by Sandra Brown
"What?"
Taking her hand, he slid it down his body and pressed it against the distended fly of his tennis shorts. "It wouldn't be fair of you to start something you don't intend to finish, would it?"
She shook her head and reflexively squeezed the rigid proof of how much he wanted her. "Oh, God." Groaning, he gave her another searing kiss.
Pent-up frustration erupted in an explosion of sexual desire. Their arms wrapped tightly around each other. Their kisses were carnal, ravenous.
Still clinging to each other, they stumbled into the nearest bedroom, his. Blindly he reached for the switch of the ceiling fan. It began to rotate over their heads and cast flickering shadows on the walls as they worked off shoes and bent to remove their socks. They bumped heads but barely noticed in their haste.
He whipped his T-shirt over his head. Stevie did the same. He reached for the front clasp of her bra and unfastened it, shoving the lace cups aside. He touched her briefly, feathering her nipples with his fingertips, making them instantly stiff.
Eyes trained on them, he unzipped his shorts and let them drop. Stevie shrugged off her bra and removed her shorts. Judd, with some difficulty and a near-comical grimace, removed his jock strap.
Stevie couldn't bring herself to glance down, though she wanted to. She hooked her thumbs into the elastic of her panties, but couldn't bring herself to take them off, either. She looked up at him with silent appeal.
"That's good enough for now," he whispered taking her hand and pulling.her toward the bed.
He lay down on his back and pulled her on top of him. Cupping her head between his hands, he gave her a long, thorough kiss, sending his tongue deep into her mouth. His legs sawed restlessly against hers. One knee insinuated itself between her thighs and worked its way up until she was riding it.
With one hand, he began tugging her underpants down over her hips. Then he rolled her onto her back and removed them completely. His eyes swept her hungrily. His hands skimmed the surface of her body, touching her breasts, nipples, thighs, the cluster of curls covering her mound.
"Stevie," he mumbled thickly before levering himself above her and pressing his face into the cover of her shoulder.
"Judd?"
"Yes, sweetheart, right now.'
"Maybe you should know-"I do know, baby. Believe me, I do.' "I'm a virgin."
His head popped up. Eyes that had been foggy with passion came into sharp focus as instantly as a high-tech camera.
"A what?"
Even after she repeated the word, he stared at her with patent disbelief. Slowly he eased himself up, rolled over to his side and sat on the edge of the bed, keeping his back to her.
"God, I wish I hadn't quit smoking."
He rested his face in his hands, digging into his eye sockets with the pads of his fingers. Eventually he peered at her over his shoulder. She had self-consciously pulled the bedspread over her.
"How did you wind up a virgin?" She gazed at him with puzzlement. "I'll rephrase. Why, how, are you still a virgin?"
"Maybe you should have finished what you started in Stockholm."
"With Presley Foster breathing down my neck? No thanks. Did he scare off all your would-be lovers?"
"In fairness to him, no. I did. Not overtly," she added when he gave her a curious look. "I just never took the time to let anything develop.
Potential boyfriends always took second place to tennis."
"Second place isn't a healthy or desirable spot for a man's ego."
"So I discovered." She moistened her lips nervously. "I wouldn't have told you if I'd known you were going to stop."
"I wouldn't have gone so far if you had told me sooner."
"Does it matter that much?"
He laughed hoarsely, humorlessly. "Yeah, it matters. A lot."
"Why? I don't think it would have mattered in Stockholm."
"Maybe, maybe not. But in Stockholm I was young and stupid. Now I'm old and stupid. At least when you're young and stupid you've got an excuse for being stupid."
Stevie closed her eyes briefly, then she stretched out her arm and laid her hand on his bare shoulder. "Please, Judd, comeback."
Keeping his eyes averted, he stubbornly shook his head no. "I can't assume that responsibility, Stevie."
"It doesn't come with obligations."
"They're implied."
"Not to me."
