Maverick

by Lora Leigh

  “Come here, and we’ll discuss it.” His hard hand patted his lap as he stared back at Risa with an edge of amusement. “You can convince me you need to go to her, rather than her coming here.”

  She blinked back in surprise. Was he teasing her?

  “There’s nothing to discuss,” she stated stiffly, forcing her hands not to form fists as she fought he need to do as he asked.

  “There’s actually a measure of risk involved in the trip,” he mused. “Sit down here and we’ll talk about it.”

  He patted his hard leg again.

  “Stop playing with me, Micah,” she demanded, frustration clawing at her now. “The situation is difficult enough; there’s no sense in adding to the complications.”

  His eyes gleamed with laughter, and with lust. She wanted to sink into that link, holding it inside her. But the memories of the single night they had shared sliced through her mind and filled her with shame.

  She couldn’t handle a man like Micah, she had decided. He was obviously more exacting in his sexuality than she had heard of men being. What happened to the wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am sexuality that men were supposed to possess? When had the rules changed?

  “I like adding complications, Risa, they make life interesting,” he told her. “Now, you can sit down here and let me pet you a little bit while you explain this need you have to escape the safety of your apartment, or we can stay here.”

  “Or I can walk out and go anyway,” she pointed out with a tight smile. “You’ll still follow, your friends will follow, and I’ll still be protected without having to humiliate myself to do it.”

  “You would of course have to get past me to get out that door,” he pointed out. “How do you intend to do that?”

  With a baseball bat, probably. That was most likely what it would take, and she didn’t own one.

  “Micah, please don’t be difficult,” she protested, trying to restrain her anger. “Nothing will be solved or gained by sitting on your lap and playing this asinine game you’re intent on playing.”

  He stared back at her archly. “Much will be gained, Risa. Just to begin with, our pleasure. Orion will be thrown off balance, and we’ll be much more relaxed.”

  She felt her hands fisting into the loose material of the T-shirt she wore as she glanced at his lap and swallowed tightly.

  He had an erection. It wasn’t hard to detect. His explanation the day before for his reasons for not releasing the night they were together made sense, but still her mind wanted to reject it. Nerves and fear gathered in the pit of her belly each time she thought about that night, each time she remembered the waves of sensation that she had fought.

  They had been frightening. The thought of experiencing them again was both terrifying and exciting. Unfortunately, the thought of disappointing him again held her back. She couldn’t control that pleasure, and the thought of not controlling her body, of once again being helpless beneath the tide of sensation, had the power to send her into a panic.

  “We discuss it here.” He patted his lap again. “Or we stay inside today. Your choice.”

  Her choice. Was anything about this entire situation her choice?

  “This is insane.” Her voice was hoarse; her gaze flicked again to his erection.

  Risa felt the flesh between her thighs pulsing, her juices gathering on the bare lips beneath the new panties she had slipped into and worn.

  His brow arched again.

  “What—” She swallowed tightly. “What are you going to do?”

  A smile tugged at his lips. “What would you let me do?”

  A shudder raced down her back.

  Micah saw the widening of Risa’s eyes, the hunger that darkened the light blue irises, and had to stifle a groan as his cock throbbed with the need to be buried inside her again.

  He could make it better for her this time. He swore he would. Not today; it was too soon. She wasn’t used to his touch yet, wasn’t used to his hand upon her body, or the needs that burned between them.

  A woman’s body was the finest work of art. It was created for pleasure. From the top of her head to the soles of her feet, a woman was a man’s greatest temptation. He would fight wars to protect her; he would give his life to see to her security. She was man’s greatest strength, and his greatest weakness. She was created as his other half, and Micah had never understood that completely, until Risa.

  “What I would let you do isn’t the point.” His body tensed further at the throb of hunger in her voice. “We both know this doesn’t work for me.”

  “Nothing has to work, love,” he promised her, his body tightened as she seemed to try to take that last step to him. “This isn’t about having sex. It’s about touch, nothing more. It’s about learning your lover’s body, your lover’s touch. Wouldn’t you like to learn my touch, Risa?”

