by Amy Andrews
‘How does two-minute noodles and flambéed marshmallows sound?’ he asked as he sat on the groundsheet he’d laid down earlier.
Sadie laughed. ‘Will we be singing “Kum-ba-yah” too?’
Kent grunted as he set the billy in the fire to boil the water for the noodles. ‘I don’t sing.’
Sadie rolled her eyes. ‘Don’t sing. Don’t fly. Don’t talk. What do you do for fun, Kent Nelson?’ she teased.
Kent looked up at her encased in his shirt. Long shadows formed on her cheeks from her eyelashes as the firelight played over her face and the sky behind her slowly faded to a deep purple. He tried not to think about the many fun things they could be doing right now.
Sadie held her breath for a second or two as the copper highlights flickered to life in Kent’s gaze. And she didn’t think it was from the fire.
‘I flambé marshmallows,’ he said.
He turned back to the billy and Sadie breathed again, the moment passing.
She asked him some technical questions to do with his photography, which got them through the noodles, but when she confessed to never having roasted marshmallows in a fire and she sat down beside him for tuition, things moved back to that state of awareness again and she knew he was feeling it too.
Kent laughed as he watched Sadie attempting to cook her marshmallow in the coals of the fire, too frightened to shove it right in and turn it into a little ball of flame. He couldn’t believe anyone could get to their twenties and not have done something so simple and so damn good.
‘You’re doing it wrong.’ He tutted as she pulled off a lukewarm marshmallow and popped it into a mouth already moist and sticky.
Not something that was good for his sanity.
Her cheeks were flushed by the heat radiating from the fire and she looked like a teenager.
‘They’re supposed to be like this,’ he said, pulling his out from the fire glowing brightly in the night like a meteor burning up on entry. He blew on it gently, putting it out, then pulled it off the end of his stick and dropped it into his mouth.
Sadie watched the process, fascinated. Who’d have thought lips that would have been perfectly at home on a statue would also look just as good coated in gooey marshmallow? Last night it hadn’t even occurred to her to analyse how he tasted. It had been too quick, too intense.
Now she couldn’t think about anything else.
‘Doesn’t it taste burnt?’ she asked, looking away as she realised she was staring.
He shook his head as he skewered another soft treat and held it above the coals. ‘It tastes crunchy and then explodes in your mouth all hot and gooey.’
Sadie’s mouth watered. And she was pretty sure it had nothing to do with the marshmallows.
Kent’s marshmallow caught and he pulled it away, pushing the glowing orb her way. ‘Here, just try it.’
Sadie shook her head. ‘Won’t it burn my fingers?’
Kent rolled his eyes as he blew on it and pulled it off. ‘You’re such a city girl.’ He offered it to her quickly. ‘Open up.’
Sadie shouldn’t have opened up. But his fingers were pushing it towards her lips and his tiger eyes were daring her and the treat smelled hot and sweet and sticky.
So she opened up.
Big mistake. The crunch melted against her tongue and soft sweet goo spilled into her mouth. Her senses filled with sugar and him. Flames danced shadows over his stubbly cheeks as she sucked every sticky morsel from his sweet warm fingertips. She saw his pupils dilate in the firelight.
Kent froze as his fingers lingered on her mouth completely of their own accord. His gaze lingered too. How could it not when her mouth glistened all sweet and sticky? Beckoned, even, and he was suddenly wondering what her marshmallow mouth tasted like.
‘Oh, hell,’ he muttered as he dropped his head to find out.
EIGHT
Sadie met him halfway, her heartbeat slow and thick as if marshmallow were running through her veins. His perfect mouth touched hers and there was nothing sweet and warm about it. It was hot and heady. Exploding inside her like a shower of sparks from the fire.
Heat shot to all her extremities. Lighting spot fires wherever it touched.
And she didn’t care that they were in the middle of the bush or that they’d known each other for only a handful of days or that creatures lurked beyond the radius of the firelight.
She only cared about his hands in her hair, the brush of his thumbs at her temples, the heat of his mouth.
