The thick, rigid length of him pierced her body with a gentle insistence. She stared up into his eyes and saw him frown slightly, his brow furrowed in concentration.
“So tight,” he whispered, bending his head for another brief kiss. “So small and tight.”
She choked back a groan of misery. He was disappointed. “Is that bad?” she asked.
He smiled ruefully. “Not hardly,” he said, and pushed himself all the way inside her.
Donna gasped, then clutched at his hands, still entwined with hers. Her fingernails dug into his flesh.
Jack went completely still, his body buried so deep within her, she was sure she could feel him touching her heart.
“You’re a virgin,” he said flatly.
“Not now,” she told him with a pleased smile.
“Donna.” His head dropped to his chest. “You should have told me.”
“Why? Would it have changed things?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
She shook her head. “Then I’m glad I didn’t tell you. Because I wouldn’t change a thing.”
He lifted his head again to stare down at her. Their gazes locked and she tried to tell him with her eyes what she couldn’t quite bring herself to say yet. That she loved him. That she wanted him more than her next breath. That she would die if he pulled away from her now.
She twisted her hips slightly as her discomfort eased and he sucked in a gulp of air at her movement. Smiling to herself, she repeated the maneuver and Jack’s eyes closed.
“Jack,” she whispered. “Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”
His eyes opened again and he looked down at her. “I won’t stop, Donna. I won’t ever stop.”
Then he moved, rocking his hips against her, and the friction of that movement sent new tremors of expectation racing along her spine. She moaned gently, arching her head back into the mattress. Trying to mimic his actions, her hips moved, too, with him, into him, driving them both onward, pushing them toward the edge of completion that waited, shimmering, just out of reach.
Her heartbeat staggered. Her chest heaved with the effort to breathe. And none of it mattered. Every thought in her head was centered on the exquisite sensations rocketing through her body.
Jack set the rhythm of their dance and Donna matched him move for move. When at last he freed one of his hands and skimmed it down between their bodies, she was desperate with need. So completely caught in a web of passion and desire that she felt as though she would never be able to draw an easy breath again.
Then he touched her. His fingertips stroked one small, incredibly sensitive piece of flesh and stars exploded in the room. Her body jerked. Her legs locked around his hips, holding him to her. She shouted his name as tremors coursed through her limbs, making her feel both weak and energized at the same time.
A heartbeat later Jack’s body stiffened, he threw his head back and, groaning her name, joined her in the sweet rush of fulfillment.
He collapsed on top of her and Donna smoothed her hands up and down his back, relishing the strong, warm feel of his flesh. His heavy weight felt comforting, right somehow. When he tried to roll off of her, she held him still. “No,” she said softly. “Stay with me awhile longer.”
“I’m too heavy,” he argued, lifting his head to look down at her.
“No, you’re not.” She smiled and boldly slid her hands farther down his back to the curve of his rear. She explored his body with the same tender thoroughness that he had hers and watched his gray eyes shimmer with a renewed passion.
“Donna,” he warned her, “it’s too soon. You’ll be sore enough as it is.”
She shook her head against the sheets. “I want to feel all of it again,” she told him, her hands cupping his bottom and kneading his flesh. “And if I’m already sore, why not?”
“You’re crazy, you know that?” he asked, dipping his head to plant a kiss at the corner of her mouth.
She turned her face into his, kissing him deeply, fully. Her tongue parted his lips and swept into his mouth, and his teasing manner instantly fell away, dissolving into a fresh storm of rising passion.
Deep within her, Donna felt his body tighten in response to her kiss and she felt the first stirrings of a delicious sense of power. Whatever he may claim to the contrary, Donna knew in that moment that he was far from feeling nothing toward her.
Unlike the first time, there were no soft murmurs, no lazy strokes and caresses. Now there was only a hunger to be fed. A desire to be quenched.
His mouth on hers became ferocious. Nipping with his teeth and grinding his lips against hers, Jack laid claim to her, body and soul. Donna groaned into his mouth and gave herself over to the tumultuous feelings swamping her. Clutching at his back, her fingernails dragged along his spine, as if branding his flesh the way she hoped she was branding his heart.
Drawing her legs up, she locked them tight around his hips, pulling him deeper, harder, inside her. When he began moving within her, she shuddered violently at his strength and gentleness. His hips bucked against hers. She moved into him, knowing now what pleasure awaited her and desperately anxious to experience it again.
Small spirals of delight began to build at her core and she tightened her muscles, straining to reach that starburst of sensation.
His harsh breathing puffed against her ear. She felt the muscles of his back bunch and cord beneath her hands. His powerful thrusts inched her backward on the mattress and she held on to him as though he were the only stable point left in her universe.
And then, almost without warning, that world exploded again. In a bright swirl of color and light, she found not the same completion she had expected, but a deeper, more vibrant, more all-encompassing swell of delight. She rode the wave of pleasure as far as it would take her, and then gathered Jack to her tightly when he cried out, emptying himself into her depths.
Hours later she woke up, cradled in his arms.
