It was as if she could hear the slick slide of his cock claiming her soaking depths.
She came, then, her muscles pulsating around him, squeezing and milking his swollen member. She opened her mouth to eat his moans as his hips jerked between her thighs.
But he didn’t come with her.
With a sudden gasp, he pulled back, tensing his entire body as if he fought his own orgasm into submission.
Afterward, Alexia was weak-kneed and dizzy.
Rivera eased her down to the floor. He straightened her clothes, slowly and carefully, as if he still appreciated her bare skin and hated to lose the sight of it even for a second.
With shaky hands, she tried to smooth her dress and her hair, but her companion only chuckled. Taking her by the hand, he led her not back out to the dance floor for everyone to see, but around another corner to an elevator she hadn’t seen.
He pulled her into it when the door opened. He also pulled her back into his arms, easing any embarrassment she might have felt as his big, warm hands kneaded her back and urged her head down against his shoulder. She could tell from his touch that the night had only begun with the urgent fuck. Her knees went even weaker at the thought of more to come.
A soft ding was followed by the whoosh of the door opening. Instead of hallway, the elevator had opened into a suite. Of course. The resort had his name on it. He would stay in the penthouse suite. With a soft, lingering kiss, Rivera left her in the main room and disappeared down a hallway.
Alexia saw Rivera didn’t just stay in the suite. He lived here. She wandered around the room because her heart and her pussy still fluttered nervously as if either could take wing at any moment. She’d heard of butterflies in the stomach, but this was ridiculous!
The suite was actually a lavish apartment decorated with stylish furniture and haphazard flair. In one corner, she recognized a distinctive designer chair, but Rivera was using it to hold a stack of magazines. She shuffled the top few and noted that they were all devoted to the sport of rock climbing. The picture on the cover of the top magazine attested to why Rivera was muscular, fit and lean. In it, a climber dangled from a precipice by his fingers, the muscles of his forearm bulging.
Now the flutter was less nervous and more concentrated. Her moist, sensitized clitoris tingled as evidence of Rivera’s vitality showed in his choice of hobby. It was then that she noticed the framed pictures of Rivera himself and the flutter became something more.
In the snapshots, his taut muscles, serious face, flexed biceps and triceps were all set against backdrops of rugged natural beauty. He belonged there, somehow, more than he belonged in a tailored suit.
He must have climbed all over the world.
Once again she was reminded that she needed to get away more. She was twenty-six years old and there was more life to be lived, more to be seen, more to be done.
A rustle or a breath alerted her to his presence and Alexia turned from the pictures to find herself facing a man she would want to know better even if he hadn’t just shown her the adult version of Sixty Seconds in Heaven.
He had taken off his jacket. The white of his shirt practically gleamed against his dark skin and the sight of his dusky nipples showing through the thin silk made her mouth go dry.
Rivera didn’t pause or speak. He came forward with a confident stride that seemed fitting considering what she’d learned about his athletic abilities. He was all perfect movement with nothing wasted, as if the physicality of climbing stayed with him even when he wasn’t scaling cliffs.
His muscles slid beneath his skin, but he was soon so close she could only tilt her chin to meet his mint-chocolate gaze. Maybe it was an offer or an unspoken wish. He took her up on it, granting her a sweet, hot kiss as she opened her lips to speak. His tongue replaced her words, filling her mouth with a moist, thrusting swirl, seducing an answering thrust from hers.
So hot.
So sweet.
So quiet.
And because of the silence, she could focus on the blending of whiskey and champagne. She could savor. She could experience the rough texture of his tongue against hers and the smooth texture of his mouth.
Alexia twined her arms around his neck as he leaned to scoop her legs out from under her.
Vertigo again.
This time because he swooped her up into his arms and spun back toward the hallway while their tongues danced. With her eyes closed, the spin combined with the kiss made her dizzy.
When an ocean breeze caressed over her face, she realized he had carried her outside. She opened her eyes to the gleam of stars mirrored in the depths of his.
The breeze carried the scent of jasmine and roses. She breathed deeply as he eased her down to her feet beside a padded chaise near a small free-form pool. There, surrounded by the gently swaying blooms in the rooftop garden, he began to undress her.
She stood nearly hypnotized by the setting and his movements, so purposeful, but so slow and easy. He found the zipper at the small of her back and watched her face as he slid it south. His starlit eyes probed hers when her bodice loosened and the spaghetti straps drooped off her shoulders. He lifted his hands to palm the straps the rest of the way down and off her arms, making the movement a warm caress.
The dress sighed into a forgotten fabric puddle at her feet and she was left covered in nothing but a tiny scrap of white lace and goose bumps.
He dropped his gaze as he lifted his hands, bringing the heated attention of both to her breasts. Butterflies? The thrill that arced from her nipples to her stomach and beyond was more jet airplanes engaged in aerial acrobatics. Rivera hummed deep in his throat and the sound was low and ragged. After so much silence, the sound startled, but when he immediately urged her down onto the lounge, she went, his hoarseness forgotten.
