Need crashed down on her, and at her core she ached and burned for him.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered, drawing his mouth from hers, glancing down at her br**sts, cupped in his palms. “So damn beautiful.”
“I want you, Justice. Now. Please, now.”
One corner of his mouth tipped into a wicked smile. His eyes flashed and in an instant he’d swept her up into his arms, stalked across the room and dropped her onto one of the wide sofas. She stared up at him as he tugged his shirt up and over his head. And her mouth watered. His skin, so tanned, so strong, so sculpted. God, she remembered all the nights she’d lain in his arms, held against that broad, warm chest. And she trembled at the rise of passion inside her.
She scooted back on the sofa until her head was resting on a pillow. Maggie held her arms out toward him. “What’re you waiting for, cowboy?”
His eyes gleamed, his jaw went tight and hard. He finished undressing in a split second but still Maggie thought he was taking too long. She didn’t want to wait. She was hot and wet and so ready for him that she thought she’d explode and die if he didn’t take her soon.
He came to her and Maggie’s gaze dipped to his erection, long and thick and hard. Her breath caught on a gasp of anticipation as Justice leaned down, tore the back cushions off the sofa and tossed them to the floor to make more room for them on the overstuffed couch. The dark green chenille fabric was soft and cool against her skin, but Maggie hardly noticed that slight chill. There was far too much heat simmering inside her, and when Justice covered her body with his, she could have sworn she felt actual flames sweeping over them.
“I’ve missed you, babe,” he told her, bracing himself on his hands, lowering his mouth to hers, tasting, nibbling.
“Oh, Justice, I’ve missed you, too.” She lifted her h*ps for him, parting her thighs, welcoming him home. He pushed his body into hers with one hard stroke. She groaned, loving the long, deep slide of his flesh claiming hers. He filled her and she lifted her legs higher, hooking them around his waist, opening herself so that she could take him even deeper.
And still it wasn’t enough. Wasn’t nearly enough. She groaned, twisting and writhing beneath him as he moved in and out of her depths in plunging strokes that fanned the flames engulfing her.
It had been too long, she thought wildly. She didn’t want soft and romantic. She wanted hard and fast and frantic. She wanted to know that he felt the same crushing need she did. She wanted to feel the strength of his passion.
“Harder, Justice,” she whispered. “Take me harder.”
He looked down at her and his eyes flashed. “I’m holding back, Maggie. It’s been too long. I don’t want to hurt you.”
She cupped his face in her palms, fought to steady her breath and finally shook her head and smiled. “The only thing that hurts is when you hold back. Justice, I need you. All of you.”
His jaw clenched tight, he swept one arm around her back, holding her to him even as he pushed off the couch. With their bodies locked together, her legs wrapped around his waist, he eased her onto the oriental carpet covering the hardwood floors. With her flat on her back, he levered himself over her, hands at either side of her head. Grinning down at her, he muttered, “Told you when you bought’em those damn couches were too soft.”
She grinned right back at him. “For sitting, they’re perfect. For this…yeah. Too soft.”
She lifted her h*ps then, taking him deeper inside. When he withdrew a moment later, she nearly groaned, but then he was back, driving himself into her, pistoning his h*ps against hers and she felt all of him. Took all of him. His need joined hers.
He lifted her legs, hooking them over his shoulders, tipping her h*ps higher so that he could delve even deeper, and Maggie groaned in appreciation. She slapped her hands onto the carpet and hung on as he moved faster and faster, driving them both to a shuddering cl**ax that hovered just out of reach.
“Yes, Justice,” she said, her voice nothing more than a strained hush of sound. “Just like that.”
Again and again, his body claimed hers, pushing into her soft, hot folds, taking everything she offered and giving all that she could have wanted. She looked up into his eyes, saw the flash of something delicious wink in their depths and knew in that one blindingly clear instant that she would never be whole without him.
Without him.
That one random thought hovered at the edges of her mind and filled her eyes with tears even as her body began to sing and hum with the building tensions that rippled through her senses.
He touched her at their joining. Rubbing his thumb over that one spot that held so many incredible sensations. And as he touched her, Maggie hurtled eagerly toward the enormous cl**ax waiting for her. As her body exploded with the force of completion, she screamed his name, and still she heard the quiet voice in the back of her mind whispering, Is this our last time together?
Then Justice gave himself over to his own release, her name an agonized groan sliding from his throat. When he collapsed atop her, Maggie held him close as the last of the tremors rippled through their joined bodies and eased them into oblivion.
And if her heart broke just a little, she wouldn’t let him know it.
The rest of the weekend passed in a blurry haze of passion. But for a few necessary trips to the kitchen, Justice and Maggie never left the master bedroom.
After that first time in the living room, Justice made a call to his ranch manager, Phil, and told him to handle the ranch problems himself for the next few days. It hadn’t exactly been a promise of forever, but Maggie had been happy for it.
All the same, she was crazy and she knew it. Setting herself up for another fall. As long as Justice King was the man she loved, she wasn’t going to find any peace. Because they couldn’t be together without causing each other pain and being apart was killing her.
How was that fair?
She sighed a little, her gaze still fixed on him. The only light in the room came from the river stone hearth, where a dying fire sputtered and flickered. Outside, a winter storm battered at the log mansion, tiny fists of rain tapping at the glass. And within Maggie, a different sort of storm raged.
What was she supposed to do? She’d tried living without him and had spent the most miserable nine months of her life. She’d tried to lose herself in her work, but it was an empty way to live. The sad truth was she wanted Justice. And without him, she’d never be really happy.
He was the most amazing lover she’d ever known. Every touch burned, every breath caressed, every whispered word was a promise of seduction that kept her hovering on the brink of a new cl**ax no matter how many times he pushed her over the edge. Her skin hummed long after he stopped touching her. She closed her eyes and felt him inside her. Felt their hearts pounding in rhythm and couldn’t help wondering, as she always had, how two people could be so close and so far apart at the same time.