by Nancy Warren
His intake of breath was sharp and deep. “I take it we’re done talking the business end of this relationship?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thank God,” he murmured. He gripped her shoulders, vise-like, and pulled her hard to his body. He took her mouth hungrily, his tongue tasting all of her, hers tasting all of him, deeply, wetly. The heat was instant, trembling, and their bodies fused, one into the other.
Dane pulled back, took her face in his hands, and dipped his head. “If we don’t slow this down, it’s going to be no fun at all.” A brief dark smile crossed his mouth. “I guess you know by now ‘detachment’ isn’t one of my strengths.” He slid his warm hands under the lapels of her robe, shoved it from her shoulders.
The next moment, he’d grasped the hem of her shift and pulled it over her head, let it fall to join her robe on the floor. The moment after that she was cradled in his arms, being carried naked to his giant bed.
He settled her in the center of it, stood back, and started to strip off his clothes—and he didn’t waste any time doing it.
His shoulders were broad, his body lean and fit—his erection. . . breathtaking. He gazed down at her in time to see her look at him and blink. “Standard equipment,” he said, his tone gruff.
If what Dane had was standard equipment, Esme had been spending way too much time at the mini-market. Dane must have been the envy of every guy in the locker room.
When he was stretched out beside her, he nuzzled her ear, then raised himself over her to look down into her eyes. Esme forced her unruly heart to ease back a notch, find a steadier beat, but it resisted, pounded harder, seemed to grow under the intensity of his gaze until it felt too big for her chest. He blew some hair off her forehead, smoothed tendrils behind an ear.
She waited for the usual words a man said to a woman freshly naked and in his arms . . . God, you’re beautiful . . . and waited, and waited.
“One of your earlobes is smaller than the other,” he said, and ran a finger along the shell of her ear. “Did you know that?”
“Uh . . . no.”
He kissed her ear. “This one,” he murmured, and his breath, skittering along her neck, had the odd effect of making her eyes close.
“Good to kno—”
“Shush, no talking. You can make notes later.”
“I don’t under—”
He took her mouth again, shutting her down, making her breath rise, spin, and stall in her throat. He ran a hand down between her breasts, over to squeeze her waist, then slid it over the outside of her thigh, up the inside, briefly touching her mound. His hand was hot, the pressure of it expert and strong, and under the heat of it, she started to open for him.
“No, not yet. Keep your legs closed. No matter what I do, keep them closed.”
Esme, dimly aware she was in bed with a man who made his own rules, nodded, met his gaze, tried to see him through the sensual fog that came and went across her line of vision.
He slid his hand up the front of her thigh, pressed his palm against her pubis, then gently probed the tight juncture at the apex of her thighs with one deft finger. Feeling his way to her clitoris, he stroked it slow and easy, building pressure, and breathless pleasure, with each precise rub and swirl of his finger.
Esme gasped and bucked.
In the limited space between her closed legs, everything was pressure, heavy and demanding; everything was confined, uncomfortably, frustratingly caged. She throbbed, tried to thrust herself up, open for him, but he straddled her, his strong legs on either side of hers, a vise, holding them together.
“Dane . . .” She looked up at him, knew her need was in her eyes. “Let me—”
He shook his head, brushed his mouth over hers, then took both her wrists in one hand and held them fast above her head. He didn’t stop, neither the warm kisses across her throat and shoulders, nor the mind-numbing rub of his finger, dipping in and out of her tight crevice, making her ache all the while, forcing her to take it, legs closed.
His every move was smooth, expert, and in a distant part of her mind she remembered Marilee saying something about her brother not liking women. Well, if how he was pleasuring her was any indication, Dane McCoy had liked more than his share.
“You’re wet,” he said, his voice low. “All honeyed.” He took his finger from her crease, slowly ringed her jutting nipple with it, then bent to her breast and suckled her, taking her deep and luxuriously.
