Pleasure licked up his nerve endings like teasing tongues of flame. The drumbeat of his heart deepened to a heavy, pounding throb.
He gripped her hand with his fist and squeezed, dragging her hand up and down the shaft to show her the pressure he liked, the speed. Then he let go, let her have at him with those slippery fingers, any way she wanted. Didn’t matter what she did. It was all good.
Every stroke, even the nervous, tentative ones, turned him on. When she cupped his balls in her hand, he realized that he was in trouble. He was going to blow his wad, right here in the shower.
Unacceptable. He hadn’t had that problem even as a teenager.
He met her questioning glance when he clamped his hands over hers, stopping the tender strokes. “I don’t want to come yet,” he explained brusquely. He grabbed the first towel he saw, muscled her out of the shower and started rubbing her down.
She stood there, vaguely bewildered as he dragged terry cloth over her body. That hot perfumed smell of her rosy, curvy body made his mouth water. Literally. He dropped down to his knees on the soggy bathroom rug and combed his fingers through her muff, parting the dark, wet ringlets to get down to the tender stuff—
She stiffened, stumbled back against the sink. Put her hand to his face to hold him away. “No.”
He froze. “What? You don’t like it?”
She looked distressed. “I’m sure that I’d like it fine if you did it,” she said, her voice small.
“What happened?” he rapped out. “Say it.”
She flinched. “Zhoglo hurt me. There. With his fingernail. While I was serving the fruit. It’s no big deal, but—”
She squeaked as he rose up and hoisted her up onto the sink. “Let me see,” he growled. A haze of fury made him almost dizzy.
“Oh, no.” She tried to wiggle down. “Forget it.”
“Shut up and let me see.” He shoved her legs apart.
The makeup light over the mirror wasn’t enough, so he flipped on the switch by the door. Becca winced and covered her eyes as the steamy little room was flooded with harsh fluorescent light.
He parted her labia, pulled the hood back to look at her clit. Sure enough, an angy red line sliced right across that button of flesh. The bastard hadn’t broken the skin, but still. Fucking ouch. His balls clenched in sympathy as he looked at it.
It made him so angry, he wanted to put his fist through a wall. Not Becca’s wall, though. That was all she needed tonight. A little property damage, to finish off her very special weekend.
He cupped his hand over her pussy and dropped a kiss on the baby-smooth skin of her groin. “That goes right to the top of the list of reasons why I need to kill that sadistic piece of shit,” he said.
“Really, it’s OK,” she hastened to soothe him. “It’s not any—”
“Shut up with the ‘it’s OK’ bullshit,” he snarled. “It’s not OK. It sucks. Face up to it.”
She shoved his hand away from her crotch. “Don’t tell me to shut up.” Her tone was crystal sharp. “I’m tired of it. Don’t do it. Ever again.”
He stepped back, chastened. Suddenly aware of the water dripping down from his hair, puddling around his feet. His dick bobbed and swung. Ever hopeful, no matter the circumstances.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m just angry. At him. Not you.”
She gazed at him, eyes narrowed, chin tilted up. Slowly, some of the haughty starch eased out of her graceful posture. Her tits jiggled tenderly as she slid down off the sink and onto her feet.
“Well,” she murmured. “Thanks for the sentiment. I suppose.”
He took hold of his self-control with both fists, and forced the words out, hoping desperately that she wouldn’t take him up on it.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said heavily.
“Do what? You mean…”
“Me. You don’t have to do me.” The words hurt his throat. “It’s a bad time. I know that. I don’t want to hurt you. I’ll leave. If you want.”
She didn’t speak. He didn’t dare look at her. He held his breath. Forty or so agonizing seconds went by. He ventured a cautious glance.
Her expression was soft. Hope soared. His cock twitched and throbbed, hoisting itself impossibly higher. Ready to rock and roll. Maybe trying to be halfway decent had actually paid off for once.
That was so seldom the case. In his experience.
