Venus felt his deep sigh where her body pressed against his chest.
“Wherever you hurt,” her lips whispered along his cheek, “I’ll kiss it to make it better.”
“Don’t tempt me.”
His short husky laugh filled her with so much tenderness and heat she pulled back to gaze into his perfect face.
Now she knew denied desire, love, like a wildfire, couldn’t be stomped out once the flames took hold, regardless of the cost. In this moment nothing else mattered but this.
“Please let me tempt you, Connor.”
His emerald eyes lightened, blinding her to everything but him.
“Here,” he said in a low voice, pointing to a spot on his throat. “This hurts.”
She placed her mouth there, tasting his skin, feeling his pulse pound beneath her lips.
She caught his tux shirt, spreading it open to trail her fingertips down his chest. “Does it hurt here?”
Lying at his side, she nuzzled her face into the warm, tight-knit muscles of his stomach and felt them contract under her mouth. “Does this make it feel better?”
She slid her fingers to his tux trousers, miraculously unfastening them on the first try despite her slight trembling, to explore with her hand and lips the heat of his thighs. “Or this?”
“Venus,” he said her name on a ragged breath.
She felt his hand under her heavy hair at her nape, urging her up to kiss.
Gently, he moved her face back and forth to penetrate all the shapes and contours of their lips touching, while his other hand made slow patterns on her bare back where the dress came to a deep vee.
“I’d feel much better if we were closer.” He lifted his hands to her shoulders and tugged ever so gently on her gown.
He eased it down her body to her ankles.
Heat oozing out of every pore, she buried her hot face in his smooth, hard chest. “Oh, goodness, all those tales of the Clayworth men’s sleight of hand are true. Here we are both naked in the bat of an eyelash.”
“Not quite.”
The pace of her breathing altered while his fingers slid into her silk thong to ease it off her body.
She tilted her head, brushing her lips against his. “Shall I leave on my stilettos for fun?”
The mischief in his eyes startled her so that a quiver of anticipation began low in her body.
His lips caressed her ankle while his expert hands slipped first one and then the other silvery Louboutin heel off her feet to land on the rug with faint thumps, joining their clothes and underwear.
He pressed soft kisses in the hollows behind her knees, his lips following the line of her thigh.
Anticipation an agony quivering at her core, she gasped in pleasure when his lips and fingers brushed the sensitive side of her breast.
“Yes, tell me what makes it feel better.” His breath feathered her aching skin.
She pressed his fingers to the curve of her breast and he lifted the swelling weight in his hand.
Taking her nipple deeply into his mouth, he teased it with his tongue.
“Yes,” she moaned softly, trying not to hold her breath.
Then she sucked in a deep gulp of oxygen as he caressed her thighs, the heel of his hand a hypnotic motion in the heat between them.
He scattered hot open kisses onto her throat, her breasts, and her quivering stomach. She tried to do the same to him, but pleasure wove ever tighter so she could only press herself closer to him, moving in erotic need to the rhythm of his body.
Now she knew Connor free of his iron-tight control gave passion and tenderness with his every touch.
She sought his mouth, drinking in his taste, wanting all of him.
His fingers a fire on her hips, he lifted her and she parted her thighs. He eased into her, convulsive warmth inside her tightening to increase the pleasure for both of them.
She felt it in his movements, his breathing, the way he whispered her name, his mouth hot and open against her throat.
She’d never experienced lovemaking like this. It filled her with spinning circles of pleasure, blending to become a kaleidoscope of sensations pulsing together. She clung to him, lost in the colors and feelings of him bringing her to joy again and again. She’d never ever settle for anything less.
Venus whimpered, snuggling deeper into Connor’s side. He struggled out of sleep to tighten his arms around her.
She’s cold.
The parts of him not tangled in Venus’s warm, lush body felt the middle-of-the-night chill.
He brushed silky strands of hair off her cheek. “Love, we need to go to bed,” he whispered into her ear, pressing a kiss on the soft skin beneath it.
She didn’t wake when he lifted her off the velvet sofa and up into his arms.
He knew the way to her bedroom from the night he’d rushed in, afraid she was in danger, and finally realized why she’d always inspired such conflicting feelings in him.
He tossed back the coverlet and laid her on the pillows.
Sighing, still asleep, she curled onto her side.
Wanting to keep holding her, he curved his body into hers and pulled the down coverlet over them both for warmth.
He buried his face in her silky hair, breathing in its fragrance. It reminded him of apricots, as did the delicate color. Unique. Special. Like Venus.
I’ve never felt happier.
Refusing to think about Clayworth’s or her father or all the other obstacles to be overcome, he gratefully accepted this perfect moment. He closed his eyes, surrounded by the exotic essence of Venus.
She woke to faint almost-morning light in her own bedroom with Connor gloriously naked curled around her.
Disoriented, she sat straight up in bed. “How did we get here?”
He stretched, every muscle knitted perfectly to the next. “I carried you.”
“How? I’m not little.” A sudden stupid embarrassment made her pull the coverlet back up over her spread of hips and breasts.
He caught her hand, carrying it to his lips. “Don’t, love.”
Love.
