Forbidden to His Touch
Page 13
He watched her through slit eyes as she memorized the textures that were so different than her own, not saying a word as she familiarized herself with his exposed torso. When she pressed her palms flat over the wide span of his shoulders and pushed his shirt over the thick expanse of taut muscle and sleek skin, he shrugged his shoulders and shook free of ironed cotton. White and black fluttered to the floor as she systematically stripped him down to his underwear. Enthralled, she trailed her fingers over every new inch of revealed flesh, tracing faint, feathery touches from sternum to bicep, from neck to shoulder blade and spine. He was beautiful, and seeing him with his defenses temporarily set aside brought a lump to her throat.
Long legs, strong and thick with bunched muscle, were slightly lighter in tone than the tanned arms and chest above, and she reveled in knowing she had access to skin the sun rarely saw. Unfounded or not, it made her feel special. Valued. Her fingertips traced the ridge of muscle above his hipbones, the tight skin of his flat abdomen, and then converged at the dark arrow of hair pointing south to a flat band of white elastic. When she dropped her fingertips to the tip of his contained erection, he circled her wrist and reclaimed control.
“Later,” he promised as he backed her up against the bed. He dipped his lips to hers, leisurely exploring the recesses of her mouth as he peeled her underwear over the rounded curve of her buttocks. Breaking the kiss, he bent to finish the job, lifting first one foot and then the other until she stood completely naked before him. He boosted her onto the bed and then stepped between her thighs before she had a chance to close them.
Unhurried and gentle, his touch felt different than before. Long, languorous strokes relaxed her muscles and made her eyes drift closed even as warm tingles gained ground deep in her belly. He lingered over her body, tending to each sensitive crease and each scented cove from shoulder to toe. Deep, languid kisses moved from her mouth to her breasts to the soft slope of her stomach. Soon, his fingers were probing lower, stroking and teasing and arousing her clenching interior while her hips shifted and stirred.
“Raf,” she said. Her toes curled around the bed frame and she lifted her arms to reach for him, to draw him up until his warm skin pressed hot and firm against hers. “I want you to kiss me.”
“All right,” he said, and she heard the smile in his voice as he resisted her efforts to move him and then inched his way even lower.
Understanding dawned, bringing a hot flush of excitement with it. Tension, wicked and deep, coiled low within her womb as his mouth skimmed her lowest rib and then trailed south along her stomach. A warm, wet dart of his tongue at her navel made her squirm and brought a bubble of nervous laughter to her throat.
But then her laughter died on a gasp when he settled his mouth upon her. Reflexively, her thighs tightened and tried to close against his head, but his broad hands held her firm. Spread beneath him, her modesty warring with her arousal, she squeezed her eyes shut and twisted her hands in the crumpled coverlet. “Raf …”
“Shh.” He blew against her sensitive flesh, his breath a cool contrast to the heat he’d left behind. “Just let me please you.”
And he did. Oh, how he pleased her. White arrows of pleasure, hot and insistent, propelled her up, dissolving her sense of self as separate from him. She surrendered to the blurring haze of arousal, helpless to stop the tide sucking her under. Surrender had never felt so necessary. So fundamentally essential. Infused with heat and filled with a desperate, raw need, she arched beneath him while her hands twisted in the white coverlet. Her heartbeat ricocheted wildly within her chest, her flushed skin, her trembling legs and her heels where they dug into the mattress. Too much, too, too much, she writhed beneath him, lost to everything but the wild, mindless communion between them.
“Raf,” she implored. Her hands moved to his dark head, guiding him, begging him as his strong, wet tongue drove her inexorably to the brink. Moaning, she lifted beneath his mouth, joining him in the hot, flicking rhythm he’d set.
Caught in the grip of wrenching pleasure, she groaned as ecstasy seized her. Paralyzing rapture suspended her, stiff and hovering at the peak, until the tension released in an exquisite, pulsing rush. Racked with tremors, she tumbled headlong over the edge, her limbs quaking with hard shudders.
“Sophia …” She heard his voice once the blissful spasms subsided.
Dragging her eyes open, she found Rafael leaning over her, his black gaze locked with hers.
“Look at me,” he demanded as he lowered to his elbows and cradled her head between his hands.
So she did, his intense gaze demanding that she not shy away from the intimacy of his touch. Then, in one slow, slick glide, he entered her fully. They inhaled in unison, their awareness of the world distilled down to the single, elemental joining of their bodies. For a long moment, neither of them moved, too caught in the wonder of their union. But then she lifted heavy, languid arms to his ribs and curved her arms and hands over his muscled back. His skin was smooth and sleek beneath her palms, and the breath escaped him in an unsteady rush as he slowly dipped his head to hers. She felt the scrape of his whiskers against her cheek, felt the flexing of his muscles and the tightly reined control as he gradually began to move within her.
Meeting his long, unhurried thrusts without resistance, she opened to him and welcomed him as pleasure mounted once again. She hooked her legs around his thighs, flexing her knees and tipping to take more.
She wanted to take all of him. Everything that he’d see fit to give her.