“I don’t want you to leave,” she whispered. “Please stay.”
Relief made him dizzy. “If I stay, we’re having sex,” he warned.
Her face was hot, eyes averted, but she nodded.
He was getting on with it. Quick, before she changed her mind.
Dawn hadn’t lightened the windows in the bedroom. Nick followed her in, padding like a big, silent panther behind her.
He went from window to window, jerking the curtains closed. He peered at the window fastenings, the warped wood, the peeling paint, the thin, uneven glass. “This place is a security nightmare,” he growled.
She had nothing to say to that. She’d never given it a thought before. Now she would probably obsess about it all the time.
Nick scowled at her antique bed: the carved bedposts, the fluffy comforter, the puffy bolsters, a heap of larger pillows, smaller pillows on top, lace and satin and embroidered pillows for accents. “Sweet Jesus, what’s with the pillows? There must be twenty of them!”
“Don’t ask,” she said primly. “It’s a girl thing.”
He swept his arm across the bed, tumbling them all to the floor with one ruthless swipe. He peeled back the comforter and top sheet, tossed them over the wooden footboard, leaving a snowy field of unbroken white. A blank canvas, waiting to be filled.
He nodded toward the bed.
She clambered on, feeling foolish and shy. There was something so businesslike and deliberate about how he just got right down to it. She couldn’t see his face all that well. She hoped desperately that the semidarkness would help her ease her well-documented sexual hangups. Though with her luck, they would probably come crowding back into her bed, now that she was back in the real world.
The bed creaked under his unaccustomed weight. He pressed her down onto her back. She shivered against the chilly sheet, but then he climbed on top of her—and oh, he was so big, so heavy, and all over her. Steely hard and so hot, smelling of soap, and beneath it, the tang of male musk. His feverish heat, his concentrated intensity, left her breathless. Water dripped from his hair. He pinned her down as if he were afraid she would wiggle away.
Like she had a chance in hell.
Then he started kissing her. Doubts, fears, sexual hangups, it all melted away into a creamy swirl of excitement. A clutch of hunger.
His lips were warm and coaxing at first, but the kiss changed, became demanding, compelling, using a silent, wordless language she hadn’t known she understood until she found herself obeying every unspoken command. She opened to his seeking mouth. She touched his tongue with hers, and the contact set off a sweet shimmer of heat, making her nipples tingle and ache, her back arch, bringing forth a liquid rush between her legs. Her thighs fell open. Her breasts felt taut, swollen and sensitive where they rubbed his chest.
He lifted his face from hers, smoothing her hair back. It took her a minute to recognize the dry, jerky sound coming from him as laughter.
“I’m nervous,” he admitted.
That racked her overstimulated, jittery body with a burst of giggles. “You? Oh, come on! Give me a break.”
“Really. I swear. I can’t touch your clit, so I’m out of my comfort zone. I like to start with a girl’s clit. It’s like the key to the castle.”
It was a needle jab of annoyance, to hear about his sexual routines with other women. Mr. Sensitivity.
She shoved at his chest. “Great,” she snapped. “I’m glad that you have to do something different from your usual sexual routine. Maybe it’ll set me apart from the teeming masses just enough so you won’t be shouting other women’s names. One can only hope.”
His body vibrated with laughter. “No worries, babe,” he said, settling his weight between her legs. “You’re in a class all your own.”
She struggled for breath. “Key to the castle, my foot,” she scoffed. “It’s not like you have to convince me. The castle door is unlocked. In fact, it’s wide open. And the drawbridge is down.”
He went very still, staring intently down into her face, as if he could see right into her. He cupped her face. “Maybe you don’t understand what I’m getting at,” he said. “I don’t just want to fuck you. I want to make you come until you scream and fly to pieces. White-hot, high decibel, end of the world orgasms. You get me?”
She stared up into the shadows that hid his eyes, openmouthed.
“Like this afternoon,” he went on. “On the island. Remember?”
