She giggled. "I use apple pie for a perfume."
His hands stilled. "Apple pie. I bet room service would deliver apple pie."
"Um-hmmm. And ice cream, too." One of her arms was trapped beneath him, but with the other she was free to explore. She ran her fingers over the length of his thick, rigid cock, admiring the way he responded to her touch, jerking helplessly against her.
His breath hissed out in a thick gasp for air. "Oh God." He kissed her again, his tongue swirling across the ridges of her palate. His fingers stroked over her thighs, rising to tease before they dipped to explore her aching clit. Then there was nothing. A hollow ache of emptiness as he scrambled to his feet. Before she could protest, he scooped her up as if she weighed nothing, grabbing the bedspread along with her. Moments later they were back in the huge king-sized bed and he was kneeling between her thighs. Her hands found the waist of his new silk boxers, tugging them down until she could stroke the long, hard length of him with both hands.
Then her hands were in his, pinned beside her shoulders.
"Candy." His whole body went rigid.
She refused to remember that this was a mistake. She could feel his cock a few inches from where she wanted it to be. He picked the strangest times to want to talk. "What?" she demanded.
"This is a lousy time to think of it, but I don’t have anything. For protection."
Candy wanted to scream. She could already feel the wetness of his stiffened cock teasing her. How could she have taken a chance like that? Knowing where he’d been the last two years? And he knew nothing of her… "I—I had a physical. Last month. And I gave blood back in September. They test you for everything. There hasn’t been anyone since then. For almost a year before that, actually. I’m clean."
"I had all the standard tests before I came over here three years ago. There hasn’t been anyone since. No one."
She had a perfect way out. She should take it. But damn it, she didn't want out. She wanted to believe him. God help her if he was lying. "We should be safe enough then…"
"But what about—I mean, you could get pregnant."
Candy felt like laughing but he wouldn’t have understood, so she just shook her head. "I can’t."
Still he hesitated. She opened her eyes again, to find he was just staring down at her naked body. "What?" she whispered again.
"Are you sure this is what you want, Candy?"
She strained to reach him, to pull him inside her waiting body. "I’m sure," she managed, "I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life." Then he was lifting her hips, sliding inside her, still kneeling, his eyes trained on hers as he gasped out her name.
He held her there a moment, his length a burning heat melting her from the inside, then he withdrew, only to thrust in again slowly, so slowly, laughing as she fought to hold him there with the strength of her grip on his cock. "Candy. And your birthday is on Christmas Day. Peppermint Candy."
She couldn’t be serious. Not while he was laughing like that. "No. Worse." She rose up to meet him, clasping her feet together behind his back.
"Christmas Candy." Down and in with a nice hot thrust.
"No." She pulled herself up to a sitting position to rub the tips of her very erect nipples across the hard expanse of his chest.
He drove into her harder, meeting her thrusting hips as she clenched her legs more tightly around him, grinning at the sound of their sweat-dampened bodied slapping together. "Candy Cane."
"No," she protested feebly.
"Don’t try to lie to me, Candy. You’re not very good at it. I guessed right. I know I did." The words came out in short pants now.
"Swear you won’t tell anyone. Ever."
"I won’t tell anyone. Ever." He lowered his head to take her straining nipple into his mouth.
Moaning with need, she found the strength to lift her head, searching until she managed to reach something—his ear—and take the lower lobe between her teeth. A tremor shook through him that interrupted his rhythm. His lips stilled on her breast.
"Don't stop," she pleaded.
His mouth and his body responded to her demand. Their pace became more frantic. Candy felt herself tighten, the tension building until she felt as if the orgasm might shatter her when it came. Her muscles ached with the strain of reaching. She clenched hard around him, trying to throw herself over the edge. Desperation drove her to work harder. She knew what would happen next. There was only one possibility when a man moved like this. She wanted to scream in frustration. She’d almost made it. She'd come so close this time. So close. If she just had a little more time…
"Candy?"
The shock of his voice, lucid and even, was almost as great as the shock of his body, stilled within her, though she could still fell his rigid cock pulsing fiercely.
"Candy."
"What?" She almost wailed in disappointment.
"You're supposed to be enjoying this. Not looking like your world is about to end."
The unfulfilled ache made her want to cry. "I'm sorry," she almost sobbed. "I was so close…I told you I wasn't very good at this."
"Candy. Look at me."
His voice was so gentle that she had to look. She opened her eyes to scan his features in the soft glow of pre-dawn. The ache began to relax. She let it go with a sigh.
He didn't look angry. "There’s just the two of us here now. No matter what happened before, this is going to be different, okay?"
Different. Right. She swallowed her regret. "Okay."
"I want you to relax. Just enjoy yourself. We'll try this again."
She blinked in confusion, feeling like an idiot as she parroted his words. "Again?"
"Why not? You have something better to do?"
She laughed at that, her voice a little shaky. "I can't think of anything I'd rather do."
He released her body to lay her back into the pillows, still buried deep within her. His hands stroked over her skin in long, sensuous sweeps. "You have a beautiful body, Candy."
