He was already accustomed to sleeping with Sara beside him. He enjoyed her presence, her scent, her breathing, her soft sighs, her warmth. He would miss her if she didn’t go back with him, in every part of his life. In a short amount of time, she had become a part of the fabric of every day, the voice he listened for, the person he shared his thoughts with. She was his balance, his temperance, his advocate, his champion.
Letting her stay, knowing he had to respect her decision, felt like the most difficult thing he’d ever done.
Sara rolled over and scooted in beside him, her hand sliding across his chest, her leg entwining with his. Gabriel froze, the embrace unexpected, his defenses not adequately in place. She was next to him, touching him, and it felt so damn good. His arm automatically went around her back and he wanted her nestled up against him, but it was a very dangerous place for them to wander.
“Are you okay?” he asked her, wondering if she was scared and just needed reassurance.
“I’m okay.”
Her hand stroked across the waistband of his boxer briefs, making him grit his teeth at the kick of desire that nailed him in the groin. Maybe it was an absentminded touch on her part, but it was downright painful for him. An erection was already springing to life from her leg rubbing over his, and her fingers made the problem worse as they played along his abs, flipping his waistband down then back up. She obviously had no idea what she was doing to him.
“I want you, Gabriel,” she said, and her hand went lower, cupping his erection and stroking him through his briefs.
Fuck. Gabriel sucked in a breath and closed his eyes for a second, enjoying the hot rush of pleasure, the rapid swelling of his cock beneath her fingers, before he forced himself to put his hand over hers and stop her. “Sara. Don’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because there’s nowhere to go with this. I can’t touch you. I won’t risk it.” He moved his hand away from hers now that she had stopped stroking him, and swallowed hard.
“Don’t you want to know?” she asked, propping up on her elbow to look at him, her hair falling onto his shoulder. “Don’t you want just one time between us to hold on to?”
“Of course I do.” That wasn’t the issue. “I want more than once. I want
every
night, with you beneath me. But we can’t. I won’t touch you, Sara. I won’t turn you into Jane or Molly or Rochelle.”
“Maybe I’m strong enough to be able to handle it.”
She had no idea how tempting what she was offering was. Gabriel lay as motionless as he possibly could, afraid to brush against her, afraid to inspire her hand to start up stroking again, afraid to breathe and catch a whiff of her scent, her shampoo, her femininity. “No, Sara.”
“You don’t have to touch me,” she said, a wicked smile spreading across her face. “I can do all the touching. Just one time, that’s all I’m asking for.”
And she brushed his hair off his face, her fingers trailing all the way down to the tips, her gaze following her touch. He shivered from the feel of her gentle and reverent caress as she pulled back and did it again, starting at his scalp and sliding her fingers down his overgrown hair.
“It’s so soft,” she whispered. “So beautiful.” Her gaze shifted to his lips, to his face. “You’re beautiful.”
“Men shouldn’t be beautiful.” But it was a token protest. He enjoyed that she thought he was attractive, was proud and pleased by the look of adoration on her face. She loved him and he wanted to hold that, take it inside him.
“You are beautiful. And I want you.”
“Take me.” His resistance was gone. He couldn’t deny her what they both wanted.
She pulled back slightly. “Do you mean it?”
He nodded, knowing what he had to do was damn near impossible, but unable to say no. “But I’m not going to touch any more than I have to. I want to protect you.”
Her eyes were wide, her mouth open, tongue darting out to wet her lips. “Okay. I’ll do all the work, I promise.”
It almost made him laugh, but his amusement was cut short by her hands roaming across his chest, exploring and scratching lightly, before descending down to the waistband of his briefs. Her fingers lingered there, wandering back and forth again, while her lips pressed onto his shoulder. Her mouth was warm, and she brushed her lips across his collar-bone on the right, then the left side, before sinking her teeth gently into the flesh of his shoulder. Gabriel closed his eyes and sighed. The scent of her filled his nostrils, the hot rush of her breath dancing over his flesh, the weight of her hip leaning against his, the smoothness of her leg massaging his calf.