Like she was ever going to forget it, in this lifetime or the next. She forced out a nervous cough, as the heated memory played in her head. Of how helpless, how terrified she had been. How unspeakably vulnerable. “Ah, yes,” she whispered. “I, um, do remember that.”
“I liked that,” he said lazily. “That was special.”
“Oh,” she said inanely. “Uh…yes. It was.”
He kissed her till she was gasping for air, and lifted his head again. “I’ve never felt anything like that,” he went on, nuzzling her temple, his hot breath tickling and caressing. “Didn’t even know that kind of thing was possible, to tell you the truth. But now I’m hooked on it. It raised the bar for me. I won’t ever be satisfied with less.”
Oh, man. She was so in for it. Tension gripped her. “Well, you should know. That was kind of an aberration for me,” she confessed.
“Yeah?” He sounded like he was smiling. “We’ll see about that.”
“That was not a challenge,” she added. “Just a statement of fact.”
“We’ll see,” he repeated stubbornly.
She felt obscurely alarmed, as if she’d presented herself to him under false pretenses. God forbid he find out how sexually blocked she really was. “I mean, the circumstances were extreme,” she hurried on.
He was laughing at her now. “That’s cool. I can do extreme.”
She swatted at him. “Stop it! You’re playing dumb on purpose!”
He caught her hand in his, turned it, pressed a lingering kiss to the damp palm. “Calm down, babe,” he said softly. “I don’t think it’s your job to worry about it. I think you should leave that all to me.”
He just didn’t get it, the arrogant…argh. “But I—”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to get you off. Got a problem with that?”
She opened her mouth, trying to think of some response that didn’t sound hysterical or crazy. Problem? Hah. Problem was putting it mildly. Her problem was how fragile she felt, and how charismatic he was, the way he tore down her barriers as if they were tissue paper.
But what was she supposed to say? Gee, do you think you could just, you know, turn me on just a little bit less? Right. Sure.
She swallowed over the bumpy quiver in her throat, and shook her head. Officially, for the record, she had no problem with that.
“I can’t scream, though,” she informed him primly. “So put it out of your head. My landlady’s bedroom is right below this one. She’d probably call the police. She’s elderly. And very religious.”
“Great. That gives me a benchmark. When the cops are hauling me away in cuffs, that’s when I know I did good.”
He scooped her up, lifting and tugging until she was on her knees facing him, straddling his crossed legs. He propped his cock up so it stuck straight up between them. He gripped her waist and lifted her higher, nuzzling her breasts. “Tits are a nice way to start,” he observed. “I’ve barely had a chance to look at these properly, what with one thing and another.” He cupped one in his hand, drew the sensitive tip into his mouth and lashed his tongue around it. “Your tits are amazing.”
The blunt compliment made her tingle and go gooey and soft. So did the delicious swirl of wet warmth from his hot mouth. “Ah, thanks,” she murmured. “So’s, ah, that. Whatever you’re doing to them.”
The low vibration of laughter reverberated through his body, and then he buried his face between them. Wallowing, licking, lapping. Worshipping them.
Her breasts had never been particularly sensitive before, at least not that she’d noticed. She’d figured they weren’t one of her erogenous zones. Wrong. They were the center of her universe, glowing points of light, of heat. His passionate caresses made her whole chest melt from the inside, shivering and soft, intensely alive. Shining.
His slightest touch sent sparkles up her nerves. She twisted, started, with electric jerks and shudders as he slowly unraveled her, begging with his mouth for something she could not grasp.
Surrender. Trust. That was what he wanted, what he silently demanded. Her resistance made her shudder, brought a gush of tears to her eyes. She dug her fingers into his hair and reminded herself exactly why his technique was so slick, his sensuality so fiercely focused. It was to prepare her to be physically capable of taking that ridiculously large thing of his into her body. There was nothing particularly personal about it. He was just being practical.
The thought made her angry. Which wasn’t really fair. After all, it was to his credit that he took his time, tried to please.