"Tome."
"Please."
"I said no."
A small, strangled sob escaped her.
Judd's head snapped around. He saw her tears, saw the pleading in her eyes. Apparently they touched him in a way her temper tantrums could not. The resolution keeping his lips compressed and uncompromising deserted him. His features softened.
He lay down beside her again and drew her against him. "Don't cry, Stevie. Don't." Typically a cynic where women's tears were concerned, he held her close and kissed her brow with commiseration.
She nuzzled his naked chest, rubbing her face against the pelt of crinkling hair. "Please, Judd, make love to me while I'm still whole. I want it to be you."
Why?"
"Sentiment, maybe. Even though you doubt it, I know it would have happened in Stockholm if Presley hadn't stopped us." She touched his nipple with the tip of her tongue, licking it deftly, and pressed her palm against his hot, swollen flesh.
"Oh, baby," he moaned, threading his fingers up through her hair. "Stop."
"I don't want to stop."
"You've got to, or- "
"I want to be a complete woman once. Just once, Judd, please."
She dusted his chest with soft, airy kisses, swinging her head back and forth as she worked her way down. She kissed his stomach, then his belly, which was rapidly rising and falling. Her lips tracked the satiny stripe of hair that fanned out denser and coarser on his lower body. He was in a state of supreme agitation and had almost reached the point of no return when he closed his fingers around her head and raised it.
He rolled her to her back and leaned over her.
"Okay," he rasped breathlessly, "if you're sure."
"Absolutely sure." He nodded grimly.
Laughing, she touched the corners of his mouth.
"Your frown is death to my ego. You could look a little happier about it."
"I'm worried."
"I told you not to be. There are no strings attached."
"It isn't that."
"Then what?" Her eyes rounded and she gasped. "You do know how, don't you?" she asked teasingly.
"Yeah, I know how," he said, his intensity unchanged. "And hard and fast isn't the way to do it the first time. If you keep doing stuff like that…" He blew out a breath and shook his head as though to clear it. "I'm going to set the tempo.
Got that?"
She nodded obediently, though she wasn't sure she could keep such a rash promise when her blood was surging through her veins with a mix of want and wonder. She wasn't sure Judd could stick with the plan, either. His breathing wasn't any steadier than hers and his face was ruddy with arousal.
"Alright, kiss me," he instructed her huskily.
"Forget everything you've ever heard about technique. Kiss me the way you think a 'bad girl' would and we'll both have a much better time."
Taking his advice as a challenge, Stevie linked her arms around his neck and drew his head down. His open mouth met hers, and it was a melding of dual passions. His tongue probed the soft, wet heat of her mouth, sliding in and out, mating with her tongue, which then returned the favor to him, apparently to his satisfaction, for he groaned with pleasure and drew it deeper into his mouth.
His hands rubbed her back, then gradually pulled the bedspread from between them until they were lying naked face to face again. She felt the warm, smooth tip of his shaft against her belly. His thighs pressed against hers. Her breasts lay lush and full against his hard chest; her nipples nestled in the dark, curly hair.
All the sensations were exquisite. The contact with his raw masculin
ity made her feel wholly female. She wondered how she had survived this long without being intimately acquainted with his body.
And she realized at that moment that she was falling madly in love with her enemy.
Asking him to make love to her had little or nothing to do with Stockholm or with sentiment, or any other excuse she could have conjured up. She wanted to be with Judd, be a part of him, entirely, without reservation or inhibition.
It was as simple as that.
Though, actually, it wasn't simple at all. It was very complex. Too complex to muddle through while his mouth was inching down her throat.
He scooped her breast toward his descending mouth and sucked on the tip with strong, urgent tugging motions that touched off responsive chords in her womb. "Ah, Judd," she cried in ecstasy.
"You're sweet, Stevie. Very sweet." He moved to her other breast while his fingers caressed the nipple he'd just left wet and erect.
