Breath of Scandal

by Sandra Brown

She nodded.

  He peeled her blouse from her shoulders and guided her arms out of the sleeves. Suddenly losing her nerve, she clasped her bra against her breasts. They gazed deeply into each other’s eyes. She noticed that a vein in Dillon’s temple was visibly ticking and that his jaw was clenched.

  “Are we going to stop here?”

  “I… No, I guess not.” She removed her hands, and her bra fell forward onto his lap.

  “Oh, God, thank you,” he said on a deep exhalation. Using both hands, he touched her hair first, the individual features of her face, then her lips, which were swollen and rosy from his many kisses. His fingers combed down her throat, chest, and the slope of her breasts. He stared at her as though she were a miracle creation.

  “Show me what you want me to do, Jade.”

  Taking his face between her palms, she guided it to her breast and watched as his lips sank into her flesh. Her nipples grew stiff against his caressing tongue. His mouth gave her unbearable pleasure.

  With a groan, he fell back onto the pillows, brushed her bra off his lap, and groped for the buttons of his jeans. Jade’s eyes widened with alarm.

  “I’m not going to do anything you don’t want me to,” he explained quickly. Raising his left hand behind his head, he gripped a curving tube of the headboard. “I can’t do anything with one hand, right? But I’ve got to make room, Jade.”

  His right hand worked frantically to undo the stubborn buttons. When they were unfastened, he spread his fly open, exposing only a wedge of white cotton briefs. Nevertheless, the shape and dimension of his erection was evident. Jade stared at it fearfully.

  True to his word, he kept one hand on the headboard, but reached up with the other to cup her cheek. “I’m hard, yes. I’m supposed to be hard. But I’m not hard because I want to violate you, or hurt you, or prove to you that I’m physically superior.

  “I’m hard because you’ve got gorgeous blue eyes that make me wish I could swim around in them. I’m hard because you’ve got terrific legs that I’ve been unable to keep my eyes off since the night we drove around in that damn limousine. I’m hard because your mouth is delicious and your breasts are sweet and I know you must be wet by now.” He grimaced from the eroticism of his own monologue. With an effort he moaned, “I don’t want to defile you, Jade. I want to make love to you.”

  Forming an X over her breasts, she crossed her arms and rested her hands on her shoulders. “I know that, Dillon. In my heart, I do. But in my head—”

  “Stop listening to your head,” he said on a near shout, which he immediately ameliorated. “What do you want to do, Jade? Listen to your heart. What is it saying?”

  “It says I want to make love to you, too, but I’m afraid I’ll freeze when you try to penetrate me.”

  He smoothed his hand over her hair. “Then I won’t even try. I knew this was going to take time. I counted on going slow. We’ll take it a step at a time, and won’t even attempt intercourse until you’re ready.”

  “That’s not fair to you.”

  “I’m not suffering.” She gave his lap a dubious glance. He chuckled ruefully. “Well, there’s suffering and there’s suffering. I’m going to sit up again, okay?”

  When she was once again kneeling between his thighs, he slowly lowered her arms from her breasts. “You’re so pretty,” he whispered.

  One kiss melded into another, until it was impossible to distinguish when one ended and another began. His hands were in constant motion. They caressed her neck, her back, her waist, her breasts. Jade was no longer timid about touching him, either. His chest was uncharted territory that she explored with inquisitive hands and curious, but cautious, lips.

  “Go ahead,” he murmured when her lips hovered above his nipple.

  She licked it daintily and discovered how exciting that was. She was thirty-three years old, and this was the first man’s body she’d had access to. It was a wonderland of new experiences for her eyes, hands, and mouth.

  Frequently Dillon’s lips returned to her breasts. He kissed them repeatedly. With the nimble tip of his tongue, he could make her almost delirious. She folded her arms around his head and clasped him tightly to her chest, loving the feel of his thick hair against her smooth skin and the warm, wet motion of his mouth.

  Her center grew achy. The lips of her sex pouted with an influx of blood and desire. To ease the feverish ache, she instinctively arched her pelvis and ground it against him.

