"This one sees all, knows all." She whisked Margo through the door. "What's the matter with you?" she muttered. "You look like you've been poleaxed."
"I have been. Give me one of those damn Tums you're so crazy about."
"Soon as I can get to my purse." Concerned, she rubbed her hand over Margo's back. "Tell me what's wrong, honey?"
"I can't now. Tomorrow." And because she understood her job, she curved her lips into a bright smile and held out both hands to the woman approaching them. "So glad you could come. I hope you enjoyed the evening."
She repeated those sentiments, with variation, for nearly an hour before the last lingerer trickled out. Necessity, along with aspirin, and antacids, kept her functioning. She wanted a quiet room, a moment to herself to sort out all the emotions whirling through her, but she was swept along when the Templetons insisted on taking the family out to celebrate.
It was nearly one before she walked into the penthouse with Josh. She should have had it all figured out by now, she thought. She should know exactly what to say and do. But when the door closed behind them and they were alone, she didn't have a clue.
"I'm going to miss them—your parents—when they go back to Europe."
"So am I." There was an easy smile on his face. His formal tie was loose now, as were the studs on his tuxedo shirt. Margo thought he looked like an elegantly male ad for an outrageously expensive and sexy cologne. "You've been quiet."
"I know. I've been trying to think, to figure out what to say when we talk about this."
"You shouldn't have to think that hard." He stepped toward her, began to slide the pins from her hair. "I've been thinking about being alone with you. Finally." As her hair tumbled free, he tossed the pins on the dresser. "It didn't take much effort."
"One of us has to be sensible."
"Why?"
At any other time, she would have laughed. "I'm not sure why, I just know one of us has to be. And it doesn't look as though it's going to be you. Josh, I'm not sure either of us knows how to handle this."
"I've got a pretty good idea how to start." His arms slipped around her, raced up her back to cup her shoulders and pull her into him.
"This part's easy, maybe too easy for both of us. I don't think we want that to change."
"Why should it?" He skimmed his mouth along her jaw. And the taste of her was warm and silky.
"Because we've muddied up the waters." How did he expect her to think when he was sampling her as if she was a delicacy he'd chosen from under glinting crystal? "Because I've never really been in love before, and I don't think you have either." Her pulse was already stuttering. "We don't know what we're doing."
"So, we'll improvise." His mood was soaring too high and too free to let her sudden attack of logic dampen it. He tugged on the zipper at the back of her dress, and when the silk parted, he slid his hands along her skin.
"Are you saying things don't have to change?" Bubbles of relief warred against flickers of need as her dress slipped down.
He wanted to tell her everything had already done so. But he knew her so well, understood that if he spoke of change, of commitment, of forever, she'd balk or evade, or simply bolt. "Nothing that we don't want to change. This, for instance," he murmured, skimming his thumbs along the soft white swell of her breasts. They rose, full and white, out of the strapless lace of a black body skimmer. Her stockings stopped high on the thigh, another seductive contrast of black against white. He let his fingers trail from stocking to flesh to lace, and thrilled at each sharply defined texture. All the while, his eyes stayed on hers.
"The minute you touch me, I want you. It's something I can't seem to control." And it worried her, worried her enough that she purposely pushed all rational thought aside and eased open his stark white shirt to caress the pale gold tint of the flesh beneath. "I've never had a lover who stirred me up so much just by being in the same room. How long can that last?"
"Let's find out." He eased her onto the bed—pale hair spilling, milk-white skin against black silk and lace. She was all promising scents and luscious curves, long, limber limbs that reached out to enfold.
She held him against her, reveling in the feel of his weight pinning her, imprisoning sex under sex with slow friction. All she had to know, for this moment, was that she wanted him. And her mouth sought his eagerly for that dreamy mating of tongues.
When had she come to need the flavor of him, the scent and texture of his skin? After so many years, how had friendship and family shot into passion and longing? And why, when their bodies meshed so perfectly, should it matter?
Her skin hummed under his hands, those long, gliding strokes that shifted in a pulsebeat to rough and possessive. What spurted to life inside of her was too layered and complex to analyze. She let the heat take her.
He felt every shift and sigh, knew when nerves had melted into acceptance. Here, in this big, soft bed, th
ere were no questions. She was, and always had been, everything he wanted.
Long, lean limbs, sumptuous curves, sleek, perfumed skin. Her body had been designed to take and give pleasure. And no one else, he thought as his mouth fused to hers, would take it from or give it to her again. No one else understood her heart, her mind, and her dreams as he did.
No one else.
Her heart leapt, then stuttered as his mood turned urgent. Desperate hands, a ravenous mouth raced over her. Sighs deepened into moans as she matched him beat for beat, flame for flame.