The harsh suck of his breath. The sweetness of lips. The deep rumble of his moan as her tongue found his.
And the driving imperative for more.
Her hands crept to his chest, bunched in his T-shirt, pulled him closer. She opened her mouth wider. Angled her neck back further. Kissed him harder.
Kent could feel Sadie trembling against him as their kiss raged out of control. Could feel the answering tremble in his gut. Every breath he took filled his head with her and lust beat like a jungle drum in his head, pounded through his veins, pulsed through his impossibly hard erection.
It was heady and addictive and he wanted more. He wanted her naked. Under him. Crying out his name.
All night.
And the one after that. And the one after that.
It was way too much, way too soon.
He tore his mouth away, his forehead pressed against hers, his breathing harsh in the vast outback evening.
Sadie mewed as her scrambled brain grappled with the abrupt disconnect. ‘What?’ she asked, her voice husky as she pulled back slightly, her hands dropping from his chest, her gaze locking with his.
Kent cleared his throat. ‘This is...kind of out of control. It’s heading pretty quickly in a direction you might not want it to go.’
Sadie frowned. ‘I’m not sixteen, Kent. I know where this is heading.’
Kent swallowed as her gaze zeroed in on his mouth and the urge to kiss her again intensified. ‘I can’t offer you a relationship, Sadie.’
Sadie blinked. Where in hell had that come from? ‘Just as well I only want to use you for sex, then.’
‘Sadie,’ he growled as his still rock-hard erection twitched.
Sadie ran her tongue over her lips, trying to savour the taste of him while he was being all adult. ‘I’m not hearing the “Wedding March” if that’s what you’re worried about.’
Kent followed her tongue as it took a tour of her mouth. ‘Don’t do that,’ he rasped as the action went straight to his groin.
Sadie heard the strain in his voice and smiled. ‘What—this?’ she asked, cocking an eyebrow as she sent her tongue around for a second swipe.
Kent felt every cell in his body tense. ‘Sadie,’ he warned.
‘Or this?’ she asked innocently as she reached for the packet of marshmallows, plucked one out and slipped it into her mouth.
‘Mmm,’ she murmured, shutting her eyes as she chewed, then deliberately pushed her hands into her hair, lifting it off the back of her neck before dropping it again and opening her eyes.
Sadie watched Kent’s Adam’s apple bob in his throat. She reached for another marshmallow, bringing it slowly to her mouth, touching it lightly to her lips before withdrawing it.
‘You look like you could do with one of these,’ she murmured, advancing it towards him, brushing it against his mouth.
Kent’s lips tingled at the illicit gesture; he wasn’t fooled by the innocence in her eyes or the soft baby pink of the offering.
It might as well have been shiny red because both of them knew it was an invitation to sin.
Their gazes locked as he opened his mouth and she gently pushed it in. ‘Now this is my kind of fun,’ she murmured.
She kept two fingers against his mouth as he slowly devoured it, admiring the way the fire illuminated the shadows of his face. When he was done he sucked her fingers into his mouth and removed the powdery marshmallow coating.
Then he hauled her into his lap and slammed his mouth against hers.
>
Sadie wasn’t sure if she moaned or he did as sugar turned to spice but she gripped the front of his T-shirt as passion flared and their kisses became deeper, wetter, longer.
Desire squirmed in her belly, heated her thighs, tingled between her legs where the denim of his jeans rasped against her. She could feel the thud of his heart beating at one with hers.
The smell of wood smoke and man filled up her senses and their passion took on a primal quality. She rubbed herself against him. She wanted to strip off all her clothes and be naked with him, like the first man and woman.
As if they were the only two people on earth.
For one crazy moment out here in the middle of nature she even wished that this were her first time.
Kent was only vaguely aware of the cool air hitting his back as Sadie hauled his T-shirt up. Their contact was temporarily broken as he ducked out of it and he took the opportunity as he claimed her mouth again to shift, to tumble her onto the groundsheet, her hair spilling out around her head.
