“I don’t know if… I mean is this…” her lips were trembling so hard she could barely move them, “…okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” he whispered, sounding dark, fierce.
Because we’ll never be the same. I’ll never be the same. Helplessly, she raised her gaze to his. She felt torn in two, dying to have him and afraid she would die if she did. She’d been a married woman for almost five years and he made her feel like a blushing virgin. “We’re friends.”
“So we are.” He dipped down, skimming her lips with his. “Tell me you’ve never thought about this before. Say you don’t want me, don’t want this, and I’ll stop.”
She went boneless, knowing she couldn’t lie to him. She didn’t want to, not about this. The words burst out on their own. “I do. I want you. But—”
Evan barely let that note of pleading leave her before he claimed her mouth fully, putting to rest all further protests.
Oh, God. She’d hugged him countless times, planted plenty of kisses on his cheek, all chaste. There was nothing chaste now about the slow burn of his lips across hers, nothing platonic about the erotic fervor that had her breath rasping through her lungs and her thighs shaking with the need throbbing at their apex. She wanted to cry out in frustration when he moved his hand from her bottom, only to sigh when he brushed her right breast with the back of his knuckles. Her nipple tightened further, pushing against the silk barring it from his long-awaited touch. His other hand moved up into her hair, cupping her nape as his kiss turned ravenous.
He moved in front of her and the motion pressed her back into the rough concrete edge of the hot tub. She couldn’t be bothered to complain. Her bra strap slipped from her shoulder with a slow slide of his fingers, baring one breast, and his kiss was tearing her heart out. He was between her legs, and his erection pressed hard against her mound.
God help her, she wanted to cover herself when he pulled back to look at her, until she heard the sound he made as his gaze caressed the skin he’d revealed. It was half moan, half growl, and it lit her blood as he filled his palms with the weight of her br**sts. His c*ck rubbed against her cl*t until she thought she would launch into the stars right there. A couple of oh-so-easy adjustments and he could be inside her. Finally inside her. This was getting out of control. She was.
“Evan,” she whispered against him, “not here.”
“I know,” he murmured, and he pulled away, licking his lips as if to collect the taste of her from them.
She expected him to stand, to lead her out of the tub. She was surprised when he put his hands on her waist and maneuvered behind her, turning her until she faced away from him. “What are you…?”
“Giving you no more time to think,” he murmured with wicked mischief, his lips grazing her ear. His hand slid down her wet thigh to her knee, lifting it out of the water and placing her foot on the seat of the hot tub. “Just a few more minutes.” Her heart nearly leapt out of her throat as the water gushing from one of the jets swirled right over her clit. A full body shudder went through her and she sobbed.
“Too much?” he asked silkily, his voice a deep rumble at her back.
“N-no…perfect…”
He left his hand there on the inside of her thigh, stroking and soothing, while the other hand cupped her breast. His fingertips played over her peaked nipple. She wanted to jump up and run away, to flee from this power that threatened to swamp her, but she needed to have this, would suffer any humiliation for it. She could feel something incredible building from the relentless vibrating pressure of the water but she craved his fingers inside her, wanted him inside her……
Her need finally drove the words out. “Evan, please, touch me…”
He uttered a low growl, and his fingers slid between her inner thigh and the edge of her panties. She almost came on the spot. Not yet, oh, not yet, not until…
He moaned her name when his roaming hand discovered she was smooth and bare there, and he slid his feverish mouth along her neck. He shifted behind her so that the ridge of his erection nudged the crease of her bottom. She bit down on her lip as he parted her folds and pushed one finger deep inside her, then a second, stretching her until she ached to cry out.
And two things happened. A door opened across the walkway—not really near them, but not at a safe distance by any means. And her orgasm slammed into her and she arched back against him, desperately holding in her cries, raising her hands to clutch his arms.
His fingers and the water worked her into a frenzy, and his other hand moved from her breast to her mouth, covering it gently, his finger slipping horizontally between her lips. She sank her teeth into his flesh, riding the pleasure in utter silence when she wanted to scream it at the moon. It wasn’t the shivery pulses she was accustomed to—she’d been driven head-on into a brick wall of ecstasy, and it was crashing down over her. One whimper escaped her, and his lips grazed her left ear.
“Shhhh.” The sound was so soft and erotic her p**sy clenched on his fingers buried inside her. He pushed them deeper in response.
Someone emerged from the door and headed away from them as she fell limp and safe against him, panting, her heart beating like a hummingbird’s wing. He was rock hard against the soft flesh of her ass and, oh, he felt enormous. She reached behind her to investigate him, and her breath caught on a groan. “Oh my God.”
He chuckled, moving his hand from her lips over her chin and down her throat, caressing her breast again. “That’s music to a man’s ears.” Gently he withdrew his fingers from between her legs, and she felt him lift his head and throw a quick glance around. “Now I think we’d better take this into the suite,” he whispered.
