An Irresistible Man

by Kylie Brant

  “Martinez, I do not want anything to… eat,” she finished as a plate with a sandwich was placed before her.

  “Look, Ma, no green things,” he joked. Her sandwich was missing the lettuce and fixings he’d piled on his own.

  Her voice was tinged with frustration. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Heard it before. Clean your plate, or I won’t take you home.”

  She regarded him with a narrowed look. That was nothing short of bribery, and he’d been manipulating events all day. But if eating the darn sandwich was all it would take to get her safely home and alone once again, she’d let him get away with it one last time

  She picked up the sandwich and determinedly chewed. But swallowing proved to be a bit more of a problem while sitting across from Cruz, with his liquid dark eyes trained on her face. She reached an unsteady hand for the glass of milk he’d placed beside her plate. Cruz Martinez had found the chink in the armor that usually guarded her emotions, and she wasn’t being allowed the time she needed to carefully replace her defenses. Why couldn’t it be easier to divine what a person was truly like? This was the same man who’d made an impassioned speech earlier about the need for more youth programs in the city. The love he shared with his family had been very evident today. How could she reconcile the man who held his small nieces and nephews with a look of softness on his face, with the criminal responsible for putting guns into the hands of kids?

  It made no sense, and even less after meeting his family today. Tomas and Kathleen Martinez were two people secure in their pride for their children. It was hard to imagine him taking a risk that would destroy his parents’ pride and loyalty if it was ever exposed?

  Other people were capable of just that, she knew. She’d been a cop long enough to see plenty of criminals, some of whom had been considered pillars of the community. Her ex-fiancé had been a prime example of someone with a perfect exterior that masked a black soul. But her belief in Dennis, she now realized, had more to do with her inability to admit she could have been so wrong about him. Later she’d been able to recall instances in their relationship when his careful mask had slipped a bit. If she’d been willing to see him for what he was, the opportunity had been there.

  “Are you done mangling that sandwich yet?” Cruz indicated the bread that was twisted in her hands, only a few bites gone from it. Madeline looked down and for the first time noticed the damage she’d done to the food.

  “Sorry. I really wasn’t hungry.”

  He nodded. “Let me grab something and we can be on our way.”

  He went to one of the drawers in the kitchen and withdrew his checkbook, pushing it into his back pocket. Madeline cleared their plates off the counter, rinsed them and placed them in the dishwasher. She turned to see him watching her, an odd light in his eye at the sight of her performing the mundane task.

  She hurried past him to grab the purse she’d set on the floor of the living room, but he didn’t immediately follow. “C’mon, Martinez,” she said, not altogether jokingly, “are you driving or am I going to have to walk?”

  He moved then, but not, as she’d hoped, in the direction of the door. Instead his booted feet walked deliberately over and stopped in front of her. Inches from her, in fact.

  “What’d you call me?”

  His nearness was the last thing she wanted to deal with. She was already edgy from her warring emotions, and she definitely didn’t need him this close. She inched backward a little, until she found the wall behind her. “I called you…” To her chagrin, her voice sounded a little breathless. “What I always call you. Martinez.” Her voice trailed to a whisper at the intent on his face.

  His arms came up to rest upon the wall on either side of her shoulders. “Cruz,” he said, the gentleness in his tone contrasting with the dark intensity in his eyes. “Call me by my name, Maddy.”

  She didn’t even comprehend the hated nickname on his lips. She was too attuned to what he wasn’t saying. To what his body language was saying for him.

  “Move aside, Martinez,” she ordered softly. Not in a million years would she admit to him that she used his last name to keep a buffer between them. Martinez was her partner, a fellow cop. Cruz… Cruz was someone else entirely.

  “Not until you call me by my first name,” he replied, his voice just as soft.

  “Don’t make me hurt you.”

  His eyebrow cocked in amusement at her threat but there was no smile on his face. His eyes were on her lips and his mouth seemed to draw closer to her own.

  Madeline let her body relax more and he came even nearer. Then one foot came out swiftly behind his, and a moment later he was stretched out on the hard floor with her on top of him, one knee pressed to his throat.