He propped himself on his side, his mouth leaving hers to explore lower, his hand coming to rest on her belly. He traced his tongue down her throat, dipping into the hollow at the base. She moaned and shifted restlessly, her body undulating in his peripheral vision, pushing her breasts up. His hand scrunched into the fabric of her dress as lust seared his groin with a fiery arrow.
He traced his tongue to her collarbone. Followed the path of her shoestring strap. Licked along the edge of her bodice. Dipped into the hint of cleavage.
She shifted again and her little whimper had him pulling back. He gazed down at her. Her eyes were closed, her beautiful full mouth parted. When her eyelids fluttered open her large grey eyes were cloudy with passion.
‘I want to look at you,’ he said as his hand drifted up over her breasts.
Sadie gasped, her eyelids flickering to half-mast as his fingers brushed an erect nipple.
Kent stopped his upward trajectory and brushed his thumb over the hard little bead he could feel scraping against his finger pad. ‘You like that?’ he murmured as Sadie gasped again and arched her back. He didn’t give her a chance to reply as he dipped his head and put his mouth to the fabric, sucking hard.
Sadie hissed out a breath as she felt the pressure of Kent’s tongue and the moistness of his mouth deep down in her centre. Her breasts had always been extraordinarily sensitive and she gripped his shoulder as he took his own sweet time with it. Her belly stirred and she shifted against the ground, each swipe of his tongue involuntarily arching her back. Her brain was utter mush when he finally lifted his head and turned his attention to her cleavage.
‘These damn buttons have been taunting me all day,’ he muttered as he popped the first one, then the next, then the next. His one-handed dexterity wasn’t the best but he enjoyed the slow reveal of her pink bra with a familiar twinkling diamanté in the V of the cleavage.
Sadie’s breath was ragged as she watched Kent patiently undo each button on her dress. All forty of them. He didn’t appear to be in a hurry and when he finally parted the dress and it slithered off her body to pool at her sides he took his time, running his gaze over every centimetre of bare skin.
Sadie actually blushed.
She wasn’t used to men taking their time or inspecting her so thoroughly.
‘Kent.’ She wasn’t sure if it came out as eager or desperate but her whole body was humming with desire.
He dragged his gaze away from her body and looked down into her firelit face. ‘You’re beautiful, Sadie Bliss.’
Sadie’s breath caught in her throat. ‘You look pretty damn fine yourself,’ she murmured.
Kent chuckled as he looked back down at two very magnificent breasts. Breasts he’d thought about a lot the last five days. He traced a finger up a creamy slope to the diamanté at the centre, then back down again. Goosebumps broke out on her skin and he looked at her. ‘Cold?’
Sadie shook her head. ‘I think I’m so hot I’m about to self-combust.’
He reached into the V and flicked open the front clasp, her large breasts spilling free. ‘You can say that again,’ he breathed reverently.
Sadie blushed at his scrutiny and tried to cover herself up out of habit. She’d spent a lot of years trying to disguise her breasts. For her father who’d wanted her to be a boy. For Leo who’d wanted them to be smaller. For her career so she could be taken seriously.
Kent pulled her arm away, planting it above her head as he stared at the perfection before him. ‘Don’t.’
She looked away from the wonder in his eyes, her belly squirming at his utter fascination. She’d seen that look too often when she’d got to this stage with previous partners. But in her experience they held more novelty value for men than forming any actual part of their sexual repertoire.
‘They’re too big,’ she muttered as she stared into the fire, embarrassed.
‘They’re perfect.’
Sadie looked at him. ‘Aren’t you going to ask me if they’re real?’
Kent shook his head as he cupped her breast where it naturally fell sidewards. ‘Nope. These,’ he said, stroking his fingers along the generous side swell, ‘are the real deal.’
And then, because he was practically salivating, he dropped his head and sucked a large round nipple deep into his mouth.
Sadie shut her eyes on a whimper that was almost primordial. His mouth was hot and her nipple even more so but it ruched as quickly as if Kent had placed an ice cube on it. She arched her back and he took it deeper.
