by Lynsay Sands
“It is. He plays hard rock songs on his fiddle. He’s quite good,” Raffaele added when she appeared blank-faced.
“Okay,” she said dubiously. “But he isn’t here, so why would your aunt and uncle have any news to report to your parents?”
“Ah. Well, because I called my uncle to see if he could help with your situation,” he admitted solemnly. When Jess raised her eyebrows at this news, he added, “I thought if we had trouble getting your passport we could return you to Canada on one of the company planes.”
Her eyes widened incredulously. “Wow. That’s so sweet,” she breathed with wonder, but then shook her head and pointed out, “It really is kind of you to even think of that, but I’d still need a passport to get back into the country. Unless you planned to have the pilot fly low and let me parachute out before they reached the airport.” Her comment was teasing, but there was an undertone of wistfulness to her voice that made him suspect she wished she could do that.
“Do you know how to skydive?” he asked with curiosity.
Jess grinned and nodded. “I always wanted to try it, so Mom bought me lessons for my eighteenth birthday. She even went with me. We had a blast,” she added with a reminiscent smile. “And we went skydiving three or four times every summer after that until they died.”
“Your father didn’t join you?” Raffaele asked with interest.
Jess smiled faintly and shook her head. “Dad was a rock. They both were,” she added quickly, “but different kinds. Dad was a big, solid rock, planted firmly in the mud. He was support and strength and steady. Not a risk taker,” she added dryly, and then grinning, she added, “But Mom was a different kind of rock, a bright, sparkly one tumbling down the hill and skipping across the riverbed. She was strong too, but she was a risk taker.”
“And which did you take after?” Raffaele asked with a smile, suspecting he already knew the answer.
“A little of both, I think,” she said slowly. “I have a strong sensible streak, and a calm exterior, which is why I got stuck babysitting Allison.”
Her grimace as she said that made him chuckle softly.
“But,” she added, “I will take risks at times.”
“Like jumping off a pirate ship into an ocean full of sharks,” he suggested.
Jess nodded. “And trusting my well-being to three complete strangers who could have been just as bad as the pirates I’d escaped.”
Raffaele’s eyebrows flew up at the words. It hadn’t occurred to him that she might have some fears and concerns about him and his cousins, but they were strangers to her. In fact, he suspected if she hadn’t been hysterical, and drunk, she would not have stayed here in the room with them last night. She probably would have insisted on going to the room of one of her other relatives here at the resort rather than risk trusting strangers in a strange land, he thought with a frown. The thought made him reach out to clasp her hands where they lay on the table. “I promise you are safe with us, Jess. Neither I, nor my cousins, would ever do you harm.”
“I believe you,” she said softly, but her eyes were on their entwined hands.
His own gaze moved to them as his desire to reassure her gave way to an awareness of the sensations popping to life where their skin touched. Little frissons and a warm tingling had already enwrapped his hand and were now coursing up his arm to race through his body like an intravenous drug. It was bringing the blood rushing to the surface of his skin, making his muscles tighten with anticipation, increasing his heart rate and blood pressure, and his breathing was becoming faster and more shallow. His body was like an engine that had been turned on and was now revving, waiting for him to take his foot off the break. Raffaele almost retrieved his hand and sat back to allow the moment to pass. He’d intended not to start the physical relationship with Jess until they were away from Punta Cana and the worries and responsibilities both had here.
But then he recalled what Zani and Santo had said. Jess could be a life mate to the pirate captain too. He had given her a taste of the pleasure that could be had between life mates. Jess, however, didn’t care for the man and between that and her fear because he was a “vampire” had managed to fight her natural attraction to him and escape his clutches. But if the rogue pirate got his hands on her again . . .
Raffaele tightened his fingers gently and leaned forward as he drew her hand toward him.