  She was good, he admitted to himself ruefully. Her reflexes were lightning fast. “Uh, Maddy…” The increased pressure at his throat had him amending, “Madeline… could you…” He gestured with one hand toward her knee and she obediently eased back a little. Too late she realized her mistake. In less than an instant he’d reversed their positions, rolling her off and under him so fast her breath was lost in the process.

  A wicked glint was in his dark eyes, and Madeline knew intuitively just how much trouble she was in. He held his weight off her slightly, taking care not to hurt her, but she was trapped against the ungiving floor and the equally hard but so much more tempting form above her. She needed to say something light, something that would defuse the moment and remove the intent from his face. But words deserted her. She was reminded of the other time she had felt Cruz stretched out over her, and the memory of his muscled body against hers couldn’t come close to the pleasure flooding her right now at the feel of it.

  She moistened her lips nervously, and Cruz almost groaned out loud. That soft, wide mouth looked vulnerable now, lips slightly parted and trembling just a bit. He couldn’t begin to count the number of times he’d imagined it just this way. And he wasn’t capable of resisting it. His lips lowered toward her and her eyelids grew heavy. He trailed feather-light kisses along her jawline, and her neck arched involuntarily at the exquisite sensation. “Maddy, Maddy.” His voice was raw, and he seized one earlobe in his teeth to worry it gently. “Say my name,” he ordered raspily, dropping his attention to the delicate cord of her throat.

  A shiver rushed through her at the first brush of his mouth. She tried to deny his request, as if by doing so she could also deny the tidal wave of desire that threatened to engulf them. Her head shook helplessly, but her defenses, already strained, were at the breaking point. His fingers threaded through her hair, and his lips were a fraction away from her mouth. Her eyes fluttered open. The sight of him above her, his handsome face stamped with passion, was more than she could bear. “Say my name, Maddy,” he ordered again. His lips moved against hers as he formed the words, and everything inside her longed to feel them against hers more firmly.

  At her silence he brushed her mouth with his once, and then again. When her head raised slightly to force a stronger pressure, he pulled away. Her hands came up to tangle in his hair. “Cruz,” she said on a sigh, a whisper. And she was promptly rewarded.

  “Yes.” His breath hissed out in satisfaction before he fiercely sealed her mouth with his own. One hand cupped the back of her head, and he took possession of her mouth with an intensity that shook her. Still she welcomed it, beckoning him closer. Her mouth twisted under his, matching his hunger, challenging it. She could feel the last vestiges of control slip away as Cruz’s demand elicited her own.

  His kisses were full of promise, rife with heat. They destroyed the carefully cultivated barriers she kept to protect herself, and shredded the proper image she’d worn so long that she had begun to believe in it. She’d spent a lifetime trying to tame her own nature, hiding her wildness. But his raw hunger unleashed hers, and she responded with an answering rage of need. The taste of him was pure wicked sinfulness, and she was coaxed closer to taste more.

  Cruz pressed her lips apart and thei
r tongues tangled. He became belatedly aware of the unyielding floor beneath her, but his only concession to it was to roll over, never releasing her mouth, bringing her body to lie fully atop his. One hand slipped to her bottom, pressing her firmly in contact with his aching groin.

  Madeline could feel her body soften instinctively against his turgid arousal. She moved slightly against him and a groan sounded in his throat. But still he kept her lips sealed with his. With one hand he cradled the back of her head, to keep her from turning away from him if she had been so inclined, which she wasn’t. The other hand went on an intimate exploration. It swept down her thighs, and then leisurely traced its path upward again, this time delving beneath her long sweater and settling on her bare back.

  Heat radiated from each of his fingers. Her skin prickled with awareness, unbearably attuned to his touch. His teeth nibbled at her lower lip, distracting her, drawing her into a carnal duel with his tongue. She responded deeply, without reservation, to his mind- drugging kisses. The back hook of her bra gave way to his questing fingers but it wasn’t until he rolled them to their sides and slid his hand to her breast that she reacted.

