by Trish Wylie
She crinkled her nose. ‘Not so much.’
‘Well, then.’ He looked out to sea, the sky on the horizon hinting at fingers of amber morning light while he contemplated how far to go with the story of the compass. With a deep breath, he looked down at her from the corner of his eye. ‘Wanna hear the rest?’
There was a chance she might read more into it than was there, but she’d trusted him so Adam could trust her in return. The boundaries of their relationship had already been set, she knew where she stood. Somehow he knew she’d appreciate the story, even before she nodded with enthusiasm.
When she batted her lashes at him he shook his head. ‘There’s no once upon a time so don’t get too excited.’
‘Spoilsport.’ She pouted.
Adam smiled at her antics. ‘He gave it to my great-grandmother as a wedding present. Every time he went to sea she would put it around his neck. So he could find his way back to her, she’d say. Then when he came home he’d put it back round her neck because—’
‘Because he’d found his way home…’
When Adam looked down at her she was staring at the compass, a wistful expression on her face. He frowned. Women tended to read between the lines. But before he could backtrack any she closed it over and let it go, leaning back against his shoulder. ‘Sounds like they were very much in love.’
They’d certainly been devoted to each other their entire lives; they died within a week of each other he’d been told. But he didn’t tell her that. Instead he told her another part of it. ‘He found a poem with a compass in it—part of it was engraved on their tombstone here on the island. Smart guy, my great-grandfather—knew how to wrap a woman round his little finger with words.’
Roane snorted gracefully, her fingers playing on his wrist again. ‘I bet she let him think he did. What was the poem?’
‘Shakespeare.’
She echoed his earlier demand. ‘Go on.’
When he hesitated she looked up at him and he saw the flash of realization in her eyes, swiftly followed by what looked like amusement to him. ‘I’m not gonna end up wrapped round your little finger with words, Adam.’
‘Ah, but I already found a way of wrapping you round my little finger without words, didn’t I?’
Her chin dropped and she ran her hand down his wrist to his finger. ‘Tell me about the ring, then. I’m guessing there’s a story to go with it if everything else you wear has one…’
The story behind the ring was out of bounds, especially to her. He didn’t need her pity. So Adam pushed his hand underneath her thigh, out of reach; gaining a shudder of awareness from her when he spread his fingers and kneaded her soft skin through the light material of her nightdress.
‘It’s a famous love poem.’
‘The story behind the ring?’
‘The Shakespeare.’ He looked out at the ocean and smiled, nudging her with the arm supporting her to get her attention. ‘Sun’s coming up. Look.’
She turned her head, so he shifted her round a little to see better, lowering his mouth to just above her ear to tell her, ‘Sunrises fall into the unforgettable experiences category.’
‘I know.’ Her tone had softened again.
Adam breathed in her light scent—moving his chin against the neck of her sweater to press his mouth against the sensitive skin below her ear. ‘Let’s see what we can do to make it more unforgettable, shall we?’
‘Hmm.’ She angled her head to make room for him.
When her hand slid up the inside of his leg Adam felt the rush of adrenalin through his veins. Shifting his hand from her thigh to underneath the edge of her sweater, he sought out her breast, filling his palm. She sank into him in response, her nipple beading as he rolled it; she was so responsive it was becoming a drug to him.
When he lifted his lashes he saw the fiery ball of the sun breaking the horizon.
‘I don’t remember all of it—’ he didn’t care if she knew it was a lie ‘—but it starts with: “Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds” and then moves on to say something about “it is an ever-fixed mark…”’
She turned her face and looked up at him while he looked back at her and continued lightly caressing her breast as he added, ‘The bit about the compass is further in…’
Roane searched each of his eyes in turn, her breathing becoming shallow. Then she shrugged back her sleeve and curled a hand around his neck to draw his mouth down to hers. ‘No wonder she wanted him to come back to her.’
Adam resisted the last inch that stood between their lips, his gaze locked with hers and his voice a husky rumble. ‘Handsome devil too.’