He lifted his head again to watch her, his eyes glittering with banked passion, and she felt an overwhelming rush of love for her poor, wounded and guarded Rafael. He looked fierce, his hunger and need drawing his beloved features taut. She could tell that now, even now, he wanted to hold himself apart. To hold her at a distance even as he kissed her and touched her and made her world fall apart. So she slid her hands down to his lean, flexing buttocks and curled her fingers over the pumping muscle. She drew him closer, wrapping herself around his trembling body as he incrementally increased his pace within her. She lifted upward to press encouraging kisses against his chest, the thick column of his neck and the bristly ridge of his jaw. Rocking beneath him, she offered her unconditional acceptance while her hands urged his release.
Her movements seemed to impel him to greater heights of pleasure, his pace quickening and his braced arms trembling. And yet still he watched her, his intent gaze never straying from hers until he stiffened between her thighs. Only then did his eyes slide closed. He surged forward, collapsing and shaking against her while her name escaped his throat in a fragmented groan.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MUCH, much later, they lay in a tangled, sated heap. Knowing the night had exhausted her, Rafael urged Sophia to sleep. “Rest,” he murmured against her soft hair as he slowly stroked her back from nape to hip. He allowed himself to kiss her again, to trace the fine line of her brow and the sweet bridge of her nose with his lips. His fingers trailed back up along the knobby length of spine, and it occurred to him that he’d yet to chart every inch of her back, to explore the gentle curve of bone and skin, the narrow planes of shoulder blade and the delicate dimples at the base of her spine. Later, he told himself as he returned his hand to the notch in her waist. After she’s had a moment to rest.
“I don’t want to go to sleep,” she said in a drowsy hum as she nestled closer. She flung a leg over his hip, her fleecy curls brushing intimately against him while her fingers transcribed soft circles over his side. “I don’t want to waste a minute of this night.”
He felt himself harden again, a throbbing, live eagerness that had nothing to do with respite and everything to do with Sophia. “You’re exhausted,” he admonished her, even as he vowed to remain awake just to watch her sleep. Somehow, the need to infuse every moment with full awareness banished his fatigue, filling him with a desperate desire to hold her, to watch over her and to imprint each minute in his memory as necessary and distinct.
He stalled her fingers and then brought them up to press a kiss against her knuckles.
“You don’t have to hide anything from me, Raf,” she said as she leaned back to stare at him somberly.
His throat thickened, but he forced himself to maintain eye contact. It was the least he could offer her, considering all the secrets he’d hidden from her for so long. “It’s nothing.”
“But what does it mean?” she asked, and a small frown notched twin lines between her golden brows. “How did you get it?”
He swallowed. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why?”
“I don’t like being reminded of the way I earned that brand.”
“Earned?” Horror darkened her blue eyes, an innocent gaze that could never fathom the degradation of his past. “How could a child possibly earn such a thing?”
He simply stared at her, unwilling to sully their limited time together with the blackness of his shame.
Her eyes softened, glittering with an empathetic sheen of tears. “I hate that someone did such a horrific thing to you.” She cupped his jaw and stared into his eyes before leaning forward to press a gentle kiss against his mouth. “I hate that someone scarred your beautiful soul.”
He stilled, his limbs suddenly frozen and his lungs unable to draw breath.
She pushed upright and brushed the hair out of her eyes. “You don’t believe me, do you?”
No words could navigate past his tight throat, so he remained miserably silent.
“You’re beautiful, Rafael Chaves,” she said as she dipped to brush her mouth over the taut skin of his chest. “Inside and out, you’re the most beautiful man I know, and nothing you could have ever done would deserve such treatment.”
When he still didn’t answer, his chest cinched into a hard knot of denial, her hands joined in on her assertion. Inch by torturous inch, she worked to convince him while his body responded helplessly to her innocent devastation. Her fingers and mouth explored the heated skin stretched tight across his ribs, trailing heat and acceptance while he grappled for control.
“One of these days, you’re going to believe me,” she murmured as she moved even lower to press a warm kiss against his branded flesh. Her hand trailed west as she nuzzled the stark evidence of his wretched past, until she circled his hard length within her small, hot palm.
Despite his desire to remain strong, to keep the most debased part of himself separate and hidden, he felt his will weaken. He felt the anguished need to believe her, to forget all the reasons he wasn’t good enough.
“One of these days,” she promised and her fingers gently squeezed, driving him to the brink, “you’re going to trust me and accept that I’m right.”
Knowing she was wrong, but too selfish to prove it tonight, he reached for her. Her name escaped on a fractured breath as he rolled to his back, seized her hips and dragged her up to him. He silenced her beautiful, lying lips with his and drowned his tortured groan in her mouth. The sweet, wet forays of her tongue, coupled with her writhing against his stiffened flesh, made him ache with a desperate need to be inside her.
To forget.
To lose himself in pleasure while she gripped and clenched around him.
She came quietly, in soft, rolling pulls that drew out his own rapture while she arched and rocked atop him.
Wanting to prolong the moment, he forced himself to slow. To change the angle of his hips and the tempo of his fingers while he drew out her trembling release. When he could wait no longer, he drew her closer, closer, trying to communicate with hands and mouth and breath that he would never forget her.
