by Anne Oliver
His bare feet made no sound as he crossed the pool surround. He stood a metre away, breathing her in, watching the rise and fall of her breasts, her nipples tight little buds against the buttercup fabric. Arousal, he knew. Just as he knew that if he bent down and touched the inside of her wrist he’d find her pulse as rapid.
‘Shall I tell you what you’re thinking?’ he said.
She blinked once at him, but didn’t answer right away. Finally she said, ‘I’d rather you show me.’ She tilted her head, and an echo of her thoughts lingered on her curved lips like honey.
The urge to drink that sweet temptation from her mouth consumed him. ‘I thought you might still be mad. I take it from your response that you’re not.’
‘It’s a waste of time holding on to anger, don’t you think?’ Dreamy emerald eyes stared up at him. ‘I’d rather make love than war.’
He sat down on the deck beside her, picked up her hand, grazing his thumb over her fingers. ‘Wise thoughts.’ He brought her hand to his lips before setting it on her thigh and releasing her, then leaned back on his elbows.
His touch seemed to set off an explosion of energy. She pushed up. Dane made to follow suit, but Mariel’s bare foot in the middle of his chest prevented him. He could see her eyes clearly. Green and direct and aroused.
She wiggled her toes against his shirt. ‘Make mad passionate love with me. Right here, right now.’
‘Okay…’ He admired the view of Mariel from this unique angle and said with a quirk, ‘But it looks like you have the upper hand at this moment.’ He scraped a fingernail under the erotic arch of her foot.
She jerked it away and let out a shuddering gasp as the first warm drops of rain speckled the deck. ‘Damn you, that tickles.’ Lifting her face to the sky, she flung her arms wide. ‘Hey, it’s raining.’
Her eyes clashed with his and she lurched as if drunk, except he knew she wasn’t. His hands shot to her hips, as much to prevent her doing him an unspeakable injury as to steady her. ‘I’ve got you.’
‘Have you?’ She crossed her arms and an unreadable expression crossed her eyes. He wasn’t sure who’d manoeuvred what, or where, but he found her feet planted on either side of his torso. ‘Maybe I’ve got you.’
He curled his fingers around her ankles. ‘You sure about that?’
Anticipation filled the hiatus that followed, as if the evening, too, held its breath. He stared up at the clouds a moment, their heavy underbellies ruddy with the reflected city lights. Lightning flickered in the distance, followed by the restless grumble of thunder.
She glanced towards the darkening heavens, too. ‘We should—’
‘Yes. We should. Slowly this time. Very slowly.’
He tightened his grip on her ankles and looked into the smouldering depths of her eyes. They were dark, mirroring the approaching storm. Flicking her hair over her shoulders, she stared down at him, all glorious sparks and energy.
‘Mariel…’ Gazes locked, he trailed his hands up those smooth, firm calf muscles.
She didn’t move or react in any way, but the pleasure of watching her eyes darken further with arousal while soft summer rain spangled her hair was like nothing he’d ever experienced. Though need pummelled at him, and urgency beat like a drum through his blood, his plan remained the same. Take. It. Slow.
Skin-warmed fabric slithered against the backs of his hands as he memorised the shape of her legs the way a blind man might learn Braille. The indentation behind her knees, the soft inner thigh.
She was silky heat and trembling need. His own fingers trembled when they brushed the damp cling of cotton at the juncture of her thighs. Anticipation, hunger. Both clawed at him as he slipped a finger beneath the flimsy barrier to find smooth female flesh. Slick. Wet. Hot…
For one paralysing moment Mariel felt her whole body go rigid. If the future of world peace had depended on it, she would have still remained where she was, eyes fused with Dane’s while she absorbed the exquisite pleasure of his finger there. As if they’d never made love before, as if it was different this time. Chained by her own rampant desire, she was scared speechless. Motionless. Mindless.
Then his hand moved away, and that panicked her infinitely more. ‘No. I—’
‘It’s okay, Queen Bee.’
