Daring in the Dark

by Jennifer Labrecque

  She folded her arms over her knees and rested her head on them. He stroked his soapy fingers over her shoulders, traced down the line of her backbone and then rubbed small circles over her back. She almost purred, it felt so good. “Ahh. You certainly know how to wash a back.”

  “Your back has beautiful lines.” He curled his fingers along her right side. “This curve. Very graceful.”

  Oh. The things he did and said—the way he made her feel. What was it about Simon that he unlocked more feelings, more response in her with a single touch than any man ever had with far more than a touch?

  “Thank you. And don’t even think about stopping and getting your camera.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.” Heat underscored his teasing tone.

  The water lapped around her as he gentled his soap-slicked hands up her sides, his fingertips barely brushing the sides of her breasts, to her underarms. My God, she’d never had anyone stroke her underarms, never knew it could feel so good.

  She raised her head and uncrossed her arms when he cupped his hands and ran them over her upper arms. He stroked the length of her limbs and she leaned back into him once again, her breasts tingling, tightening in anticipation of where his hands would roam next.

  He reached around, beneath her arms, and worked his finger magic across her collarbone, along her chest leading to the slope of her breasts and then the curve of her breasts, along the side, beneath them but never actually touching them or her nipples. Finally he cupped them and she dropped her head back against him, the thud of his heartbeat strong against her shoulder.

  “Yes.”

  “Is this what you wanted?” His breath gusted against her neck. “Is this what you’ve been waiting for?”

  “Yes.”

  “Me, too,” he purred next to her ear while his fingers found her nipples. Warmth rushed between her thighs as he plucked and kneaded and caressed. Judging by the way his cock surged against her back, he enjoyed fondling her breasts as much as she enjoyed his “fun.”

  He cupped his hands and sluiced water over her front, rinsing off the soap.

  “Now your back.” She leaned forward and he rinsed. He settled her once again against his chest.

  “Feel better?” He traced the shell of her ear with the tip of this tongue.

  “Much.” He expected her to think coherently…talk…when his tongue and mouth were…ooh.

  “I think you can feel even better yet,” he said, low and seductive.

  She closed her eyes when he kissed her neck. She loved having her neck kissed. It tingled through her body all the way to her toes. He could spend hours kissing her neck and she’d be a happy camper.

  “I don’t know…I’m feeling…ooh…very good.”

  “We’ll see about that,” he said and anticipation coursed through her. He ran his hands over the rounded mound of her belly and she tried to suck it in, to flatten it. His warm breath teased against her ear. “Stop, Tawny. Relax. You’re built like a woman’s supposed to be built. Soft, with curves in all the right places.”

  Go to the head of the class for that answer, Simon. He was so tuned in to her, seemed to read every nuance of her body language. He trailed his fingers, the lightest of touches, along the tops of her thighs.

  “Open your legs for me.” His voice was as thick as his erection nudging her from behind and reminded her of her dream that morning. It was a perfect blend of fantasy and reality and left her all the hotter still. She spread her legs and cool water rushed against her slick heat.

  Simon reached between her thighs, his arms and hands dark against her pale skin, and parted her with his thumbs. “Oh, luv, I like your bare style.”

  It had taken two margaritas of Dutch courage to actually work up the nerve to have another human being wax her there and it had hurt like hell, but when it was all said and done, once she’d gone bare she was never going back.

  She inched her legs farther apart. “Me, too. The better to feel you.”

  And feel him she did—every screaming, craving nerve ending in her body centered between her legs. He traced her with a finger until he found her clit and brushed against it. She whimpered and pressed against his hand. Okay, maybe her neck wasn’t her most sensitive spot.

  “Easy. Relax. Not so fast. Sit back and enjoy it. Savor it. You liked it when I did that?”

  “Yes.”

  “How about his?” He slid a finger into her and she forced herself not to arch into him, but she did clench her muscles around him.

  “Yes.”