Spots formed behind her eyes as he flicked his tongue and grazed his teeth across the sensitive nub. She cried out when he released it, from relief or frustration she wasn’t sure, but it was short-lived as he bent to suckle the other, his fingers moving to continue the torturous possession of the one recently released.
Heat started to ripple in little pools deep inside her belly and she lifted her hips restlessly as she cried out, ‘Kent.’
Kent lifted his head, desire pounding thick and sludgy through his veins. She looked utterly sexy with her head tossed back, her mouth parted and he quickly claimed it, plundering the soft recesses, soothing her whimpers with his tongue even as he stoked them higher by fondling and kneading her breasts.
‘Oh, God,’ Sadie whispered as Kent once again abandoned her mouth in favour of a nipple. She sucked in a breath, arching her back as his warm mouth closed over her and his fingers created havoc with the other.
Sadie couldn’t think. She could barely breathe as she rode the intense sensations battering her body. The ripples spread further to her thighs and radiated to her buttocks as the world became just Kent—his bare broad shoulders and his hot, hot mouth.
She was sure she was drooling.
She was definitely very, very ready.
Kent pulled away to look at the moist peak he’d just been savouring glisten in the firelight. ‘God, Sadie,’ he groaned. ‘I could do this all night.’
Sadie had a brief moment of clarity when she knew she’d never survive a night of this before he lowered his head to the closest nipple and the world went hazy again.
She cried out as his teeth grazed the tip, her muscles inside contracting hard at the sheer eroticism. Heat flooded into her pelvis. Her thighs grew heavy. Her belly tensed. She was barely aware of his hand finally relinquishing its torture of the other nipple as the ripples grew stronger, more rhythmic, syncing in with the swipes of Kent’s tongue.
Kent’s head spun at the desperate keening cries coming from somewhere at the back of Sadie’s throat. Her arousal was heady and his erection throbbed at every appreciative little whimper. Her nipples were hard and tight against his tongue, a stark contrast to the warm gooey marshmallow from before but no less sweet.
His hand stroked down her abdomen, swirling around her belly button, brushing lower, her soft sighs playing like a cheer squad in his head.
His fingers brushed the edge of her underwear, soft and gauzy, the little diamanté that had taunted him
that night in the bathroom hard as the nipple in his mouth. He moved lower still, tracing his fingertips down over the outside of the fabric, the weave of the filmy material imprinting on his fingerprints.
He followed the heat down, down, down as his tongue rolled over and over the peak of her taut nipple, his teeth grazing lightly with each pass. His finger dipped into the seam that parted her, whispering against the little nub engorged with sex, heat and lust.
Sadie bucked. One second his mouth was creating delicious havoc and the next, with just one brush of his finger, her world came apart. Release hit at warp speed, coalescing into a ball of heat and light and pressure right at her very core. The ripples became a tsunami and exploded through her internal muscles in spasms of almost unbearable pleasure.
She cried out his name into the night as her climax not only shook her, but felt as if it shook the very foundations beneath her. The stars above her head twisted into pretty kaleidoscope patterns just before her lids shut them out and she gripped his shoulders to keep her earthbound.
It took a moment for Kent’s lust-drunk brain to realise what was happening. His hand stilled and he lifted his head as he looked down into her firelit face as she gasped, her eyes shut tight, her head rocking from side to side.
Watching Sadie Bliss shatter into a million pieces was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.
He’d never been so turned on in his life.
He’d lost his virginity at nineteen and he’d prided himself on always leaving a woman satisfied, but never in all the years since had a woman been this responsive.
He watched every last nuance of her climax as it rippled through her face from her scrunched brow to her parted mouth. He held her as her cries settled, her face relaxed and her eyes slowly opened, coming into a slow dazed-looking focus on his.
He smiled down at her. ‘Why, Sadie Bliss, that’s one hell of a party trick,’ he murmured.
Sadie’s brain scrambled to come back on line as her cheeks warmed. She saw amusement flickering in his gaze and shut her eyes again. She wanted to die. She wanted the earth to open up and swallow her. The man had barely touched her and she’d shattered into a thousand pieces like some seedy porn queen.