by JoAnn Ross
Unable to resist the lure of all that silken, perfumed flesh, he reached out and traced a slow circle around first one breast, then the other. “If I’d believed you, darlin’, I never would have been able to eat dinner.”
“Then it’s a good thing you didn’t believe me.” She looked up at him through the fringe of her lashes, giving him the same saucy look that Georgia’s most famous southern belle had used to bring that devil-may-care Yankee blockade runner to his knees. “Because you’re definitely going to need your energy.”
Her scent was surrounding him, seeping beneath his skin and into his blood like a drug. Her flesh was as pale as porcelain, as smooth as satin. His fingers glided over the sprinkling of freckles scattered over the crest of her breasts.
“Sun kisses,” he murmured.
Her head was spinning again. She could feel her legs weakening. She thought she’d known what to expect from Cash. After all, they’d been together countless times like this.
But not like this, she amended as she grabbed hold of his shoulders to keep from melting. Never like this.
“What?”
“Your freckles.” He dipped his head and skimmed his lips across the light brown flecks. “My mama always told me freckles were kisses left by a smiling sun.”
She shivered as his tongue flicked over a taut nipple, causing a spark that shot straight through her to that warm, moist place between her thighs. Her skin, beneath his lips, felt strangely tight. Too tight. And sensitive almost to the point of pain. Her body felt hot and swollen.
She closed her eyes, all the better to concentrate on the tumultuous feelings flowing over her. Inside her. Dazzling lights sparked behind her lids like heat lightning flashing on a distant horizon.
He bit her fragrant shoulder. Then soothed the reddened flesh with his tongue. Chelsea heard him say something, but his low deep voice was only a distant roaring in her ears.
He lifted her up, carrying her into the bedroom. He continued to kiss her, the kisses growing deeper and more drugging with each step.
He placed her on the turned-down bed. Although the room was dark, the light streaming in through the open door from the living room cast a warm golden light over her. Her body gleamed like pearls; her eyes shone like emeralds. Cash stood beside the bed, looked down at her and found her wonderful.
“You are so beautiful.” He shook his head, as if wondering what miraculous trick of fate had brought her to him.
Chelsea held out a hand to him. “What I am,” she said, in a lush, throaty voice, “is lonely.”
Cash did not need a second invitation. He began stripping off his clothes.
Although it took a Herculean effort, Chelsea managed to keep her passion-heavy lids open to watch him. The sheets felt cool against her back; his gaze, dark with hunger, heated her breasts, her stomach, her thighs.
Age had not diminished his sex appeal. During the intervening years, Chelsea had, whenever she thought of Cash, managed to convince herself that she’d imagined the perfection of his body. But she was wrong.
He was a strong lean man who’d not allowed himself to soften. There wasn’t an ounce of superfluous flesh on his body; he was all lean sinew and hard muscle. And he exuded a male vitality that made her nerves sizzle like hot electric wires on a rain-slicked street.
The mattress sighed as he sat down beside her. “You are so soft.” He skimmed a finger up the inside of her thigh. “So lovely.” Excitement crackled along her skin like a flash fire. As she unconsciously gathered up a handful of sheet beside her, he took her hand, slowly uncurled her fingers, and pressed her palm against his chest. “Feel what you do to me, Chelsea.”
His heart was pounding like a jackhammer. Pleased that she was not the only one so harshly affected, she smiled up at him. “That’s amazing.”
“It’s you.” He sucked in a deep breath as she explored this phenomenon further. Her hand slid slowly downward over his rib cage. When she bent her head and pressed her open mouth against his hard, flat stomach, she felt every muscle clench. “Only you.”
Her fingers curled around his penis. He was as hard as stone, as warm as a new sun. She tested his weight and thickness and found him thrilling. She felt the tumescent flesh stir beneath her stroking touch and felt a surge of feminine pleasure that she was responsible for such obvious desire.
Chelsea’s heart swelled with such emotion she thought it was going to explode right out her chest. Moved, but unable to express her feelings in mere words, she bent her head and touched her lips to the smooth, straining tip.