Roane’s eyes smiled at him. ‘Just would be.’
‘Probably a girl in every port…’
He leaned in and brushed her lips with his. Roane in turn lifted her other arm and wrapped it around his neck, light now dancing in her darkening eyes as her voice took on a seductive huskiness.
‘Don’t ruin it for me.’
Adam studied her eyes and then asked what he’d been burning to know for hours, his voice low and rough. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Tell you what?’
‘How inexperienced you were.’
When doubt crossed her eyes and she avoided his gaze he leaned back a little, his voice firmer. ‘Look at me.’
Her lashes lifted, blinking slowly as she looked into his eyes. Then she took a deep breath. ‘Would it have made a difference?’
‘No.’ Adam tightened his hand against her breast, brushing his thumb over her nipple and earning a gasp from her parted lips as her eyelids grew heavy. Smiling with satisfaction, he kept his tone deliberately low. ‘You thought it would?’
Roane didn’t answer him.
Moving his hand, he caught her nipple between his thumb and forefinger, the move arching her spine away from the band of his arm and drawing a soft moan from low in her throat. ‘It wouldn’t. You’ve got fire in you. I could see it. Wanted it. Still do.’
‘You put the fire in me,’ she breathed.
‘No. You already had it in you. You just make me want to bring it out. If you tried holding it back I’d work harder for it.’ Any man who considered himself a man would do the same in Adam’s opinion.
Roane was looking at him as if she’d never seen him before or as if he was something completely new and fascinating to her. It was momentarily unsettling. So Adam moved his hand over her breast again and smiled when her eyes closed and she offered her neck to him.
Tilting his head to one side, he lowered his mouth to her skin and kissed his way up to her ear. ‘Ever make love outdoors?’
She groaned. ‘We can’t.’
He was already moving his hand down her body and dragging her nightdress up her legs. ‘Yes, we can.’
‘No, we can’t.’ Her body made a lie of the words by parting her legs as he trailed his forefinger up the inside of her thigh. ‘We don’t have anything…’
Adam lifted his head to look down at her languid eyes, her full lips parted and waiting. ‘Still have a lot to learn, don’t you?’
He began lowering her to the blanket he’d brought down from a swing seat on her porch. When she was lying on her back looking up at him he studied her face, temporarily floored by what he could see in her eyes. She was giving herself to him openly and completely. Even when the flicker of her lashes told him how unsure she was of herself. He brushed her hair back from each of her cheeks in turn, savouring the feel of her soft skin beneath his fingertips. Then he traced her mouth, his gaze lowering to watch as her lips parted and the brush of her exhaled breath whispered warmth over the back of his hand. When he looked back up there was wonder in her eyes too, a sense of awe that he could make her feel what she felt? She really had no idea how much of a siren was buried beneath her cloak of inexperience.
Adam wanted to strip that cloak away and let the siren out to play. He was going to tempt her out…
So he lowered his mouth to hers and sipped from her lips
, as if she were the finest of wines and every single drop were nectar. He felt her small, cool hand against his cheek, her fingers splaying out against the skin warmed by the heat of the fire in front of them and between them. When he lifted his mouth he turned his head and kissed her palm, framing the back of her hand with his and threading his fingers through hers as he angled it back and kissed the beating pulse at her wrist before gradually working his way up her arm.
Lifting their joined hands above her head, he got to a point where her sleeve was in the way.
‘I told you, you should stay naked,’ he complained. ‘Up.’
Tugging the sweater unceremoniously over her head, he smiled a small smile at her rumpled hair and shining eyes, balling the soft material in his fist and setting it under her head for a pillow. ‘There.’
Gaze locked on hers, he unbuttoned the pearl beads down the front of her nightdress, his palm pushing the edges apart so he could look at her. Adam had always had a deep and abiding appreciation of the female form, but with Roane it was more than that. He ran his fingertips from the base of her neck, through the valley of her breasts to the indentation on the slight curve of her stomach. She was perfection.
