Forgotten Father (2 page)

She turned, looking up at him with the hint of a
roguish smile. “No.”

“Neither am I,” he said roughly, pulling her into
his arms. Her gaze met his and in that long moment, he saw both
heat and welcome. Bending forward, he claimed her mouth with his
own.

Delanie felt the brush of his lips, the warmth of
his breath against her face…and tumbled head first into heaven. For
a man all angles and planes, he had the most mobile mouth, soft
almost, molding and sliding over hers, nibbling and sampling as if
she tasted of nectar.

He felt heated and hungry, needing and wanting, all
at once. Never before had she been kissed. Not really. Not till
this moment with his mouth on hers.

Lifting her face to his, she gave herself over to a
kiss that drew her in, drew her closer and sent her over the edge.
The strength and power in his hands left her trembling as he cupped
her face for his feasting. Longing and urgency swept through her
with the force of a wild fire.

Had she ever known such a perfect mating of mouths?
Ever before lost her sanity in just one kiss?

Clinging to his broad shoulders as he angled her
face for the onslaught of his kiss, she felt
awakened
,
yanked suddenly from her normal daily world into a brighter,
hotter, better place. Had Sleeping Beauty felt this searing,
coursing sense of life singing in her veins when the Prince at last
roused her?

A raucous burst of laughter sounded behind him,
startling Delanie out of the heated moment between them.

Mitchell dropped his hands at her jump and watched
with burning eyes as she leaned back against the veranda railing,
staring up at him in shock. It was as if the air around them were
heated, the buzzy little molecules slamming into each other and
leaving goose flesh along her arms.

The ragged sound of his breathing echoed her own and
Delanie knew she’d never find this again.

She’d kissed her share of frogs before, certainly
enough to know when she was staring Prince Charming in the face.
Nothing had ever felt this right.

He brought his hand up, stroking her upper arm, the
glow in his eyes almost unbearable as she looked at him.

“What’s your name?” he asked, his voice almost
inaudible.

Knowing they had a lifetime of mundane moments
ahead, Delanie ached to cling to this breathless, magic aura, this
unspoken connection of souls.

Unwilling to leave the magic, she shook her head,
reaching up to slide her hand along his neck and draw him back to
her kiss.

“Just…take me,” she begged.

******

Shutting the door to his room and hearing the locks
click home, Mitchell turned into the darkened room and gathered his
woman into his arms. With her erotic invitation searing a pathway
to his brain at lightening speed, he’d kissed her hard and brought
her to his room.

No words spoken. No names.

If that was the way she wanted it, he’d go along and
rejoice in his good fortune. What functionally intelligent single
man wouldn’t do the same with a woman like this?

Drawing her tight against him as they stood in the
darkened suite, Mitchell savored the feel of her against his body.
Through his evening clothes and her skimpy little dress, he felt
the imprint of her body, the softness of her breasts, the firmness
of her thighs. Pulling her in, he bent his head and met her open
mouth. Lips and tongues, breath mingling harsh in their
throats.

He let his hands roam over her back, from the
tapered curve of her waist to the delicate bones of her shoulders,
he kissed her while his hands mapped out new, breathtaking
territory. Meeting his kiss with a hunger as hot as his own, she
clung to his lapels and pressed herself to him.

No awkward wooing here, no hesitant pauses. Just
lust and longing like he’d never before known.

Taking her sweet warm tongue into his mouth, he
swept his hands lower, down over the flare of her hips, down to the
curve of her bottom. Cupping her, Mitchell lifted and raised her
straining body against his arousal.

A wild mating sound broke loose in her and he lifted
her, carrying his prize into the bedroom where a king-sized
four-poster waited. A faint light shone from the shuttered window,
casting moonlight through crevices.

Sitting her down on the bed, Mitchell stepped back,
tearing off his dinner jacket and yanking at the tie around his
neck. In seconds, he was bared to the waist, shirt studs
pinging
as they scattered.

She waited for him on the bed, sitting there in the
faint light, her copper hair mussed, her eyes wide. With a hint of
innocence in the movement, she slowly nudged off one heel and then
the other, before dropping them on the floor beside the bed.