Jack held her close when she would have moved, unwilling to give up the feel of her tucked safely beside him.
“Did I fall asleep?” she whispered, her warm breath brushing across his chest with a feather-light touch.
He chuckled. “No, ma’am,” he said, his hands stroking up and down the length of her back. “You fell unconscious.”
Despite his tight hold on her, she managed to lift her head to look at him. Tossing her dark hair back out of her eyes, she said, “You shouldn’t have let me sleep, Jack. I don’t want to miss a minute of this night.”
“Honey,” he told her, smoothing back that stubborn lock of hair again, “you’re new at this, remember? You’ve had enough for one night.”
“No.” She shook her head, tumbling her dark hair back into her eyes only to be swept aside again. She bent and kissed one of his flat, brown nipples, running her tongue across the pebbly surface.
He groaned as the sensation of her tongue on him swept down throughout his body. Amazing, he thought, but he was ready and raring to go. Again. It seemed that he couldn’t get enough of this incredible woman. And maybe, at least for this one night, he shouldn’t think beyond that thought.
There would be time enough for thinking in the morning. And the morning after that. Something inside him coiled tight and dark as he realized that very soon she would probably regret every moment they had shared in this tiny room. Shouldn’t he take the opportunity to build enough memories to see him through the lonely years he would face without her?
“Donna…”
She smiled and lifted her head again. “I’ve waited a long time for this, Jack. I don’t want to wait another minute.”
“Baby,” he said reluctantly, “if we go again this soon, you won’t be able to walk tomorrow.”
“Then we’ll spend the day in bed.” Her eyebrows wiggled and her smile broadened just a bit.
“Man, whatever happened to shy virgins?” he asked, though he was infinitely grateful that she obviously wanted him as badly as he did her.
“It�
��s a myth,” she told him, bending to taste that flat nipple of his again. The tip of her tongue traced across that piece of sensitive flesh and Jack’s arm around her tightened further. Lifting her head again, she looked at him out of one eye. “Virgins aren’t shy. They just don’t know what they’re missing. Once we find out—there’s no stopping us.”
“I’m convinced,” he muttered thickly as her right hand began to stroke his belly and parts farther south.
“You know, Jack,” she whispered between hasty kisses following the narrow trail of curls down the length of his chest, “I really think I’m getting the hang of this. There’s really not a lot to learn, is there?”
He caught her head in his hands and brought her face to his. Sealing her lips closed with a mind-boggling kiss, he finally let her go long enough to assure her. “Baby, this class is just getting started. You’re a long way from graduating.”
Then, before she could say a word, Jack flipped her onto her back.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
“You’ll find out,” he said, his voice low and husky, filled with promises of long nights and careful loving.
“Jack…”
She reached for him but he pushed her hands aside then dipped his head to claim first one hard, rigid nipple then the other. Slowly, lavishly, he worshiped them, each in turn. His tongue swirled around the dark, pebbly buds and he nibbled at her with the edges of his teeth.
He felt her passion blossom beneath his touch. Pleasure tore through him as he realized that for the first time in his life, giving satisfaction was more important to him than finding it himself.
His hands swept up and down the length of her, his fingertips sliding into her warmth and then out again, leaving her breathless and tortured. She tossed her head from side to side on the pillow and small, inarticulate sounds erupted from her throat.
He smiled and slowly trailed kisses down her rib cage, across her abdomen and past the triangle of dark curls that hid her treasures from him.
She flinched and tried to move away. “Jack, what are you doing?”
He held her still, his big hands gentle but firm on her hips as he moved to kneel between her legs. Glancing into her eyes, he smiled and said, “I’m keeping you after school for an extra lesson.”
“Jack—” She shook her head, one hand reaching toward him. “I don’t think—”
“Good.” He cut her off neatly. “Don’t think. Feel.”
Lifting her bottom from the mattress, he held her, suspended as he nudged first one of her legs, then the other, over his shoulders.
Her hands fisted in the sheets and her eyes held a glimmer of wary apprehension. Then his mouth covered her and she whimpered helplessly.
Jack sipped at her as though her body was a cup, containing the finest, most intoxicating brew. With his tongue, he stroked her most sensitive spot until she was trembling in his arms. Glancing at her again, he saw her eyes close as she trustingly gave herself to him, opening herself to whatever he chose to do to her—with her.
Her surrender fed his own passion and he deepened his touch, sliding one finger into her depths as he continued to lavish attention on her inner flesh.
Donna gasped, opened her eyes and looked at the man she loved as he caressed her more intimately than she had thought possible. She should be embarrassed, she knew. At the very least, she should close her eyes so that she wouldn’t have to see what he was doing to her.
But she couldn’t. Her gaze locked on him as her heartbeat accelerated until she thought it would burst from her chest. Intense spears of delight shot through her body, ricocheting off of each other until she was nothing more than a coil of anticipation, being wound tighter and tighter with every passing moment.
He stroked her with his tongue again and suckled gently at a spot that seemed to be directly linked to every nerve in her body. Tremors coursed through her. She heard herself whimper again and was powerless to stop it. As an internal tension built she was certain would kill her with its strength, she reached forward and cupped the back of his head, holding him to her.