  He swore lavishly.

  She didn’t realize that he had slipped his hands beneath her skirt until she felt his palms sliding up the backs of her thighs. “Is it all right, Jade?”

  She could only moan incoherently.

  His hands moved over her derriere, palming her, pulling her closer. Then he lowered his head and nuzzled the valley of her thighs through her skirt.

  “Ohmygod.” She gasped at the burst of pleasure the unexpected caress brought her. Her thighs liquefied. She clutched his shoulders tightly. He splayed one hand over her derriere and moved the other to the front panel of her panties. His fingers slipped beneath the lace and into the dense, glossy curls above her sex.

  Jade didn’t even think to be afraid. Rather, she released a ragged sigh and bent her head over his.

  “Open your thighs a little, Jade.”

  He didn’t poke at her. He didn’t crudely probe. His fingers were gently questing, persuasively stroking, applying no more pressure than the beat of a butterfly’s wings. She inched her knees farther apart.

  “That’s it,” he whispered encouragingly. “Christ, you’re wet.” He nudged her breast, then turned his mouth into it. “Silky wet.”

  His finger slipped between the swollen flesh but didn’t penetrate her. Gently, slowly, he separated the full lips to expose that most sensitive spot to the revolving strokes of his finger. By instinct, Jade began to undulate against his hand.

  The candlelit room began to shrink around her. Her universe was reduced to the center of the bed, the center of her body, where Dillon was giving her more pleasure than she had ever dreamed possible. His tongue was on her nipple, flicking it as delicately as the pad of his finger was moving over her slippery clitoris.

  Her tummy quickened. Her breasts heaved on each rapid breath. Heat consumed her. Shamelessly, she rode his hand. When the pressure became unbearable, when her body had become a combustion chamber, she caught his muscled shoulder between her teeth to keep from crying out as the shattering release came.

  He fell back among the pillows, bringing her with him, so that she was sprawled across his chest and belly, her legs lying between his. He strummed her spine, stroked her bottom, massaged her shoulders.

  Her head remained buried in the hollow of his neck. On her descent, she breathed deeply of the scent of his sweat mingling with her perfume and his cologne. Occasionally a tiny tremor shimmied through her.

  Eventually, he placed his hands on either side of her head and lifted it so he could gaze into her face. “You were something,” he whispered gruffly.

  She ducked her head with chagrin. “I never knew it would be so… so…”

  “My words exactly.” They laughed softly. They kissed softly. Then they kissed carnally, their tongues entwining. Dillon unfastened the waistband of her skirt and pushed it down her thighs. His hands slid into her panties. His rough palms closed over her derriere, drawing her up.

  “I want to feel you against me, Jade. Your wet, your heat—against me. I swear my cock will stay where it is, but, hell…”

  She wanted to feel him, too. Moments before she had thought that all her desire had been exhausted in one act. Instead, his kisses were already renewing the longing ache that was at once new and yet familiar.

  She kicked away her garments and stretched out over him. When Dillon caressed her again, his hands touched naked flesh, and he groaned. He continued to pull her up his body until his mouth could reach her breast.

  It seemed natural for her legs to part. Her knees separated to straddle his w
aist. He wrapped his hands around the backs of her thighs and slid them up and down in a caress that made her weak.

  “Dillon, please.”

  She couldn’t specifically name what she was begging for. But she never would have anticipated what he gave her. Grasping her hips between his hands, he drew them up as he leaned forward off the pillows. He buried his face in the glossy hair between her thighs. To keep from pitching forward, Jade gripped the rails of the headboard behind his head.

  He kissed the springy, dark curls.

  “Dillon—”

  He slipped lower and kissed her again, his mouth open and loving. She almost swooned when she felt his tongue—separating, searching, finding, tickling, stroking—while his hands massaged the backs of her thighs just below her buttocks.

  The roaring in her ears returned. Her heart rate accelerated. A rosy blush spread upward from her pubis to her taut nipples.