He was studying her, somewhat critically, like an artist might. She choked back a desire to cry. "No one’s told me that in a long time. I thought …well, you know, things—change—as a woman gets older."
That slow smile she'd come to recognize as his mark of complete honesty settled on his lips. "I don’t know how old you are, Candy. I don't need to know. I don’t care. I don’t know what you looked like five years ago or even last year. When I saw you in that crowd at the auction house the first thing I thought was that you were the most beautiful woman I'd ever laid eyes on. I think you’re beautiful now. Perfect in fact."
"Perfect. Me." She let herself run her eyes over him. All of him. His bronze skin reflected the early morning light. He had the face of a model. If anyone should know, she should. And he had the body to go with it. He was hard and fit and sculpted like a Greek god. She needed to tell him that. "So are you," was the best she could manage.
He grinned down at her. "Nobody's ever told me that before. I'm glad you like my body. Maybe these last two years were good for something. Touch it. Touch me. Anywhere."
Her hands rose to stroke over that magnificent skin, gathering courage as they touched.
"Just relax and enjoy yourself. This is supposed to be fun." She hardly noticed as he began to move inside her again, rocking slowly against her, his hands on her hips guiding her in this new rhythm.
Her fingers brushed over his lips, and he sucked them in, worshiping each one in turn. He laid his thumbs on either side of her clit, stroking with each long, slow, lazy thrust. "Let go," he whispered against her skin. "Ride the wave."
Surprise had her laughing as the orgasm built back again, sweeping over her easily this time.
"Come for me Candy," he murmured.
The next one came faster and harder, and he picked up the pace.
He was the one who looked strained now, building back to a fevered frenzy, his hands pulling her harder against him, his body driving deeper into her wet, waiting flesh. "Is
this what you wanted me for?" he groaned.
Her muscles tightened around him again, as an even stronger orgasm threatened to rip the breath from her lungs. "Yes!" she moaned, her fingers digging into his hips. "Now!"
As if what he'd done before had been only a tease, he thrust into her, hot and heavy and pulsing with need. Her legs locked around his waist, tilting her pelvis so that he could push more of his length into her. She could feel the weight of his balls slamming against her with every thrust. The hotel bed frame creaked with the strain of their efforts. His teeth bared, growling like a feral animal as he shattered at last, spilling into her in a searing gush. She rode out the wave, shattering like glass as he screamed out her name.
His arms buckled and he would have rolled to fall beside her, but she pulled him down flat, keeping him locked inside her until the last final spurt found its home. Still she held him, enjoying the feel of his weight on her, the feel of his cock going slack within her as her aftershocks milked him of his last resistance.
He propped himself up on one elbow at last, moving his free hand to brush the hair from her face. She thought he would speak, would say something to shatter the mood, but instead he brushed his lips across hers in a tender kiss that was too perfect for words. His arms slipped around her and he rolled them together until they lay with her head on his chest. One hand held her tightly in place while the other stroked gently over her skin.
The silence stretched out between them before he spoke again. "You are real, aren’t you? It’s almost impossible to believe, but you’re real."
She didn't know how to answer that. Instead she asked a question of her own. "Who are you, Brooke? Who were you? Before?"
He waited so long to answer she almost thought he wouldn't. "Three years ago I was a grad student at the University of Michigan. History of South East Asia. I was working on my Doctorate, and I had a chance to do my fellowship at Hanoi University."
She almost laughed. "A professor? You're a college professor?"
He shrugged. "Yeah. I was. Or almost."
She did laugh at that. "When I first saw you I thought you looked like a construction worker. I was afraid anyone as good looking as you are would be dumb as two rocks."
One heavy black eyebrow arched. "I suppose only women are capable of intelligent thought."
"No, of course not, but—"
"Can you read a blueprint?"
Candy blushed. "No."
"Can you measure an inverted right angle cut?"
She had to laugh. "Okay. I get your point. Maybe not all construction workers are innately stupid. There could be one or two brain cells floating around in all that prime beefcake."
"I've done construction work. It's not all that easy."
He still sounded a little peeved. Candy decided it was time to change the subject. She ran her hands over the bulging muscles in his upper arms. "So how the hell did you end up here, professor?"
He shrugged, distant again as he remembered. "I was doing field work at a site in Laos between semesters. Went into a local bar one night and ordered a Lao-Lao. A kind of local whiskey, but stronger than I ever expected it to be. I never was much of a drinker. Anyway, that's the last thing I remember. I think I got rolled. The next thing you know I'm in the local jail. No wallet. No cash. No passport. No ID. No money. No way to prove who I am. That one phone call thing? That's not Laos."
He pushed a hand thought his hair, rolling to stare at the ceiling. "Three days later this man I've never seen before pays my bond. I have to work for him at his factory until I can pay him back. But I'm not very good at the work and I owe him for food and the roof over my head and that costs more than the wages he pays me. The longer I work for him the more money I owe him."
A hundred questions came to mind, but she waited for him to continue, hardly daring to breathe.