He bucked beneath her intimate kiss and made an animal sound, deep in his throat. The tortured growl caused sensuality to pump like molten lava through her veins. Encouraged, she flicked her tongue along the length of his penis, and was prepared to take him fully in her mouth, when, sensing her intentions, he fisted his hand in her hair and lifted her head.
“Lord, lady, if you keep that up, we’re going to end this in about ten seconds flat.”
“I don’t care.” Her fingers continued to stroke him as her eyes offered a blatant feminine dare. She wanted him. Now.
“Well now, honey, I’m real sorry about that.” He grabbed hold of both her wrists in one hand and pushed her gently back against the pillows, holding her hands together above her head. “Because I want to take my time.”
She squirmed beneath his restraints. But in a sensual, erotic way designed to make his temperature and blood pressure soar. “And do you always get everything you want?”
His smile was a wicked slash of white in the purple shadows of the darkened room. “Tonight I do.”
Clamping down on his need to take, Cash concentrated instead on his desire to give. To touch. To torment. Lying down beside her, he trailed his hands all over her naked flesh, fondling her aching breasts, scraping over her tingling nipples, creating a spiral of flame down her back before kneading her buttocks.
After her body had warmed to the boiling point, he continued his sensual torment by trailing his mouth over the fiery trail his hands had blazed.
He sucked on her nipples with hot, hungry greed, creating a primal pull deep in her feminine core. His teeth bit into her shoulder, nipped at the tender cord in her neck, closed around an earlobe and tugged. He kissed her stomach, the sensitive hollow between her pelvic bones. His tongue cut a hot wet path through the nest of coppery curls between her thighs. All the time, she was moving restlessly beneath his hands and mouth, writhing on the sheets.
When his lips plucked at the source of all that moist heat, her body bucked, moving instinctively, unashamedly against his mouth.
“Please.” Chelsea knew she was begging. But she felt no shame. Her secret places were swollen, throbbing with need. A wild, out-of-control pulse that matched the jackhammer beat of both their hearts was throbbing between her legs.
“Cash.” Her voice was half gasp, half sob. “Hurry.” She tossed her head back and forth on the pillow as his tongue slipped into her wet hot center and his teeth began nibbling on her ultrasensitive clitoris. “Please hurry.”
“It’s okay, darlin’.” He put his hands beneath her bottom, lifting her hips off the sheets, pressing her harder against his mouth as he feasted on the feminine juices flowing from her. “I promise not to take you anywhere you don’t want to go.”
The pleasure-pain escalated, spiraling into a tighter and tighter coil. Just when she thought there couldn’t be more, he replaced his tongue with first one finger, then two, reaching deep inside her, stretching her, rasping the tender inner tissues with his deep hard thrusts. His mouth covered hers, allowing her to taste herself on his lips. He held her tightly against him, his fingers deep inside her, his tongue tangling with hers inside the moist cavern of her mouth. This was the way Cash had wanted Chelsea. The way he’d imagined her too many times during too many long and lonely nights during their years apart. Hot and hungry, rising higher and higher toward the dizzying peak of passion.
He released her mouth and tilted his he
ad back, drinking in the sight of her parted lips, her heightened color, the flush, like a fever that covered the lithe body arched against his stroking touch.
His thumb parted the sensitive pink folds, searching for the taut nub above her vaginal lips. When he found it, he pressed down. At the same time he thrust his strong fingers in more deeply than ever before, so deep he was touching the back of her womb.
Her eyes flew open, wide with shock as she felt herself shattering into a thousand crystalline pieces. She cried out his name on a wail of wonder.
He held her, kissing her as the contractions that were gripping at his fingers, like hundreds of hungry little mouths, slowly subsided.
She was limp. Boneless. The fire alarm outside in the hallway could have sounded and she could not have moved if her very life had depended on it.
“I never knew,” she managed to gasp on a ragged, labored breath. “It’s never been that way before.” Her glazed eyes were puzzled as she tried to focus on his face through the shimmering mist still clouding her mind. “Not even with you.”