The word melted her bones. She slipped back down onto the pillow, her heart doing a dance against her ribs.
He leaned over, pulling the coverlet completely away, his eyes caressing every inch of her body.
“Why do women think men like skinny girls? Studies prove that looking at a curvy woman can be as addictive and stimulating as drugs or alcohol.”
He cupped her hips with his palms, catching her close, cradling her against the heat of his thighs. “Can’t you feel how addicted I am to you?”
Overcome with emotions new and startling to her, she swallowed his kiss, heat spinning through her blood. With him she truly felt like Venus, goddess of love.
Burning for him, she arched into his mouth, his tongue drawing scorching circles over her breasts to their aching center.
She sobbed once. “I never thought addiction a good thing before.”
His husky laughter caressed her stomach, her thighs. He lingered there, teasing her with his tongue. “I’m addicted to every part of you, love,” he murmured between her writhing thighs, sucking gently, his mouth and tongue bringing her to a mindless fever pitch of desire.
His words, his touch melted every inhibition. She opened completely to his body, his touch, eager for him.
He took her face between his palms, gazed into her eyes, his breath as uneven as her own.
“Tell me how I can bring you more pleasure. Tell me what you want, love.”
Hardly able to breathe, only able to feel, she wrapped her legs around his body, pulling him deep inside her.
“All I want is you.”
Chapter 20
It must be morning. The thought flickered into her half-awake brain as she slowly opened her eyes. Faint light outlined her drawn bedroom drapes.
Without moving any other part of her body, she turned her face to Connor on the pillow beside her.
His perfect nose was buried in bunche
s of her hair.
The shocking, scalding tenderness she felt turned to confusion and ultimately, although she tried to stop it, to cruel regret.
How could she love Connor, still honor her family, and satisfy her real need to find out the truth and vindicate her father, which she knew with every fiber of her being needed to be done?
We’re star-crossed lovers in a romantic story with a sad ending. And I’ve just made it even worse by experiencing the most tender and erotic lovemaking of my life. How can I resist this?
Wuthering Heights, Casablanca, Witness, every tragic love story she’d ever read or seen ran through her head.
Ready to sob herself into a puddle, she eased her hair off his pillow, although from the sharp tugs she felt sure she’d left a few strands there under his lips.
Without waking him, she slipped on her robe and padded to her jewelry bower.
Here, she’d try to still the heartbreaking thoughts tumbling through her head, making her utterly miserable with longing for what could never be unless she could clear her father’s name.
With a deep sigh, shuddering to her bare toes, she sat at her design table, determined to focus on anything besides her doomed feelings for Connor.
She pulled out the tray with the newest, simplest designs she’d created.
Smiling, she remembered her excitement at finding this early 1900s gilt metal chain with sapphire blue rhinestones, which had long ago lost its clasp and pendant. She’d found a clasp and then been thrilled at rescuing the 1920s glass cabochon and rhinestone pendant from a tray of broken jewelry at a flea market. United, the two discarded beauties had created a delicate, lovely piece.
She fingered the lone YSL 1960s asymmetrical earring she’d found in the same tray at the flea market.
The vendor had laughingly asked what she wanted with one earring and had sold it to her for four dollars. Now the colored crystal rhinestone with turquoise and red enameling had become a pendant on a thick gold-plated chain.
“What are you doing, Venus?”
Cutting through his words and her shock were his hands gently massaging her shoulders.
Embarrassed that he’d discovered her secret, she couldn’t bear to turn around. “I’m… I’m fixing pieces of broken jewelry I’ve found and putting them back together.”
He knelt beside her and she saw his hips were wrapped in one of her pale green bath towels.
“You designed all these pieces?”
His gaze left her face to linger on the trays lined with necklaces, bracelets, and brooches spread out on the wide work table.
“They’re beautiful, Venus.”
Her heart did the same dance it had earlier when he’d used the word love and her insides melted, sending the warmth tingling over her skin.
Against every instinct she’d had to keep her creations a secret, now she felt overwhelmed with happiness about Connor knowing.
“I’ve never told anyone about my designs. Not even my sisters. I wasn’t sure they’d understand why I want to do it.”
His hair ruffled across his forehead, his eyes shining, he looked at her and smiled. “It’s the ultimate ‘going green.’ Taking beautiful, well-crafted pieces from the past and giving them new life now.”
Venus choked back tears of wonder. “You really do understand what I’m trying to do.”
Slowly, he stood over her and tilted her head back to press kisses on her eyelids, the tip of her nose, her flushed cheeks.
“Wear one of your creations for me.”
His hands at her nape, he fastened the turn-of-the-century sapphire rhinestone necklace around her throat. The pendant fell between her breasts.
He pulled her up against his body, his lips whispering across her ear. “You should call your designs A Touch of Venus. Magical like you. Every piece deserves to be worn.”
She could hardly pull air into her lungs. “That would be a dream come true. To give my pieces new homes with people who would cherish them.”
She closed her eyes against the intense, powerful look on his face.
Under his deep kiss, the hard, restless feel of his body, Venus ached in the colors of her jewels.
Red heat.
Sapphire sensations.
Aurora borealis prisms of desire.