She touched his arms, her index finger dipping into the bend of each of his elbows. Her mouth slid in alongside his cheek, perilously close to his lips, but she didn’t touch them. She brushed the stubble on his chin, traced the line of each cheekbone, ran her lips over his eyelashes, and buried her mouth and nose in his hair, her chest pressing against his, while he lay with his hands clenched at his sides, heart racing, palms sweating. Her touch was sweet and delicate and sensual, and he felt the appreciation, the wonder of her feelings for him, and he was humbled, satisfied, even as his body ached for her. It was worth the torment to have the feel of her fingers and her soft lips on him, and he watched her, the light from the hotel lamp casting shadows over her smooth skin.
Sitting up, she took her tank top off and Gabriel saw her bare breasts for the first time, her nipples taut and mere inches from his mouth. Her breasts were small and high, proportioned for her petite frame, and her blond hair spilled over her shoulders. She had slight tan marks, but it looked like it was from her tanks instead of a bathing suit, and he wanted to run his finger over the white line of her skin, but he didn’t. Nor did he encircle her waist, her back, bury his lips in her neck, when she leaned forward and pressed the warmth of her chest against his, her nipples brushing over him.
She sighed at impact, eyes momentarily fluttering shut. He groaned.
“I wish you weren’t so damn noble,” she said. “I wish you were cruel and heartless and were perfectly willing to risk my becoming enslaved . . . I wish you would touch me everywhere, with your fingers, your lips, your tongue.”
“No, you don’t,” he said. “You don’t really mean that.”
Sara peeled down his briefs, on her knees in front of him, and she glanced up at him over the length of his erection. “Right at this moment, yes, I absolutely do. I want you to be a total bastard and fuck me.”
Damn it. The vehemence of her words sent a burst of hot air from her lips straight onto his cock, and he gritted his teeth, dug his fingernails into his palms, released air slowly through his nostrils, fighting for control.
“But I would regret it long-term, I know that. You’re right.” Her hand closed around the head of his erection briefly before she pulled it away. “And I wouldn’t love you if you were a total bastard. Which I do.” She licked her fingers thoroughly, then returned to him, stroking lightly up and down, her saliva creating a smooth, slick motion. “I completely and utterly love you.”
“I love you, too. It’s the only thing keeping me in control.” He kicked his briefs off to have a distraction from what she was doing, and to feel the freedom of being totally naked with her.
Her hands ran over his thighs, nails lightly scraping, while she bent over and took him into her mouth. Gabriel let one moan escape at the unexpected rush of ecstasy before he squeezed his lips and eyes shut. There was numbness in his hands from the pressure of the fists he was making, and his abs, thighs, biceps were all clenched tight as he fought for control, her wet, warm mouth over him, sucking slowly and languorously. Fingers tickled his testicles and he clung to his control, concentrating on enjoying her attention, even as he was painfully conscious of what he couldn’t offer her in return.
When her tongue flicked across the tip of his shaft, he managed to say, “Sara. That’s enough.” He couldn’t take any more. It had been so long since he’d felt the touch of a woman, the slick warm sensation of a woman’s mouth sliding over him again and again. The last time he had been with a woman he’d been drunk, like all the times before that, and now he was seventy-five years sober. Everything was also heightened with Sara, sharper, more intense, because of his feelings, his love for her.
It made a difference and he didn’t want to stroll too close to the edge too soon.
Sara sat up, her eyes bright with desire, lips shiny and wet, and she pushed her panties down over her hips and legs and dropped them onto the bed. For a second, she rested there, her hands on her ankles, her knees raised in the air, her back arching forward, hair spilling over her shoulders and chest as she looked at him, wide blue eyes unblinking, filled with love for him. Her body was gorgeous, delicate and feminine, soft curves and smooth skin, a lovely façade for an even lovelier woman. The display of her backside against the bed and her breasts resting against her knees was tantalizing, delectable, and his mouth watered, his fingers twitched, his body ached to touch, to taste, to take.