And when the first incredible shudder shot through her, she held him tightly to her. She shouted, “Jack!” as her body exploded in his arms and kept him firmly locked to her until the last, lingering ripples of satisfaction faded away.
Finally spent, her hands fell to her sides and she lay limply in his strong hands. When she gathered the strength to open her eyes, she looked up and met his desire-filled gaze.
She didn’t know what to say. What could she say to a man who had just done what he had?
Thankfully, Jack solved that problem for her. He gently set her back onto the bed, smiled and whispered, “Class dismissed.”
Eleven
After a couple of hours of sleep, they awoke to the slivers of dawn poking through the gaps in the curtains.
Donna moaned quietly and stretched against him.
Jack’s teeth ground together as he tried to halt his body’s instantaneous reaction. But that, as he realized a moment later, was a losing battle. It seemed all she had to do was draw a breath and he was eager to become a part of her again. To feel her warmth surround him, pulling him inside her, where he wasn’t alone. Where incredibly, after all of these lonely years, he had found peace.
But it was a temporary contentment and he knew it. As if to remind himself of that fact, he swung his legs off the bed and stood.
“Where you going?” she murmured, her voice still husky, whether from sleep or renewed passion he didn’t know—and couldn’t afford to find out.
“Take a shower,” he said abruptly. “Gotta get to work.”
She pushed herself into a sitting position and the sheet dropped away, puddling in her lap. Instantly his gaze dropped to the swell of her breasts and his palms itched to cup them, caress them.
He inhaled sharply and told himself to get a grip.
Donna raked one hand through her tousled hair, shoving it back from her face with lazy grace. Slanting him a smile, she yawned, then said, “I guess I’d better get moving, too. Talk to Marie Talbot about that job.”
He nodded but couldn’t help wondering if she would be telling Ms. Talbot that she would only be on base temporarily. Or would she keep it a secret, continuing the charade of their marriage?
A marriage that, for last night anyway, had felt suddenly, and completely, real. Memories filled him, rushing through his mind like a strong gust of sea air. Images of her, open and trusting, reaching for him, crying his name, rose up in his brain and he wondered how he would ever live without her.
She absently rubbed her stomach as it grumbled noisily.
“Guess I worked up an appetite,” she said, and gingerly moved to the edge of the bed.
“Sore?” he asked, even knowing the answer.
She shot him a quick, mischievous look. “It was worth it.”
Like a bolt of lightning, sudden realization struck him with the force of a blow that threatened to knock him to his knees. She’d been a virgin. Jack’s eyes widened as the implications of that fact raced home.
How stupid could one man be? he wondered frantically. Desire was no excuse. Passion no defense. He could only hope that she had been smarter than he.
Warily he asked, “Donna?”
“Uh-huh?” She eased up off the bed and stood facing him, naked and completely unselfconscious.
“I’m ashamed to admit it, but something only just now occurred to me.”
“What’s that?” she asked, taking a step toward him as if to comfort him.
“Last night…” he said, holding up one hand to ward her off long enough to let him keep his thoughts straight. “Please tell me you were safe.”
She laughed and he felt a momentary respite from the worry that had suddenly dropped over him like an early morning fog.
“Of course, I’m safe,” she told him. “That’s one good thing about a virgin, Jack. No worry about diseases.” She paled then and looked at him. “You’re not—”
>
“No,” he assured her quickly. “I’m healthy. I’m not talking about diseases here, Donna. I’m trying to ask you if you’re on the Pill.”
She laughed again.
Incredible.
“Now why would a virgin be on the Pill?” she said, smiling and shaking her head at the notion.
The sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach was apparently contagious. He watched her face pale again and when she plopped down onto the bed behind her, he wasn’t even surprised at her stunned expression. “Ohmigod,” she whispered.
“You can say that again,” he muttered as his temporary marriage suddenly began to look a lot more permanent.
All day Donna tried to dismiss the worries from her mind. After all, she told herself, it wouldn’t do her a damn bit of good to get all wound up about it. She either was or wasn’t pregnant. It was too late now to do anything about the situation one way or the other.
Instead she concentrated on her new job. Marie Talbot, an older woman with gray hair and sparkling green eyes had hired her on the spot and immediately put her to work.
There was only one child in the base school who was hearing impaired. Dylan, a nine-year-old boy, had taken signing courses before, but his skills had weakened since he’d had no one to continue his lessons. The first time Donna signed to him, his eyes lit up with excitement.
And as the day went on, Donna was pleased to note that some of his classmates, intrigued with her flashing hands and Dylan’s giggles, wandered over, expressing interest in learning.
Within an hour or so, Dylan was transformed from a shy, solitary child to an excited little boy, eager to make friends and teach them how to talk to him.
Her day flew past and Donna was thankful. It wasn’t until she was driving home from work that she at last had time to think about the possible repercussions of her one wild night of lovemaking.
The Littlest Marine & The Oldest Living Married Virgin Page 24