“And it’s just the beginning.”
True to his word, he took her higher, again and again, until Chelsea was certain she had nothing left to give. And even then he proved her wrong.
When he finally claimed ultimate possession, surging into her, hot steel into velvet, she tightened around him, drawing him deeper, milking him, matching him thrust for thrust, rhythm for rhythm.
He lifted her spread legs so he could pound into her with a force that rocked the bed and caused fireworks to explode behind her closed eyes in fireballs of dazzling color. Although she would have thought it impossible, Chelsea felt him grow harder. And larger.
He called out her name and went rigid, the muscles of his neck standing out in stark relief. Chelsea felt the explosion deep within as he filled her with his seed, then immediately felt the inner spasms of her own release.
Groaning, Cash collapsed onto her. She wrapped her arms around his back, and her legs around his thighs, keeping him inside her, unwilling to surrender the feel of his hard moist body against hers.
His lips were pressed against her hair and he was murmuring soft, hypnotic words. But because of the wild pounding of her own heart in her ears, Chelsea couldn’t hear them.
Chapter Nineteen
Roxanne’s only consolation was that it didn’t take long. George’s sour whiskey-and-cigarette breath, as he covered her mouth with his had made her gag, and his unkempt fingernails had scraped her skin, but after forcing himself inside her, he’d climaxed after two quick pumps. Cursing, he’d immediately passed out.
She gingerly left the bed, grimacing at the sticky semen trailing down her leg. The knife was lying on the quilt, where he’d dropped it sometime during the forced sex. She picked it up, moved it from hand to hand, and looked down at him, fantasizing for a long luxurious moment cutting off his flaccid penis and balls.
Reluctantly reminding herself that this bastard rapist wasn’t worth doing hard time for, she instead took the knife and hid it away in her lingerie drawer, then opened the drawer of the bedside table and took out the Smith & Wesson revolver she’d bought last month for self-protection after someone had tried to break in.
She took the revolver into the bathroom with her, where she cleaned up, trying to wash away all traces of George Waggoner from her body. Although she longed to take a shower, she didn’t dare risk getting that far out of reach of her gun. Once he recovered, he would undoubtedly be back for more. And she intended for him to understand that the next time would be his last.
She dried herself, rubbing her inner thighs with a force that reddened her skin. She scowled at the teeth-shaped scrape on her breast. Dammit, he’d broken the skin. The human mouth was dirty at best; she shuddered to think what germs this man’s might be harboring.
Deciding that she’d have to think of some reason to talk her doctor into a prescription for antibiotics—although rabies shots would probably be more appropriate in this particular case—she took her emerald green silk robe from the hook on the back of the closet door, put it on, then returned to the bedroom.
He’d rolled onto his back and was sprawled atop her mattress. He was snoring loudly, his mouth open wide. He reached down, unconsciously scratching his groin, which drew her attention back to that limp, flaccid sex. When she viewed her own blood staining her precious quilt, fury surged through her, burning away any lingering pain, searing away her humiliation.
He’d pay for this, Roxanne swore. When she could think up an appropriate punishment. For now, she just wanted him out of her house.
She leaned over him, and pressed the barrel of the gun against his scrotum. “Wake up you son of a bitch,” she said. “I want you wide awake when I blow your fucking balls off.” Her threat garnered an immediate response.
His eyes flew open. “Roxanne, sugar—”
“Don’t you sugar me, you rotten, perverted son of a bitch. In fact, don’t you say a damn thing. Unless you want to be singing soprano real soon.”
His jaw slammed shut. His eyes were wide, all whites and dilated black pupils. She knew his mouth was dry when he nervously licked his lips.
“You raped me, George.” She pressed the barrel deeper into his unwashed flesh. “And for that, you’re going to pay. Big time.”
“Please, baby.” Sweat was pouring down his face. Off his nose, and from the tip of his shriveled penis, like a dripping faucet. His body was slick with the rank moisture. “Look, sugar, I mean, sweetheart—”
“Wrong word, George.” She cocked the pistol and smiled down at him. “It’s Ms. Scarbrough, remember?”