"Please," she gasped moments later as his tongue feathered one stiff crest. She thrust her hips forward, grinding them against his rigid manhood.
Moaning low, he smoothed one hand down her body and between her thighs. He caressed her gently, moving his fingers between the velvety folds. "Almost, but not quite," he told her, smiling gently into her face before lowering his head and kissing her stomach.
His hands stroked the insides of her thighs, urging them to separate, though without any hint of threat, coercion or violation. He nipped her skin lightly with his teeth and bathed her navel with his tongue.
She cried his name sharply when he kissed the cluster of pale curls between her thighs. Then his tongue, soft and inquisitive and agile, entered her. He kissed her deeply, again and again, until her head was thrashing on the pillow and her body was quickening to the strokes of his tongue.
Rapturously she submitted to the spirals of sensation that were winding her being tighter and tighter. At the height of her release, she clutched handfuls of his hair and gasped his name.
A film of perspiration had broken out on her face when he raised himself above her. He sipped at it while he positioned himself between her thighs and lifted her hips against his.
Holding her there, he pressed into her by slow degrees, letting her body gradually adjust to his hard length, so that by the time he was buried snugly inside her, the only difficulty either had experienced was in holding back the passion that demanded immediate fulfillment.
"You feel wonderful surrounding me," he whispered, softly kissing the lips she had bruised with her own teeth. He swallowed hard and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, reveling in the ecstasy of being inside her. "You feel sensational."
She murmured his name in a breathy voice while her fingers ghosted lovingly over his face.
She was unaware of the tears that glistened in her eyes, but he saw them.
"Are you okay?"
She nodded her head quickly. "Yes, yes, yes."
"Well, I'm not," he said, baring his teeth.
"I'm about to die. But, God, it's a helluva way to go."
He began moving inside her, stroking her until they were both senseless and all that mattered was succumbing to the tumult of emotion that seized them. When they did, he pressed his forehead upon hers and chanted her name.
"Want me to-"
"No."
Judd chuckled. "You didn't let me finish.
"Whatever it is, I don't want you to do it because you'd have to move. And if you move, I'll have to," she said, yawning listlessly, "and I don't think I can."
Judd did move, but only to pull her into the circle of his arms and prop his chin on the top of her head. Stevie moved, too, curving her arm around his waist.
"Why did you taunt me on the tennis court this afternoon?" she asked.
"Because you were playing poorly, and the reason you were was that you didn't consider me a worthy opponent and, therefore, weren't putting forth any effort."
"I was playing poorly, yes, but not because I didn't consider you a worthy opponent."
"Then why?"
"My head wasn't in the game."
"Where was it?"
"Here."
"Here?" Judd angled his head back. "You mean here, like we are now?"
"Hmm."
"You just won't let me lie, will you?" he said around a resigned sigh. "In all honesty, that's the reason I was taunting you." Stevie lifted her head off his chest and looked up at him, her expression questioning. "Making love to you is all I've thought about since the other morning when we were interrupted."
"Me, too."
"All you had to do was ask, lady."
"I did."
He looked chagrined. "Oh, yeah, you did, didn't you? Well, you know what I mean."
Smiling, she returned her head to his chest and began idly plucking at the hairs tickling her nose.
"I can't believe I'm lying here like this with you, naked and sated. I've often thought that if I ever got you alone, I'd kill you slowly."
He placed his lips close to her ear. "If you hadn't come when you did and given me the green light, you might have succeeded." She giggled and gave his buttock a hard pinch. "Imagine the headlines," he went on, undaunted,
"'Famous Tennis Pro Screws Famous Sportswriter to Death.'"
"Will you behave? This is serious. I don't think you realize how badly your nasty articles have wounded me."
His soft laughter subsided. "Why didn't you just consider the source and blow them off?"
"Because almost everything you've written about me is true."
His hand ceased strumming her spine. He eased her off him, placed her on her back, and rolled to his side. Propped on one elbow and leaning over her, he asked, "What are you talking about?"