In this glorious world there was no space, no reason for tragedy or doom. For these precious moments there was only Connor.
With one slow sweep of his hand he freed her of the robe, his fingers smoothing over the swell of her hip.
“Your skin feels like silk here,” he whispered. “And here.” He lifted the heavy weight of her breasts in his palm, his thumb caressing the nipple.
Weak with desire, she sighed deeply, sagging into his arms.
“Yes, love, let’s go back to bed.”
He swept her up in his arms and she couldn’t find the strength to protest or argue that she wasn’t a delicate flower like her sisters. He made her feel as if she was perfect. Perfect for him.
As he laid her on the bed, their eyes locked and his mouth hovered barely above her lips. “I love making love to you, Venus.”
Last night in Connor’s arms she hadn’t believed anything could ever be sweeter. Now her skin and his seemed warmer, the fit of their bodies tighter. Each knew the exact rhythm, the moment of exquisite pleasure for the other. She gave herself freely with no inhibitions, no fear. He returned that tenfold and more, dazzling her senses, completing every dream of desire she’d ever known.
This time Connor opened his eyes to Venus curled up on the pillow beside him. Looking at her profile almost buried in her thick cloud of hair brought such a startling blaze of pleasure that he had to discipline himself not to touch her.
Maybe it felt so strong because of the panic he’d felt earlier when he woke to find her gone and he’d discovered her in her jewelry studio.
Thinking of the unique, beautiful pieces she’d created, it came to him how he could make at least one dream come true for her, if not the one she truly wanted.
He slid slowly out of bed and pulled the coverlet up over her shoulders before he went to her studio. Studying the trays of jewelry, he picked out the pieces that immediately caught his eye. He hesitated, thinking she might want to keep them for herself. Then he remembered her words, give my pieces new homes with people who would cherish them, and smiled, his instincts telling him this would make her happy.
Thirty minutes later, showered and with the jewelry safely stored in the duffel bag he’d brought last night, he sat on the side of the bed closest to her.
“Venus,” he said her name once. And again, “Venus.”
Slowly, she lifted her heavy-lidded eyes. She batted her thick lashes, as if his presence beside her hadn’t penetrated her sleepiness.
“Connor,” she whispered and sat up, clutching the coverlet to her breasts, covering the lucky pendant tucked between her warm heavy breasts, perfumed with her unique fragrance. “What time is it?”
Unable to resist, he cupped her flushed cheek with his palm. “Time for me to go.”
“We need to talk.” Now her eyes were brilliant, catching the morning sunlight as she twisted strands of her silky hair around two fingers. “About… this. Last night. Us.”
“We will. Come to Clayworth’s this afternoon. I have a surprise for you.”
Her eyes blazed, questioning him while she twisted more hair. “What kind of surprise?”
“Something I think you’ll like. One o’clock. Will you come?”
He didn’t realize he was holding his breath until she nodded and he let it out on a long hot sigh.
“Yes, I’ll be there. Better to talk about this at Clayworth’s than in my bedroom.”
Connor would rather stay in the bedroom with Venus, but Clayworth’s had always been home to him. He felt the beat of its rhythm every time he walked into the flagship store in the Loop. His legacy. Rebuilt twice by his ancestors after the great Chicago fires. They’d never surrendered to defeat.
Neit
her would he. He’d pore over the evidence against her father again and again searching for a way Alistair could be innocent, hopeless though it seemed to look for what didn’t exist.
He knew how concerned and confused Venus felt about these feelings beating between them, despite all the differences neither of them could stamp out.
For the first time he felt a deep, life-changing regret for the necessity of being here when he’d rather be there with Venus.
The thought made him smile and hurry to the costume jewelry department.
As luck would have it, the department manager stood talking to Diana while she gathered pieces for a window display.
“I’d like a space cleared near the Alexis Bittar display for a new artist.”
The manager rushed to the next counter to do as he asked.
Across the top of this glass counter he spread the four necklaces, two bracelets, and three brooches he’d taken from Venus’s studio.
“These are lovely.” Diana traced the six faux pearl drops hanging from a brooch of sapphire and more pearls. “This necklace with the rose motif and the white on red carved cameo looks like a fine vintage piece. So does this triple-strand bracelet of faux pearls with the gilt metal links and the shields with engraved hearts. But the designs are more contemporary. Who’s the designer?”
“They’re called A Touch of Venus.”
Wide-eyed surprise marked Diana’s delicate features with a childlike innocence, very different from the femme fatale of last night.
“Venus designed these? She never said a word to me. But she told you.”
Remembering the look in Venus’s eyes, the emotion in her voice when he’d discovered her in her studio tapped such deep feelings for her he fought to hide even a small part of them.
“Yes, she told me. However, I didn’t tell her I brought some of her designs here for display and to sell.”
Again, Diana blinked up at him, shock widening her eyes.
Sure of himself, he laughed. “I know it’s a bold plan to take them without her knowledge but I want it to be a surprise. She’ll be here at one.”
At 1:00 P.M. sharp and not a minute late for a change, Venus walked into Clayworth’s on the hunt for Diana. To accomplish what she needed to do today, she required heavy moral support.
All I Want Is You Page 20