His mouth drawing on her, she nearly came off the bed. Delirious, she fought him, desperate to spread herself, feel the warm air on her exposed vulva, feel him on her vulva. Still, he kept her pinned beneath him, immobile, desire whipping through her, a hot wind, swirling and fierce, unrelentingly contained.
He moved over her, rested the weight of his erection against her mound, making sensual primitive moves she knew tortured him as much as they tortured her.
He lifted his head, moistened her dry lips with his tongue and kissed her deeply, then he slid down—let his length and hardness rest in the valley created by her closed thighs—and gave his attention to her other breast, pulling the nipple deep into his mouth, lapping at it with his tongue.
Esme felt another rush between her legs, and lifted herself to him, crazed and increasingly desperate, every fiber and nerve in her body fire-driven and scorched.
“Now,” Dane growled from somewhere above her.
She looked at him, so dazed she couldn’t understand what he meant.
He released her wrists, shifted his lean hard body down, and planted his knee as a lever between her calves. “Open your legs, Esme. I want to look at you in the moonlight.”
She did as she was told, and he immediately put his hands on her knees, spread her wide. He studied her with dark hungry eyes, and she saw his chest expand and contract as if he’d run a marathon in the desert. “You,” he said, running a finger deeply through her drenched and oversensitized crease, “are cream, slick and rich.” He tore his eyes from her pubis and met her own fogged gaze. “In the moonlight you shine like poured gold.” He looked back down at her mound, now raised in full display, and his eyes went heavy lidded. He opened her more, spread the lips of her vulva until she felt the cool evening air against her heated center. “I could look at you forever.” He lightly kissed her clitoris, pulled back, and stroked her softly, his eyes never leaving her sex.
Esme panted, forced her eyes open wide enough to see his face, and said as sternly as her dry voice allowed, “You’d better plan on doing a lot more than looking, McCoy.”
Five
Dane went down on her. Holding her hips, he held her to his lips, seared her with his mouth and tongue.
“Oh, God. I can’t . . .”
Like a flock of disturbed birds, all thought left her, and the only sound in her brain was the beat of her wild heart. Her body quaked and trembled, and she held his dark head as if it were heaven itself.
Which it was . . .
He licked her long and deeply, lifted his head, and replaced his fabulous mouth with two fingers, unmoving as if there to hold his place. “You’re going to come now, Esme,” he murmured, his voice hoarse and ragged. “Hard and fast, over and over again.”
His eyes were midnight blue, and she didn’t breathe, couldn’t breathe. Her eyes fixed on his, saw the determination embedded there, the feral glow of male power. “I’m going to take you deeper.”
He slipped his fingers into her and pressed her nub gently with his thumb. She moaned, thrust toward him . . .
“Easy, easy . . .”
She thrust again, high, demanding. Groaning, she grabbed handfuls of his hair, curled her fingers in it, but still he held back, toyed with her, caressed her. Lower now.
Her head fell back against the pillow, every sense in thrall, expectant.
He swept her with his tongue, long and lavishly, nuzzled her . . . His groan vibrated against her, carried into her.
“You’re incredible,” he murmured against her burning, quivering fle
sh. “So open. Ready.” He pulled her engorged, hardened nub into his mouth, sucked—
Esme exploded.
“Oh, God—” She hurled the words, hoarse and guttural, into the moonlit room and fell back.
Dane growled against her shivering, vulnerable flesh, burrowed into her heat, took her deeper, took her high. Again.
Unable to stop herself, she came again, thrust herself up, wave after wave of sensation pulsing through her depleted body.
Dane lifted his head, stared down at her with ink-blue eyes, and stroked the hot, delicate tip of her. “Again, Esme. One more time.” He tugged her clitoris, the barest of pulls, a rasp of friction on her drenched, sensitized vulva . . .
“I can’t, I can’t.” But even numb, spent, she felt it build, hover in the depths of her, far, far below.
“You will.” He tugged again, skillfully, mercilessly... achingly gentle, as if the soft flesh of her sex was a silken thread.
Silk delicate enough to float in the heat and wind emanating from her burning, thrashing body.