  Her eyes dilated; the most incredible flush washed over the creamy flesh of her face and neck. A hint of color, a mere suggestion of the fire that blazed in her body.

  And he knew that fire. He knew the heat of her tight pussy, the stiff points of her hard little nipples, the taste of her. She was an aphrodisiac to his senses, and his hunger for her refused to abate.

  “Come, Risa,” he whispered as he gauged the weakening need that filled her eyes.

  He held his hand out to her. “Come to me; feel your lover’s touch.”

  Her hand trembled as she laid it in his. That slight tremor touched his heart in ways it shouldn’t. She was innocent of a lover’s touch, except his own. Still, she had no idea of the power of her own sexuality, or its effect on him. Would she be surprised, he wondered, to know she could make him feel weak with his need for her?

  “Ah, love.” He drew her to him, catching her hips and pulling her legs into place on each side of his legs until she was kneeling in front of him, watching him in confusion. “There.” His hand stroked up her back. “I like looking at your pretty face when I’m touching you. I can watch your eyes darken, see the heat that builds beneath your flesh. I make you hot, Risa; admit it.” His teasing grin was met with another flash of confusion in her expression.

  “You frighten me,” she whispered as he brushed her hair back from the gentle lines of her face. “I can’t control what you do to me, Micah.”

  Ah yes, control. There was no control when lusts raged out of control, and the addition of the drug that still affected her small body would make the pleasure terrifying for her. She hadn’t been able to control her body’s response to touch when she was first injected with the Whore’s Dust. It had made her beg for touch, despite the degradation she felt at the act. Control now would be uppermost in her mind.

  Controlling her response, her pleasure. She needed to learn her own body, learn the depth of the pleasure, before she learned that control wasn’t needed when it was a touch she desired with not just her body but her heart and her mind as well.

  “Kiss me.” He whispered the demand. “Take what you want, Risa.”

  He watched her eyes, watched the throb of her pulse at her neck. The thought of touching him sent a response tearing through her. He could see it, felt it in the tensing of her slender thighs alongside his.

  She was dying for this touch. He was so hungry for it, he wondered if he would survive the wait.

  RISA LICKED HER lips nervously as she stared back at Micah.

  “What do I want?” The words fell from her lips before her head had a chance to censor them.

  Her hands moved over his chest to his neck. She felt the heat of his flesh, the throb of his pulse, the thunder of his heart.

  “You want to kiss me.” His lips formed the words, drawing her gaze to their tempting lines.

  “What more do I want?” she asked, knowing she wanted so much more. “Will you touch me as I kiss you, Micah?”

  She needed to be touched. Her flesh felt tight, achy. The need to be touched was overwhelming. She ached. The ache was like a sickness, like a fever she couldn’t get rid of.

  “I’ll
touch you whenever you like, Risa; you have only to ask.”

  Weakness flooded her; need exploded inside her. Her hands moved to his shoulders, gripped the hard muscle there, and her lips lowered to his.

  She had never kissed anyone, by her own instigation, her own initiation.

  Micah sat beneath her, his body tense, humming with power and promise as her lips touched his and she felt a cry welling in her throat.

  For the first time she had the chance to learn the shape of his lips against hers, the feel of them. Her lips parted, her tongue stroked over the fuller line of the lower curve, and she tasted coffee and heat. She tasted the man slowly, rather than simply the hunger that poured through her.

  Her head tilted, lips parted over his, her tongue touched the seam of his lips and she felt lost in the wonder of the sensuality that began to build slowly between them.

  Not just lust. It was so much more.

  “Touch me,” she breathed against his lips. “Please, Micah, touch me.”

  A groan rasped from his throat and his hands moved from the hard grip they had on her hips as his lips parted beneath hers, and then she didn’t know who was kissing who, who controlled and who led.