"Off-the-record?"
"In journalistic circles, when the interviewer is in bed with the interviews in a state of undress and sexual repletion, it's generally understood that whatever is said is unprintable."
"Oh. Thank you for clarifying that."
"You're welcome. Now quit stalling and run that by me again. What do you mean, everything I've written about you is the truth?"
"A lot of it was. You've often said that I don't belong on a tennis court. In a way, you're right, Judd. From the very beginning my father discouraged me from playing because tennis was 'a rich kid's sport.' I played anyway, but what he had said stuck with me. It gave me a complex. I wasn't like the other players. I wasn't as… as privileged.11 "That's nonsense."
"Maybe, but that sense of inferiority compelled me to prove myself. I had to work harder at it than anyone else, always playing catch-up. I was accepted into most clubs because of my ability on the court, not my pedigree.
"I always had to be better," she stressed, making an appeal for his understanding, "because acceptance depended on it. That's why, when I was financially able, I always dressed well and played up to the spectators. Don't you see, Judd? I was saying, 'Hey, look at me. I'm worthy of your attention.' I was desperate to win approval.
And, yes, sometimes I even resorted to being cute just to ensure that I wouldn't be ignored.
"You saw through all my machinations," she told him in a voice husky with emotion. "You had me pegged from the very beginning. Your columns struck terror in me because they were so incisive. I feared that if my insecurities were visible to you, they must be to everyone else. I'm the classic sufferer of the impostor syndrome.
You were my worst nightmare, the person who would expose me."
His eyes were fixed on her lower lip, but he wasn't contemplating its sexiness so much as he was arranging his own thoughts.
"If all that is true, Stevie, it was an accident.
If I tapped into your insecurities, it was by chance and had nothing to do with incisiveness.
Fact is, I took digs at you because I resented that a cute, young thing like you could do what you did so well and reach the pinnacle of your sport, when I'd had to fall back on writing about how others were doing what I wanted to do myself.
; Hacking out that dumb column is a far cry from a career in professional baseball."
"It is not dumb," she said, laying a sympathetic hand along his cheek. "I only said it showed no talent or finesse because I was angry.
You've cultivated a faithful reading audience that wouldn't miss a single acerbic word. No writer can do that for any length of time unless there's substance behind his writing. Your readers aren't fools, you know."
"Thanks for the compliment." He finally surrendered to the temptation and kissed her lower lip. "But I know, deep down, that I haven't done a single worthwhile thing since I had that water-skiing accident."
His hazel eyes became dark and intent. "Not until I brought you here. Maybe I've redeemed myself for all the jealousy I've harbored against you." 'Jealousy?" 'Of you and every other pro who made it. I've been lashing out at all of you to some extent, but you were the easiest one to single out."
"Why?"
"Because you were atypical. You weren't muscle-bound and unattractive, which was my chauvinistic, narrow-minded opinion of what a professional woman athlete should look like.
"And," he added around a deep breath, "as long as I'm baring my soul, I might just as well go all the way. I was still miffed about Stockholm.
I wanted to go to bed with you, didn't get to, so I was sulking like the little boy who didn't get his candy. Maliciously I disparaged the very thing I desired. Pretty juvenile, huh?"
"Pretty human."
"You're being generous."
"I'm in a generous mood." She smiled up at him and drew a line down his nose with her fingertip.
"To prove just how generous, I'll forgive you every nasty word you've ever written about me on one condition."
"What?" he asked suspiciously.
She whisked a kiss across his lips. "Make love to me again."
"Stevie, we really shouldn't."
"Why not?"
He hesitated, which was a mistake. She took advantage of his indecision by sliding her hand down his middle and cupping the full heaviness of his manhood.
"We shouldn't because it might…uh-" he became hard beneath her rhythmic stroking "-might not be good for you," he finished lamely.