Silk strong enough to reach her depths, find the coming, the rapture, the scream . . .
Esme swung her head from side to side, clasped the sheets with rigid fists. “No!” she cried, when he circled her, pulled her silk again. Once. In absolute perfection.
She imploded, convulsed, a third stunning climax rolling and shuddering to her core.
Barely able to breathe, she looked up from under heavy-lidded eyes into Dane’s dark, tension-ravaged face as he pulled away from her and rolled on a condom.
He centered himself at her wet, still pulsing opening, and entered her in one strong, penetrating stroke. Esme’s body, beyond ready for him, took him fully, and she widened her eyes, watched his face as he at once left her and joined with her, watched the taut, otherworldly expression that claimed his handsome features, the slow closing of his eyes as he thrust into her. She savored the thickness of him buried deep within her, then the strain and heave of his muscles when he emptied himself, gained his own blinding release.
For a time their bodies, slick and scorched from sex, were sealed to each other, their breathing the only sound in the large room. Then Dane cursed mildly, mumbled something about condom duty, and left her to go to the bathroom.
When he came back, he stretched out beside her, pulled her close and kissed her temple. “You, Esme Shane, are spectacular.”
“What I am, is exhausted.” She snaked a hand across his chest, played in the curls there.
“And satisfied.”
“I hope that wasn’t the lead-in to the was-it-as-good-for-you-as-it-was-for-me question.”
“Wasn’t a question.” He ran his hand over her belly and squeezed her waist. “I’m neither blind nor deaf.”
She smiled. “You really are arrogant, you know.”
“Hmm.” He nuzzled her neck.
And such an amazing lover, you could be addictive. She rubbed her eyes, sighed, and wondered if there was a rehab center for withdrawal from Dane McCoy. Fortunately, she had a few days before she had to find out. She nestled closer to him, and her gaze drifted to the window. The pale clouds that had covered the moon drifted away, and Esme, her energy spent, her senses languorous, watched the moonlight spill into the bedroom.
Her thoughts moved from satiation to curious.
“You’re a wonderful lover,” she said. “I’ve read about that techniq—”
“Don’t,” he said, propping himself up on one elbow and looking down at her.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t start analyzing.” He circled her nipple with a slow lazy finger, and her breath caught. God, she couldn’t want him again this soon. And he couldn’t possibly be . . . up for it if she did.
Maybe she could locate some of his old girlfriends and they could form their own self-help program. She stretched under his hands, and he bent to lightly kiss her peaking nipple.
“Let’s go for a swim. Then come back here for”—he circled the nipple with his tongue—“more of the same.”
“I didn’t bring a suit,” she said, trying to talk while he nibbled on her.
His head came up. “The beach is private, you don’t need a suit.” He rolled out of bed and stood over her, six-feet-one of gorgeous masculinity, panther-like, confident, and waiting for her. His sex, heavy between his legs, tempted her to initiate that “more of the same” he’d mentioned, right now. She couldn’t take her eyes off him and couldn’t resist reaching out to touch him, cup him. “A swim sounds wonderful,” she said, lifting her eyes to his. “But when it’s over, it’s my turn to . . . play. Agreed?” She squeezed him gently.
He tensed and briefly closed his eyes, didn’t hide his reaction to her fondling, and she saw his stomach contract. He gazed down at her, but his back was to the window, and she couldn’t see his face. “If I didn’t agree to a proposition like that, I’d have to turn in my man badge.”
She smiled and pulled back her hand. “From what you just gave me, I’d say there’s little or no chance of that.”
The sandy beach was moon-silvered, the night warm—the water of the Gulf cold, once you got out a ways. Esme lasted sixty seconds and ran for the beach, toward the blanket and towels he’d brought from his bedroom.
Dane forced himself to stay in the water, get his goddamn sex-ravaged brain working again. If he planned to slow himself down, he’d need all the cold water he could get. Otherwise he’d never let Esme out of his bed, be all over her like a dick-brained teenager—which is exactly what he felt like.