When she shivered he looked into her eyes. Was she cold? No, not cold. He’d made her shiver with desire. For him. It made him feel like a god.
Moving his flattened palm, he cradled her hip as he kissed her again; drinking deeper, suckling on her bottom lip until she opened her mouth on a sigh. When he moved his palm upwards, letting it learn the inward curve of her waist, she shifted on the blanket to get closer. But when he let his fingertips whisper over her ribs she squirmed, and he felt the low echo of muffled laughter in her throat. Ticklish. He smiled against her mouth. He liked that.
Kissing her deeper still, he sought out her tongue. Then he filled his hand with her breast again, growling at how perfect a fit she was, the bead of her nipple dead centre in his palm. As if she were made for him, or born from his imagination.
Moving over her and settling into the cradle she’d formed for him he dragged his mouth from hers and kissed down her neck, feeling her arch up into him as he kissed his way to her breast and held it up in his hand to draw her nipple into his mouth. She moaned—and when he caught it between his teeth, she gasped. Adam felt like a musician playing a delicately strung instrument. Each place he kissed brought forth a different sound that then vibrated through him and echoed in empty spaces he hadn’t known he had. And when he did know, it felt as if the hollowness had to be filled with her.
Pushing an arm under the upward curve of her spine, he dragged her upright, rocking back on his bent knees and hauling her onto his lap. When he looked up at her he saw wide eyes filled with a combination of arousal and surprise, so he yanked her closer; the material of her nightdress bunched tight between her legs as she came into contact with the ridge of his erection.
Awareness flushed her cheeks. She rocked her hips experimentally against him, her sharp intake of breath and the way she bit down on her lower lip distracting Adam from the rush of blood to his throbbing groin.
‘Adam—’
When she breathed his name like that it did him in. Didn’t she know that?
Thrusting his fingers into her hair, he angled her head back, using the arm around her waist to control the backward arch of her body as he lowered his head to her breasts. Every pull of his hungry lips earned him another rock of her hips against him, her hands clinging to his shoulders and her fingernails pushing into his skin. He could almost feel the siren struggling free…
He pushed the material off her shoulders, down her arms, letting it pool around her waist as he twisted it around his fist behind her back and pulled it tighter between her legs, adding to the friction of her movement. But when she realized what he’d done she froze, her body trembling from within.
Adam kissed her neck and turned his head to whisper roughly into her ear, ‘Don’t stop.’
Sliding his hand down, he cupped the back of her neck between long fingers and his thumb and lifted his head—the tip of his nose almost touching hers as he looked into her eyes and tugged the material tight again. ‘Take what you need from me.’
Roane swallowed hard, her voice husky. ‘I can’t.’
‘Yes, you can.’
‘But you won’t—’
‘Not this time.’ And if she had any idea what it was costing him she wouldn’t look at him the way she was. ‘I want to watch you.’
‘I can’t.’ The agony in her eyes came through in the wobble of her soft voice. She wanted to please him. What she didn’t know was her pleasure alone pleased him. He could wait. For now…
‘You can.’ He angled his head, his mouth hovering over hers. ‘I can make you.’
Still looking into her eyes, he dragged her lower lip between his teeth and let go. ‘I can wind you up so tight you won’t be able to stop yourself. Your body belongs to me now.’
He kissed the lip he’d tugged when a flash of fear crossed her expressive eyes. ‘I can make you do it with words alone if I want to…’
Moving his head again, he set his cheek to hers and spoke into her ear again, his voice low and even, the words purposefully slow. ‘I can tell you what it felt like when I was deep inside you. I can tell you what it was like when you came around me…’
Her hips moved restlessly against him, her breathing ragged in his ear.
‘I can tell you how amazing it was.’ He pressed his lips to her ear lobe. ‘I can tell you how much I want to feel it again. And again. And again. I can tell you how many times I want to come inside you the way I did…’
Roane whimpered and moved rhythmically against him.
Adam smiled, holding the material in place and feeling the shudder of her body as she got closer to the edge. ‘Take what you need. I want you to.’
