloth of her bikini bottoms, and she shuddered pleasurably at the touch. The friction was good. So good! But as her orgasm began to rush toward her, Sarah needed Joss inside her. She told her as much—ordered her, more like—and arched into Joss as two fingers slipped inside. The pace of Joss’s thrusts was fast, deep, as the waves of pleasure ripped right through her core and took her higher and higher until she felt as though she were floating above them. She rode it until they began to crest and coalesce into one spectacular wave that crashed over her, consuming her with a power she had rarely felt before. She cried out, bucked hard against Joss. The intense pleasure finally released her, leaving her quivering, blinking, clinging tightly to Joss.
Joss continued to softly kiss her breasts, the touch of her lips so tenderly contrary to the violence with which Sarah had just come.
“That,” Sarah said, still breathless, “was amazing.”
“No,” Joss replied, trailing tiny kisses back up Sarah’s throat. “That was only an appetizer.”
Sarah smiled, not sure how much pleasure she could take all at once, but more than willing to give it a try. “You have more in your bag of tricks?”
“Way more. I’m just getting started.”
“Ohh, I do like the sound of that.”
Joss moved against her, sliding her body back and forth over her. She was solid and strong without being overpowering. Sarah moved with her, effortlessly matching her rhythm.
Joss nuzzled her neck, her breath warm puffs against her skin. “This feels so good. Like this. With you. The way I always knew it would. But there’s one thing.”
Sarah raised questioning eyebrows at her lover. Yes, she thought with a small gasp of wonder. Joss is my lover. For now.
“These.” Joss fingered her bikini bottoms. “Need to go. I need to feel all of you.”
Her hand was like silk as it slid her bottoms down her thighs and off. The motion, slick, patient, sensual, left Sarah’s breath trapped in her throat. Much as her desire swelled and propelled her to wanting more and wanting it now, she would let Joss do with her as she wished, even if it was a slow, unyielding torture of the sweetest kind.
Joss caressed Sarah’s inner thighs, drawing lazy circles on her skin before she slid lower and kissed Sarah’s belly. Hard and wet, Sarah had to command herself to wait, to enjoy, to see what pleasures Joss brought next. The anticipation left her quivering and breathless, but she casually ruffled the soft hair at the back of Joss’s head. Its texture was silky, light, like golden wheat blowing in a summer breeze, and she sifted it through her fingers.
Lower and lower Joss slid down her body, and although Sarah knew what was coming next, she squeezed her eyes shut at the first exquisite contact of Joss’s mouth on her. She let herself be carried on the tide of pleasure it brought, growing wetter and harder yet as Joss’s tongue began stroking her slow, then fast, soft, then hard and harder still. A light show exploded behind her eyelids, and her moaning sounded almost as though it were coming from someone else. She was apart from her body and yet every nerve ending was on fire and intensely attuned to each one of Joss’s magnificent touches.
“Oh, Joss,” she murmured, thrashing her head back and forth. “Your mouth…”
Joss’s tongue circled her clit, stroked it. Her lips sucked it lightly. A finger slipped inside her, its thrusts matching perfectly the strokes she’d begun again with her tongue. Sarah was a goner. She rose off the towel, almost levitating, pushing herself harder and faster into Joss’s eager mouth, as the first strands of another orgasm swept up her legs and shattered her into about a thousand pieces of throbbing ecstasy. She felt herself gushing into Joss’s mouth, felt Joss thirstily swallow every last drop. Yes, she concluded after a moment, and not unhappily, I’m ruined forever.
* * *
Joss held Sarah firmly in her arms as her orgasm spent itself in tiny, full-bodied spasms. Sarah was so beautiful when she came. So beautiful naked. So beautiful in each raucous and delicate way she responded to Joss’s touch. Bringing this woman such joy, such physical pleasure, warmed Joss from the inside out. She could almost come herself simply by pleasuring Sarah. Except, well, she wanted to come from Sarah touching her, from Sarah doing the same things she’d done to her.
Remembering each response her tongue, her fingers had elicited from Sarah, she was at first unaware of Sarah sliding her bathing suit down her shoulders.
“Not fair,” Sarah said huskily, “that I’m naked and you’re not.”
Joss laughed, placed her hands over Sarah’s and helped her ease off the one-piece bathing suit. She watched Sarah’s eyes, the way they lit up, as she took in all of Joss, then she lightly caressed her shoulders.
“You’re strong,” Sarah said, a hint of awe in her voice. “Muscular.”
She let Sarah ease her onto her back. “My morning swims.”
“Mmm,” Sarah moaned. “I’d like you to skip the swimming part this week and use your muscles for…other things.”
“Well, they do say you should mix up your workout routine.”
Sarah rolled on top of her. Her eyes were busy scanning every inch of Joss. And apparently liking what they saw. “Good, because I can help you with that.”
“I’ll bet you can.”
