Brush Strokes (11 page)

They slowed so she could handle her
business. “Uh, I’ll leave that to you,” she replied. She looked up
at Joe. “Right now, I have to show my man some serious gratitude
for his bone-headed, yet worked-out-in-the-end
decision.”

Joe chuckled, but started them moving
again. The lady had spoken. As for him, he couldn’t wait to be on
the receiving end of that gratitude if the kiss from a moment ago
was any indication of what he might expect.

* * * *

Tanya kept stealing peeks at him from
the corner of her eyes on the ride over. As he unlocked the door,
Joe noticed she did it again. Pushing the door open, curiosity got
the better of him. “What?”

She’d sidled up to him, flattening her
breasts against his back. Her arms linked through his and gave her
hands a chance to crawl over his abdomen and chest. “Hmm?” she
mumbled against his shoulder blade.

He linked one hand with hers and
shuffled them forward. “You keep peeking at me. Is there a
reason?”

Her hand dropped from his, but she
stepped around until they stood face to face. “You love me.” Not a
question. A statement of fact said with a reverent voice. “It never
occurred to me that you have feelings for me. Not until I saw what
you’d done for me. Definitely not until you said it.”

“
Well, I suppose that
reminds me.”

“
Of?”

“
Your art lessons. I’m not
done yet.”

She laughed, hugging him. “Let’s see,
we’ve done touch and taste. What’s left? Smell?”

“
Unless you have a thing
for men’s feet, we’re gonna skip that one and assume you’ve got it
down,” he said, laughing with her.

Her nose wrinkled. “Uh, yeah. Let’s
skip that one.” She chewed on her lip thoughtfully, her eyebrows
drawing together. “But really, what would be left? Sight, sound—I
suppose we could do that one—smell, touch and taste.”

“
Sound’s a good guess, but
that’s not it either.” He reached for her hand and headed toward
the bedroom. The click of her heels against the tiled floor gave
him something to balance the rate of his breathing against.
Otherwise, he’d be hyperventilating by now. The moment he pined
for, the want of two months of sexual tension was about to be
relieved. “There’s one crucial element to art that you have to
realize to create true masterpieces.”

“
You know, I don’t know how
I let you talk me into doing these so-called lessons. But after
seeing the kind of eye you have, the way you chose those sections
of my paintings to display, I have no doubt you know exactly what
you’re doing.”

He clutched his free hand over his
heart. “Oh, you wound me! You doubted that I could do
this?”

She winced. “Maybe a little. In the
beginning.”

“
Wait a minute. Stop
distracting me. You still have to figure out what’s next. I’ll even
give you a hint. It’s not really a sense. Not really. But it’s
mandatory for what you do.” They crossed the threshold and the
sight of his bed sent his heartbeat from a trot to a full-blown
gallop. He faced her, standing a breath away so that when he
located her top’s zipper in the back, dragging it down took little
effort. Her top came loose and he held his breath when the material
floated to the floor. The dark brown tips of her breasts stood
erect before him, making his mouth go dry. She reached behind her,
and the sound of a different zipper filled the air. When the little
black thing she wore followed the top, leaving her standing in
elegant heels and frilly pink panties, he thought his heart might
stop.

“
Oh my God,” he offered. A
half-assed compliment, but all he could manage. If he thought her
derailment of their conversation could distract him, he had no idea
what the sight of her near-nakedness would do. After another beat,
he said, “You called me your man earlier.”

She started to unloop his belt. “I
did.”

“
Did you mean
it?”

Her chin tilted as she raised her eyes
to look at him. “Of course. You don’t think I hop into bed with all
of my models do you?”

“
No, of course not.” He
could have high-fived the nearest person after that confession. The
ugly thought never actually raised to the forefront of his
consciousness, but damn it came close. “But Tanya,
sometimes…”

“
You said that I never saw
you for you.”

Her hands pushed back the flaps of his
shirt she’d managed to unbutton. He toed off his shoes and helped
her with the pleated khakis he wore. After she spoke, he paused,
however. “Every time you looked at me, it was as if you could only
see what you would do next for your artwork. You made me
wonder…”

His trousers dropped and Tanya lowered
herself to the ground with them. The heat of her breath traced
along his thigh as she helped him step out of the remains of his
clothing. She mumbled something incomprehensible.

“
As much as I love the
thought of you down there, I can’t hear you. What was that?” He
gripped beneath her arm and helped her to rise.

Tanya blew out a breath. “I said,
things change.”

“
When? When did things
change?” She started to speak, again so softly he wasn’t sure of
her words. “Uh unh. Talk to me.”

Tanya backed toward the bed. “This
isn’t the time for this.”

He followed. Naturally. “This is the
perfect time. I want you so badly the middle of my chest hurts with
every second I delay being inside you, but I need to hear this from
you, sweetheart.”

She gave up putting off the
inevitable. He
had
to know. “When things started heating up, I started to notice
you. Really notice you. And when you held me after the fire and you
offered me your home, a place to sleep. Without a word from me, you
cleaned up the nightmare of the aftermath.” She did this sexy
little backwards crawl onto the bed. And damn she looked so perfect
there. “But it was at the art show, the first time I saw what you
did for me, I knew…”

“
Knew what?”

“
I knew that I’d been
falling for you all this time. Sneakily. Stealthily. Truly…falling
for you.”

She didn’t profess love, not yet, but
he could live with that for now. She would get there soon enough.
So there was really only one lesson left. One he wanted her to
remember always. His blood simmered low when he asked, “So we’ve
left behind the typical five senses everyone thinks of, but there’s
one left, right?”

“
Right,” she said,
smiling.