Jess stared at their entwined hands, noting his darker skin against her still-pale flesh despite the sun she’d gotten since arriving in Punta Cana. Her skin was positively sparking under his. That was what it felt like anyway. It was the same thing she’d experienced with him before, and with Vasco. It was what gave her hope that she could still experience that crazy heady passion she’d experienced with the vampire pirate. But with someone else. Probably not Raffaele, though, she admitted on a small sigh. He always pulled back at this point, and she fully expected him to do it again now, so was surprised when, instead, he began to draw her hands across the small table and leaned forward in his seat.
Raising her gaze from their hands, she peered at his face and simply stared. She’d thought his eyes a brown so dark they looked black, with flecks of a blue so pale they seemed silver in the dark pool of his irises. But now his pupils were dilated, she saw. A sign of attraction Jess recalled from one of her classes as she stared at the large black holes and the silver rimming them. It was as if the flecks had coalesced in the smaller space left by the dilating pupils, shrouding the darker eye color. They almost seemed to glow in the sunlight coming in the window, she thought with wonder, and then glanced down with a start at their hands again. He had drawn her fingers to his mouth and was now pressing a kiss to her knuckles in an old-world gesture she’d read about but never seen.
Even as Jess thought that, his tongue slid out and ran between two of her fingers. The action left her mind blank, but not her body. It stiffened, every muscle and even her nipples tensing, even as something in her core softened like warmed butter and began to melt, sending liquid heat pouring downward. She wasn’t aware that her mouth had dropped slightly open until he suddenly raised his head and leaned across the table to claim her lips with his.
It started with a sweet brush of his soft mouth across hers that had an almost electrifying effect, and then it exploded into heat and passion. His tongue was filling her mouth, his lips slanting hungrily over hers and stealing her ability to think of anything but the need suddenly shuddering through her in mounting and overwhelming waves.
Jess was aware of his hands reaching for her, but still wasn’t sure how she ended up lying diagonally across the table, while he remained seated. But the position allowed his mouth to devour hers while his hands roamed freely over her body. He caressed her breasts through the thin T-shirt, kneading and massaging the eager flesh, and rubbing over her erect nipples, teasing them to a pebble-like state that was almost painful before moving down to cup her between the legs.
Jess cried out when his fingers pressed firmly there, rubbing eagerly over the cloth of her shorts and the panties barring his way as his tongue thrust in and out of her mouth. When he suddenly stood, she clutched at his upper arms, her upper body coming upright as he urged her legs around until she was sitting on the edge of the table in front of him.
She moaned with distress when he broke their kiss, and then gasped with surprise as her T-shirt briefly covered her face, but then it was gone, flying through the air. Raffaele paused briefly then, his gaze eating up what he’d revealed. There was no surprise on his face that she wasn’t wearing a bra, but then he’d probably felt the absence of one when he’d been caressing her through the T-shirt, she supposed, and then let her thoughts drift away as he kissed her again. Jess responded eagerly to his mouth on hers, kissing him fervently back, and then his hands slid up her stomach and claimed her breasts without the cloth in the way.
Jess gasped and jumped slightly on the tabletop at the contact, and then arched into the caress, her response to his kisses becoming more violen
t and demanding as he kneaded the eager flesh and teased the hard nipples. This time when he broke their kiss, she didn’t moan in protest. Instead, she leaned back and arched her chest upward, offering herself to him as he lowered his head to catch one excited nipple between his lips and began to lash and suckle it.
Moaning, Jess raised one hand to clasp his neck, and lowered her head to kiss the top of his as she murmured encouragement. She noted absently that his hair was clean and sweet-smelling and then one of his hands slid between her legs and began to rub her again and she let her head fall back on an excited cry, her bottom lifting up off the table and her legs spreading wider to allow him to step between them as he caressed her. Small tremors began coursing through her body. She was almost vibrating with excitement, some part of her mind acknowledged, and then Raffaele urged her to lie back on the table and released the breast he’d been suckling, to straighten and tug her shorts and panties off.
