10
GRAPPLING WASN’T HIS USUAL WAY, BUT THIS WAS something so . . . explosive he lost his rhythm and style. He grabbed whatever he could grab, took whatever he could take. And there was so much of her—his tall, curvy friend.
He all but ripped off her shirt to get to more.
No stopping now for either of them, for here ran needs and urges far beyond careful and rational thinking. Here was the moment, and the next and the next would have to wait.
This bright new hunger for her, just her, must be fed.
But not, he realized, standing in her living room or rolling about on the floor.
He scooped her up.
“Oh Jesus, don’t try to carry me. You’ll break your back.”
“My back’s strong enough.” He turned his head to meet her mouth as he walked to her bedroom.
Crazy, she thought. They’d both gone completely mad. And she didn’t give a single bleeding damn. He carried her, and though his purpose—and hers—was hurry, it was foolishly romantic.
If he stumbled, well, they’d finish things out where they landed.
But he didn’t stumble. He dropped to the bed with her so the old springs squeaked in surprise, gave with a groan to nestle them both in a hollow of mattress and bedding.
And those hands, those magick hands were busy and beautiful.
She used her own to pull and yank off layers of clothes until, at last—God be praised—she found skin. Warm, smooth—with the good firm muscles of a man who used them.
She rolled with him, struggling as he did to strip off every barrier.
“Bloody layers,” he muttered, and made her laugh as she fought with the buckle of his belt.
“We would, both of us, work outdoors.”
“Good thing it’s worth the unwrapping. Ah, there you are,” he murmured and filled his hands with her bare breasts.
Firm and soft and generous. Beautiful, bountiful. He could write an ode to the glory of Meara Quinn’s breasts. But at the moment, he wanted only to touch them, taste them. And feel the way her heartbeat kicked up from canter to gallop at the brush of his fingers, lips, tongue.
All that was missing was . . .
He brought light into the dark, a soft, pale gold like her skin. When her eyes met his, he smiled.
“I want to see you. Beautiful Meara. Eyes of a gypsy, body of a goddess.”
He touched her as he spoke. No grappling now; he’d found his rhythm after all. Why rush through something so pleasurable when he could linger over it? He could feast on her breasts half a lifetime. Then there were her lips, soft and full—and as eager as his. And her shoulders, strong, capable. The surprisingly sweet stem of her neck. Sensitive there, just there under her jaw so she shivered when he kissed it.
He loved how she responded—a tremble, a catch of breath, a throaty moan—as he learned her body, inch by lovely inch.
Outside someone shouted out a half-drunken greeting, and followed it by a wild laugh.
But here, in the nest of the bed, there were only sighs, murmurs, and the quiet creak of the springs beneath them.
He’d taken the reins, she realized. She didn’t know how it happened, as she’d never given them over to anyone else. But somewhere between the hurry and the patience, she’d surrendered them to him.
His hands glided over her as if he had centuries to pet and stroke and linger. They kindled fires along the way until her body seemed to shimmer in the heat, to glow under her skin like the light he’d conjured.
She loved the feel of him, the long back, the narrow hips, the hard, workingman’s palms. He smelled of the woods, earthy and free, and the taste of him—lips, skin—was the same.
He tasted of home.