  It was about to happen again. She wanted it. And yet…

  “No.” She tried to draw away from him. “Dillon, no. Stop.”

  Having heard the key word, he released her, but looked befuddled and anxious. “For God’s sake, why?”

  “I want you inside me.”

  She peeled back his briefs and lowered herself over the tip of his penis, which was already moist from its glistening emission.

  “No, Jade, let me—”

  “Let me!” she said emphatically. The first rhythmic contractions were already seizing her when she took the smooth head of his organ between the protective folds of her sex. Her body pulsed around it.

  He moaned something profane and placed his hands on the tops of her thighs. He brushed his fingers through the damp cluster of curls and pressed the distended little kernel of flesh beneath their apex.

  Jade called his name as her climax rocketed through her. She impaled herself on him, then collapsed on top of his chest while the spirals of sensation continued to curl through her. Dillon wrapped his arms around her slender body. He needed nothing more than penetration to make him come.

  The walls of the candlelit bedroom echoed soft cries of gladness, whimpers of gratification, and, eventually, sighs of repletion.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The mood in the hospital room was sepulchral.

  The doctor standing at the foot of the bed no longer kept his pessimism concealed. Looking first at his patient, then at the patient’s wife, he said, “I’m sorry. We’ve done all we can.”

  For several moments after he left, neither said anything. Finally, Hutch turned his head on the pillow. He reached for Donna Dee’s hand. “Well, I guess that’s that.”

  “No.” Her small, pointed face screwed up as she struggled to hold back tears. “That new antirejection drug might work.”

  “You heard what he said, Donna Dee.”

  “He said it was experimental and that he’s not very optimistic. I heard every word. That doesn’t mean I believe it. I refuse to believe it.”

  “You always have had a knack for refusing to believe what you don’t want to.” Wearily, Hutch closed his eyes.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” He lay there, saying nothing. She gave his hand a tug. “Hutch?”

  He opened his eyes, though the effort obviously taxed his diminishing strength. His voice was faint. “You never wanted to believe what really happened with Jade.”

  “Jade?”

  “We raped her, Donna Dee. Just like she said.”

  She tried to pull her hand away, but he gripped it with surprising tenacity for a dying man. Donna Dee was frantic to change the subject. “You’ve got more important things to worry about than something that happened fifteen years ago, Hutch.”

  “I’ve got an eternity in hell to worry about. I raped her. And helped prod Gary Parker into killing himself.”

  “Hutch, that doctor has depressed you. You’re talking crazy. Now hush!”

  “Stop lying to yourself, Donna Dee!” he wheezed. “I’m guilty as sin. We all are.”

  “Jade provoked you into it, Hutch. I know she did.”

  He released a longsuffering sigh. “You know better than that.”

  “Maybe she didn’t do anything outright, but—”

  “My daddy told me the day after it happened that I’d be real sorry before it was over with. He was right.” Hutch turned his eyes up toward the ceiling. “I’m glad of one thing. I’m glad it’s not Jade’s boy’s kidney that I’m rejecting.”

  “Why do you say that?” she asked resentfully.

  “Because if he is my son—and I like to think he is—I wouldn’t have wanted him to give up anything for me. Jade was right to tell you no when you asked her. None of us has a claim to her son. None of us is good enough.”

  Donna Dee felt a stab of envy and jealousy that only Jade’s name could evoke. She clutched her husband’s hand. “Why’d you do it, Hutch? Did Neal goad you into it? Was it just one of those crazy situations that got out of hand?”

  “Yeah, Donna Dee,” he mumbled dispassionately. “It was just one of those crazy situations that got out of hand.”

  She could forgive him for rape easier than she could forgive him for desiring Jade. “There was no other reason you… you took her?”

  Hutch hesitated, then softly replied, “No, there was no other reason.”

  But Donna Dee didn’t believe the denial any more than she believed his forced smile.

  * * *

  A ray of sunlight fell across Dillon’s face. Sunlight didn’t filter into the windows of his bedroom in the trailer, so for a moment he wasn’t sure where he was or why he was feeling so damn good.