Jess sat up the moment they were off and was pulling his head back for another kiss before he’d even finished tossing them aside. Raffaele responded to the demand, his mouth claiming hers in a searing kiss, and then his hand was between her legs again and she cried out into his mouth as his fingers plundered her excited flesh, finding the center of her excitement and circling it firmly. Jess’s body responded eagerly, her hips shifting to meet the touch and her legs closing around his legs.
Desperate to end this sweet torture, Jess reached for the button of Raffaele’s jeans and managed to quickly unsnap and unzip them. She didn’t bother pushing them off. Instead, she ran one hand blindly along the cotton briefs underneath, and then slid her hand in to find and clasp the erection waiting there.
Dear God, he felt as hard as rock, she noted as her hand slid over him. And while he wasn’t a foot long or anything crazy like that, the man had some serious girth going there. Her fingers wouldn’t meet when she closed her hand around him and slid it along his hardness.
Distracted as she was by what she’d found, Jess wasn’t sure what Raffaele did then to cause the response she suddenly had. It was as if a second wave of pleasure was riding right next to the waves she was already enjoying. Before she could worry overmuch about that, Raffaele tried to urge her hand away. But Jess resisted and instead drew his erection closer, directing him to where she wanted. Getting the message, he stopped caressing her at once, but he also broke their kiss and pulled back to peer at her.
“Are you sure?” he asked, his body as stiff as a rod.
Jess didn’t even stop to think. She was trembling with need, her body dripping with desire. It knew what it wanted. She nodded abruptly and tugged his head back down to reclaim his lips. Much to her relief, even as he bent his head to kiss her, he clasped her hips, and when his tongue thrust into her mouth, he also thrust himself into her body. It was a double whammy that had her crying out into his mouth as her body closed around him, legs wrapping around his hips, arms around his neck, her lips sucking desperately as he withdrew and then thrust back into her.
Jess’s brain winked out then, able only to handle the mounting pleasure coursing through her and unable to process much else. She was vaguely aware of his shifting and that he was suddenly sitting in his straight-backed chair with her facing him in his lap, his hands urging her to ride him, and then one of his hands slid between them to begin to touch her again and Jess screamed as that barely started caress pushed her over the edge. Her release hit her with the violence of a tsunami so that she was hardly aware of Raffaele’s shout joining her own before darkness rushed in to wipe out her awareness.
It took Jess a moment to get her bearings when she woke up. At first, she had no idea where she was or how she’d got there except that she was sitting up slumped against something rather than lying down. She also didn’t seem to have the strength to move. Her body was still quivering like a harp string after it’s been plucked. That thought gave her pause. Still quivering? Oh. Right. She and Raffaele had—
Jess opened her eyes. They were seated at the dining table in the living room of the men’s suite. Well, Raffaele was seated at the table; she was still on his lap, facing him, her body slumped against his chest, her head resting—and mouth drooling—on his shoulder.
Grimacing, she closed her mouth and then her eyes to take stock. So, okay, she’d just had the best mind-blowing, earthshaking sex of her life. That was good, right? So, Vasco shouldn’t be such a temptation again if he got his hands on her. That made life a little less scary. Knowing she had this to turn to, she should be able to resist the lure of the vampire pirate and avoid becoming his soulless vampire/pirate bride, roaming the high seas, feeding on poor unsuspecting tourists.
Definitely good, Jess decided, and then gave her head a little shake. She was no shrinking violet. She’d dated in high school and university, and had sex with a handful of different boyfriends along the way. She considered herself experienced, and she’d thought at least two of her lovers in the past had been superskilled, but she had never before enjoyed sex so hot and passionate that it had left her a mindless, quivering mass near the end, and then unconscious once it was over. Good Lord! What was that? First Vasco had made her a mindless twit, and now Raffaele had just blown her mind entirely. Was it the men? Or did she have a tumor or something that was causing a release of hormones that would make sex with any man seem like the be-all and end-all?
Jess frowned at the thought. If just Vasco or Raffaele had affected her like this, that would have been one thing. But having two of them causing this reaction in her so close together was suspect. She might have a serious health issue here.