“Whatever you say. But you used to like being called Mrs. Waggoner,” he whined.
“That’s yet another thing you’ve got wrong, George.” She clucked her tongue. “This just isn’t a good day for you, is it?” She shook her head. “I’m afraid I don’t have any choice but to kill you.”
“Jesus H. Christ!” His eyes widened even further. He was shaking like a drunk coming off a bender. “You can’t kill a man just for forgetting your new name.”
“True. But I can kill him for raping me.” Her eyes were blue ice, her smile glacial. “Say goodbye, George.”
Roxanne was still smiling when she pulled the trigger.
Chelsea couldn’t remember ever being so happy. She lay with her head on Cash’s chest, listening as his heart, and hers returned to normal. One of his hands was caressing her back, the other was playing in the damp curls of her hair.
“That was amazing,” she said on a soft, satisfied sigh.
He kissed her shoulder. “We aim to please.”
And gracious, how well he’d succeeded. Beyond her wildest imagination! “Wonderfully amazing,” she repeated, still basking in the afterglow of passion. “And surprising.”
“Surprising? Are you saying you didn’t think I still had it in me to make you fly?”
“Oh, I knew from the moment I walked into Roxanne’s parlor you could do that. I just didn’t think you—we—could make love so slowly. So beautifully.”
She lifted her head and gave him a sweetly serious look that pulled at innumerable cords inside Cash. “I know this is going to sound like a horrendous cliché, but I’ve truly never experienced anything like that.”
“I’m glad.” He caught hold of her chin, leaned forward and kissed her. A deep, slow kiss that rekindled smoldering embers.
“I wonder why it was so different?” she mused when the heartfelt kiss finally ended.
Cash was not exactly in the mood for this conversation. He’d finally done what he’d been aching to do for weeks. And it was as good—better—than he’d hoped for. He would have preferred merely lying with her, enjoying the cooling aftermath of their passion. But knowing it was a woman’s nature to want to discuss things, he sighed and turned his mind to her question.
“I think it was different because it was different. There’s no big mystery involved, darlin’.”
“
But didn’t you feel it? How even though you were burning up, it was still somehow comfortable?”
“Comfortable?” Old shoes were comfortable. The battered, sweat-stained, decades-old cotton hat he wore fishing was comfortable. Old dogs and watermelon wine were comfortable. Sex with Chelsea would never fit that description. “Like boring?”
“Never.” She patted his cheek and gave him a benevolent, faintly patronizing smile. “You know what I mean.”
“No. I don’t think I do. Are you saying you weren’t turned on?” Let her just try to deny it, Cash thought.
“Of course not. I was merely trying to explain that in the old days, making love with you was always a little frightening. Tonight, as exciting as it was, I felt perfectly safe.”
Safe. Shit. That was even worse than comfortable.
“Well that sure gives a whole new meaning to safe sex,” he muttered.
“You’re not even trying to understand.” It was Chelsea’s turn to be irritated. She’d been so happy. She’d been floating on gilt-edged clouds of pleasure. Why did he have to ruin it by acting so much like a… She paused, trying to come up with exactly the right word. Man! she decided.
“Oh, I understand, sweetheart.” Before she knew what was happening, he’d reversed their positions, and was lying on top of her, his long legs entwined with hers, his body pressing her deep into the mattress. “I was trying to take my time. To let you get used to the idea of us being together again. To make tonight memorable.”
He was hard again. She could feel the hot rigid flesh pressing against her belly. He was using his superior strength to hold her to the bed in a way she found undeniably thrilling.
“It was.”
“Memorable, but safe.” He bent his head and bit her shoulder—not painfully, but hard enough she knew her skin would be bruised in the morning.
“Yes.” She’d begun to tremble.
He scraped his teeth down the crest of her breast, enjoying her sharp intake of breath. Then he lifted his head and looked into her eyes, which were darkening with rising desire. “I think it’s time for you to understand that what I feel for you isn’t always safe. And it damn well isn’t always gentle.”