He went under again, came up, shook his head, and finger-combed his hair back. His gaze shot to the beach and Esme waved at him, made a show of shuddering, and mouthed, You’re crazy!
He was crazy, all right, but not in the way she meant it.
He watched her dry herself, her skin all shivery and pale. Her generous breasts, so recently in his hands, now plump and loose under the white beach towel she’d wrapped herself in.
God, she was gorgeous. All curves, all woman, all heat under his hands. The way she’d exploded under him, holding nothing back, giving him . . . all of her; if he’d had the stamina he’d have held her there forever.
Even the cool Gulf water couldn’t stop him from getting hard.
He dove again, swam swiftly away from the beach, then turned and headed back. If he’d hoped muscle power would trump brain activity, he was wrong. He couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Dane had read that a woman in climax was at her most beautiful, but he’d never believed it before tonight, until he’d watched Esme reach for it, her eyes heavy lidded, her mouth slack and moist, her nipples stone hard, like hot ice in his mouth. She’d glowed, like roiling, melting gold, her long black hair a spray of sin across his pillow.
He’d wanted to hold her in that place, that just-before-coming place, for hours.
Hell, he might yet.
If he didn’t freeze his balls off first. He looked at the sky in time to see a drift of dark gray clouds cover it, then headed for the shore, and in a few easy strokes he was there.
Esme smiled at him and shivered theatrically. “You’re a better man than I am, McCoy.”
“It’s not that cold if you hang in there.” He reached for a towel.
She wore hers sarong-style and was covered from breasts to knees.
He should have brought smaller towels. He started to dry himself.
“Let me.” She took the towel from his hand.
She dried his back first, then came around to his chest. Starting at his shoulders, she worked her way across his chest and headed down.
Looking up at him, she nodded at his more unpredictable anatomy, and said—damn near purring—“Do you mind?”
“I’d mind if you didn’t,” he said, which was the absolute fucking truth. He couldn’t wait to feel her hands on him.
Esme wasn’t shy—thank God—and she took her time. When she finished with him, it would have a taken a seven-mile swim off the coast of Antarctica
to bring him down.
She dropped the towel to the sand and ran a finger lightly along his now fully-at-attention cock. “You’ve been . . . gifted.” She took the weight of him in her hands, looked into his eyes, and squeezed him gently. Her smile altered subtly, shifted to intense. “Very gifted.” Again she traced him.
His mouth turned into a desert, and every atom in his body waved a white flag. He spread his legs to hold ground, but if she expected an answer, he didn’t have one. Hell, he’d had nothing to do with what nature endowed. All he did was try to make the most of it. Although at the moment, Esme was doing it for him.
She dropped to her knees in front of him, set her hands on his legs, pressed her thumbs in the crevice of his thighs.
His breath lumped in his throat like a goddamn medicine ball.
Jesus, she was going to do him! And he’d probably topple like a mile-high bald cypress. “I don’t think this is a—” Her mouth found him, and his germ of an idea that this particular outdoor activity might not be workable was crushed by a tongue stroke.
He was toast.
Her hands slid around him, grasped his ass, and held him to her lips, her tongue—as if he needed holding. He spread his fingers on her head, forked them into her straight silky hair—managed not to crush her skull when she took his tip in her mouth, tasted him, took him deeper.
His head jerked back, and he sealed his eyelids to a tight close, let her take complete control over a piece of his anatomy that generally had a stubborn, one-track mind of its own. The sacrifice was worth every lick, stroke, and tug.
He heard the low murmuring in his throat, felt the build up, and hit the red zone. He had to move, or—
“Baby, you’d better . . .” He didn’t have to finish.
She rolled on the condom he’d brought from the house and licked and kissed her way up his stomach to his chest. Taking a nipple in her teeth, she gave it a sharp bite, then looked up at him, her gaze sultry with challenge, and dropped her towel. “I’m ready for you,” she said, and stretched out on the blanket.