She stretched out beneath his intense, dark gaze. The padding had been kissed with twilight’s moisture so it was cool against her heated skin. Her nipples grew more taut. From the coolness against her back or the intensity in his eyes, she couldn’t be sure.
All was back to silence with only soft sighs of pleasure and the breeze and the rustle of flowers all around. The mood was too perfect, too sensual and magic. She didn’t want to break the spell with words and apparently neither did he.
In this rooftop garden, it was as if Rivera was a Fae king who had brought her to his hidden kingdom. One word might bring the real world crashing, shouting and ringing down around them.
So, hush, instead.
Feel. See. Smell. Touch.
Her senses were more alive than they had ever been. Magic? It was almost preternatural. The cool padding beneath her. The tickling breeze on her skin. Rivera reached to pluck a fat dew-dampened rose blossom from a nearby bush and then he trailed the wet silken petals from her wrist to her shoulder, under and around one breast and then the other. Here, then, the kiss of butterfly wings, a barely-there sensation directed by his firm hand.
He painted dew and fire over each of her distended nipples, causing her to arch her back and gasp even as she kept her eyes open to watch the red, red rose held in his tan fingers playing over her pale skin. When he trailed the rose away from them, between them and down, he left her nipples harder and pinker as if the rose had left some of its color behind.
Down, down to her stomach and then over the white lace, he used the rose to tease its vivid seduction, pausing to focus where the tender bud of her clit pulsed, barely hidden.
“Yes,” Alexia gasped and he smiled in response. Watching, always watching with those deep, dark eyes.
She spread her thighs wanting more of the rose’s silk…and more from Rivera. Alexia stroked her hands down her body following the rose’s path until she came to her panties. She hooked her thumbs in them and paused, waiting for him to tell her what to do.
Instead of speaking, he leaned dow
n suddenly and took the waistband in his teeth. She cried out and her pussy creamed when he pulled the lace free using only his mouth. He abandoned the rose then and it lay softly on her most intimate folds while he straightened to strip away his clothes. Bit by bit, he revealed the hard, beautiful body the tailored suit hadn’t been able to completely hide.
His skin was rich caramel-brown tinted by the sun and his heritage. It was stretched taut and smooth over ripples of muscle that rivaled those she’d seen on the cover of the magazine. Active? Rivera had not one spare ounce of flesh. His whole body shouted vitality and no other part more so than his rampant penis, jutting up proudly from a nest of springy curls.
Alexia was fit, but her body was all soft curves against his steel when he joined her on the chaise.
He took her lips again. This time gently with slow strokes and soft nips. As if her mouth was a decadent treat to be savored. And he moved his hips just as slowly, sliding his cock against her tender folds, easing the head of it slightly in, then away, again and again until her legs were wide and she was begging.
“Please.”
He slid into her slow inch by slow inch so that her intimate walls could feel every ridge along his shaft. Her pleasure began to climb before he was even buried deep, so that by the time she engulfed him, by the time he was sunk all the way to his balls, she griped him with spasms of release.
He rocked against those spasms, pistoning in and out with long, deep strokes, taking her release higher and higher, tighter and tighter until she broke the silence, crying out loud and long.
Rivera’s control was amazing. He gave her his bare rock-hard penis while she came, but then he pulled back and reached for his pants to fish out a condom. Alexia wasn’t finished. She could tell by the way she reacted to him sheathing his cock for her. More moisture, more tingles.
He rejoined her, slipping his cock deep, slickly and easily. And then he was no longer controlled. Faster and harder than she would have thought possible, he took her. She met him thrust for thrust, eagerly claiming another release with a wild cry that had to carry all the way to the beach below.
With that cry, his body tensed in her arms and he shook all over, trembling with a massive release. The musky scent of their joining combined with the night-blooming jasmine as they lay closer than close beneath the glitter of the stars.
Chapter Two
Alexia woke the next morning snuggled into a massive bed beneath a downy comforter surrounded by pillows. She vaguely remembered Rivera tucking her there the night before after…well…after he had brought her to climax so many times her body ached from the sensual marathon.
She sat up and stretched, loving the slide of Egyptian cotton sheets on her sensitized skin. Then, as she braced herself for the inevitable morning-after embarrassment and recriminations she expected to feel after such decadence, a stray sunbeam illuminated a sterling breakfast service on a table by the window.
A carafe of juice, a covered dish, a bright linen napkin folded into the shape of a swan—all created a welcoming tableau, but it was the crystal bud vase holding a single full-blooming rose that charmed her and made her forget how she was supposed to feel.
The rose made her think of something besides breakfast, and she clasped her legs together in response to the pleasant tingles of memories between her thighs.
Rivera had left her the rose. She was certain. Especially when she slid off the bed to move closer and spotted a small, plain envelope leaning against the vase.
She picked it up and opened it, eager for communication from the man who she suddenly realized hadn’t spoken a word the night before.
One boldly scripted word met her eyes.
Tonight?
So simple and so to the point.
The tingle between her legs grew to an all-out throb.
And yet, something about the question mark from such a sexy, confident man went beyond hot to endearing. He had gifted her with an amazing night—one that had left her body tender and hyperaware as if the morning sun streaming in through the half-open blinds heated to life the memory of his fingers on her skin. Still, he asked if she wanted to see him again tonight?