That he loved her.
They made love twice more, until Sophia fell asleep in a damp, languorous heap. For a while, Rafael allowed himself to hold her, to steep himself in the pleasure of simply watching her. Dawn, despite his attempts to hold it at bay, hovered inexorably on the horizon, lightening the gray layer of fog that blanketed the city and bringing with it the miserable knowledge of what he could never have again. With excruciating, painful clarity, he knew he mustn’t ever indulge in her sweetness again. His night with Sophia, a night of imagined pleasures that had haunted him for years, had fulfilled every fantasy he’d ever harbored. And now, it had come to an end.
For the few hours they’d been together, he’d shoved his conscience aside, determined to wring every moment of pleasure out of their forbidden tryst. He’d let himself kiss her, unwilling to resist the bowed arc of her upper lip, the sweet, slick heat of her small, scolding tongue. He’d allowed himself to touch every soft, scented inch of her, to finally, finally worship her the way he’d always longed. But it had been a mistake. A mistake he had to rectify before he brought devastation and ruin to the one person he’d vowed to protect.
Watching her sleep, so trusting and tousled, he felt a stab of guilt. He didn’t want to hurt her. Ever. But what choice did he have now?
Cursing himself, he felt remorse tighten like a fist within his chest. If he’d just exercised a bit of restraint, she might have emerged from this night unscathed. They might have remained partners.
But no. He’d been weak. He’d succumbed. When he should have accepted the fiery flush of her outrage as his just due, he’d argued instead. He’d allowed his fear of losing her to overrule his good judgment and had joined her in that damned office. Even knowing how dangerous that small, private space could be, how reckless he’d been to follow her, touch her, kiss her, he hadn’t stopped to think about the consequences. Reason had abandoned him, leaving him to operate on pure, carnal instinct.
And this time, there’d been no one to stop them. One taste of her mouth, and he’d been lost. Utterly, irrevocably lost. Caught in an avalanche of need so overwhelming, his common sense, his judgment and his promises to Turino and himself had ceased to matter. Nothing had mattered but Sophia and the desire that flared between them, a desire that had been smoldering for years. Like a match touched to flame, he’d been consumed with the need to possess her. To claim her, pleasure her and never come up for air.
It was a mistake that had nearly driven him to his knees, slamming into his gut with as much force as a fist. Now that he knew what being with Sophia was like, he couldn’t trust himself around her anymore. He knew what it was like to watch her face as he pleasured her. He knew what it felt like to be deep, deep inside her when she pulsed around him. He knew, and the knowledge that he could never be with her again burned a hole in his chest. Things between them could never be the same again.
He had to leave. Permanently. Before he caused more damage than he already had.
But what if she’s pregnant?
The thought brought a flush of warmth, a raw need to possess her, claim her and stand guard while her belly grew heavy with his child. It was barbaric, selfish and utterly, utterly wrong. He’d make a wretched father, would ruin whatever innocent life she brought into the world. He hadn’t even been able to take care of his brother; he had no right to think he’d do better with a child of his own. Wanting to share a child with Sophia, craving a life and family he didn’t deserve, would only bring devastation to them all.
Knowing he wanted it anyway shook him to the core.
Sick with self-loathing, he forced himself to abandon her, easing away from her soft, tousled warmth. She stirred, murmuring in her sleep and flinging a hand out to smack against his ribs. She slept the way she lived, sprawled in wild, unfettered abandon and with a slight smile on her face. She looked like she held a secret she couldn’t wait to share, and he wanted to gather her up tight and never let her go. But he had no right. The golden-haired goddess with roseate skin and eyes the color of California sky deserved better.
Sophia awakened the morning after they’d made love, expecting to find Rafael’s big, warm body stretched out next to her and his hot eyes touching her everywhere the lavender comforter didn�
�t cover. With her heart light and her veins fuzzy with warmth, she’d reached for him only to discover an empty stretch of cold mattress and rumpled white sheets.
Two hours and several unreturned phone calls later, she finally realized he hadn’t just ducked out for coffee and a paper, nor had he retreated to his own rooms for a quick shower and shave. He’d left, and a call to the front desk confirmed it. Two days before his scheduled flight home, he’d stolen away without a single word of farewell.
She eased her worries by telling herself that he couldn’t have touched her the way he had, with his hands and lips and fingertips worshiping her in wordless praise, if he didn’t feel something for her.
He was just running scared, she rationalized. Like always, she’d veered too close and he was backing away to regroup. She shouldn’t take it personally.
She shouldn’t blame him, or try to force him close when he wasn’t ready. He’d fought the inevitable for as long as he’d known her, and she was willing to give him space to come to terms with the fact that their relationship had changed. She was willing to wait for him to finally admit that he loved her, and to forget all about those ridiculous lines he insisted on drawing between them.
Hadn’t she been waiting for him for what seemed like a lifetime already? What was a few more days? she thought as she gathered her things to follow him home.
They were meant to be together. It was only a matter of time before he realized she was right.
So it was with an effervescent sense of anticipation that she returned to California, to the winery and partnership she now wanted more than life itself.