  One hand lifted to her face, his palm cupping her neck. She loved that touch. It made her feel cherished, made her feel surrounded by him. The other hand pushed beneath the loose hem of her shirt. It stroked up her back; his fingertips touched her flesh on the way back down. Electric pleasure seemed to surround her as she allowed herself to sink beneath the waves of sensation that built inside her.

  The uncharted waters of slow, building heat were exhilarating. The touch of his lips against hers as she learned the shape, the hunger, of a kiss gave her a heady confidence. The feel of his neck and shoulders beneath her touch, the feel of his heartbeat thundering in his chest, gave her courage.

  He had to enjoy her, she thought desperately. Would he kiss her with such hunger if he didn’t? Would his heart race with excitement?

  She jerked, her thoughts flying from her head as his palm cupped a breast, his thumb finding her nipple as a ragged cry tore from her throat.

  Her head jerked back, eyes opening. She should have kept them closed, because the sight of his kiss-swollen, damp lips sent a punch of reaction to her womb.

  “Micah. Tell me what to do,” she gasped, her hands clenching his biceps now. “Tell me what to do.”

  “What you’re doing,” he groaned. “Let me touch you, Risa. Just feel good for me, love. Just let it feel good. This is all, just touch. Just touch, baby. Nothing more.”

  Just touch. She could handle just touch, maybe.

  “Here. Let’s take this off for you.” The hem of her shirt rose.

  Risa lifted her arms, eager to be rid of the confining material as he stripped it from her.

  “Damn. Look how pretty.”

  Both hands cupped her breasts, framing the violet lace of the half bra that framed her flesh and lifted the swollen mounds to him.

  Risa ran her hands over his shoulders, pushed them beneath the edges of his shirt, and rasped over his flesh with her nails.

  It wasn’t enough. As his lips moved over her neck, angling too slowly to the rise of her breasts, she tugged at his shirt. Her fingers fumbled with the buttons; she was certain one might have popped off.

  She wasn’t watching for the building arcs of dark intensity inside her now. It was just touch, he had promised her. She didn’t have to worry about being thrown into a maelstrom that might tear her soul from her body.

  Just touch was safe.

  Her breathing was harsh, heavy. The thunder of her heartbeat echoed in her ears as hunger settled heavily between her thighs.

  Her clit was tormented. Inside, her pussy throbbed and ached; her juices slid from her, preparing her, begging for touch as she pulled at the open edges of his shirt.

  He released her long enough to tear it off and throw it aside. Once the material dropped from his hands, he was touching her again.

  His lips were on her breasts; his tongue stroked over her distended nipples as they rose beneath the lace cups of her bra. His groan echoed around her, but his flesh was there for her touch.

  Touch. He promised her touch.

  She felt her hair across her shoulder, stroking her, feathering against her flesh as his fingers lowered the lace covering her breasts and his mouth captured a tight nipple in the wet, heated confines.

  She jerked, arched. Flares of explosive pleasure tore along the nerve endings from her nipple to her pussy. Her juices were hotter, coating her pussy now, electrifying her clit.

  It was just touch. Touch alone would swamp her in the dark abyss that threatened at the reaches of her mind.

  “Yes, love.” His whisper was a dark croon to her senses. “Let me touch you. Taste you. You’re sweet, Risa. As sweet as sunshine.”

  A moan gathered in her throat, a trailing little cry as she felt the closure of her pants release, the zipper rasping down.

  Then he was touching her there. Touch, just touch. His fingers circled her clit, rubbed against it. His teeth rasped over her nipple, sending a surge of painful pleasure to attack her system.

  She moved against his fingers, lost in the building sensations. She wasn’t frightened. There were no waves of darkness. The darkness was already there. It eased around her, slowly, washed her in warmth. It wasn’t dizzying. It wasn’t frightening.

  She was barely aware of the cries falling from her lips. Her hips writhed against his fingers as he continued to rub around her clit, against it. He didn’t go lower. He didn’t invade the spasming, desperate clench of her pussy. He didn’t penetrate it, didn’t touch it.