“Jess?” That murmur by her ear was accompanied by his hand sliding slowly up her back.
The caress made her groan as her body reacted eagerly to the touch. Jess was quite sure that, if it could, her skin would pull itself from her body and wrap itself around him like a blanket. Honestly, his touch was leaving a tingling path in its wake, she noted as his hand paused and started back down the way it had come in what was probably supposed to be a soothing caress, but was just exciting the hell out of her.
Hoping to end the caress, Jess raised her head and sat up. Big mistake, she realized at once. Not only did Raffaele immediately focus on her breasts now in front of his face within licking distance, but her lower body shifting on his reminded her of what they’d been doing when she’d passed out. He was still inside her, and while he’d apparently deflated and slid partway out after finding his satisfaction, he was now swelling again . . . and pushing back up into her as he did. Groaning, Jess closed her eyes and bit her lower lip as she fought not to shift on top of him again to encourage the growth happening.
“Jess.”
His voice was almost a growl this time, and she opened her eyes just in time to see his mouth close over one already hardening nipple.
“Oh, God,” Jess breathed, and then moaned as his mouth sent excitement whipping through her body once more. And then his hand slid between them again and he began to caress her. That was all he did, suckle her breast and caress her. Jess moved in response to his touch, her hips shifting, but she wasn’t riding him. She was chasing the pleasure he offered as he urged her to lean her upper body back against the table and bent over her, his mouth and tongue toying with first one nipple, and then licking their way to the other as his fingers danced over the damp eager flesh above where they were joined.
Her second orgasm came so hard and fast Jess almost bit her tongue in her surprise and then she screamed and thrashed on his lap briefly before welcoming the soothing embrace of the darkness that followed.
It was knocking at the door that woke Raffaele. Blinking his eyes open, he lifted his head abruptly and stared at Jess. While she still rested in his lap, her legs hanging limply on either side of his, she had fainted and fallen back, her upper body resting on the table, her face in repose and her breasts on display. She was beautiful, a feast to the eyes, and he couldn’t resist taking in his fill.
“Room service.”
> The words pushed through his fascination and he glanced toward the door with a frown and then began to move. Slipping his arms around Jess, he stood and then grimaced when his body responded to the movement. He was still inside of her, and had to lift her off of his again-growing cock, and then shift her and scoop her up into his arms before carrying her quickly to the bedroom. Raffaele laid her gently on the bed and covered her, then hurried back out of the room, pulling the door quietly closed behind him. He then put himself back in his pants and did them up as he hurried to the door.
The knocking hadn’t come again after the shout, so Raffaele wasn’t surprised when he opened the door to nothing. Stepping out into the open landing, he peered in the direction of the elevators and spotted the worker wheeling the cart back up the hall. Raffaele called out and the man glanced back, smiled, and then turned the cart to head back.
“Sorry. We’d fallen asleep,” Raffaele murmured when the man reached him.
“Ah,” the waiter said wisely, and then wheeled the cart into the room when Raffaele held it open for him.
Raffaele let the door slide closed and then followed the man across the living room.
The waiter wheeled the cart up to the table by the windows, but then retrieved a cleaning cloth and a spray bottle of cleaning fluid from the cabinet of the cart.
“Everything is always wet this time of year,” the man commented as he moved to the table.
Raffaele started to nod, but then stilled as he noted the dry spots on the table. One was definitely an ass print, he thought, and noted handprints as well before it all disappeared under a mist of cleaning fluid. Deciding it was a probably a good thing Jess wasn’t awake and out here right now, Raffaele left the man to it and moved to the tray to look over the many covered plates, the coffee carafe, a small pitcher of orange juice, and a smaller one of cream. It looked to him as if everything was there.
The sound of voices woke Jess. Opening her eyes, she peered around at the bedroom with two double beds in it, confused at first as to how she’d got there. The last thing she remembered doing was—