  “You feel so good. You’re so much hotter than the water. It’s like dipping my finger into warm honey.”

  His voice, low and sexy, his words, his touch, the feel of his body behind her, his arms around her, the feel of his breath against her skin when he spoke, the faint scrape of his whiskers against her shoulder, the cool water lapping at her hot skin, all centered in her, through her.

  He alternated stroking along her slit and sliding a finger, then two fingers, into her, while his thumb worked magic on her clit. He cupped her left breast in his other hand, toying with her nipple, plucking, squeezing.

  Tawny gripped the sides of the tub and spread her legs wider, pressing against his hair-roughened legs on either side of her. Please. She couldn’t stand anything that felt this good much longer, but she also didn’t want it to stop.

  “Harder. Faster. Yes…yes…like that…oh…” She thrust her hips up to meet his fingers, driving him deeper within her, grinding her clit against the pressure of his thumb.

  “That’s it, luv. You’re so beautiful. I want you to come for me. That’s it…” Simon’s voice sent her over the edge. She turned her head and bit into his shoulder, suckling him, tasting the warm saltiness of his skin against her tongue as she spasmed with pleasure.

  She collapsed against him, quite simply because she didn’t seem to have a bone left in her body. She felt as fluid and formless as the water surrounding her.

  Simon pressed a kiss to her hair and wrapped his arms more firmly around her. “Oh, Tawny.”

  “Mmm,” she murmured and rubbed her cheek against his arm, the only response she was capable of at the moment. Slowly she came back together, fully aware of his hard ridge behind her, the taut muscles of his belly and chest, the tension banding his arms.

  She slid forward and turned around to face him on her knees. Sexual arousal and need etched his face, glittered in his eyes. With a slow smile she reached for the soap.

  “Your turn.”

  “I CAN’T GET IT UP,” TAWNY said, her frustration evident in the way she shoved her hair back off of her brow. “Do you want to try?”

  “Sure. I’ll have a go at it.” God this would be embarrassing if he couldn’t get it up for her, but there was no guarantee. He put his weight behind pulling up on the window sash. “These older buildings have been painted so many times, sometimes the window’s painted shut.” He felt the smallest amount of give. “I think it’s coming.” Yep. The window gave and opened a few inches. He wrestled it the rest of the way.“My hero,” she said, teasing him with a smile, but her eyes shone with something that wrapped around his heart.

  God, he was hopeless. He felt ten feet tall just because he’d opened the bloody window for her.

  “It’s no Arctic blast, but it’s a bit cooler than in here.” The drenching rain had brought little relief from the relentless heat. Steam rose from the pavement below.

  “When it rains at home, it’s steamy, too. But New York never smells fresh the way Savannah does after a rain,” Tawny said on a wistful note. She swept back the comforter and top sheet and settled against the pillows propped against her headboard. “At least the sheets are sort of cool.”

  She obviously had no intention of sitting in the cloying confines of her den. Suited him fine. He stretched across the end of the bed, a towel around his hips. His damp clothes were draped over the shower rod in the bathroom. She’d had the benefit of fresh clothes and wore a pair of black panties, which were
really just plain but very sexy, and a black tank top.

  “Do you miss Savannah?” he asked.

  “I miss certain things about it. The way it smells after a summer rain. The sound of a horse-drawn carriage on cobblestones. Spanish moss draping trees so old and sprawling they canopy the streets. Have you ever been there?”

  “No. I’m not well traveled outside of New York and England.”

  She traced a lazy pattern on his calf with her toe. He liked the casual way she touched him, as if she needed to and had the right to. “The slower pace might drive you insane, but you’d love the city itself.”

  They lay in the flickering light, with the sounds of New York drifting in through the window, and she painted a picture for him of her birthplace, of the history and architecture and culture. Whether she knew it or not, her voice slowed, took on more of that honeyed Southern accent that always underlay her words. He imagined the two of them enjoying a horse-drawn carriage ride along cobblestone streets beneath moss-drenched oaks.