  Electric pleasure shimmered through her at the feel of his fingers teasing her nipple. Both of them moaned at the sensation, their breaths intermingling. She opened eyelids that seemed weighted to see Cruz gazing at her through slitted eyes, watching the pleasure chase across her features. She should have been alarmed at the fierce male desire stamped on his face, but instead she reveled in it. If she’d been stripped of the vestiges of the cool image she normally exuded, well, so had he. Gone was the amiable teasing demeanor that usually marked his handsome face. Right now it reflected a primitive intensity, that of a man caught between satisfaction and frustration.

  He palmed her breast and swallowed her whimper at the action. Her nipple stabbed at his palm and he wanted suddenly, savagely, to put an end to this teasing. He wanted her naked, stretched out beneath him, and he wanted her hands on him, all over him, showing the same restless curiosity about his body that he felt for hers. They had ignited too fast for him to maintain control much longer, and the floor wasn’t where he wanted to take her. He wanted her in his bed, where he had imagined her the first time he’d laid eyes on her.

  His thumb batted at her nipple, and he pressed a kiss to the pulse on her neck. “Ah, Maddy. This isn’t the right place for us this first time. I don’t want that delectable backside of yours covered with bruises.”

  She nipped at his chin consideringly. “If you were a gentleman, I wouldn’t be the one with bruises.” She could feel the smile on his lips when he kissed her then, but amusement was swiftly swept away.

  “I want you in my bed. Beneath me.” When he raised his head again, his voice was lower, more guttural. “I want to be inside you, to feel for myself the fire you hide from the world.” He pressed kiss after kiss to her throat, her jaw and cheekbones. “Come upstairs with me, Maddy. Come with me now.”

  His raspy tone and earthy words rocked the tempest inside her. She didn’t question how easily he’d found the inner flame she usually kept locked firmly away. Just as she didn’t question the answering fire she’d found in him. Her neck arched under his ardent mouth and reason fled. Reason hadn’t played a part in this situation from the beginning. It didn’t explain why she longed to unbutton his shirt and touch him as intimately as he was touching her. Reason wouldn’t allow her to yield to the temptation he presented, or to ignore the defenses she’d erected to keep him at a distance.

  She’d lived her life by logic for the past several years, allowing it to dictate every move she made. It hadn’t been an easy task; there was a spark deep inside her that needed careful tending, lest it flare up and mar the mapped course she’d set for herself. He was asking for too much, way too much. He was tempting her to deny the careful caution she used to keep emotions at bay. And she was afraid that he wouldn’t be satisfied until she gave to hint more than she had to any other man.

  Fear spiked suddenly in her then, as much fear as it was possible to feel while white-hot tendrils of heat still curled beneath his lips on her neck. She used the fear, drew its cloak closer around herself, to help combat the incessant temptation of the man above her. Fiercely she summoned the memories of her last surrender, and how badly her emotions had failed her with Dennis Belding. She called on her fading logic for all the reminders of why Cruz Martinez was the last man on earth right now she should trust. Being wrong about Dennis had almost destroyed her. She’d almost destroyed herself for making such a colossal mistake. How could she live with herself if she made another one here, with this man?

  She wedged her hands between them, sliding them to his shoulders, meaning to push him away. But her fingers clenched suddenly as his teeth took a tiny nip at her throat, and her neck arched in unconscious pleasure as his tongue swept the same area in lavish apology.

  For once, rational thought seemed to vanish, swirling away in the mist of sensual desire. Instead of caution she felt emotion, strong and pure, and so intense that she gasped from it. It had been such a long time since she’d let herself feel, so long since anything or anyone had been allowed to reach this part of herself, which she guarded so zealously.

  “Now, Maddy,” that dark voice whispered to her. “Come with me now.”

  She was beckoned closer to the savage fire burning inside him. She was forced to deal with consequences of spending years with her own wild nature locked away. She hadn’t reckoned on meeting someone who could set it free without her conscious permission. Now it was liberated, a conflagration of emotion that spread like wildfire within her, and she reveled in the torrential outpouring.

  “Yes,” she whispered, the word barely leaving her lips before they were covered with his. Then he pulled away, his breathing ragged. Slowly he rose to his feet, reaching down to take both her hands and pulling her up against him. And holding her hand, he led her silently up the stairway to his room.