‘I know. I know it is.’ She blew out a breath, pushed both hands through her dampening hair as she struggled against a tide that threatened to drown her. ‘Now you’re back, and I’m here, and it’s slow and easy, and I’m still getting goosebumps. Because it’s you.’
Feeling dazed, she looked down at the shoulders she’d slung her arms around in easy friendship, the familiar grey eyes she’d known since childhood. Except now those shoulders seemed impossibly broad and his eyes smoked with desire. ‘It’s been over a week and I still can’t get my head around it.’
‘Don’t try. Don’t think at all.’ His tone was light as he touched his palms to the backs of her knees, but she sensed the tension hum through his body like a low electric current. ‘Come down here.’
Easy, since her legs and every other body part were melting. Simple to slide, boneless, on top of him, to put her lips on his and drink him in. Slowly. He tasted of berries and beer, midnight and man.
She raised her head to stare at him in wonder. And amazement. Tangled her restless fingers in his over-long hair and pushed it off his face and behind his ears, breathing in the scent of his skin on the moisture-laden air. She lifted a hand to his eyelashes, caught a single crystal raindrop on her finger.
His fingers fumbled a moment behind her hair, then her zip was being lowered, baring her feverish skin to the refreshing rain. He was sliding the fabric away and she was lifting her arms and helping him, every movement, every shivery rasp of fabric against flesh, skin against skin, dreamlike in the softness of the night, until she was naked but for a scrap of ivory lace bikini.
He rolled her onto her back beside him and leaned up on one elbow. Backlit by the pool’s underwater lights, his hair was haloed by a silvery rain mist. His gaze took a leisurely but scorching journey down her body—she could almost feel the moisture on her skin turning to steam, and barely stopped herself moaning.
‘Yes. Now,’ was all she could say.
He shook his head, his eyes glittering in the dusky dimness. ‘You do everything at light-warp speed. Not tonight.’
He traced the side of her face with his knuckles, the barest touch.
And she forgot to breathe.
Forgot everything but the pleasure he promised.
Slow. He was true to his word. He cupped a breast in his palm, rolled the excruciatingly sensitive nipple between finger and thumb, then dipped his head to take it into his hot wet mouth and suckle, drawing the exquisite moment out like warm spun toffee. And again, as he paid the same loving attention to her other breast.
Languid. His palm, hot and heavy, was leaving her breasts to glide across her belly and down, slipping beneath the waistband of her panties.
Lazy. The long, liquid pull as he slid one finger over her moist centre. Deeper, until she moaned his name, the throaty murmur stirring from somewhere deep inside her.
Unable to help herself, she moved her legs and arched into his hand, restless, aching. Wanting. She’d never wanted this way with any other man. ‘Dane…I—’
‘Shh…’ He rubbed his lips over hers, obliterating what she’d been about to say, then stared down at her. His face was part shadow, his hair haloed by the moisture’s silvery mist, but his eyes… They were almost cool—unlike his kiss—and direct. ‘Just lie there and be quiet.’
‘But I—’
He kissed her again, drinking the words from her mouth slowly, the way he’d savour a rare vintage wine, until she couldn’t remember a single one.
When he left her lips to nibble his way down the column of her throat and over the pounding pulse in her neck, she couldn’t breathe. When he shifted and his tongue delved into her belly button, she couldn’t move. When he laved his way sl
owly and sinuously over her abdomen to the edge of her bikini, she couldn’t think…
He was smoothing the cling of lace away, the arousing ridge of callus at the base of his fingers chafing her skin as his hand slid down her thighs, over her calves until he’d divested her of the last shred of clothing.
And, oh… Ah… Yes… His mouth was hot heaven on her air-cooled flesh as he parted her legs and worshipped the swollen knot of need with his tongue. Hands alternately fluttering and fisting in Dane’s hair, she floated somewhere between paradise and dawn.
The murky atmosphere dewed her skin with sweat and rain while a restless sky flickered and rumbled. Pressure, thick and white-hot, building, burning. Rising on a cumulonimbus crescendo that echoed within her.
She arched against him, the torrid shock of climax shuddering through her, a primitive sound issuing from her throat, tearing the sultry air.