“I…don’t think I can walk just yet.”
“Then I’ll carry you.”
How, how, how had that stupid woman let this man go?
For Todd?
They lingered a few moments more, Evan stroking and petting her, running his lips along her neck, her shoulder. She was horrified when she felt tears well up, but thankfully she was wet all over, so he didn’t have to know when she lost the battle and they slipped over her cheeks.
He helped her from the hot tub and they struggled back into their clothes, a difficult task on their wet flesh. They simply carried their shoes. Hot tears kept dripping off her chin, and she knew she’d better get a grip. God knew this was too perfect to ruin, and they still had all night ahead.
“Are you all right?” he asked. “My offer to carry you still stands.” He winked at her.
“I’m fine.” She was horrified at the strangle in the words. She wasn’t fine, and she knew it. This hadn’t happened in months…this knot of emotion swelling in her chest until she thought it would tear out of her body and destroy everything in its path.
Only it wasn’t anger this time…not anger, but…it was the hurt. The carelessness with which her heart had been stomped underfoot. Sometimes it surged up and she couldn’t contain it. But why now? Must be the tequila, she thought, coupled with the mind-shattering orgasm jarring all this loose. And the fact that she wanted so much more of him.
Evan held her hand all the way to their suite, absorbing quivers she tried to pretend were from the chill of the air conditioning. She stood dripping and shuddering and silently weeping in the hallway while he unlocked their door and pushed it open for her. Head ducked, she rushed past him into the room, hoping he wasn’t watching her too closely.
She should have known better. He dropped his shoes and shut the door, moving to stand behind her. A moment later one of his hands slid over her shoulder. The other reached around to pry her shoes from her death grip and toss them away. “Kelsey.”
The gentleness in his voice broke her. She whirled around, folding herself into the circle his arms made around her. He caught her, strong and solid, crushing her to him as she sobbed into his damp shirt. She heard his long sigh rush through his airways.
“Get rid of it, sweetheart,” he murmured, stroking her hair. “Give it to me. All of it.”
She couldn’t believe the words that were rising in her throat, demanding to be spoken, but there was no help for them. She was on the verge of having something that had been well beyond her reach for so many years, something she’d never thought she’d have. He couldn’t deny her now. She couldn’t deny herself. “I need you.”
“Tell me.”
She raised her burning, blurred gaze to his. The voice that sounded from her throat couldn’t have been her own. “I need you to f**k me, Evan, f**k me until I can’t walk anymore. I don’t care if you hurt me, just do it…”
“Goddammit,” he rasped, and she’d never heard him sound so savage. His hands seized her head, tilting her face upward, and his kiss chased the breath from her lungs. She made some wild animal snarl in her throat and grasped his hair, ready to climb him like a tree if it would get his c*ck inside her any faster.
His arm swept down under her ass and lifted her. She clung haphazardly as he carried her into the bedroom, not wanting to let go even when he tossed her back on the bed. She writhed, rubbing her thighs together, watching him stare down at her for what seemed an endless moment. He was completely silhouetted in the light from the living room, but she imagined he could see her well enough. It wasn’t fair.
“What?” she demanded.
“Nothing.”
She’d never wanted to be nak*d more in her entire life, and she couldn’t wait on him to get her that way. When she sat up to strip her slinky blouse off over her head, he grabbed it first and gave it a fling across the room. It was a struggle to kick off her clinging pants, and he had to help her with that, too, freeing her bare legs from the damp material.
All strength fled then in the aching rush that flooded her and she collapsed on the mattress, trying to wrestle back control of her breathing. He crawled over her and hooked his fingers in her panties. His eyes caught a glint of the dim light as he stripped the delicate fabric down her bare legs, nearly ripping it.
Oh, Jesus, was this happening? She’d had this dream so many times in the past month, sometimes so vivid she could swear it was real until she woke in her bed sweating and aching and alone. But this Evan wasn’t going to disappear into the darkness of her bedroom. This was real.
“My God,” he murmured, and she covered her face with her hands and sobbed in pleasure and mortification as he caught the back of her knee in one hand and pushed her legs open so wide her muscles trembled. “I just have to…” he whispered, then he dipped his dark head, and the soft, damp warmth of his mouth covered her. His tongue lined her, licked deeper at her moisture, flickered over her clit.
Panic ripped through her and the room spun. She pulled her hands away to make a grab for his hair, but on direct orders from her heart, twisted the bed’s comforter in her fists instead. Let him! Oh, God, let him…
She thought she would die from the warmth of his breath on her burning flesh. It was almost a relief when he kissed and licked a trail up her belly, keeping her legs held open wide. He paused to circle her belly ring with his tongue then to nuzzle the silk of her bra and lock his lips around each nipple in turn through the fabric on his pathway up to her mouth.