He grabbed her the way she liked, pulled her through to the bedroom. “You can get your own drink after.”
“I’ll get you one, too.” She yanked his jacket off his shoulders and away. “Boots,” she said and made him laugh.
“I’m aware of the order of things.”
And still they dived toward the bed. Pulling, tugging, then tossing boots.
“We broke something last time,” she remembered as she rushed to unbutton his shirt. “What was it?”
“My grandmother’s crystal vase.”
Her fingers stilled, her eyes widened in distress. Then he grinned.
“Oh! Liar!” She threw a leg over him, shoved him onto his back. “You’re going to pay for that.” Crossing her arms, she grabbed the hem of her sweater, pulled it over her head, winged it over her shoulder.
“I’ll pay more,” he told her. He slid his hands up her sides, over her breasts as she fought open the last buttons.
“You bet you will, buddy.” She lowered her head, catching his mouth in a crushing kiss before scraping her teeth over his bottom lip, ending with a nip.
He retaliated by flipping her over, doing the same.
They wrestled off clothes, wrestled each other in a rush of give-and-take.
So much the same, she thought, wonderfully the same, but now she knew what they could bring to each other. All heat and demand and speed, like flying through fire—simmers and flashes and bursts.
She reveled in the thrill of skin sliding against skin—his to hers, hers to his—the heady friction of it. His mouth, dark with hunger, his hands, rough with greed, raced over her.
How had she lived without knowing what it was to be wanted so completely, so urgently, so thoroughly?
She needed to give him the same, to show him how the want for him flooded through her.
He couldn’t get enough of her. Whatever he took only sparked a bright hot need for more. When he had her like this, moving, moving in the dark, he couldn’t think, could only feel.
And she made him feel drunk, half-mad with it. Made him feel strong as a god, reckless as a cornered wolf.
The world outside dissolved; time spun away.
Just her body, the shape of her, those sleek muscles under smooth skin. The sound of her—breath and sigh and soft, soft moan. And her taste, so hot and sweet.
She struggled up, fast hands, quick legs, to straddle him, and starlight caught in the crown of her hair like diamonds.
She took him in, fast and deep, her hands pressed to her own breasts as the first wave of ecstasy swamped her.
Then she rode, free and wild, starlight on her skin, dark triumph in her eyes.
He gripped her hips, clinging to her and some last thread of sanity.
And she lifted her arms high, crying out in that same dark triumph.
Flames shimmered at her fingertips, tiny pinpoints of light that flashed, bright and blinding as the sun. Stunned by them, bewitched by her, he held on—and he let go.
* * *
IN THE DARK, IN THE DREAM, SHE REACHED FOR HIM.
“Do you hear that? Do you hear that?”
“It’s just the wind.”