Something about the way she did it slowed Mitchell
down, gentling the blood thundering in his head. Instead of
throwing her back on the bed and entering her without pause like a
conquering warrior, he went and sat next to her.

Cradling his palm against her smooth, ivory cheek,
he drew her mouth to his and kissed her slowly. She tasted of
surprise and sunshine, of stark, straight-forward sex. Nothing
practiced, nothing too skilled, but sweet, soul-stopping
copulation. Mitchell burned. Just kissing her, holding her against
his body as they lie back on the bed, made his skin tighten, made
every sense riot for her.

She nestled in his arms, one hand clinging to his
bare shoulder, the other pinned tight against his stomach. Small
against him, pale against his darkness, soft next to his hardness.
Every part of him felt hard, taut with arousal, consumed in a
moment without any thought, but kissing her, possessing her.

Making her his.

Mitchell lifted his head, stroking his hand along
her cheek and down the pale column of her neck. Bending to her
again, he kissed and nibbled at her mouth, the trailing of his hand
exploring the hollow of her shoulder, the firm skin of her
arms.

Consumed in her, his brain shutting down, he
registered the faintest scent of some perfume in the curve of her
neck, a tickling, haunting floral hint mingled with the sweetness
of her skin. Burying his face there, intoxicated in the taste and
scent of her, lost in the sweet cream of her skin beneath his
tongue, he slowly became aware of her hand at the nape of his
neck.

Her head thrown back on the pillow of his arm as he
damply traced the path of her throat, she held him to her. Her hand
threaded through the hair at the back of his head, she cradled him
closer. Urged him nearer.

A sudden shaft of unnamable emotion bolted to him.
She seemed untried in the tender way she held him, pure and eager
in his arms, as if she’d been waiting just for him. Untouched.

For one jarring moment, Mitchell wondered if she’d
been with a man before.
God, he hoped so.
Being a woman’s
first carried too many implications, too much responsibility.

As self-absorbed as it might be, he didn’t want to
worry about her emotional expectations just now, didn’t want to
think about having to extricate himself from an entanglement
afterwards. Any woman who was beautiful as her could only have
avoided sex because she was holding out for the price of a wedding
band.

His presence at this party would be enough to
convince most women of his ability to support them in the style to
which they’d like to become accustomed.

Stilled by his jarring thoughts, he paused, poised
over her sexy, still-clothed body in the faint light.

But in that instant, he felt the stroke of her hand,
sliding over his bare shoulder, gliding down over his arm before
tracing a delicate, searing path down his chest. Her lips moved at
his jaw, her breath warm against his ear. She kissed him, gently
biting at the skin below his ear, as her hand traced lower and
lower.

In a flash, blood thundered against his ear drums,
rocketing through his veins. There was nothing virginal in the path
her hand took, nothing untutored in the deft way she opened his
trousers.

Pushing her back on the bed, Mitchell plundered her
lips, dragging at the knit dress covering her body. Greedily, he
stripped the garment off her, enflamed by her answering hunger and
the eager way she tugged at his clothing. Beneath the inky dress,
she wore only two scraps of lace. Slipping the straps of her bra
down, he cupped her breasts, stroking her delicious flesh before
reaching around to loosen the clasp. Within moments, he divested
her of her lingerie as she drew off the last of his clothing.

Tumbling back against the bed, both naked, they
grappled, locked in an erotic embrace, their bodies rubbing,
pressing against each other. To his shocked pleasure, she touched
him everywhere, as voracious for him as he was for her. Accustomed
to more sedate and conservative bed partners, Mitchell reveled in
her, reveled in the heady consciousness of having enflamed a
passionate, desirable woman to want him equally as bad as he wanted
her.

She tasted sweet, everywhere. Kissing her kernelled
nipples, he stroked the soft, smoothness of her tummy, the downy
delta between her thighs. Intoxicated in their coupling, he lost
consciousness of anything but the woman under his hands, the vixen
who knelt over him, kissing and biting her way south until he
couldn’t bear anymore and pushed her back against the bed.