  “You obviously love it. Why’d you leave?”

  “I do love it, and in a way it was hard to go, but not really. I left because I needed to.”

  “Needed to or wanted to?”

  “Needed to. I needed to step out of my comfort zone, discover new places, new things, discover myself.”

  She intrigued him with her mix of gutsiness, attitude, open sensuality and insecurities.

  “And have you? Discovered yourself?” he asked.

  “I thought I had. Tonight’s sort of blown me out of the water. But I think I’ve finally figured out it’s an ongoing process. Every day brings something new and different—some days more than others—like today. I know for certain I’m not the same person I was when I left, and that’s a good thing.”

  How did she feel about today’s changes? After this fiasco with Elliott, would she think about moving back home? She didn’t strike Simon as the type to run home to her mother, but he had to ask.

  “After this with Elliott, are you thinking about moving back?”

  She shook her head and gave him a funny look. Tendrils of loose hair danced across her shoulders. “Not in the foreseeable future. I love Savannah and it’ll always be home—I look forward to my visits—but New York has a pretty firm hold on my heart, as well. What about you? Have you ever wanted to live somewhere else?”

  Tawny was easy to talk to and the dark didn’t hurt either. Simon found himself telling her things he’d never told anyone else, perhaps never truly thought about consciously. “When I was a kid spending my summers in Devon, I wanted to stay there forever. When I got older, I realized it was my grandparents that drew me and not the place itself. Once I moved out on my own, New York felt more like home.”

  “My parents aren’t exactly warm and fuzzy either.”

  They weren’t even touching—well, except for her toe against his calf—but he felt closer to her emotionally than he ever had to anyone, even Elliott. He almost told her he hadn’t said that about his parents, but he supposed he had. Indirectly. She had a way of seeing through to him. And as she’d said earlier, what was the point of prevarication.

  “But you’re warm and outgoing. How did that happen?”

  “I’m an anomaly, the which one of these doesn’t belong.” She laughed and the rueful note tore at his heart.

  “I’ve always been the odd man out, as well.” He’d thought it innumerable times. It was liberating to say it.

  “What are they like?” she asked.

  “My parents?” She nodded. “Clever, engaging, articulate. They’re a self-contained unit. They made wonderful cocktail-party guests and lousy parents.”

  “No brothers or sisters?”

  “Nope. Just me.” And it had been just him in every respect. They hadn’t been a family. Growing up had been such a lonely experience until he and Elliott became friends that he didn’t particularly want to revisit it. “What was it like with two sisters?”

  He switched the conversation back to her. She looked at him and he knew she was onto him, but she indulged him nonetheless, launching into tales about her siblings.

  She was a natural storyteller. He loved the rhythm and cadence of her voice. There was a soothing quality to her speech even when she was regaling him with her childhood escapades.

  “You might be the baby of the family, but I’m seeing a pattern here. You’re definitely the instigator.”

  “Hmm. I told you…I’m the one who doesn’t quite fit.” Drowsiness exaggerated her drawl.

  “You sound tired,” he said.

  “I am. What time is it?”

  Simon checked his luminous watch. “Almost midnight.”

  “It’s still early, but I think I’m emotionally exhausted and then too much fun…”

  “Get some sleep.”

  “Mmm. That’s a good idea.”

  They’d had sex twice, but there was such an intimacy to actually sharing a bed with another person, letting your guard down enough to drift into unconsciousness….

  “Would you rather have me on the couch?” he asked.

  “No. Stay with me.” Don’t read more into it than she means. “It’s cooler in here…and I don’t want you to go. I changed the sheets this morning, if that was…you know, if you felt funny about… I’m making a mess of this.”

  “You’re not making a mess of anything.” He slid up the bed to stretch out beside her. She was one woman in a million—concerned that sleeping on sheets after Elliott would bother him. He ran his finger down the line of her nose and pressed a chaste good-night kiss to her forehead. “Thank you for telling me. Go to sleep and I’ll be right here.”