‘Oh, God—’
She wrapped her arms around his neck and held onto him as if her life depended on it, her breasts rubbing against the wall of his chest and making him wish his T-shirt wasn’t in the way. He wanted her skin to skin with him, nothing between them, nothing in the way. He wanted to drive deep into her body and get lost in her. He wanted her screaming his name. He wanted.
He was consumed with need. He’d never felt that before. She was like a fever in his blood.
She rocked her hips forwards, grinding herself onto his erection. Then she stilled. A low moan pushed upwards from inside as her body shook uncontrollably.
Adam leaned back, his fingers in her hair so he could pull her head back and see her face. Her eyes were hooded, glittering and so very dark it was almost as if she wasn’t there. Her lips were parted, the air she dragged into her lungs making her lower lip tremble. Her cheeks were flushed—a strand of hair was stuck against her damp forehead…
She was sensational.
Adam’s heart thundered in his chest, his breathing ragged, his gaze so intensely focused on her he was frowning in concentration. He burned for her.
Her breasts heaving between them, Roane’s eyes slowly returned to a closer shade of the luminous blue he knew so well. She damped her lips, dropped her gaze to his mouth, and then leaned forwards—the voice of a seductive siren making a determined demand: ‘Now you.’
Adam groaned as their mouths fused together. Hell, yes. She could do what she wanted. He was all hers.
CHAPTER NINE
WHEN HE TOSSED the helmet at her she scrambled to catch it and looked up at him with wide eyes, laughing nervously. ‘Oh, I don’t think so.’
‘Trust me, sweetheart. You’ll love it.’
Her gaze shifted to the shining black metal of his beast of a motorcycle, then back to Adam. She didn’t know which one gave her more of a kick to look at, frankly. The motorcycle was dangerous and risky and would probably be the experience of a lifetime—and Adam…Actually in fairness there was very little difference between them. She liked to think Adam was less likely to kill her, though…
He was buttoning up his tradem
ark shirt-worn-over-T-shirt, long fingers moving with the same dexterity he’d used on her body for hours on end. Roane felt a newly familiar rush of heat prickle over her skin as she watched him. How could she still want him that much when he’d pretty much pleasured her into a languid puddle? She had muscles that ached in places she hadn’t even known she had muscles, but since each and every ache came with a memory…
On second thought maybe he did have the means to kill her. But what a way to go.
He patted the seat of the bike. ‘C’mon.’
Roane wavered, grimacing. ‘Do I have to?’
The hesitation seemed to surprise him. ‘You can fly a plane but you’re afraid to get on a motorcycle?’
Cocking a brow, she made a circle with a limp-wristed hand. ‘Do we want to turn that one round and take another look at it? Planes are statistically safer than motorcycles.’
He took a long stride towards her and grabbed her elbow, tugging her forwards. ‘Have you ever even been on a motorcycle?’
‘No. I don’t know anyone who owns one.’
‘You do now.’ He lifted the helmet out of her hands and set it on the seat beside his before reaching out to button up her jacket. ‘Consider it one of many firsts I’ve brought your way. I’m broadening your horizons.’
Roane found it difficult to focus on excuses when the backs of his fingers were working their way up from her stomach, over her ribs and lingering on her breasts. But when he lifted his chin and smiled lazily at her she sighed heavily, fully aware of the fact he knew what he’d just done to her.
‘If you kill me I’m never speaking to you again.’
‘I’ll keep that in mind.’ He placed a swift kiss on her mouth and reached for the helmet.
‘Please do.’ She laughed. ‘’Cause I’m not much use to you if—’ The rest of the sentence was muffled as he pushed the helmet onto her head, patting the top of it with a grin when she scowled at him.
‘There.’ He buckled the strap under her chin while she set her hands on her hips. ‘You’re good to go.’
Roane tugged the front of it down a little to tell him, ‘You white-knuckle me and this is gonna be the shortest relationship in the history of mankind.’