by Joanne Rock
* * *
DAMIEN KNEW HE SHOULDN’T have walked down those steps to the lower level. He’d recognized as much the second the scent of chlorine hit his nose, understanding damn well that Miranda must have made use of the spa.
Now his blood ran hot in his veins at the sight of her glistening bare shoulders above the churning water. Locks of her short, newly colored hair clung in wet waves to her neck, even though she had most of it caught in a clip. A delicate silver chain around her neck reflected the light as she moved.
She had to be naked.
The discarded robe off to one side said as much as that bare shoulder. He couldn’t look anywhere else, seized with the desire to lick a droplet of water from her skin where it rolled down her arm.
“Actually, I came down here just for that reason—so it would be a good scene.” She pointed toward her laptop, an open document visible on the screen.
And? Had she written it yet? He hated to rush her. Would not rush her, damn it. But there she was. Naked. In his hot tub.
He forced himself to sit on the edge of the lacquered bricks surrounding the spa. Close, but not too close. He tried not to stare down into the water, where the tops of her breasts were occasionally visible. Okay, maybe he didn’t try that hard.
“How is it turning out so far?” With any luck, her heroine had already overcome her doubts and ripped off the hero’s clothes.
Tension threaded through his muscles. Tightened every inch of him.
“Um...” Color rose in her cheeks. “I think there’s an interesting phenomenon at work.”
A multi-orgasmic phenomenon, he hoped. Or an insatiable sexual craving that he’d have to work all night to satisfy. He was very ready to provide whatever she needed.
“How so?” He ground the question out between clenched teeth, glancing toward the laptop. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to read what she wrote without... Hell. He was already so wound up he could barely see straight.
“I was—” her gaze darted to his “—highly inspired. But I ended up... That is, my heroine wound up with a self-gratification scene.”
He wanted to think his way through what that meant. For Miranda. For them. But his brain stalled on an image of her touching herself, and remained right there.
Any attempt to reassure her—to say anything at all—ended in a dry rasp from his throat. Sweat beaded on his forehead from the effort to stay still. Not reach for her.
“Crazy, right?” She gave a small shrug that lifted her left breast perilously close to the surface of the water. “But I think—subconsciously—I don’t want my heroine to be with you before I am.”
Silence hung in the room for long moments after that announcement. He tried to silence the buzz in his head so he could make sense of her words. But he didn’t trust his first instinct, which told him she’d just flashed him the go-ahead sign.
“I’ve had a tough time staying focused, with you sitting so close and so naked.” He felt his right temple start to throb. “Which means I’m going to ask that you...” He scraped a hand over his face, hoping that closing his eyes for a second would erase the image of her from the backs of his eyelids. “I need you to be very, very clear about what you want.”
“Right.” She nodded, her brow furrowed. “I’m not going to be able to write my way through this scene, and I don’t want to decide what happens next.” Her cheeks flushed darker and her lips trembled a little bit. “I just want you to touch me.”
6
I SHUT DOWN my issues.
It wasn’t easy, but it was easier than it had ever been before. I tuned out the part of my brain that said I wasn’t good enough or pretty enough or deserving of this man. Instead, I focused on the heat in his eyes and reminded myself of how patient he’d already been with me. How kind. How honest. This moment was a long time coming for me, and the time was right.
Damien was right.
I could tell from the way his eyes lightened and then darkened that he definitely wanted me. And I was definitely ready for more. I’d known it the whole time I’d been writing that scene where Shaelynn dreamed of Damien touching her. I just flat-out had not wanted to let her have him first. I’d been saving this moment for me.
His shirt came off in a blur of burnished muscle and gray poplin. The tie, the shirt, the tee beneath it...all gone. He stared at me with an unmistakable glint in his hazel eyes. He wanted me badly. But he had every intention of treating me right.
My skin got goose bumps under the water. Pleasure spun through me just beneath the skin, sending my nerves on high alert. My breasts beaded so tight they ached, and my thighs pressed against a heat that didn’t have anything to do with the hot tub.
“Don’t. Move.” He backed away, ducking into the adjacent bathroom. I heard drawers open and bang closed again.
When he reappeared, he had an armful of fluffy white towels and a handful of silver foil packets that he tossed on the decking around the tub.
“Condoms. A lot of them.” I said it aloud, just because the whole encounter felt surreal. I wasn’t sure if I wanted it to feel like a fantasy. Or 100 percent reality.
A little of both, maybe.
I did not want to mess this up.
“I figured I’d be very, very clear about what I want, too.” He gave me a pirate’s grin—all white teeth and wickedness. “But I understand if those condoms are just wishful thinking on my part. Better to have them and not need them than to...”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “I get it. Easier to stay in the mood if we’ve got them nearby.” I remembered how I froze last time when he wanted to move from the staircase to a bedroom. This way, if things got heated, we could stay in the moment.
I could keep my insecurities at bay.
“You can still write the scene to play out however you want it, Miranda,” he assured me. “You’re in charge.”
I shook my head. “My imagination isn’t this good.”