But he didn’t give her time to come down. Before she could draw breath he was plunging a finger inside while his mouth continued to suckle, relentlessly pushing her further, faster, higher. Gasping, she slid over the hot and slippery edge again. She closed her eyes on a moan.
Slowly she became aware that the plush-prickly sensation on her belly must be Dane’s chin. She opened her eyes again and met his over the pale expanse of naked flesh. ‘Oh. Wow.’ Her lungs couldn’t seem to find any oxygen, and she seemed to be incapable of muttering more than one word at a time.
‘My sentiments exactly.’ His voice was thick as he reared up, flicking open his belt buckle.
She laughed raggedly, struggling for breath as she wiggled down, beneath his body, until she felt the rasp of denim and the hot swell of his erection against her sensitised flesh. Buttons popped as she leaned up, tore open his shirt and rubbed greedy hands over hard, hairy flesh.
He snagged her fingers. ‘Slow, remember?’
‘Okay. But make it quick.’ Slow had never been in her vocabulary. But she lay back while he yanked off his almost buttonless shirt, tossed it aside. He stood to shuck off his jeans and jocks.
And… She’d seen him naked, but it had always been in a fevered rush. Now… What could one say about perfection? Every feminine cell rolled around and lay down and begged at that magnificent display of aroused masculinity, and her pulse, which had almost steadied, picked up again at double time.
Dane. In the flesh. Glorious, touchable, within reachable flesh.
He lowered himself to the deck in one deft manoeuvre that swept what little breath she had left from her lungs, rolled her beneath him, almost crushing her in the process.
‘Some women like to be smothered,’ Mariel murmured, struggling for air and space. ‘I’m not one of them.’
‘Quit complaining.’ But he took some of his weight on his elbows and stretched out over her, the lines of his body like some sleek and muscular predator. The hard length of his erection prodded against her pelvis. His chest rubbed up against her breasts as he coaxed her with light, flirty kisses over her face, her neck, her ear, where he whispered, ‘We’ll discuss personal preferences another time.’
He pressed his lips to hers, the kiss turning from playful to passionate in less time than it took for Mariel to form a response. Streams of sensation flowed over her skin as his fingers traced her brow, her cheeks, her jaw. His tongue delved inside, coaxing hers to join in with a sensuality she couldn’t resist.
Reaching down between their bodies, she wrapped her fingers around him. He jerked in her hands, stopped kissing her to pull back and stare into her eyes. They remained that way for an eternity, gazes locked as she slid her fingers slowly from silky tip to throbbing base, then back to the tip once more. She smoothed the drop of moisture she discovered there with her finger before guiding him between her thighs.
No words. In the deep well of midnight, with the one person who knew her almost better than she knew herself, speech was unnecessary. Time was irrelevant. Their eyes met in accord. She understood him, his vulnerabilities, his fears, his needs. Just as she knew he understood hers.
The rain had almost stopped, leaving only the pungent smell of freshly damp vegetation and the remnant moist heat from the day. She heard the rhythmic plop as water rolled off a broad-leaved plant nearby. A patch of sky peeked through the clouds, its silver-gilded edge lit by an invisible moon.
A different kind of heat seduced her now, as he pushed his blunt satin tip inside her. A slow, delicious friction stroked and rubbed her inner muscles. A moan escaped her. The long, liquid glide to paradise.
Urgency grew, need sharpened as he urged her higher. She followed, and with fingers, lips, teeth and tongue she urged him, also, to pursue her.
She met him stroke for stroke, matching demand for demand, as their bodies moved in a choreographed dance. Like a perfect storm, he whipped them away together on a flood of sensation until they washed up on some distant shore.
Dane groaned—maybe she did, too; she couldn’t be sure—and collapsed on top of her. Their eyes fused on the other’s, lips close, breath mingling. His heart was drubbing like a piston against her own.
When he made to pull away, take some of his weight off her, she yanked him back with what remaining strength she had. ‘Don’t go.’
‘I wasn’t leaving.’
His silky hair brushed her skin as he smiled at her in the dimness. ‘I was thinking we should go inside and find somewhere more comfortable. Maybe get some sleep.’