"Things like this just don't happen to Americans. Not in the twentieth century. I keep expecting to wake up back in Hanoi. Instead there's a man with a cane ready to beat me if I don't do what I'm told. We're in a really remote rural area in Xam Nua province now. I think if I can just find a phone, let someone know I’m still alive—but there are no phones. Every time I escape the village authorities catch me and send me back."
He ran a hand through his hair. "The punishment for running away is severe. But I'm hardheaded. I keep thinking I can get away, somehow get back to the life I had before. A trader comes through buying the debts of the difficult ones like me. Now I'm at a brickyard outside Vientiane, the capitol of Laos. Vientiane's a big city, and they're trying to be a part of the modern world, even if they are one of the last communist strongholds. I shouldn’t have any trouble finding a phone. It's near the border to Thailand. At the worst I figure I can slip across the border. I can get help in Thailand.
"I’m watched better here. Guards with guns. I wait until the monsoons hit and it's raining so hard you can't see three feet in front of your face. I have to search the gutters near the bars for change for a pay phone, and then the phones don't work in the rain. Two days before they catch me again. Two days of shivering in doorways soaked to the skin before the local thugs sell me back to the brickyard. I owe the owner of the brickyard for my recapture fee too. I'm so far in debt now I can never work my way out. Next slave trader comes through, and I'm on my way here."
Candy swallowed hard, trying to find her voice. "What—what will happen to the other people who were sold there yesterday?"
He shrugged. "Its either slave labor or prostitution."
She'd known. Hadn't wanted to voice the unspoken truth, but she'd known...that was the fear she'd seen in his eyes. Her arms tightened around him protectively. "Oh God."
He shrugged again, as if it didn't bother him. As if he hadn't come so close to that fate himself. "It happens all over the world. Most people just don't want to know."
And if it had been what she thought, if she had been simply renting his services for the week, she'd have been as guilty as the rest...
Maybe she already was. Why would a man like this be interested in her, anyway? Was he just a little too perfect? Would he be here at all if they’d simply met at a club, or bid on the same item at that auction?
Funny. She hadn’t even thought about that doll she’d wanted so much. That all seemed so trivial now.
His hand skimmed up over her shoulder to brush back the hair from her face. He kissed her, tentatively, as if exploring the possibilities between them. He smiled finally. The smile did wonderful things to his face. His hand played over the curve of her hip. "You really don’t own a factory."
Her answer came out sounding like a sob. "No."
His fingers teased the outline of her nipple. "Or a brick yard."
"A brick yard? God no."
The tip of his tongue swiped over the hollow of her throat. "Or a brothel."
She shivered, caught off guard as much by the question as by the sensation of his tongue against her skin. "No, I don’t own a brothel. I—" She wanted to say more, but the words didn’t want to come out.
His breath played over her ear, sweetly seductive even now. "Say it, Candy. Say what’s on your mind."
She took a deep breath, trying to come up with the words. "You don’t have to—I mean, not just because I paid your bond. What makes this any different than if the German had won? What makes being with me any better than that Japanese whorehouse?"
Laughter shivered over him, but gently, so that she felt more than she heard. "In the first place, you're a woman."
She nearly choked. "You mean—"
He did laugh now. "What did you think, women would come there to pay for my services?"
"Oh God."
"Candy, I owe you a great deal more than the money. But I'm not trying to pay you back with sex. You'll just have to trust me on that. This is just for me." He placed her hand over his randy cock, which jumped at her touch. "I don't think a man could fake that," he said thickly.
Her breath caught and her eyes closed as she expl
ored the feel of him, fine, smooth, silky skin over heat that promised so much.
He went still and silent again, and she stiffened, waiting for the blow. "You’re not just cleaning me up so you can loan me out to bored rich women, are you? Is that what all the fancy clothes are for?"
He was serious. Candy blinked twice, feeling like an owl trying to adjust to the daylight. "Okay. Maybe I am naïve. Is there a market for—for such services?"
He kissed the place where her pulse shivered at the base of her neck. "That’s what you thought you were spending your money on yesterday, wasn’t it?"
She should have argued with him, should have denied such an accusation, but she didn’t. Couldn’t, because it was all too true. "Yes," she whispered as his kisses trailed down her throat to the hollow spot between her breasts.
"You mean yes, this is what you want from me?" His breath felt hot against her moist skin. "Or yes, you’re going to share me with your friends?"
"I don’t share," she managed, though she wasn’t sure how. His mouth was doing the most erotic things to her breasts. "And this is exactly what I thought I was paying for. But I thought I could make it okay, because it was just for my birthday, you know? I lied to myself. It’s not okay. Not if you don’t want to be here."
His mouth stilled on her breast. "What happens to me after Christmas?"
There wasn’t much of her thought process still functioning, but perhaps that was for the best, because she finally managed to ask the question she should have started with. "What do you want to happen, Brooke?"
Beautiful gray eyes fastened on hers. "Nobody’s asked me that in a very long time."
She took advantage of the space between them to run her hands across his chest. "Well, I’m asking you now."
She could feel the effort it cost him to share that part of himself. "I just want to go home."
"I think I can probably manage that. I’ll do everything I can to help you."
All I Want For Christmas Page 4