My breath caught. A shiver ran through me. I could never have written this. Him. Imagining that gorgeous, hard body of his all over me was easy. But I would never have guessed the prelude. The lead-in. The way his eyes smoldered as he unfastened his pants.
My eyes dropped south, drawn by the sight of what was going on beneath the belt.
“All for me,” I whispered, half to myself and half to the part of me that was Shaelynn.
I was pretty sure that she was cheering me on from somewhere deep in my subconscious. No matter how nervous I was, I had the heart of a gutsy girl, damn it.
Damien had the rest of his clothes off before I could blink, his thick erection jutting from between his hips. I think maybe he was giving me time to get used to the idea of being with him. The condoms. The nakedness. He was giving me a last chance to bail out if I needed it.
Apparently he didn’t realize how committed I was to this program.
“Please hurry,” I urged, reaching wet arms toward him. Once he kissed me, I’d be okay.
He dropped onto the edge of the tub just as I arched up. He slid into the water and I shifted onto his lap. His arms wrapped around me, the raw strength of him obvious even as he held me gently.
Sensations bombarded me, from the tickle of hair on his thighs along mine to the musky, male scent of his warm skin. I looked up into his hazel eyes for a second before his mouth landed on mine and he kissed me.
My breasts flattened against his chest, the peaks beading and aching. I cupped his chin and cradled his face, craving every angle of the kiss imaginable, wanting to eat him up. Tension coiled inside me, a flagrant, hot awareness of him. But he moved slowly, teasing my mouth with purposeful swipes of his tongue, nipping my lower lip with his teeth and making me gasp with sharp pangs of want.
“I want this,” I said aloud, making sure he knew it. I’d been waiting for so long to have th
is kind of kiss. “I want you.”
He broke the contact, his eyes boring into mine while the steam from the hot tub swirled around us, sealing us together in a white veil.
“I dreamed about this,” he confided, fingers splayed along my spine.
“Me, too.” Since before I even met him. Although the dreams had gotten far more specific and tantalizing since Damien gave my sensual imaginings a definite focus.
“You’re shaking,” he noted, cupping my face in his palm, angling my chin so he could see into my eyes in the reflected lights from overhead.
“That’s not normal?” I shifted on his thighs, edging closer to his hips and nudging the hard length between them.
He ground his teeth and sucked in a breath, making me realize how much what I did affected him. What amazing, powerful knowledge. I tucked it away deep in my mind, grateful to him for that gift. His fingers played lightly on my cheek, traveled up into my hair.
“Just making sure we’re good.” His words cracked on a dry note, making me realize how much he held back for my sake.
I took a deep breath, certain I wanted this. Him.
“I’m great. Better than great.” I traced his lips with one finger, finding his mouth surprisingly soft compared with the rest of him. My gaze followed the damp trail I left behind, the water glistening until I leaned down to lick it off.
Growing bolder, I tugged his lower lip between my teeth and nipped it. His shaft twitched against my hip and I wondered if it was too soon to sit astride him. I’d been ready for him since he’d walked into the room, but I didn’t want to rush.
Then again, I didn’t want to give myself time to panic....
“Stay with me,” he whispered between kisses. “Let me taste you again.”
He kissed me hard, his lips settling on mine with a hungry possessiveness that made me weak in my knees and chased away the worries again. His arms held me captive, positioning me where he wanted while he had his way with my mouth. A languid desire gave way to something more frenzied. More hungry. I pressed closer, my breasts aching and sensitive. The warm wall of male muscle provided the best abrasion I could imagine. I was more shameless than Shaelynn as I wrapped my arms around Damien’s neck and held on, needing more and more of this feeling.
He pulled back and paused for a second to watch me. Maybe he was satisfied with what he saw, because he didn’t stop. He lowered his lips to my neck and I moaned at the sensation. Water bubbled at my back. His tongue licked sexy pathways down my throat, then down my chest, where my breasts rose out of the water. Suddenly, I ached there with a fierceness unlike anything I’d ever felt before. I needed his kiss there. Now.
“Please,” I murmured, threading my fingers through his hair while the bubbles simmered all around us. “I’m crawling out of my skin.”
He cupped a breast in his palm and lowered his mouth to capture the tip. My eyes stayed glued on him, hypnotized by the sight. White teeth flashed for an instant before he drew on the crest. Hard. I bucked against him, twisting to get a better feel of his body. This was what I had been craving for years without knowing it. This tender attention. A man caring about what I felt and what I wanted. Needed.
Right now, I wanted him all over me. Between my thighs. My sex ached for him.
Visions of my novel ran through my head. Damien’s voice in my ear urged me on. I think that’s what gave me courage to straddle him now. I shifted my body so I sat astride him, my knees planted on a built-in tub bench so that my sex met the thick erection that awaited me.
He lifted his head, his eyes greener than I’d ever seen them, the pupils dilated wide.
“I need to taste you first.”
I was still thinking about what that meant when he reached for a handful of the fluffy towels he’d brought out to the spa. Blankly, I watched as he leaned over me and around me to spread the towels on the edge of the hot tub.
Before I could ask, he lifted me from the water and laid me on the bed of terry cloth, my legs still dangling over the edge of the spa.
