Her hips arched, rubbing against the hard, aching length of him. Did she know what she was doing to him? Did she care?
Jake groaned, and realized that slow was no longer a possibility. Not now, not with this woman, not ever. When it came to Amanda Lennox, the definition of the word restraint was lost on him. Nor did he have the time or patience to relearn it.
He balanced his weight on his left elbow. His fingers trembled as he reached down and fisted calico and linen, dragging her skirt up until it bunched in wrinkled folds high on her slender white thighs. She wore a single chemise, and a dainty pair of pantalets. The pantalets were quickly dispersed. The crisp white linen chemise proved no barrier. Shifting his weight, Jake nudged her legs open with his knee. His leg rose, and his lower thigh wedged itself against moist, beckoning heat.
His hand opened, splaying over her small, tight stomach. He felt the breaths rushing in and out of her, felt the warmth of those breaths scald his cheek as he dragged his lips from hers, lifted, and let his gaze skim down her perfectly curved body.
His hand blanketed almost her entire stomach. His fingers looked big and dark and strong against the lush feminine backdrop. Beneath the calico, he felt minute tremors quaver through her. The tiny shivers of anticipation vibrated up his arm like the clap of thunder that echoed around them. Matching tremors rippled through his blood like waves of molten heat.
His hand lifted, skimming her ribs, settling only a scant inch from where it needed most to be. The undercurve of her breast felt firm and inviting against the sensitive webbing between his thumb and index finger. He nudged her, squeezed gently, testing her firmness and fullness through the cloth.
His hand turned inward. He didn't cover her, the way his palm begged for him to do. That would be too quick, too unsatisfying. He'd rather linger, let the delay feed the fire building within him, within her, before he extinguished it. Only once he'd made the need unbearable for them both would he give her his full touch. Only then.
He began at the very base of her breast. With an upward stroke he slowly, slowly swept over her from the tips of his fingers to the heel of his palm. He paused, sucked in sharp breath, rolled his palm back down, then up once more. He felt her nipple pucker beneath the cloth, felt it burn like fire into the center of his palm. He curled his fingers inward.
Amanda's response was immediate and sharp. A bolt of awareness shot like liquid lightning through her blood. Her back arched off the ground. If it wouldn't have been too bold, she would have peeled free the buttons of her blouse and removed the barrier separating flesh from hot, hungry flesh. What Jake was doing felt wonderful, sinfully erotic. No man had ever touched her like that. Now, she wanted to know his touch without the obstruction of calico and linen. She hungered for it, was desperate for it.
Jake fed her desperation. And in so doing, he fed his own. He didn't remove the hindering blouse, the way they both wanted badly for him to do. Instead, he tested the size and shape of her breast in his palm. And marveled at the fit. She was firm and round and perfect. On second thought, "perfect" didn't come close to describing how it felt to touch this particular woman, in this particular way.
Had any woman ever nested into his hand so flawlessly? None that Jake could remember. That might be because, at that moment, he couldn't remember having been with any woman before this one. His entire life stopped and started right here, right now, with her. No one came before Amanda Lennox, no one would come after her. Not like this, not ever. He knew it.
Jake's hand moved to her buttons. Skill had little to do with his ability to slip them free. His fingers were shaking, his movements awkward and schoolboy-clumsy. He managed to work each pearly disk from its hole only by focusing the core of his attention on the sweet rewards that would be bared once the chore was done. Warm white skin... hard pink nipples...
The buttons came undone in record time.
Jake parted the calico placket wide, his gaze drilling into the splash of white linen chemise beneath. The fragile laces closing the front looked impossibly complex to his passion-dazed mind. Desire was riding him hard. In his current state of mind, the thought of wasting time untying those laces was beyond him.
He shifted, reaching down to slip the knife from its sheath at his belt. The blade glinted in the muted sunlight; the steel was wet, rain-slickened. His gaze volleyed between the knife and the woman, then settled on the latter. He scanned Amanda's face. Beads of rain made her skin shine like moist porcelain. Her eyes looked large and round, slightly dazed as her gaze locked on his.
The knife lifted.
Her eyes rounded, she trembled, and for a split second he thought she was going to scream. She didn't. Instead, after a telling hesitation, she surprised them both by arching one brow and tilting her chin up to allow him better access.
The metal glinted wetly in the dim light as it arched toward the chemise, and its intricate crisscross of laces. Jake's fingers had been trembling before. They weren't trembling now. They never did when he held a knife. His strokes as he cut through the obstructive ribbons were clean and precise, fluid. They were also purposefully slow, revealing her inch by tantalizing inch.
The laces severed, he returned the knife to its sheath, and feasted his gaze on her. In color, her skin wasn't too different from the chemise. He could tell at a glance that the two were worlds apart in texture. Linen was cool and smooth... forbidden white skin was hot and silky and tempting as all hell.
Something tickled the hollow of Amanda's throat where her pulse throbbed. She shivered when she felt Jake's warm, rough fingertip stroke a burning path downward, pausing when he reached the valley between her breasts. He nuzzled the shadowy cleft, slipping his finger between, stroking the full underside of each until she burned and whimpered.
It wasn't until her breathing went shallow and gaspy, when she strained against him, her body begging intimate attention, that his fiery touch melted away.
Amanda opened her mouth. Jake's lips smothered what she was about to say. He covered her lips in a grinding kiss. While he let her respond to him, that was all he let her do. When she surrendered with a low, husky moan and tried to lift her arms to caress his back, he batted her hands away.
His tongue was like fire, plundering, claiming. Years of suppressed desire flamed to his kiss, to the sharp nips his teeth made at her lips. Amanda's spine arched, and she molded her breasts to his chest, lifted her hips, straining for more.
Jake had always sensed fire in this woman. Even from the start, when it had been concealed beneath a veneer of ice, her passion had always been there, simmering beneath the surface. She'd just needed the right hand to spark the fire. His hand. He wanted to brand her with his touch.
Again, she tried to move her arms, this time to curl them around his neck. Again, he wouldn't allow it. Jake found her wrists and, ensnaring them in one fist, tugged her arms over her head. The method of restraint was double-edged. The position pressed her more fully into his length. The feel of her breasts crushed beneath his chest made his blood boil, his senses reel.
His free hand skimmed the curve of her hip. The indentation of her waist. Higher. Her bodice and chemise parted. The gaping cloth welcomed the fingers he snuck beneath the cloth. So did the warm fullness of her breasts.
Skin to skin. Jesus, the feel of her in his hand was everything he'd imagined it would be, and more. Her breast was full, ripe, her nipple already rigid. He flicked his thumb over the tip, bringing it to an even harder peak.
Jake captured her hot, airy groan with his mouth even as his hand closed over her. His touch was skilled, her reaction strong and uncivilized. She twisted beneath him, at the same time matching the urgency of his kiss with a wild, hungry response of her own.
The fingers manacling her wrist melted away. The second his grip loosened, Amanda slipped her hands free. She stroked his long, sleek, rain-dampened hair. Her fingertips acquainted themselves with the width and strength of his shoulder, the strong, rippling cords of his upper arms, the firm expanse of his back. As pleasurable as it felt, she wanted to feel it all again... without the obstruction of cloth.