Wanting It All: A Naked Men Novel

by Christi Barth

  “There are better ways to get to know each other.”

  Right. Like sex. Sheesh. It wasn’t as if she’d flown solo on a rant. Knox threw back at her every bit as much as she threw down at him. Apparently, the whole thing had pitched him off balance. There was no other explanation for the cessation of sexy times. Yes, she was on a serious hunt for marriage material. But sometimes a girl needed to stop and look around in the middle of the journey. The sheer masculine hotness that was Knox Davies merited a looooong rest stop on her hunt.

  Madison wrapped her legs around his thighs, urging him into the vee it created. “Would you have learned as much about me, as fast, if I giggled my way through that bottle of champagne, swapping stories about, oh, old Halloween costumes?”

  He stared deeply into her eyes. Hard not to, what with his face being just a nose-length away. “Depends on your costume of choice. It can say a lot about a person.”

  “Okay. What’s yours?”

  “James Bond. He’s smart, knows how to wear a suit, and bangs every woman who crosses his path, good or bad.”

  Hmm. That did say a lot about Knox. They didn’t let dummies into MIT. She’d heard chapter and verse about his penchant for going through women faster than an otter could open an abalone. And the man liked to dress up. Way up.

  Here they were on a boat in the summer, and he was in a white linen suit. The navy-and-white striped shirt might pass as casual if she hadn’t seen the flash of silver cuff links on his wrists. Not to mention a patterned pocket square. She’d never seen one of those in real life before meeting Knox.

  And while her brain wanted to dismiss all the fanciness as over-the-top, Madison couldn’t help but marvel at how he didn’t look stuffy. Didn’t look like a boring business type. No, Knox rocked the scruff along his jawline and broad shoulders filling out the coat, tailored to show off his narrow hips, too. Money looked good on him. Not as good as she’d look on him, though.

  “So?” Knox broke into her ogling. “What do you go as on Halloween?”

  Damn it, this would prove him right. And Madison knew from just two dates that she wanted to be right more often than Knox. Just often enough to keep the scales tipped in her favor. “A bookworm. I have a sweatshirt printed with a chapter of Wuthering Heights, a book pendant, pajama pants covered in prints of books, and I anchor a paperback on top of my head, too.”

  “Offbeat and adorable. Sounds like the Madison I’ve gotten to know so far.”

  The compliment rankled. “Yes, your stupid theory works. Halloween costumes reveal all. Now that we know everything there is to know about each other, can we get back to making out?”

  To her dismay, his hands shifted to the far less erogenous zone of her shoulders as he canted backward, putting even more breathing room between them. “Look, I’m just trying to do the right thing.”

  He’d used the exactly perfect words to diffuse the situation. Damn it. Now Madison couldn’t be annoyed at all. On the other hand, it moved him several spaces forward on the Ultimate Trip to Marriage game board. She wanted to think about it and keep talking with him. Just not right now. “Remember when you swirled your tongue along the roof of my mouth? That was doing the right thing.”

  Finally, Knox looked as frustrated as she felt. “Yes, I want to have sex with you. Yes, I hoped this yacht would impress you and I’d at least get that bra off you tonight. But, Madison, five minutes ago you seemed ready to tear my throat out.”

  “Three minutes ago I had your tongue down my throat. Keep up with the times.”

  The tan skin that bracketed his eyes crinkled as he scowled. “I can keep up. I can run circles around you, Book Girl.”

  “Prove it.” Tightening her legs around Knox’s waist and looping her arms around his neck, Madison pushed off the table so she hung from him. “While keeping in mind that speed doesn’t necessarily earn you extra points.”

  “Are you sure? I may be a horndog, but I’m a gentleman, too. I can wait to make my big move on you until we finish the champagne. Or more to the point, I can wait until we finish fighting. It’s not my usual foreplay.”

  “I don’t think we’re going to be done fighting for a very long time.” And wasn’t that fun to contemplate? “Let’s call this a time-out.”

  “The sex break that refreshes?”

  “Exactly.”