In the faint light from the window, her skin looked
luminous as a pearl, pale and flawless, dark only at the crests of
her nipples and the surprising auburn thatch between her legs. She
was a true redhead, it seemed, a woman honest at least in her hair
color.

Honest too in her hunger for him, he thought with
intense satisfaction.

Mitchell knelt between her legs, every nerve
screaming for completion. Not completely lost to sanity, however,
he made himself pause long enough to get a condom from the dresser
drawer.

Then, returning to her, he knelt between her legs
and sheathed himself.

******

Lying naked, splayed on Mitchell’s bed, Delanie
watched him put on the condom, her heart threatening to bruise
itself against her breast bone. This was it, the moment she’d
dreamed of, making love with the man who would be her sweetheart
for the rest of their days. Her forever lover.

Impatiently, she clutched at the bed covering as he
smoothed the latex into place. Every part of her cried out for him,
for his kiss, his warmth against her, for the absolute rightness of
his touch.

He leaned forward and placed a damp, hot kiss on her
belly.

Laughing softly at the frustrated sound she made in
her throat, Mitchell moved closer, his erection nudging her cleft.
She reached for him then, urging him in, needing him like she’d
never known she could need a man.

Slowly, he entered her, inch by inch, filling the
ache in her body the way he now filled her soul. Delanie clung to
him, gasping as his long, slow thrusts sent ripples through her
body.

Above her, his face dark in the shadows, he loved
her with tenderness and thoroughness that left her trembling and
crying out, feeling more complete than she’d ever thought
possible.

Every touch, every stroke, the scent of his skin,
the crisp texture of the hair on his chest. It was right, so right,
at last.

Spiraling upward, her unconscious cries harsh in her
throat as he moved in her, she felt herself shattering,
disintegrating into a million pleasure-locked pieces. His sudden
hoarse cry and the stiffening of his body echoed her own. Together,
they rocked in the moment, lost.

Found.

Together, at last.

With his weight slumped against her moments later,
Delanie felt a tear ease its way down the side of her face. Slowly,
she stroked his bare muscled back, treasuring the shape and feel of
him. No moment had ever been this perfect.

Now that he was here, she’d never have to be alone
again.

******

Mitchell woke slowly despite the sunlight streaming
through the window and the jangling of the phone on the bedside
table.

“Hello?” he said, finally locating the
instrument.

“Mitch!” his grandfather barked. “Are you still in
bed, you rascal?”

”Yes.” Mitchell rolled onto his back. How like
Donovan to be so hale and hearty first thing in the morning.

“Alone?” his grandfather asked with a suggestive
chuckle.

Mitchell glanced at the tumbled bed, his gaze
scanning the empty room. “Apparently.”

Donovan laughed again. “Well, get the hell up and
come have breakfast with me. No point in lying around in an empty
bed.”

“Okay. Give me a few minutes.” Mitchell sat up,
rubbing at his sleep-fogged eyes.

“No more than fifteen,” Donovan insisted. “I didn’t
get a chance to introduce you to my favorite employee last night,
so I invited Lanie to join us for breakfast in the Blue Salon.”

“Of course, I’ll be right there,” Mitchell said
carefully keeping the grim note out of his voice.

Hanging up the phone, he thought again of the real
reason he’d cleared his schedule in order to attend The Cedar’s
reopening.

Lanie Carlyle. His grandfather’s mistress. The woman
who’s pretensions he’d come here to deal with. She could sleep with
his grandfather all she wanted—more power to the old goat, but the
clever Ms. Carlyle wasn’t laying hands on Donovan’s money. Mitchell
had a responsibility to make sure of that.

Jolted back to reality by his grandfather’s call,
Mitchell got up, rubbing a hand over his face to try and clear the
mists from his head.

Still, he felt surprisingly good this morning
considering he’d spent much of last night locked in carnal pleasure
with a woman straight out of his best dreams.

Had she left while he slept?

Looking into the bathroom and the sitting room for
signs of his mystery woman, Mitchell frowned. Nothing. She was
gone. His sensuous, passionate lover of the night before had crept
away while he slept.