With two fingers on his chin, she gently drew his gaze back to hers. “Said what?”
He swallowed hard, yet he couldn’t seem to form the words.
“Nothing you say to me could change how I feel about you, or,” she smiled, “stop what’s about to happen.” She rubbed the stone between her fingers. “Please tell me.”
Releasing a long, shuddering breath, he said, “The stone is supposed to help me with decision-making and self-confidence. Ridiculous, I know.”
“It’s not. I believe in the healing power of gemstones.”
“You do?”
She nodded. “I have an uncut rose quartz sitting on my bedside table.”
“Why?”
Unable to stop herself, she leaned forward and pressed a kiss where his heart thundered beneath his warm skin. “I put it there four years ago to dull the pain of my grief.” Another kiss. This one, a few inches to the left. “I leave it there to—” She skimmed her fingertips over each side of his ribcage, enjoying how her touch made his flesh quiver.
He cupped her face and recaptured her attention. “To what?”
Now it was her turn to break eye contact, but he was having none of it. He bent down to eye level and forced her to look at him. “Don’t leave me alone in the Bare Your Heart Club.”
She chuckled, but quickly sobered. “Open my heart to love again.”
His hands briefly tightened around her face before he rested his forehead against hers. “How’s that going for you?” he whispered.
“Showing promise.”
He kissed her, tangling his tongue with hers and making her go mad with need. She could no longer recall why it was imperative that she leave tomorrow. What harm would there be to stay a few more days?
She broke away long enough to lick and kiss her way down his neck to his chest. “You are so breathtakingly gorgeous,” she whispered against his heated flesh.
His head dropped back as his hand cradled the back of her head, encouraging her toward his taut nipple. In the warmth of her mouth, it hardened even more as she laved the bud, over and over.
Wanting more, she smoothed her hands over the hills and channels of his stomach to the long length of him. She molded her palm over his thickness and squeezed.
Zeke hissed out a breath above her. It thrilled her to know she could have such an intense effect on him.
He bent and kissed her again. This time with a wild urgency that made her heart explode and the area between her legs tingle.
Working on opening his trousers while drinking in every drop of his drugging kisses made her hands clumsy, but she finally managed to unbutton, unzip, and push his pants and underwear down to his bare ankles.
Their mouths broke away long enough to allow him to kick free of his clothes.
He stood before her, naked.
Pulsing with desire.
Magnificent.