  “As the lady wishes.” Abruptly his hands went beneath her ass, supporting her. Knox swung in a half circle to deposit her back on the white cushions. When he set her down, his hands stroked up her sides…taking the sundress with them.

  Wow. He’d bared her to his burning gaze in less than two seconds. That was a move and a half. Smooth. Fast. And in the time it took her to process it, Knox shucked his jacket, his polished loafers…and his pants.

  His pants? Already? “Isn’t there an order to these things?” Especially since his shirttails covered up everything but the hem of his boxer briefs. “Shirt, then pants, so I can look my fill before I’m blinded by the majesty of your sure-to-be-enormous penis?”

  “I like that. Spot-on description, by the way.” His teeth flashed in a toothpaste ad grin. “There’s a plan.”

  “Aha. I figured as much. An MIT alum probably approaches sex with the scientific method. Plans. Charts.”

  “My cleaner’s complained about how hard it is to get ground-in dirt out of linen pants.” Knox dropped to the deck. “And I need to be on my knees to do this.”

  Then his face was buried in her cleavage while both thumbs rubbed circles over her instantly erect nipples. No. Wait. Madison needed to be precise, to mentally record every second to savor when she was ninety…or to savor in three months while alone in bed on a Saturday night.

  Knox’s end-of-day scruff, rough against the sensitive skin of her inner breasts, contrasted with the wet smoothness of the up-and-down laps his tongue made in the valley between them. Each sensation alone would’ve been great. In tandem, they were fantastic. But topped off by the light thumb rasp across her nipples, it became a trifecta of pleasure. Forget sex. She’d be perfectly happy if he kept doing just this all night.

  “Don’t stop,” she ordered. To make that point clear, Madison threaded her fingers into his hair and held him in place.

  It didn’t work. He lifted up just enough to talk, but it was too far to maintain contact. “Who said anything about stopping? I’m just getting started.”

  He slid his hands around her back. They were immediately replaced on her left nipple by his mouth. His hot, wet mouth. When he suckled against the wet satin of her bra and it lifted straight off, for a split second Madison thought he’d done it just with his mouth. Then she realized he’d unsnapped the clasp first. That was how pleasure-addled her brain cells were already.

  The bra slithered down between her legs to pool on the deck. Madison knew this because she couldn’t stop staring down at Knox. Yes, eye-shutting was the normal response to having her nipples sucked. But she couldn’t stop looking at him. At his dark hair against her pale skin. At the way his back muscles bunched beneath the fitted shirt. At the dark hair dusting the backs of his strong, tanned calves.

  Big hands plumped her breasts together. Knox whipped his head back and forth, licking one nipple, then the other, and then back again. Her knees pressed against his ribs in a silent invitation to do more. Madison restlessly ran her hands up and down his arms, wishing she could reach more, touch more, see more.

  “Knox.”

  His tongue paused its swirling tugging just long enough to spit out, “What?” And even that was too long a break.

  “I want you.”

  “I can tell from those adorable little gasping noises you’re making.”

  Was she? Madison had been too busy paying attention to Knox to catalog her own reactions to him. She scooted back against the cushions. Not out of reach entirely—God forbid—but enough to get his attention.

  “This, what’s happening right now, is a two-way street. Or it should be. I demand equal time.”
/>   “So take it,” he said, with laughter in his voice and the light of challenge in his eyes.

  Finally. She zipped through undoing his buttons. Her reward? Acres of tan skin, with just enough of a mat of dark hair across the well-formed pecs. Madison knew it would be rough against her own chest. She also knew how much she’d enjoy it. Defined abs, bisected by a thin line of hair, made her mouth water. But she didn’t linger with the staring. No, she wanted to be able to run her hands over everything at once.

  Madison tried to pull a sleeve over his hand. It was a no-go. Geez, she hoped everything they said about big hands being an indicator of the size of other body parts was true, because his hands were big enough to make hers feel dainty. And that almost never happened. Frustrated, she grabbed the sleeve with both hands and yanked. Hard. Sunlight flashed as his cuff link flew across the cockpit. The tinkle it made hitting the table leg didn’t stop, because then it pinged down the steps, one by one, as the boat rocked on the water.