  Madeline was dizzy when she reached the loft, the kisses they’d shared on the way more at fault than their spiral journey. Her gaze flickered over the room nervously as she felt uncertainty intrude. The area was meticulously neat. The charcoal gray carpeting looked freshly vacuumed. The bed was made, a comforter of black, gray and maroon spread tidily over it. A huge domed window was set in the wall above the bed. Rays from the fading sun beamed through it, painting the bed with fingers of light.

  Cruz’s eyes followed the path of her gaze. He wondered what she thought of the room he’d designed, but even more urgently, he wondered how she would look stretched out across his bed as he’d long imagined her, her body dappled with sunlight. He wanted fiercely to see that, to experience the electric pleasure promised by her long lithe legs and high breasts. He wanted her writhing under him, as she struggled to take all of him, and then he wanted to watch her face transform with ecstasy when the limits of their control were shattered.

  Her gaze met his, and she reacted with an involuntary shiver. For although he didn’t come any nearer, she felt heat simply from his look. She could read his erotic thoughts as surely as if he’d spoken, and suddenly realized that hers were probably just as visible to him. The silence in the room tautened, and Madeline could feel her pulse throbbing. She watched him go over to the bed and sit on the edge, tug his boots and socks off, and leave them on the floor in what she was sure was uncustomary disorder.

  “Maddy.” His voice was low. “Come here to me.”

  Her feet moved to obey without conscious decision. When she was standing in front of him, he spread his knees and brought her closer, between them. His face was level with her breasts and he used her position to nuzzle them, first one then the other. Next he rose, and his body rubbed hers in the ascent. He drew her hands to his shirt and whispered huskily, “Undress me.” And again she obeyed.

  Her eyes watched the progress of her fingers in fascination. First one button was undone. Then two. She caught her breath at her first glimpse of his bare chest, fingers
faltering in their task as she took in the sheer male beauty of him. Cruz obligingly finished for her, stripping off the shirt and dropping it to the floor.

  His torso looked as if it had been sculpted by an artistic hand, its bronze hue gleaming invitingly. Her hands rose to touch him, as if she couldn’t help herself. He was firmly muscled, defined pectoral muscles neatly bisecting his chest. The hard muscles were repeated along his rib cage and stomach. He had no chest hair, as if nature hadn’t bothered to further adorn perfection. There was only an enticing silky black ribbon of hair arrowing from his navel and disappearing into the waistband of his jeans.

  Cruz’s breath hissed out of his teeth at the first tentative touch of her hands on him. The long-awaited contact ignited his hunger again, at a time when be most needed all his control. After only seconds of her caresses his own hands moved swiftly, grasping the hem of her sweater and bringing it upward, over her head. He let it drop to the floor and she shrugged out of the unhooked bra.

  His hands cupped her breasts, which were beaded with arousal. He toyed with the nipples, rolling them gently in his fingers until an involuntary sound came from her throat. Then, with the calm masculine assurance that was so much a part of him, he bent to take one nipple into his mouth.

  The ground fell away from Madeline’s feet at the hot, wet suction on her breast, which seemed unbearably sensitive. She gasped as she felt his teeth lightly scrape her nipple, before he soothed it with his tongue. His thumb made lazy circles around its twin, causing it to draw even tighter before he switched his attention to it. Her knees threatened to buckle and she leaned heavily into him. Cruz took that opportunity to lower her to the bed, stripping the black leggings, shoes and socks off her in the same movement.

  She swallowed hard. Lying in the middle of his bed wearing nothing but a scrap of panties made her feel intensely feminine and utterly vulnerable. The emotions were heightened by the sight of him, still partially dressed, studying her, his eyes at half-mast. She remembered suddenly the first time she’d seen him. He’d reminded her of a pirate then, and he brought the same vivid image to her mind at this moment. His earring seemed so much a part of him that she rarely noticed it anymore, but she did now. It was a diamond chip and, coupled with his broad bare chest, it gave him a half-civilized, untamed look. She watched, enrapt, as his hands went slowly to his jeans, unfastening them and pushing them down his firm flanks Clad only in black low-riding briefs, he seemed quintessentially male, very much the conquering warrior.