  His lips suckled at her breasts; his fingers rubbed at her clit. He stroked and she swore she might have screamed out his name.

  One arm wrapped around her hips, but he didn’t restrain her; he didn’t hold her in place. He let her move. His fingers followed. Bright pinpoints of light began to flare behind her closed eyes. Flames began to race over her body, and before she could control the darkness, it rose in a sudden wash of light and color and exploded through her system with an ecstasy she couldn’t imagine.

  She screamed his name. She arched, bucked in his grip, and then flowed with the next eruption of pleasure as his fingers finally eased. But he didn’t move. His palm cupped her mound, the pad pressing into her flexing clit as she rubbed against him, taking the last remaining pulses of sensation as she rubbed against him with jerky abandon.

  She finally collapsed against his chest, her breathing ragged as shudders continued to race through her body. Her nails eased their grip on his bare shoulders; her thighs melted; then each muscle in her body followed suit. She was limp against him, torn by the knowledge that such pleasure could exist from touch alone.

  “Precious Risa.” He kissed her forehead, pulled her hair back from her cheek, and kissed there as well.

  He touched her with gentleness, though she could feel the tension in his body and sensed his lust raging through him.

  “You didn’t,” she whispered, knowing he hadn’t found his release. “Again.”

  “Shh. My time will come,” he told her, his voice raspy as he kissed the lobe of her ear. “This was for you, love. And trust me, feeling your pleasure race through you more than makes up for any discomfort I may feel.”

  His hand still cupped her, but his palm rasped against the ultrasensitive bud of her clit, but only when she wanted it to rasp.

  Risa kept her face buried in his neck as the final shudders eased through her.

  She had never known that touch alone could be so destructive. She couldn’t have imagined that such pleasure could exist. This was what she had fought the night he had taken her? How insane could she have been?

  “Do you know,” he whispered at her ear then, “a man who understands true pleasure understands that his woman’s pleasure is tied directly to his own? It’s a very hollow release, Risa, for a man who understands that, when his lover has not found her
pleasure as well. But it is a pleasure untold simply to see and to feel his lover’s release, whether he gains his or not.”

  She burrowed closer to him, feeling a blush heating her skin. “Your accent is slipping again,” she said weakly.

  He chuckled at her ear. “So it is. You’ll have to forgive me. I’m still immersed in my lover’s pleasure.”

  She almost laughed. A smile did curve her lips, because she could still sense his own unrelieved need.

  “Does it hurt?” she asked then.

  “Does what hurt?” His hand eased from her, only to pull her closer, to allow her to feel the hard ridge of his cock rising beneath his jeans. “This? After several days in your presence, I’m becoming quite familiar with the situation.”

  Risa lifted her head and stared back at him. There was amusement in his black eyes, in the shape of his lips. He wasn’t angry, but he was still very much aroused.

  “I could try.” She swallowed tightly. “That wasn’t fair to you. We could go to the bedroom.”

  She didn’t quite know how to handle this situation. She had just come on his fingers, had known an explosive release that left her weak and almost sated in his arms. There was an awareness, though, that something was missing. That she had managed once again to cheat not just herself but him also. She just wondered if she would survive knowing what she was cheating herself out of.

  “Risa, love, the time that we come together again will arrive soon enough.” He fixed the little latch to her slacks and drew the zipper up before easing the cups of her bra back over her breasts. “Come now.” He lifted her from his lap and set her back on her feet. “Let’s see about getting you into those butt-snugging jeans I bought you, and one of your pretty tops to go over your new lacy panties. I must admit, I’d find great pleasure in that today.”

  After the climax he had just given her, balking at that seemed a little childish. Besides, she’d wondered how the jeans and snug tops would look. She’d never worn clothes designed to cover and yet show off her body. She had always been self-conscious, too afraid to want to draw attention to herself, as a teenager. And after the kidnapping and her confinement in the private institution Jansen had placed her in, Risa had been terrified of wearing clothes that would reveal any part of her body.