‘Okay.’
Pushing up, he swept her into his arms and headed for the door. She clung to his neck as he climbed the stairs, barely raising a puff. And just this once she was content to let him play hero.
The cool, smooth sheets beneath her body lulled her towards slumber. Resting her cheek on the pillow of his broad chest, she breathed his scent and listened to his heart return to a regular rhythm. Heard his breathing settle and knew he’d fallen asleep.
So easy for him, she thought. He probably went to sleep with strange women beside him all the time. Why would it be any different with her?
Because he’d told her he’d never brought a woman here to sleep.
She lifted her head to watch him and her heart tumbled. He looked like the boy she’d known, innocent and sweet. Rather than disturb him, she kissed her fingers, laid them lightly against his lips.
When had she ever felt this fulfilled? The answer was easy. Never. Maybe it was because she’d never made love before in so many ways. Body, mind, heart.
But fear snuck through the hazy contentment. If she wasn’t very, very careful her heart would be the loser. Big-time. She wasn’t going to let anyone hurt her again. Not Dane, not anyone.
She could not allow uncontrolled emotions and past dreams to cloud what was supposed to be a practical arrangement.
And yet she’d allowed him to set this dangerous precedent by bringing her to his bed tonight. She should have insisted he take her to her own room. She’d leave. In a moment. Carefully sliding off him, she shifted to the edge of the bed, closed her eyes to shut out the reminder of his robe hanging on the back of his door.
Somehow she must have slept, because when she pried open her eyes again the pearly light of dawn was pushing back the darkness. Dane’s body was sprawled against her, a heavy palm resting on one breast. Every place their bodies touched was slicked with sweat. Neither had thought to switch on the air-conditioning and a blanket of thick air swamped them.
Too late to slip away to her own bed now.
The vague tingling low in her belly sharpened and spread upward, tightening her nipples into hard peaks. The large-palmed hand covering her breast obviously registered that fact and squeezed gently, then rolled the sensitive nub between his thumb and finger.
‘You’re awake.’ His hand moved lower—a slow, lazy glide that had her arching into his big body.
‘Mmm… Uh…’ Heat blasted her skin and her breath caught as he reached between her legs and slid a finger over still swollen flesh. Her whole body throbbed, tensed.
‘G
ood morning.’ His eyes, smudged with sleep, smiled at her.
He was doing it again, driving her up. Driving her towards the edge. And she had to admit she liked it—especially when he did that thing with his thumb… She was even prepared to let him play there a little longer…
But she had her own ideas…
Twisting, she dragged her body up and over his until she was sitting astride him. She saw him blink, watched his jaw drop as she grasped his sex in both hands and impaled herself. His eyes weren’t sleepy now. They were wide and opaque and involved.
‘And a good morning to you, too,’ she said. Then she slid down on him in one slow, smooth glide. ‘Now, pay attention. It’s my turn.’
Dane left for the north of the state later that morning. Because she didn’t want to appear needy or clingy Mariel made sure she’d already left for her little office when it was time for him to leave. Of course she gave him a long goodbye kiss.
She spent the next few days in a frenzy of activity, interviewing potential tailors, sketching new designs and preparing patterns.
He called her every night. She missed him. She tried hard not to, because sooner or later he was going to call it off. She knew that. So she focused on her work. The way to success was so clear she could almost taste it.
Unless…
Instead of writing up her order for new stock one morning, she forced herself to confront the impossible and made an appointment with her family doctor. She’d finished the active tablets in her packet of Pills. Her period was nearly two weeks overdue. She didn’t want to start a new pack until she knew why.
Dr Judy explained, ‘If you haven’t missed a Pill, vomited or used other medication, it’s unlikely you’re pregnant, Mariel.’
Mariel bit down on her lip while she looked at the older woman who’d treated her for all the childhood illnesses over the years, and felt like throwing up. She’d read the Pill’s accompanying leaflet. She knew the advice by heart… Now. And now was a little late. A lot late. ‘I was airsick on the way back to Australia. And somehow I miscalculated the time difference and ended up with a spare Pill…’