Crush on You (26 page)

Yet he was already drawing down her panties!

But maybe that’s what adults got to do as well . . . it wasn’t a man thing, but an adult thing, that compartmentalizing. Sensation out in the open and in-the-moment. Emotions separate and locked safely away.

“Oh, God,” she whispered as he tossed her underwear over his shoulder.

Moving lower, Penn pushed her hemline higher. Then he eased between her legs and wrapped her calves with his warm palms to push up her knees.

His gaze fixed on her . . .
there
. . . his thumbs slid up and down her cleft, opening her, exposing her. Who knew she could be even more bare?

Heat rushed up her neck and flooded her face. “Penn. No one’s ever . . . I . . . This is so . . .”

His gaze flicked to her face and she thought he knew what she meant. “Intimate?”

She bobbed a little nod, even as he continued stroking her in that confident, carnal manner. “We, uh, I, well, it was mostly kind of furtive,” she said, her face burning again, as she considered how gauche she must seem to him. Before Penn, her only experiences had been as one of two rookies groping in the backseat or under a blanket.

“Most teenage boys suck at sex,” Penn replied.

She relaxed, thinking he understood that this was moving too fast, too intimately for her. Her legs tried drawing together, but then he was lowered between them, his shoulders keeping her knees parted.

“Adult males on the other hand,” he added, his smile wicked, “we just suck.”

And then he did that! Right there!

Alessandra’s eyes rolled back in her head. It was a good thing she’d stuffed her feelings in that secure compartment, else she might feel mortified about now.

Instead, she was electrified.

His mouth eased up, and his tongue lapped at her, teasing little licks that made her hips lift in entreaty.

He laughed. “You taste good,” he said, and then ran a finger down her pulsing skin to slide inside her. He pulled free to paint her own wetness over her bottom lip. “See?”

Her tongue reached for his finger and she tasted the creaminess of her own body. Another burn washed over her skin, and beneath her bra her nipples furled tighter, the lace of her bra rasping against the sensitive flesh. She wanted to be naked.

Only, oh wow, how arousing it was to be mostly dressed, and with a half-naked Penn Bennett between her thighs. She felt the silky ends of his hair caress the skin at the inside of her hipbones and then he was kissing her there, too, sucking again, little stinging kisses that made her jerk and shudder. It hurt, it didn’t. She wanted him to stop. She wanted him never to stop.

“Penn,” she whispered, closing her eyes.

“A little louder, honey,” he said.

But she’d given him so much already. Given him more of herself—like this, anyway—than she’d given anyone. To hang on to what little power she had in this circumstance—where he had all the moves and she had only the helpless reactions—then she was going to have to keep them as subdued as she could.

Just another security measure.

She opened her eyes to catch him watching her face. There was knowledge in his expression, another example of his expertise, and she could tell he thought he could break her. Make her beg, plead, show her passion with her voice. Be shattered by an orgasm.

His fingertip circled her clitoris. She caught her breath, caught the moan that wanted to break free, and hung on to her senses, even as he tried to make her release them with his mouth, his fingers, his intimate kisses that had her throbbing, pulsing, tingling. Everywhere.

She almost lost the game when he lifted his head, his beautiful mouth wet. His thumb rolled along the edge of his bottom lip and then he licked the moisture off it, as if to savor more of her taste. Her belly clenched. A moan welled in her throat.

Still watching her, he ran his tongue over his two longest fingers and slid them inside her body. Still silent, she bowed up and clenched hard on the delicious intrusion. Penn groaned.

“You’re killing me, baby,” he said.

She was the one dying. Any minute now he was going to break her self-imposed chains and then he’d know . . . he’d know . . .

There was nothing to know! She was an adult. This was sensual, sexual, not emotional and even the rookie could win the contest sometimes.

His fingers moved out, pushed in. She tried breathing with the rhythm, letting the pleasure roll over her in controlled waves. He slid deep, held, then drew his fingers out again, curling them to touch her in a new spot. An expert touch, one that had the climax waiting to pounce curling tighter and tighter, even as her restraint was raveling.

He was watching again . . . waiting to pounce, too, the minute her passion overtook her. When she gave voice to it, he’d win.

He couldn’t win. Alessandra reached for her neckline. She yanked on her dress, the skinny straps sliding down her arms so she could pull the bodice and strapless bra beneath her breasts. The bunched material plumped them high, her hard nipples standing hard. Penn froze.

She didn’t. Hoping he couldn’t see her that her fingers were trembling, she ran them over her hot skin, then cupped her palms around her flesh and thumbed her nipples. Under Penn’s fascinated stare, she pinched them as he had that night in her bedroom. The sensation arrowed down her body and she clenched tighter on Penn’s fingers.

“Oh, no, you don’t.” He shook his head, as if shaking himself awake. His fingers glided free of her and then he crawled up her body, pushing her hands away so that he could cup her breasts in his own.

She bit her lip. It was so much better to feel his workingman’s rough skin against her. He plumped them in his palms, then brought them closer together, to lick the top of one nipple and then the other. She writhed against the sleeping bag, and he threw a leg on top of her. The side of his jean-clad knee pressed against her mound, giving her a delicious weight to wiggle against.

Penn tightened his hands on her breasts, the touch firm as he brought both of them closer together. His shaggy hair tickled her flesh and she slid her fingers through it. He groaned, his knee pushing harder against her, just as he pushed her nipples closer toward her center and took both in his mouth. Sucked.

Her fingers bit into his scalp and every muscle in her body stiffened. Her hips pushed up, fighting the weight of his leg. He didn’t release it.

Or release her. Instead, his hands grew more insistent, cupping her harder even as the suction on her nipples increased. She felt the edge of his teeth at the base of the hard nubs and her breath held in her chest.