  He opened one eye, saw the gauzy mosquito netting, and suddenly remembered why he should be feeling like the prince of the world today. He had freed Jade of her demons.

  Wearing only a complacent smile and a night’s growth of stubble, he rolled to his other side, eager to pull her sweet body against his for another round of exorcism.

  The other side of the bed was empty.

  Alarmed, he threw off the sheet and flung back the netting. He called her name, but it echoed off the walls of the empty house. He stumbled to the window. There were no curtains or drapes, only a screen. He searched the yard, anxiety making his chest feel tight.

  When he spotted her, he expelled a deep breath of relief, then leaned against the window casing to enjoy the view. She was dressed, but her feet were bare. The sunlight painted iridescent stripes on her tousled hair. Cupping his hands around his mouth, he called out to her.

  She looked up toward the second-story window. “Good morning.” Her shining smile rivaled the new sun. She had pinched up several gathers in her skirt to form a bowl with the fabric. She had filled it with peaches. “Peaches fresh off the tree for breakfast. I’ve already had one. They’re delicious.”

  “Not as delicious as you,” Dillon said to himself. The first stirring of arousal tweaked his loins. Turning back into the room, he located his jeans at the foot of the bed and hastily pulled them on. He didn’t bother buttoning the fly before jogging down the hallway. He leaped over the stairs that needed repairs and burst through the front door at a run.

  The yard was empty.

  “Damn!”

  Suddenly, it struck him where he would find her. He ran through the formal garden. Sure enough, on the other side of it, he found her sitting in the swing beneath the live oak.

  He was out of breath by the time he reached her—more from excitement than exertion. He placed his hands on the ropes supporting the swing and leaned down to kiss her for the first time since daylight.

  Her lips were moist with peach juice, and, though only their mouths were touching, it was a potent kiss. When he lifted his lips from hers, he looked down at her through eyes that were drowsy with lust. She had knotted her shirt tails at her waist, but, to his delight, hadn’t bothered buttoning it. From his vantage point, he could see the enticing cleft between her breasts.

  “I like your outfit, Ms. Sperry.”

  Con
tradicting the formal address, he slid his hand into her shirt and covered her sun-warmed breast. She always reported for work looking like a woman of the world, a female executive on her way up. Even in casual clothes, she emanated a professional air.

  This barefoot, shiny-faced, disheveled Jade was a real turnon, although this morning it wasn’t taking much to turn him on.

  She leaned her head against his forearm and sighed pleasurably over his bold caress. “I couldn’t find my underwear.”

  “It’ll turn up. Right now, I like you the way you are.”

  Her cheeks turned the same color as the ripe peaches lying in her lap. He laughed, and it felt odd… and good. It was as though he had lost a hundred pounds overnight. He felt that light, that free. He was happy. And, he realized, he was madly in love.

  The estate was an unworldly setting. The empty old house was private and romantic, their island of seclusion. The birds seemed to have slept late. Even industrious squirrels were taking a day off. The air was sultry and still. It was a hazy, lazy morning when everything that lived and breathed intimated sex. He wished he could stop the clock for about a hundred years and spend every minute of it making love to Jade.

  “Get up and let me sit down.”

  “Then where will I sit?” she asked saucily.

  “In my lap.”

  The idea must have appealed to her because she got up to let him have the swing, then sat down in his lap. “Peach? One of the last of the season.”

  He bit into the peach she held to his mouth. The sweet, fragrant juice oozed out of it, running over her hand, down his chin and dripping onto his bare chest.

  “Good?” she asked.

  “Mm-hmm.” He curved his arm around her neck, tilted her head back, and kissed her with unapologetic carnality. When it ended, he sighed, “Very good.” He guided her hand up to her own mouth. She took a bite of the peach. He forced her to take another one, then another, until her mouth was full and juice was streaming over her chin and down her throat.

  Dillon watched it trickle onto her chest before lowering his head and licking it up. He untied the knot at her waist and parted her blouse, baring her breasts to the sunlight and his own seeking lips.