  She smiled sleepily, hands-down the most beautiful smile he’d ever seen, on or off camera. “Try to sleep, too.” She found his leg with her foot.

  “I will.”

  He lay in her bed and listened to the muted sounds from a city that never slept, even in the midst of a blackout, and the soft cadence of her breathing. Without forethought, he lightly stroked her hair away from her face, wanting only to touch her while he still could, unwilling to sleep away his time with her. She uttered a soft satisfied sound.

  “Simon?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m glad tonight happened.” Imminent sleep slurred her words.

  “So am I,” he said.

  Despite the suffocating heat, she shifted closer to him and—what the hell, they were both sweaty and sticky—he pulled her into his body. Her thigh slid between his and she curled her arm across his chest. She pressed a tender, drowsy kiss to his chest and he quietly fell a little harder, faster, deeper in love with her.

  8

  “NO! COME BACK!”

  Bloody hell! Simon jerked up, momentarily disoriented by the strange bed, candles and a screeching woman. Righto. Tawny. Her bed. Blackout.“What’s the matter?” He jumped to his feet and grabbed Tawny, who shook like a leaf.

  “Peaches.” She gulped air and motioned to the bedroom window. “He pushed through the screen and went out the window. He’s on the ledge.” She death-gripped his arm. “He doesn’t have any front claws. What if he slips out there?”

  She loved that cat. Simon didn’t hesitate, didn’t think, he just did. He worked the screen loose, tossed it back into the room and stuck his head out the window.

  “Can you see him?” Tawny squeezed into the window opening. “Oh, God.”

  Peaches, now that the deed was done, apparently realized the error of his ways and huddled on the ledge several feet away.

  She lowered her voice. “Come on, baby. C’mere, Peaches. I’ve got a nice kitty treat waiting for you.” Her voice shook.

  Peaches yowled in kitty hysteria but didn’t budge. Brilliant. If the people in the next apartment opened their window, the cat would probably be startled off the ledge.

  Tawny gripped his arm again and Simon tried to reassure her. “Just stay calm.”

  “I’m going out there after him,” she said.

  “Blood
y hell you are.”

  “I can’t just leave him.”

  “I’ll get him.”

  “No. I can’t let you do that. And he doesn’t know you anyway.”

  Over his dead body was she going out on that wet ledge. He looked down—all seven floors down—and it might very well be his dead body—but no way, no how was he letting her go.

  “Panicked animals respond better to strangers in a rescue situation. I saw it on Animal Planet.” Total, absolute codswallop—to borrow Grandpa Dickie’s favorite expression—and he’d lie again to keep her off the ledge. He edged her out of the window frame and back into the bedroom.

  “Wait here and I’ll hand him to you.” He didn’t give her a chance to argue. He climbed out of the window and onto the ledge. It was far narrower than it had appeared from inside.

  He gripped the window frame with his left hand and slowly stood, struggling to maintain his balance. He braced his right hand against the rough brick, wishing the ledge was made of the same instead of slick, wet marble. He hugged the building.

  He made the mistake of glancing down. Vertigo rocked him. Head swimming, he teetered and then regained his balance. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He didn’t like heights worth a damn.

  “Simon, get back in here,” Tawny said, her head shoved out the window, near his knee.

  “I will when I get the cat.” He kept his eyes trained on the building and Peaches.

  “How are you going to do that?”

  She’d picked a jolly time and place for a conversation. “I don’t know. I’m working on a plan now.”

  “Don’t you think you should’ve thought about it before you went out there?”

  “I think best under pressure.” More codswallop.

  He edged toward Peaches, and his towel—the knot loosened by this climb out the window—inched down his hips. Lovely. He was only wearing a towel and it was falling off. Moving very slowly and carefully, he took it off and draped it over one shoulder. Better to hang his bare butt over a ledge than get tripped up by a towel.

  Fuck again. He wasn’t even going to die with dignity. Honor perhaps but no dignity.