He crawled over her, lowering his body
until they touched bare skin to bare skin. The soft curves of her
body, the ones he’d all but idolized, welcomed him. He brought his
hand to her breast, touching it not in a sexual way, but resting
his palm against the insistent thump of her heart.

“
There’s one sense that’s
left to recognize. Intuition. Use it now. Feel and know what’s
happening here.” He pressed lightly on her chest, then pointed to
his own. “And here.”

Chapter Nine

Tanya stared into his dazzling,
soulful eyes and in them found the safety, adoration and love he
wanted her to feel. His body molded so perfectly against hers,
every inch of his skin warming her through until she thought her
body generated enough heat to set fire to the bed beneath them. And
when his lips touched down against hers, his kiss was so tender, so
full of meaning, she could have drifted away from the pleasure of
it all.

Joe’s fingers feathered down her neck,
stopping to trace the choker circling it. “This is beautiful on
you,” he murmured before his mouth trailed where his touch had just
been.

Heat licked at her skin. Maybe Joe’s
fingers or maybe his tongue. But every place he touched sent more
of that molten sensation skittering over her flesh. Her thighs
trapped the hard length of his cock. The remnants of the intense
orgasm he gave her earlier never left, but remained a constant hum,
keeping her panties moist in the few hours they spent at the art
show. Now with his erection rubbing against her lips, they were
saturated with her body's moisture. When he removed the sodden
material, for certain her cream would track down her
thighs.

Joe's clever hands slid down, cupping
her breasts before thumbing stiffened nipples into points of
painful delight. By the time he dipped down to take one in his
mouth, she arched toward him, bodily begging him to relieve some of
the aching need curling through her very soul. “God, yes, please
Joe,” she moaned.

So very nice. Moist tongue. Hot
breath. Erotic pull.

He laved over her, his attention fixed
on that one spot. Electric bolts streaked out and left to release
into the atmosphere somewhere near her toes.

His other hand curled around the strip
of panties covering her hips. Fabric tightened against her as he
pulled, a desperate clawing meant to remove the thin bit of
material separating her from him. Later, she might regret the rough
attention on the expensive lingerie, but right now, she’d burn the
damned thing off herself if it helped remove her panties that much
quicker.

She writhed, rolling her hips, milking
him with her thighs, all but begging for him to finally put the
cock she craved for months, the cock that made her mouth water with
anticipation, inside of her body and quench the need threatening to
take her down permanently.

But his mouth made those wonderful
sensations and she didn’t know where to concentrate first or next.
Her mind split between swollen breasts and her saturated pussy,
between wanting more of his hands, his mouth, his cock. The need
was so great, so all-consuming.

He trailed a moist path down her
sternum, dipping into her belly button before delving further down.
He paused over the dense thatch of dark curls, inhaling deeply
enough that she felt the expansion of his chest and the
self-satisfied moan that vibrated through her skin.

“
I told you that I was
going to ruin that thing you were wearing, didn’t I?” he mumbled
against her thigh.

Yes, ruin the skirt. Ruin the bed. He
could ruin whatever he wanted so long as he didn't move from that
spot. “Yeah,” she replied breathlessly.

“
Maybe I’ll turn these into
shreds, instead.” He tightened his grip on her panties, still
covering the apex of her sex. On any other day, she might have
shrieked at the mere suggestion, but right now, she’d hand him the
scissors. Every time he spoke, his breath touched down on her heady
moisture, sending an instant reminder of just how much she
wanted—needed—him.

There was a brief spark of pain when
he tugged, but then just like that, he broke the delicate tie of
fabric, until at last, nothing separated her from her
man.

Tanya parted her thighs and Joe
brought his hands behind her knees, spreading her wide before him.
She held the position, breath held, body humming. His strangled
groan, his desperate ragged breathing sent pride soaring through
her, but when his fingers slid through the pool of moisture before
caressing the hood of her clit, she bucked and all conscious
thought fled.

There was a moment of reprieve, a
second that allowed her to catch her breath before Joe’s mouth
descended. Her hands shot out to the bunched sheets, gripping them
with fists, before the quivers started. He ravaged her pussy,
dipping and tasting, nipping and sucking until the quivers turned
into full-blown tremors. Those delicious shockwaves raced out from
her belly and exploded into her limbs until they had no place left
to go except out of her mouth in a scream of abject pleasure, of
ultimate release, that held her in its grip sure and
true.

Then he was there. Kissing her,
curling his tongue into her mouth. Sharing the taste of her body
with her. And his cock, his thick, blood-engorged cock pressed
eagerly forward, fueling the shudders still gripping her clenching
pussy. Warning bells sounded in the back of her hazy mind, but her
Joe, her man, despite the frenzy of the moment, remained always in
control.

“
Oh my God, don’t stop!”
she cried, desperate, afraid that yet again they would be
interrupted. He grinned and broke contact with her long enough to
almost throw the top drawer of his nightstand out of its tracks.
She watched his desperate hunt, a groping search for something
within and when he withdrew the small packets a moment later, a
wave of relief for the thing she couldn’t remember, but he did,
enveloped her.

He opened then unrolled the condom
quickly, covering a dribble of moisture he leaked before she could
use a finger to swipe it away. Next time she would taste him, but
right now, she needed him inside of her. Deep in her belly, the
fires burning there demanded she put them out, that she accept him
now and end this erotic torment. Before she could voice a protest,
to hurry him along to ease the pain, he was there. He kissed her
again, his once erratic breathing slowing to a crawl. And with the
same easy pace, he pushed forward, splitting her swollen nether
lips with the head of his cock. Pushing forward and kissing
her.