  Whoops. Madison bit her lip. “Are those expensive?”

  “Does it matter?”

  With a grin, Madison yanked at his other sleeve and sent the other cuff link flying. “Nope. They were standing between me and your naked chest, so they had to go.”

  “I agree.”

  She stood and bent over him to grab his shirttail. Conveniently, that presented her breasts right at face level for him again. And Knox was no slouch in the opportunity-grabbing department. He stroked the sides of her breasts as she whipped the shirt up and off. His excellent stroking distracted her enough that her aim suffered. Madison whacked him in the ear with her wrist on the upswing.

  “That’s why I should be in charge,” he said with a wince.

  “There is no ‘in charge.’ Everybody gets a turn,” she insisted.

  “Someone’s always in charge. And it just so happens that when it comes to the bedroom, that someone’s always me.”

  Madison couldn’t help but be intrigued. With an added layer of extra turn-on. A bossy bed partner would be a new experience. And Madison loved collecting new experiences. “Can I still touch you now?”

  “That would be an affirmative.”

  Madison dropped to her knees, straddling him. Good thing she kept limber with online workout videos, because getting her legs around Knox’s thighs was quite the stretch. She feathered her fingers across his skin, following his collarbone out to his shoulders for the sheer pleasure of trying to wrap her hands around his biceps…even though she knew she’d fail. Big hands, big biceps—what would she find next on the list of big body parts?

  She pressed her cheek to his chest, enjoying the rasp of hair tangling with her eyelashes. Ran her hands down his sides to squeeze the tightest ass she’d ever had the pleasure of kneading. Realized her mistake immediately, retraced her movement to slide her hand beneath the cotton cupping those firm cheeks. Ah, yes. Skin. Seductive skin. Sexy skin. Even with the breeze off the river lifting her hair, his skin blasted off heat.

  “Stop that,” he ordered in an almost guttural voice.

  “What? You said touching was fine.”

  “Stop the grinding, or this’ll be over before we’re naked.”

  It took his words to make her register that she’d been rocking back and forth against him. Because just seeing him, let alone touching him, made her burn with need. Her hips moved on instinct.

  Madison trailed soft kisses down the line of his sternum. “Sorry. I can’t help it. You could be Mr. June on a hot-guys calendar. You turn me on, Knox.”

  “That’s the plan anyway.” His hands caught her beneath her arms and swooped her up to stand. An instant later, his teeth were at the edge of her panties.

  Forget the mental playback of the whole night. All she needed burned into her brain was the image of Knox, eyes the same gray-blue as the Bering Sea on a cloudy day locked onto hers, as he ever-so-slowly dragged those panties down to her knees with just his teeth.

  He probably got them lower with his hands. She probably stepped out of them. Madison couldn’t tell, though. Because once the elastic hit her knees, he straightened again. Put his mouth right on her and exhaled a warm breath that sent tendrils of heat throughout her entire body.

  “God, Knox—”

  “Pick one,” he murmured. The vibration of his voice against her most sensitive flesh made Madison’s breath catch in her throat.

  She managed to pant out, “Smart-ass.” Then she grabbed his hair and held on for dear life as his tongue flicked back and forth. Moans poured out of her throat.

  Hands tight on her ass, probably all that was keeping her upright at this point, Knox said, “Tell me what you like.”

  “I’m pretty sure I’ll like whatever you want to do to me.”

  Pushing off the deck, Knox stood. Shucked his briefs while keeping eye contact. Well, he tried to keep it. Because as soon as Madison’s peripheral vision clued her in to the final act of his striptease, she had to, had to, look down. From the middle of a thatch of dark hair sprang the long, thick solution to her aching need. She kept staring as he plucked a condom from his pants pocket and rolled it on.

  As she started to kick out of her sandals, Knox shook his head. “Keep those on. It’ll make things easier.”

  He walked her over to the wheel. They’d been protected from view by the hardtop canopy up to that point. But the front of the cockpit was all glass. Her arm automatically rose to cover her breasts. “Won’t people be able to see us up here?”

  “Do you care?”

