There was a smal window at the head of the bed and I could just barely make out the planes and angles of his face in the moonlight.
He stil didn’t say anything but I could see he was looking at me.
“I’m sorry about the tequila,” I whispered, changing to a different subject.
Final y he spoke but quietly. “Don’t worry about it.”
“You licked my lip,” I reminded him.
“You tasted of cherries,” he told me.
Oh right, Jet’s lip balm.
“I forgot.”
“Drinking is my problem, I won’t make it yours,” he told me, his deep voice was relaxed, even sleepy, but there was stil that fierce undercurrent that he used when he was talking to Roam.
I didn’t say anything.
I waited, a few minutes passed and then I went on. “I can’t believe you shot Sal Cordova in the ass.” I couldn’t help myself, I thought it was funny even though I knew I shouldn’t.
I smiled at him in the moonlight.
“Seemed a good place to aim,” he told me and I felt my body go slightly stiff.
“You meant to shoot him in the ass?” I asked.
“He is an ass,” was Vance’s reply.
“That’s true,” I told him and then relaxed again.
I sighed and was silent for a few beats.
Then I said, “What did you mean when you told me you never expected to get the chance at something so sweet?” I whispered in a voice so low I thought maybe he wouldn’t whispered in a voice so low I thought maybe he wouldn’t hear it.
His hands slid along the silk of my nightgown, down over my bottom then I felt the fingers of one hand curl into the material. He pul ed it up and then one of his arms went tight at my waist, the other hand skimmed over my bottom and pul ed me deeper into him.
What he didn’t do was answer.
Or, maybe, that was his answer.
I held my breath through his movements, my bel y fluttering but then his hand and arm went stil .
“Vance? Did you hear me?” I said a little louder.
“I heard you.” That’s al he said.
“Um,” I started, knowing it was likely rude but finding courage in the dark and saying it al the same, “from what I hear, you’ve had a lot of sweet things.”
“No. I’ve had a lot of easy things.”
“I know a couple of girls you’ve –”
“None of them smel ed of melons, tasted of cherries or ended up worth the effort,” he said bluntly.
I blinked at him in the dark. “Are you saying I’l be worth the effort?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he responded immediately.
I blinked again, stunned and feeling weird, good weird, bad weird, scary weird, Rottweiler snarling weird.
“How do you know I’l be worth the effort?”
“I know.”
“How?” I pushed.
“I just know.”
“How?” I didn’t let it go.
“You eat shit most your life, work, sweat and bleed for anything you could get the rest of it, you know sweet when you taste it.”
Oh my God.
I didn’t know what to say to that so I didn’t say anything at al and fel silent.
“You done talkin’?” he asked after a few minutes.
I nodded.
His hand at my waist slid up my back to my head. He tucked my face into his throat and he held me.
I laid there awhile.
Then when I thought he was asleep, I took my hand from where it was pressed against his chest and I wrapped it around his waist.
When I did this, his arms went tight, he yanked out my ponytail holder and my hair spil ed over his hand. He ran his fingers through it then I felt him twirling a tendril somewhere in the area between my shoulder blades.
I guessed that meant he wasn’t asleep.
Whatever.
I closed my eyes and settled in.
He kept playing with my hair.
Before I knew it, before I even would have thought it possible, I fel asleep.
Chapter Ten
Mine
I woke up with a bel y in the state of advanced fluttering.
In fact I was pretty certain in the recesses of my deep sleep I’d already experienced some significant flutterings and thought they were a dream.
I knew by now with Vance’s relentless pursuit of me and al that had happened during that pursuit that what I was feeling was very, very turned on.
This had to do with the fact that Vance’s body was pressed close to my back.
It also had to do with the fact that Vance’s hardness was pressed against my bottom.
But, mostly, it had to do with the fact that Vance’s hand was at my breast and his thumb was stroking lightly back and forth across my nipple.
I moved slightly and so did Vance, pressing into me.
With his mouth at the back of my neck, he said,
“Mornin’.”
At the same time his thumb stopped stroking, it was joined by his finger and they pressed together. Also at the same time his other hand slid into the front of my panties and went deep.
I felt a shockwave shoot from my nipple and detonate between my legs.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
He didn’t stop, both his hands worked me and I pushed back into his body, nestling my bottom into his crotch. I started breathing heavily, my stil -sleepy mind completely muddled.
I tried to turn, to touch him but his arms tensed and he held me where I was.
I gave up, giving into the sensations. I felt his teeth nip my shoulder, catching the strap of my nightgown. His body moved as his mouth pul ed down the strap, exposing my breast. He was now skin-against-skin at my breast, one of his fingers slid inside me and I felt heat slice through my body.
I tried to turn again but he kept me where I was, finger moving in and out and instinct made my hips move with it, riding his hand.
“Jesus, Jules,” he said at my neck, his voice hoarse and his finger slid away and touched me again, moving, swirling and I felt it coming.