Joss’s breath left her in a rush as Sarah’s breasts brushed firmly against her own. God, they were full, so soft and so fucking sensual. Oh, baby, I need you, Joss thought, unsure if she’d given voice to her words. Sarah began grinding into her, firmly, rhythmically, murmuring against her throat, kissing her collarbone, her chest, nipping at her breasts, sucking her nipples. She wanted to soar with this woman, reach new heights of pleasure together for…God, I don’t know, the rest of my life maybe. She was high with desire, so high, that she didn’t want to analyze that last thought. It was the sex, the thrill and anticipation of orgasm that was making her needy and sentimental and a bit crazy. Yes, that’s it.
She could have stayed this way forever, enjoying each new sensation pulsing through her. But Sarah had moved down, and now her mouth had found her sens
itive, wet flesh. Sarah kissed and suckled Joss, licked her in long languid strokes that took her higher and higher. Oh, God, I can’t hold on. She wanted to come this way, with Sarah’s mouth on her. It was exactly what she had dreamed about, fantasized about, for weeks now. And yet it was so much better too. She whispered Sarah’s name over and over. Her body tightened, to the point where she thought it might snap, and then she was quaking uncontrollably. Her body turned to liquid as her orgasm tore through her, possessed her with a violence she was unfamiliar with, and then slowly released her.
She moaned softly, momentarily sleepy and sated and spent, but also ridiculously happy. Making love with Sarah was everything and nothing like she’d imagined. “Jesus, that was spectacular, Sarah.”
She kept her eyes closed, even as Sarah settled into the crook of her arm and rested her cheek against her chest. She couldn’t look at her this minute, afraid of the weakness, the need, her eyes might reveal.
“I suppose,” Sarah said after a quiet moment, “we should find somewhere more comfortable before we fall asleep.”
“Hmm, yes, a bed would be nice.” Joss rolled over until she was facing Sarah. “But not until I have shower sex with you.”
Sarah laughed, her voice sweet and soporific. “Yes. Shower and a bed. Although, we have to get ourselves there first.”
Joss pushed herself onto her elbows, then, with effort, to her knees. She felt boneless, but her desire for Sarah was far from exhausted. She helped Sarah up. “Come on. You can lean on me.”
“Good. But I might need you to carry me.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The smell of coffee stirred Sarah from her slumber. She sat up in bed as Joss carried in two steaming cups and handed one to her.
“You know exactly the way to my heart,” Sarah groaned, taking a gulp and nearly burning her tongue. She was limp with exhaustion. Every one of her muscles screamed at her, but not out of pain. Or if it was, it was the good kind of pain, the kind that said you’d used your muscles for a rewarding purpose. And oh, she had! They’d made love as the sun set outside, paused long enough to raid the fridge of what was left of the cheese and fruit plates that were part of yesterday’s welcome gift, then retreated once again to bed for another round of magnificent sex that went late into the night. If she closed her eyes, she could still feel Joss’s fingers on her flesh and the moist imprints of her lips from their insistent explorations.
Joss, in an oversized T-shirt and nothing else, climbed into bed beside Sarah, her mug held securely in her hands. “Are you as tired as I am this morning?”
“If it wasn’t for that damned sunlight peeking through the blinds, I’d try to convince myself it’s still night.”
“The only thing that’s telling me it’s daytime is my stomach. We’re going to have to get some food in today. Or go out.”
Sarah slumped back against the headboard. “Mmm, I don’t want to leave this bed.”
Joss leaned over and kissed her. “Me either, but we have to keep our strength up.”
“Good point.” Sarah sipped her coffee and thought about the bulging briefcase of work Joss had brought on the trip. A lot of it, Joss had told her, had to do with curriculum for next semester at the medical school. It was highly unlikely, especially now, that much of it would get done. “About the plans you had for this to be a working vacation…”
“Ha, work? Christ, I can’t keep my hands off you.” Joss ran a finger down Sarah’s naked thigh. “But since you’re so disciplined, what about that thick sketchbook you brought? You going to do some sketching?”
“I only brought it out of habit. I haven’t felt much like sketching lately. Or painting.” It’d been weeks since she’d done any real work, not counting her classes and tutoring Roxi.
“I know. But you’ll get it back.”
Sarah wasn’t so sure. Roxi had renewed her spirits a little, but not enough for the amount of work and focus she needed to put into her art if she were to have any chance of making a living at it. Her discipline, her joy for painting, had lost its luster. It was probably something like what writers called writers block, she supposed. It was all new to her, this inertia, and she didn’t have the first clue how to get out of it. “Have you heard anything about Roxi?”
“No, but I’ll text Nancy right now if you’d like.”
“Okay, but don’t take too long.”
“Oh yeah? Got plans for me?”
Sarah leaned into Joss, kissed her firmly on the mouth, then, with her tongue, traced the outline of her lips. “Does that answer your question?”