  It was a question she’d never pondered before. “Maybe, maybe not. I’m not sure. I know I don’t want to get arrested for indecent exposure, though.”

  “Don’t worry. I like to push the envelope, but not cross any legal lines.” Knox pointed at the opposite shore, which she knew to be Virginia. “Cars are whipping past on the George Washington Parkway at fifty miles per hour. Even if they stopped to gawk, nobody would see anything but the top of our heads. Same for anyone hiking on the island itself. We’re just out of range.”

  “Spoken like a man who’s done this before.”

  “I ask again—do you care?”

  It didn’t even take her a moment of thought to answer. Not because her brain was sex-addled, but because she was so certain of her reply. “Nope. Everyone has a past. Whatever happened in yours turned you into the man I want to be with right now. Only the present matters.” And maybe the future, depending on how this encounter with him goes.

  “A woman after my own heart. Man, you are gorgeous.” With a smile of pure masculine appreciation that set off even more butterflies in her stomach, Knox ran a hand down her side as if stroking velvet. Then he laced her arms through the steering wheel and bent her over by flattening his hand on the small of her back. “Hang on tight.”

  She threw him a teasing smile over her shoulder. “Am I in for a bumpy ride?”

  “You’re in for the ride of your life.”

  “Way to set the bar high.”

  “Precision and accuracy are the cornerstones of my world. I’m just keeping it real.” And then he slid into her on a single, slow push that felt like it would never end. Until, finally, the wiry hair at his groin nestled against her butt.

  Her eyes fluttered shut to process the sensation of being so completely filled. But she forced them back open when he pulled out and started all over again. Clearly, Knox had been right, again. This would be the ride of her life.

  Because yes, after only two—no, three—long thrusts, it was obvious he knew exactly the best way to stimulate every nerve ending in her body. But on top of all that, she was on a boat on the Potomac. That was a new one. Moored across from a national historic park and memorial to a president—also new. Having this amazing sex with the breeze on her…well, everything, and sunlight on her face, seemed to heighten all her senses. So Madison stared at the solid mass of trees ahead, and the glints off the water, and…

  Knox thrust into her again, but this time he bent forward to latch onto he
r neck. The suction over her pulse point combined with the exquisite fullness slammed her eyes shut.

  His fingers tightened on her hips, almost to the point of pain. But not quite. “Do that again,” he ordered.

  “What?”

  “That squeezing thing. It drives me crazy.”

  Ha! She knew he’d like that. Madison turned her head to capture his lips as she clenched her inner muscles again. It made him groan. It also made him pick up the pace. The slap of their skin was echoed by the slap of the water against the hull.

  He broke off with another sharp exhale. “You’re amazing, Madison.”

  “Thanks. I think I’ll save my review for after the big finish,” she teased between pants. Because he’d suddenly turned into a jackhammer of pleasure. Knox reached beneath the wheel to grab her breast and lightly pinch her nipple. So. Darn. Good.

  They were skin to skin, ankles to thighs, hips to ribs. Everywhere they touched sizzled from their mingled sweat and the heat they generated. She moaned. He groaned. They both gasped in tandem. Madison white-knuckled the wheel as if it were the safety harness on a roller coaster. Because she was at the tip-top, stomach in her throat and ready to fall.

  Knox’s grip tightened, fingers digging in. “Now,” he growled.

  And darned if that wasn’t all it took to push her over the edge. Darned if he didn’t keep her on that careening slide to satisfaction by continuing to move, to thrust, to squeeze, to lick, to overwhelm every one of her senses.

  As the body-wide ripples finally started to subside, Knox whispered in her ear. “Well?”

  “Pretty good,” she said nonchalantly. “But anyone can be a one-hit wonder. You, as a science guy, know that results have to be replicated multiple times to be trusted.”

  “You’re a hard-ass grader. But you make a good point.” After easing out, Knox pulled her upright, one hand across her chest and the other sliding down between her legs. “We should definitely go again.”

  “Right now?”

  He laughed so loudly that the ducks in the water below squawked and flew up in a burst of feathers and noise. “How about we start over with the snacks and drinks first?”