I’d had orgasms before, self-induced, but it was nothing like this, nothing at al . It overwhelmed me, I sucked in breath and Vance knew it was going to happen.
He rol ed me to my back, his hand stil between my legs, I wrapped my arms around him, bucked my hips, his mouth came to mine and it hit me.
And when it did I moaned his name.
The minute I finished his name, he moved away and I made a detached mew of protest at the loss of his heat and hand but he wasn’t going anywhere.
I was stil in the throes of my orgasm when he tore my panties down my legs, spread my thighs and he came up between them and fil ed me.
It didn’t hurt, not at al . Instead it felt beautiful.
I whispered his name again. He pul ed up my legs at the knees, pushing deeper, moving rhythmical y and my hips matched the movements of his.
“Jesus Christ, you’re tight,” he muttered into my neck and I wrapped my arms around him, pul ing my knees back further so he could slide deeper
He went up on his hands, grinding into me, looking down at me, his eyes dilated, his hair around his shoulders.
Looking up at him, at that moment, he was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
“Come back to me,” I murmured and the minute I asked, he did, his hand moving between us, touching me, pressing into me. I was sensitive there, ready again. I started panting, it was too much; I thought it would shatter me.
“Vance,” I whispered in an urgent voice.
“Let go,” he told me, deep voice husky, eyes staring into mine.
I did.
A few minutes later, he did too.
* * * * *
I used to go to summer camp in the mountains for two weeks and, when I got older, I became a camp counselor. We did a lot of horseback riding.
Maybe Indy was wrong and it wasn’t an urban myth.
Whatever. It didn’t matter.
What mattered was the fact that I just discovered that sex was great. Sex was wonderful. Sex was the best thing ever invented.
Vance’s weight was on me, pressing me into the bed.
He was stil inside me, my arms wrapped around his waist, thighs tight against his hips and I was thinking stupid thoughts, my mind racing, my body spent.
Vance slowly, gently slid out of me and shifted to the side, taking me with him. I lifted my chin to look at him, maybe even smile at him but with one look I knew something was definitely not right.
Damn.
Maybe I’d done it wrong.
“Vance…”
His eyes were intense, more intense than his normal intense. Something was in his face, something not right and I didn’t know if it was good or bad but whatever it was, it was immense.
“Did I hurt you?” he asked.
So that was it.
I shook my head.
His hand moved between us then between my legs, touching me gently and my hips jerked at his touch because I was stil tender.
The whole time he looked into my eyes, staring at me in that intense way.
“What are you doing?” I whispered.
“Checkin’ for blood.”
My breath caught.
Oh crap.
He knew. He knew I was a virgin.
How did he know?
It was my turn to stare at him.
“Are you on the pil ?” he asked.
I shook my head again.
His hand came away, his eyes went to it then he moved to the bottom of the bed and dropped over the edge silently. I stared at him while he did this, stunned immobile then his hands wrapped around my ankles and he dragged me down the bed, caught me when I came over the side and put me on my feet.
“What are you doing?” I asked, unable to keep up.
He grabbed my hand and pul ed me into the bathroom.
“Am I bleeding?”
“No.”
“Then, why –?”
He stopped in the bathroom and nabbed a rol ed washcloth (mint green, Egyptian cotton, my towels were lush) out of a basket on the back of the toilet. He threw it into the sink and turned on the tap.
“Vance, for God’s sake, what are you doing?” I snapped, my patience spent.
He came at me, face clouded.
I took one look at his face and retreated. Without far to go in the smal room, my back hit the bathroom wal and his body came up against mine.
“You were a virgin,” he said.
I opened and shut my mouth three times not knowing what to say.
“Don’t deny it.”
“How did you know?” I whispered.
“No one’s that fuckin’ tight. Jesus, Jules, why didn’t you say anything?”
“Turn off the faucet,” I said in an effort to stal . I did not want to have this particular conversation.
“Answer me,” he demanded. Vance was apparently intent on having this particular conversation.
I gave in to get it over with. “I tried, last night but things got…” I started then stopped, “and this morning things were advanced –”
“I didn’t use protection,” he interrupted me.
I blinked at him then my eyes got wide.
“Fuck. ” The word was a gentle explosion under his breath and then he got further into my space, his face close to mine. “I didn’t expect it to go that far.” This was not good.
“What did you expect to happen?” I asked.
“I expected to make you come with my hand and have time to get protection before I fucked you. But Christ, your face when you came…”
He stopped speaking and I stopped breathing.
Then he went on. “I also expected you to be the kind of woman with enough experience and brains to keep herself protected.”
My mouth dropped open then I snapped it shut then I said, “You make it sound like my fault.”
“You didn’t tel me you were a virgin. Things would have gone differently if you had.”
I didn’t know what that meant and I didn’t get the chance to ask.
He kept talking. “How in the fuck does someone who looks like you remain a virgin until you’re twenty-six fuckin’
years old?”
