Kate impatiently kicked off the smothering covers. ‘You can make love to me now.’
Drake reared up on his elbow. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked tensely.
She dug her nails into his arms impatiently. ‘Yes, I’m sure…Drake, I want you—I want you to make love to me here, now!’
He didn’t need a third invitation. Nor was there any long-drawn-out foreplay. He tossed off the covers and swivelled them sideways on the bed, tugging her hips to the edge of the mattress, sliding backwards until his feet struck the floor. Propping himself over her on one braced arm, he opened the fastening of his jeans and pushed himself deeply inside her, uttering a thick, guttural sound of satisfaction as she lifted her hips to guide him home. With a twisting jerk of his hips he seated himself even more tightly between her spread legs, the muscles in his thighs rippling under the denim as he braced his feet against the floor, bent his hungry mouth to her breasts, and began the deep, hard, thrusting rhythm that they both urgently needed, bringing them quickly to a mutual, violent convulsion of groaning ecstasy.
Twice more he racked and then wrenched her body with convulsive pleasure before turning off the lights and finishing with a long, slow, sensual loving that left them panting and weak with sweet exhaustion. Then he pulled the sheets firmly back around them, arranged her to his satisfaction…facing away from him with her bottom spooned by his hips…and tucked his arms around her, sealing her back to his smooth chest.
‘And now,’ he informed her with yawning satisfaction, ‘now we cuddle up and go to sleep together like all good lovers do!’
CHAPTER TEN
TWO weeks later, Kate tiptoed up the hall to stand outside the firmly shut door to Drake’s office, pressing a warning finger to her lips as she looked down at Prince, trailing at her heels, who looked to be winding up for an inquiring ‘wuff’.
She raised a hand to knock and dropped it again, chewing at her lip. The door shut meant that Drake wasn’t to be disturbed—they had arranged that all-important signal right from the start. If she came over and his door was shut, she went away again.
Except in dire emergencies. Which this wasn’t—well, not as Drake would class it, anyway…
‘I can hear you thinking!’
Muffled by the near soundproof door, Drake’s voice made her jump.
‘Woof!’ yelled Prince at the sound of his master’s voice, clearly letting her off the hook. Or so she thought.
‘You may as well come in, Kate.’
She cracked the door open and poked her head in, pushing Prince back with a firm hand.
‘I wasn’t going to knock,’ she told him. ‘I was going to wait. Have I wrecked your train of thought?’
He angled his head down and looked at her over the top of his narrow spectacles. She had been charmed to discover that he wore the neat, gold-rimmed reading glasses when he worked for prolonged periods at his desk. She had teased him that it made him look like a ‘proper writer’, but he had got her back by wearing them the next time they made love, and forcing her to admit that they made him look incredibly sexy.
‘Do you want the polite answer, or the truth?’
‘The polite answer, please,’ she said, pushing the door wider.
He threw down the gold-topped pen with which he had been correcting pages and took off his glasses.
‘You’re looking rather frazzled.’
‘I’m frizzled and frazzled,’ she said, fingering through her salt-laden locks. I don’t seem to have any water.’
‘Low tide classified as an emergency now, is it?’ he asked, but his brown eyes were amused as he rocked back in his chair, lazily stretching his arms before tucking his hands behind his head. ‘If you wait twelve hours I’m sure it’ll come back in again.’
‘I mean at the house. I went to have a shower and nothing happened. None of the taps are working, either. The rental agent said to phone a plumber, but apparently he doesn’t work weekends in Oyster Beach…unless you have too much water. He’ll come for a flood but not a drought. Would you mind if I used your guest shower?’
He gave her an impatient look. ‘You know you don’t have to even ask, you can shower here whenever you like—or have a soak in the spa.’ His eyes glinted. ‘I know you like a long, leisurely bathe, so that your skin is soft when you stroke on those silky body lotions.’
He was reminding her that more than once he had applied them for her, revealing a wicked talent for erotic massage…
‘Thanks,’ she said in an effort to stay focused on her errand. ‘I’ve been down on the beach all morning and I think I’ve brought half of it back with me.’
He looked approvingly at her glowing colour. ‘Aren’t you glad I persuaded Marcus to give you an extra month’s holi
day?’
‘Persuaded? Blackmailed, more like!’ she laughed.