“What—”
My unspoken question was answered when he knelt on the bench, positioning himself between my legs, my knees propped on his broad shoulders.
“Oh. Oh.”
Any awkwardness vanished as he took me in his mouth and kissed me. My eyes slid closed, the carnality of seeing his strong torso between my thighs almost too much for my overwrought senses to bear. The sensations spiraling from the feel of his tongue on my swollen sex were all I could handle right now. It felt very decadent. Very naughty. And better than anything I could have imagined in my feeble writer’s imagination.
“Damien.” It felt so good to say his name. To know that he was the one who kissed me intimately.
I thrashed against the towels, my skin cooling from the drying water even as another heat burned me up inside.
He increased the pressure, responding to needs I never voiced, as if he knew exactly what I wanted long before I did. I gripped fistfuls of towel in each hand, holding on for dear life. Anchoring myself to this moment and grounding myself in the reality of it. Damien Fraser kissed me. Licked me.
Suckled me...
I flew apart so hard and fast that I screamed aloud. Waves of pleasure rocked me, pounding through my feminine muscles with delectable intensity. I writhed against the floor and against Damien, my legs twitching, but he never relinquished his hold on me, urging me higher with a few final devastating flicks of his talented tongue.
My breath gone, my senses stunned, I was grateful when he levered himself up to wrap me in his strong arms. He kissed my shoulder. My neck. Nipped my ear while the aftershocks continued to fire through me.
“Are you okay?” he asked gruffly, his concern as evident as his hunger.
My heart melted for this amazing man, and I fell a little more for him even as I knew I probably shouldn’t.
“Way better than okay,” I managed to reply with an effort. I kissed his cheek, unable to process all the things going through my brain, even as the pleasure still coursed through my body. The way Damien made me feel really hammered home how thoroughly I’d been deceived as a naive teen. Sex was so much more amazing than I ever could have guessed. And technically, we hadn’t even had it yet. I smiled. “I don’t think I have words for how that felt.”
A very male grin told me he liked that answer.
“Ready for more?” he asked, his voice practically a growl.
And yes, mine was practically a purr. Mind-blowing satisfaction apparently could do that to a woman.
“I thought you’d never ask.”
* * *
HIS HANDS SHOOK.
Damien almost couldn’t believe it when he saw his fingers tremble as he smoothed aside Miranda’s hair and kissed her. Partly that tremor was from holding back. But he’d be fooling himself if he thought that was the only reason. This thing happening between them was about a whole lot more than sex.
His feelings for her were growing faster than he could deal with them. And he hadn’t even been inside her yet. Ignoring the implications of that, since he was in no position to think about it now, Damien focused on what mattered.
Her.
“Are you warm enough?” He ran a hand up her silky thigh. Her skin had cooled while he’d pleasured her, and he didn’t want anything distracting her from what was about to happen.
He needed her totally in the moment with him.
“I’m plenty warm, thanks to you,” she teased, rocking her hips against his as she reached for the condom stash on the tub deck.
He ground his teeth together, willing himself to go slow. To take his time. He didn’t intend to get so caught up in what he wanted that he lost sight of what she needed. He wanted to blot out every memory of the bastard who’d hurt her.
“But if any part of this gets chron
icled in fiction, I want it to be just right.” He figured it would be better to keep the moment light, to help her focus on him and not think about the past.
“Fiction will favor you, Damien Fraser.” She grinned and ran her hands up and down his arms while he rolled on a condom. “In fact, I know a certain writer who will sing your praises in lavish prose that will make other women long to meet you.”
“I’ve got the woman I want to meet,” he admitted as he sheathed himself, then kissed her.
She sighed in his arms, wrapping herself around him and letting him take over. For just a moment, he allowed himself to look at her, her eyes closed and her features relaxed while he kissed her.
Miranda Cortland was so beautiful. Earrings studded the rim of her ear. Tattooed eyeliner stamped both eyelids. But neither distracted him from the delicate loveliness beneath. She could wear all the flower stickers she wanted on her nails. All the crazy clothes. He’d still see the vulnerable sweetness bolstered by steely determination. A woman who’d found a way to overcome old hurts and find a new life for herself.
The need to protect her threatened to steal the moment, so he gave her the only thing he could. Steadying her thighs, he reached between them to tease the tender bud of her sex. Reawaken the heat he’d kindled earlier. Her eyes flew open, locking on his while her lips rounded on a breathy gasp.
He took her mouth with his, claiming a kiss. To his surprise, she trailed a tentative touch up the ridge of his shaft, setting off a reaction so strong that sweat popped along his forehead. He couldn’t hold back.
Hooking an arm around her waist, he lifted her against him. Positioned her right where he needed her. He entered her gently, carefully. He guessed it had been a long time for her.
He hadn’t anticipated how much she wanted him. So when her legs locked around his waist and she thrust her hips forward, he had to bite his tongue to hold himself in check.
Focusing on the sound of the bubbling water behind them, instead of the sweet, needy noises she made in the back of her throat, Damien waited until he had control of himself before he moved again. Guided her hips back and forth in a slow rhythm with his.