Okay, so, I was getting the impression that my virginal status was a turn off. Instead of this making me angry, it hurt me someplace private, someplace there was no way in hel I’d ever let show.
I pretended his words didn’t affect me and looked for an excuse.
“I’ve been kinda busy,” I told him.
“That’s not it.”
“I’m a lesbian?” I tried.
He stared at me like he thought it might be a good idea to cal a certain kind of doctor.
Then he twisted his torso around, turned off the faucet, came back and put his hands on the wal on either side of me.
“No one has ever touched you?” he asked, his voice stil sounding angry, intense and I didn’t know how to react.
I mean, this wasn’t exactly the end of the world, was it?
Was I that bad?
“No one’s ever touched me,” I answered softly.
“No one?”
I shook my head.
“Put their mouth on you?” he went on.
“Vance!” I exclaimed.
“Answer me, god dammit!” he clipped, his eyes flashing, the intensity escalating and my heart began to race.
“No!” I yel ed, confused and beginning to get freaked right the hel out.
When I said no he moved quickly, yanking my body to him and his arms went around me tight, his mouth came down on mine in a hot and heavy, ful -on-tongue-action kiss.
It took my breath away.
He pul ed away but only to yank my nightgown over my head and throw it aside. I noticed his nakedness then, forgetting my own, and stared in amazement at his body for the second he gave me before it was against mine, pressing me to the wal , hands everywhere, mouth on mine.
My bel y was fluttering again, wildly, and I went with it, exploring his skin with my hands.
Okay, so, maybe I was wrong about my virginal status being a turn off.
It was out of control, even though we’d just finished, we started again and it was not like before. I thought that had been intense but this was. It was violent, unrestrained, we were al over each other and it was fucking amazing.
Within minutes I was alternately panting, kissing him, tasting his neck, his col arbone, his shoulders and my hands were running over his ass when he bent, lifted my leg, swung it around his hip and slammed into me.
My head went back when he fil ed me and cracked against the wal .
He heard it, picked me up with his hands at my behind, stil inside me. I wrapped my legs around his hips and my arms around his shoulders. He moved us into the hal , his head tilted back and mine tipped down, our mouths locked together.
He went to his knee on the floor and dropped me to my back. He moved over me, I kept my legs and arms around him and he started immediately moving inside me, hard, fast, deep, my body jolting with his thrusts. It felt good, beyond good, straight to magnificent.
His hands went to the sides of my head, fingers in my hair and he looked down at me while he moved. I tried to kiss him but he dodged my mouth.
“Never,” he said, his voice gruff, his hips stopping their thrusts and grinding into me.
“Never what?” I murmured, one of my hands sliding down his back, the other one went into his hair.
“Outside my bike, never has anything important in my life been just mine.”
My body stil ed, so did my heart, and my eyes locked with his.
He started moving again, slowly, deeply and he kept talking. “Always castoffs, leftovers, used, sometimes even food from dumpsters.”
My heart started beating again, only to trip over itself; my breath came fast, not only from what was happening to my body but what he was saying.
“Vance –”
His lips c
ame to mine, his hands moved out of my hair and went to the sides of my face and he stared in my eyes, pressing deep inside.
“Mine,” he muttered, his deep voice hoarse, that fierce undercurrent there.
His tone caused a shiver to run through me, straight through to my soul.
Then he kissed me.
* * * * *
“I’ve got to get to work,” Vance said to me (or, more appropriately, against my neck). We were back in bed, comforter up to our waists. Vance had his arms around me; I had my hands pressed against his chest.
Boo was sitting on the end of the bed staring at us with barely concealed impatience at what he considered the unacceptable delay in the arrival of his morning wet food breakfast.
After we were done on the floor in the hal , wordlessly Vance had carried me up to the bed not like last time but cradled in his arms. He’d managed that feat too, graceful y.
He pul ed me into bed, yanked the comforter over us and he held me, stil silent.
I was silent too. My body was completely sated after three earth-shattering, back-to-back orgasms, so much so, I could barely move.
My mind was blank with shock and, if I admitted it to myself, pure unadulterated fear.
I pul ed my thoughts together, tossed my emotional Rottweiler a juicy steak and twisted my head to look at Vance. “We have to talk.”
And we did. We so had to talk.
He kissed me quickly then looked in my eyes. “Is this one of your whisper-sweet-stories-about-your-life-and-smile-at-me talks or something else?” he asked.
“Something else,” I told him.
“Then we don’t have to talk.”
“Crowe.”
He kissed me again.
“I’l cal you later,” he said.
“Crowe –”
“We’l go out to dinner before the meet with Darius.”
“Crowe!”
He leaned in, kissed my forehead, let me go, moved swiftly and disappeared off the edge of the platform.
“Crowe! ” I shouted.
I scrambled to the end of the bed, wrapping the comforter around my naked body. With effort and absolutely no grace I threw my legs over the side of the bed, stumbled, corrected myself and jumped down, pul ing the bulk of the king-sized comforter with me
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