“Yup.” Joss retrieved her phone from her nightstand and quickly typed a few words. Within a minute, an incoming text chimed. “Nope, nothing new with Roxi.” Another chime. Joss grinned.
“What?”
“Nancy. She’s being a smartass. She says she figured I was busy working on my new medicine specialty with you this week.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
A wider grin from Joss. “That you’re helping me with my gynecology skills.” Joss typed a few characters. “I told her I’m learning plenty.”
“Actually,” Sarah said, rapidly growing wet as visions of Joss making love to her began to overload her circuits. “I think Nancy raises a very good point.”
“You do, do you?” Joss set her phone down, rolled on top of Sarah and pinned her arms above her head. “I think it’s a very good point too, and the practical exam is about to start.”
“Ooh, I love the idea of you playing doctor with me.”
Joss licked a trail down Sarah’s throat, down to the valley between her breasts. Her thigh began pulsing long, slow strokes against her center. “Since I have you in this weakened state, there is one more thing.”
“Oh, God, I’ll do anything at this point as long as you don’t stop.”
Joss stilled herself and looked into Sarah’s eyes. “I want you to sketch me. This afternoon. On the beach.”
A lump settled in her throat. “Why?”
“Because I want to see you work. I want to see what you’d do with a portrait of me.”
Sarah’s palms began to itch. She didn’t want to sketch anybody, didn’t want to do any work this week at all, and if she did, it would be a crap job. “I don’t really do portraits.”
“Please? For me? I’ll pay you.”
Joss looked so earnest, so serious about it. She’d done so much for Sarah these last couple of months, it wouldn’t be right to say no. Besides, a sketch was nowhere near as demanding as a painting. “All right, but as long as you don’t expect much. And you insult me by offering me money.”
“All right, thank you. I was thinking I could give it to my mother for Christmas. She’ll be thrilled. And besides, if it’s not great, I’ll blame your subject.”
Sarah grinned and kissed the tip of her nose. “If you don’t soon get busy with me, it’s going to be Christmas.”
Joss laughed. “Your wish is always my command.” She dipped her head and delicately took a nipple into her mouth, tracing its contours with her tongue, sucking lightly.
Sarah arched at the tendrils of pleasure that were soon vining their way around her body.
* * *
They managed to make it out of the cottage for a deli lunch and loaded the baskets on their bicycles with bread, milk, cheese, tomatoes, eggs, bacon, sausage and salad fixings. Their restocking was followed by a dip in the ocean—the plan being that they’d have to behave on a public beach versus their backyard pool—then an hour or so of Joss pretending to read while she studied Sarah through her sunglasses beneath a palm tree.
Sarah was a classic beauty. A straight, strong but feminine nose, a firm jawline, dimples that made her look youthful and slightly mischievous so that, while smiling, she seemed secretly to be planning something naughty. Her eyes were sky blue when she was happy, but deep and cold like the north Atlantic when she was upset or intense about something. Her smile was warm, intelligent, curious. And that hair, streake
d to new hues of gold and red from their time in the sun, was a thick, wavy mane that made you want to run your hands through it.
When it came to her own looks, Joss knew there was no comparison with Sarah’s. All her life she had been told that she was “handsome,” something she’d come to appreciate. But Sarah—she was the kind of woman who turned heads when she walked into a room. People wanted to know who she was. Wanted to know her, as if they couldn’t wait to see if there was the payoff of a personality beneath all that beauty (there was). What was extraordinary was how Sarah paid so little mind to the endless compliments, to the outright salivating (mostly by men, but by plenty of women too) in her direction. She was a woman with far more substance, far more layers beneath the looks. She could make a miserable old man like Jack Pritchard downright jolly. She could entice the most hard-core introvert into talking. Alternately, she could also make the most self-absorbed, pretentious idiot shut up long enough to sit back and listen to her talk. Sarah was a woman with many gifts. Gifts Joss did not come close to possessing herself.
“You’re looking very intense,” Sarah said. “Enjoying that book?”
“Enjoying the view, more like.”
“Speaking of views, are you ready for our portrait session? If you were serious about it, that is.”
“I’m deadly serious about it. And yes, I’m ready.”
While Joss did need a Christmas present for her mother, she had asked for the portrait because she wanted to do something, anything, to get Sarah working again. It was the only thing she could think of that wasn’t begging or nagging or bribing.
Moments later, Joss had thrown on a button-down shirt over her bathing suit, finger combed her hair, then watched as Sarah placed her sketchbook in her lap and arranged her pencils and charcoal on a towel beside her.
“Should I look out over the water?”
“No. I want you looking at me.”
“That won’t be hard to do. Should I smile? Or should I look serious?” Joss had never sat for a portrait before and hadn’t any idea how she was supposed to act. It was nearly as intimidating as performing one of her first surgeries, being watched and appraised by her superiors.
By Mutual Consent Page 16