Her legs widened, his knee slid against her center and he pushed there, firm. The gentle bite on the base of her nipples sharpened, and then his tongue rubbed over their tips.

Her hips rose, her bare folds brushed the rough-soft denim, and she pushed against the steady pressure of his leg and . . .

Came.

Surprise stole her voice, her breath, her thoughts. She rode through the waves of bliss in spontaneous silence, not trying to win a contest, just trying to survive the sweet agony of it.

From far away she heard Penn curse. Then he was naked, over her, in her, his erection stretching her contracting inner muscles and giving her another wave of pleasure as they found something to wrap tight.

“Alessandra. Good. God, so good.” Penn was chanting as he drove inside the clasp of her body. She tilted her hips, and he rubbed against that special inner spot on every thrust. She was still quivering around him when he climaxed, again groaning her name.

He collapsed half-on, half-off her body, his cheek against her fanned hair. Pinning her, she thought with a smile.

Penning her in.
Ha. Funny me.

She opened her mouth to share with him the pun, then the thought froze in her brain.

No, no. He hadn’t penned her. Not at all. After too many years, the Nun of Napa’s
passion
was free.
Emotions
were caught, but stored safely away from him.

Alessandra was safe, wasn’t she?

Her pulse was pounding with anxiety as her lover drew up on one elbow. He stared down at her, his gaze benign, then his eyes narrowed and his head tilted, as if he could read her apprehension on her face.

She swallowed, her vulnerability bringing her to the edge of tears.

Penn’s expression cleared. Grinning, he tweaked her nose between his thumb and forefinger. His smile turned more wicked as he raised his gaze skyward. “I’m blessed, for I have sinned with the best damned fuck in the universe.”

Oh, the rat. She shoved him off her, pretending to be mad as her pulse stuttered, steadied.
The best damned fuck in the universe.
Wouldn’t you know that Penn Bennett would be intuitive enough, and yes, raunchy enough, to say the right thing in the right moment.

A woman with a real heart might fall in love with him for that.

Penn shut himself inside the Tanti Baci cottage, testing the double-entry doors he’d just hung at the entrance. The place was reasonably protected now—and a security company would complete the job later in the week. No more nights on the floor in the bridal boudoir, though he was thinking of putting up a brass plaque to honor what he and Alessandra had accomplished there two nights before.

No ghosts had appeared, but he sure as hell had seen stars.

Was there a more frustrating and more fabulous fuck than Alessandra Baci, the Nun of Napa? She pretended to hate the four-letter word he’d used for her, but he’d seen that gleam in her eyes. All the good girls liked to get dirty now and then, even though she continued to stifle her responses. But a lady who hadn’t been laid since her teens was a special case.

A case he had a sudden hankering to attend to again, right this instant. While he’d spent another night in the cottage, last evening he’d been all alone. An affair to his mind didn’t add up to two nights and one interlude in her office. Maybe he needed to explain that to her—all while he was kissing her until she was warm and wet and needy.

A little desperate himself, he yanked open the new door to go after her—and found himself face-to-face with Roger. Crap.

“Hey, Penn,” his friend said, a big ol’ grin stretching his thin face.

The big ol’ grin made it clear that Roger was seeing a few stars himself, meaning Penn had to make a decision. He’d been able to avoid it for the past couple of days. With the cottage in disarray, the
Wedding Fever
producer and Lana had taken off to a bed-and-breakfast in Sonoma County, giving Penn a reprieve. But if they were back—so was his dilemma.

Did he tell Roger that the woman who spread that wide smile over his face was likely to rob him blind?

“Everything all right?” Roger asked, stepping into the cottage.

“Yeah.”

“The place looks great.” He ran his hand over the back of one of the handmade Craftsman-styled benches that Alessandra had ordered and that had been delivered the day before. Their honey finish was just a shade lighter than the gleaming hardwood floor recently refinished.

“Yeah,” Penn said again, rubbing the back of his neck with his palm. “Did you, uh, have a good couple of days?”

“Lana loved a boutique she found in Healdsburg.”

“I’m sure she did.” Especially since it was most likely Penn’s money she was spending at the place. He hadn’t sicced the cops on Lana Lang because it had been so damn embarrassing just to think of how trusting he’d been that he couldn’t imagine actually telling the police that he’d been duped. What if word of that had gotten around L.A.? He’d called himself a fool and accepted his losses as the price of a lesson well learned, never considering she’d move on to someone else—especially someone he knew.

Shit. Fooled again.

Blowing out a long breath, he shut the door to the cottage, giving him and Roger privacy. “Listen, I’ve got something important—”

The door popped open. In platform shoes and a bustier that looked more like club-wear than wine country-wear, Lana entered. “Honey,” she said, her gaze lasering on Roger. “You got away from me.”

She swished past Penn to reach the other man’s side. Her hand found the crook of his arm and her mouth met the corner of Roger’s. At the kiss’s end, a faint smudge of her red lipstick remained, looking like she’d clipped the poor guy on the jaw.

The blow Penn had to deliver was going to be the one that really hurt. But hell, he couldn’t keep quiet, even if he had to do this in front of Lana herself. Steeling his spine, he shut the door once more, then turned toward the couple. “Roger—”

Click.
That damn door, open again. With a growl of frustration, he spun around. There stood Alessandra, framed in the doorway, and he felt like
he’d
taken an uppercut.

He didn’t know what it was . . . the soft morning light surrounding her or maybe it was her looks in comparison to Lana’s. The slender blonde was a beauty, but the brunette in front of him was apricots and plums and the juiciest of peaches. Dressed in an orangey-gold cotton dress that halter-tied around her neck, fitted close at her waist, then billowed past her knees, she looked like summer. Behind her, the vineyard showed a bountiful green, but nothing could look more lush or beautiful than Alessandra herself.