The pen he had used was beside the tray. Without hesitation, Alexia picked it up and replied.
Yes.
Chapter Three
She left the note on the table and made her way back to her suite, nibbling a slice of toast. After a long shower, she dressed in white shorts and a simple tank, hoping a walk on the beach would ease the flutter of excitement in her stomach…and lower. Would she see him before nightfall? Would they get a chance to talk and get to know each other, or would conversation spoil the almost magical mood they’d found last night?
Though her phone gave off its insistent “charge me” tone several times while she dressed, she ignored it more easily than she had the night before.
V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N.
As Alexia exited the elevator, a man in a tight black T-shirt and form-fitting trousers approached. His arms bulged and his white teeth flashed, and even without the outfit she would have pegged him as a personal trainer, fitness guru or, as a closer look at his nametag confirmed, masseur.
“Ms. Scott, I’ve been waiting for you. If you’ll follow me, I’ll take that tight little ass of yours to heaven and back again.”
Raul flexed his fingers in a dramatic kneading motion and winked.
Alexia smiled, won over by his friendly outrageousness.
“I didn’t schedule a massage,” she corrected, ruefully thinking about her tender muscles.
“And who are you to turn down a gift from the gods?” Raul teased, linking his arm with hers and pulling her toward a bustling salon. “Or should I say a gift from one particular god who would probably rather do the honors himself.”
Alexia laughed. She couldn’t help it. Raul was flamboyant and fun and his enthusiasm was infectious.
Before she knew it, she was nude, wrapped in a sheet taken from a warming cabinet and lying on a tilted table. That’s when she realized Raul wasn’t exaggerating about his abilities. His big, strong hands did take her to heaven and not just her ass. He stroked, kneaded and squeezed all of her muscles with professional finesse. Some she’d never known she had. He also flirted shamelessly as only a man who had no interest in follow-through could.
It was arousing in a purely sensory way. Her body, already tingling from the night before, was pampered and pleased beyond belief.
And Rivera was responsible for her pleasure. The idea increased it by crazy knee-weakening leaps and bounds.
“You needed this, love. You were tense and tight.”
Alexia floated, no longer tense, tight or nervous, enjoying his hands while the rest of the salon filled with morning patrons. She was tilted enough to watch people come and go, so she saw when Rivera strode into the room. She couldn’t miss when her sexy lover from the night before began to use his hands to speak to the salon’s manager in sign language.
Raul noticed where her attention had been drawn.
“Carlos Rivera. Amazing, isn’t he? He almost died, you know. Fell two hundred feet. Broke lord knows how many bones and crushed his windpipe. And he still managed to climb down to the main path to signal for help. He should have Never Say Die tattooed on that gorgeous ass.”
“He can’t speak,” Alexia breathed, the silence of the night before suddenly explained.
“Won’t speak. At least, not much. It took him quite a while to manage even a hoarse whisper. The doctors told him he’d never speak again. He learned to sign while he was recovering.”
“Oh,” Alexia responded, aching for the man whose mystery and vulnerability was slowly being revealed.
“The strong and very silent type,” Raul noted. “And just so you’ll know, not a player. Every woman in this place and a few men would
fall all over themselves for that man, but since the accident, he’s been untouchable.”
“Untouchable,” Alexia echoed just as Rivera’s gaze locked with hers, and even though he was across the room, the nerve endings of all her pleasure points were singed.
* * *
For the rest of the day, unexpected gifts like the breakfast and the massage came Alexia’s way. Sparkling lemonade by the pool, a fresh fruit salad accompanied by another rose from the rooftop garden at lunch and a new note in the afternoon.
“I can’t wait to taste you again.”
She couldn’t help imagining the words spoken against her ear in a hoarse, seductive whisper.
How could she tell him his injury didn’t matter? She was so glad he’d survived. That he was strong and vital and here for her to meet. After only one night, she couldn’t imagine a world without Carlos Rivera in it.
Chapter Four
By the time dusky twilight settled its cool promise over the resort after a long, tropical afternoon, Alexia had relived every moment of the night before, again and again. She’d even held his note against her lips, imagining his wicked tongue as she’d fingered herself, climaxing easily with the memory of the way he had filled her.
She took special care with her appearance, choosing a barely-there bra and panty set under a scrap-of-silk red sheath that reminded her of his roses. She also slipped into outrageously tall fuck-me stilettos.
Deep down she knew she was trying to seduce sounds from her new lover—a gasp, a sigh, her name.
She remembered gloss this time, and thought about Rivera’s thick shaft between her lips as she applied it.
What she didn’t think about was her phone. Not once. It lay on the nightstand where endless vibrations had finally sent it completely dead and silent.
* * *
He was in the pool when she let herself into the suite. She found him there, swimming back and forth and back again. He stopped when he registered her presence and stood with the opposite side of the pool at his back. He stretched his dripping arms out to prop himself on either side—so relaxed and inviting it made the jet planes start swooping in her veins once more.
Silent Surrender Page 2