Gabriel wanted to say something, was struggling for the words to describe how beautiful she was to him, when she turned and straddled him, a knee on either side of him, her warm inner thighs pressing down on his erection, and he lost his entire train of thought. Her hands touched the bed, to the right and left of his head, and he was covered by her, surrounded, the tips of her breasts brushing his chest, and he reached back in desperation, grabbing the headboard and gripping it hard to resist the urge to touch. Not that he thought they weren’t at risk for her to become addicted to him anyway, given what she was doing, but he had to try, had to stop himself from contributing.
She was rubbing herself lightly over his cock, and her body was moist from want already, so that when she poised herself over him, he knew she would slide down easily. His mouth was hot from desire, his entire body clenched tightly, coiled in anticipation, more than ready for her.
Sara said, “Oh, I do love you,” then spread her thighs and pushed, sending her body down over his in a hot, wet collision.
Gabriel closed his eyes and let the moan escape, let himself release the vocal burst of pleasure, and then just lay still in the moment of throbbing, intense ecstasy. He was inside her, and he never wanted to be anywhere else.
Sara’s instinct was to close her eyes when she positioned herself over Gabriel and went down on him, her body giving, opening for him, everything hot and tight and sensitive as he filled her, but she wanted to see him. Forcing her eyes to stay open, she watched Gabriel lie still beneath her, his hands clenching the headboard of the hotel bed, knuckles white, his shoulders tense, dewy sweat sheen all over his skin, the hair at his temples damp with perspiration from his efforts to stay in control. She could feel him throbbing inside her, feel the strength and desire in him, knew he wanted to move his hips and thrust into her again and again. But he didn’t. He stayed still and let her be in control, let her own the moment, and she took it slow, savoring the ripples of pleasure that each movement tripped off in her. Goose bumps rose on her skin as she gripped the bedsheet and rocked her hips, moving herself up and down on the length of him.
It was everything she had expected and more. She had never been the one completely in control, had never taken with such single-mindedness, never loved a man with the entirety of her body, heart, mind, soul, the way she did Gabriel. Normally she liked to ride a man sitting straight up, but she wanted more of a connection with Gabriel, wanted her skin on his, wanted her breath intermingling with his, so she leaned forward, let their chests collide. She dropped her head by his chin and panted, the sensations acute and overwhelming and amazing. She loved the way her hair covered his, the blond and brown strands tangling together in a messy heap. Letting go of the sheet, she gripped a fistful of his hair instead, holding on as she moved faster, hips thrusting desperately as the tightness built inside her and the hard, slick slam of him into her body had her teeth tearing into her bottom lip.
It was good, so damn good, and she ground onto him, as her panting turned to moaning, which accelerated to yelling as she drowned in sensations, frantic and desperate, loving every second, but wanting more, harder. Then she paused, knew she was going over the edge, and gave one last thrust of her hips down onto him, and came with a soundless shudder.
Sara snapped her head back and rode out the waves of pleasure as she looked down at Gabriel. Something about the look on his face, the love she saw, the desperate clawing for control, the edgy darkness in his eyes, made her instinctively pull almost all the way off of him, then push down, as far as she could, and she saw and felt his own orgasm trigger. Together, it went on, and she gripped his hair and fought for breath, relaxing onto his shoulder.
They lay there, panting, her legs around him, bodies intimately connected, skin hot and flushed, her heart pounding, mind blissfully blank.
“You have no idea what you do to me,” he said, his voice low and rough, his words punctuated by his heavy breathing.
Sara couldn’t move, limp and satiated on his chest. “Oh, actually, I have a pretty good idea.”
Gabriel knew that she wasn’t going back to New Orleans with him. He felt it in the way she clung to him, the softness of her eyes, the anxiety that slowly crawled up and overtook her languid post-sex contentment.
When she said, “I don’t know how to say this . . . ,” Gabriel put his finger on her lip.
“You don’t have to say anything. I know.”
“Know what?” She had pulled off of him and slid in alongside him on the bed, her arm across his chest as she stroked his skin lightly.
“That you have to stay. I can feel your thoughts.”
“Feel my thoughts?”
“Yes, it’s kind of like an aura. I understand why you need time to think. It’s okay. I don’t want you to do anything impulsively or that you aren’t comfortable with. Take all the time you need to think about us.” He wanted to kiss her, but didn’t dare. “I know I’m asking a lot of you.”