“Don’t.” Gritting his teeth, he took hold of her hand and pulled it free as he gave her a half smile to take the sting out of his sharp warning. “You keep that up, and it’s over before we get started.”
“Okay then. Can’t have that.” She toed off her sneakers before taking hold of her jeans to drag them off.
“I’ll do that,” he said, stroking his hands across her breasts, cupping them in his palms, thumbing her nipples, until she swayed unsteadily on her feet. “I’ve been thinking of nothing but stripping you out of your jeans for the past few days. I want to enjoy the moment.”
“Hope it’s okay if I enjoy it, too,” she whispered.
“Absolutely.” Smiling, he dropped his hands to the waist of her jeans and slowly pushed them down over her generous, gorgeous hips. He took that tiny swatch of lace panties with him as he went, and going down on his knees, he left a trail of kisses along her flesh as it was exposed to his gaze. “You have an amazing body,” he murmured.
She squirmed in his grasp and reached down to slide her fingers through his hair, dragging her nails across his scalp. “My boobs are too big,” she argued in a quiet voice. “And so are my feet and my butt.”
“You’re wrong,” he whispered and as if to prove a point, he slid his hands around to cup her behind, his fingers kneading her tender flesh until she whimpered and swayed unsteadily. “You have a great butt and your breasts...beautiful.”
She held on to his shoulders to keep herself steady and then stepped out of her jeans when he wanted her to. Then she was naked, standing there in a splash of watery sunlight, as glorious as he’d known she would be. He ran his hands over the line of her hips and all the way down her long, shapely legs to her narrow feet. “I love your curves. A man could get lost in your body and happily stay that way.”
She cupped her hand under his chin and tipped his head back so she could look into his eyes. “You mean that,” she asked after a long second or two, “don’t you?”
“Babe,” he assured her, “your body is a wonderland.”
She had curves and he liked them. She had long legs and he wanted them wrapped around his hips, pulling him deeper into her body. And the dark blond curls at her center were at just the right height for him to do something he’d been dreaming of doing for far too long.
Still looking up at her, Sage reached out to brush those curls aside, clearing a path for his mouth, his tongue. She knew what he was about to do. Her eyes went wide and she sucked in a deep breath and held it. “Sage...”
“I want to taste all of you,” he said and leaned in, covering her heat with his mouth.
She gasped and arched into him, her fingers digging into his shoulders, her short, neat nails scraping his skin. She wobbled unsteadily, but his hands on her butt kept her still, held her in place.
He licked and kissed and stroked and fed the frenzy leaping inside him. He sensed the tension in her body and tightened it with every slide of his tongue. His hands ran up and down her thighs, over her hips, and then dipped down so that he could invade her heat even while he tasted her.
The world shrank down until there was only Colleen. Her taste, her scent—she was all. She was everything. Every soft moan and gasp that escaped from her throat made him more frantic to feel her body bucking under his. He sensed she was close to another climax, and this time, he was going to be buried deep inside her when she came.
And suddenly he couldn’t wait another second to bring them together in the only way that mattered. He pulled away, stripped off his jeans and laid her down on the threadbare rug with its pattern of faded pastel flowers. He levered himself over her as she reached for him, parting her legs, so ready, so eager, so—
“Damn it.”
“What?” She shook her head, blindly blinking to bring him into focus. “What is it? Why’d you stop? Please, don’t stop.”
He dropped his forehead to hers and if he’d been strong enough, he would have jumped to his feet and kicked himself. But hell, he hadn’t carried protection around with him in the hopes of getting lucky since he was a kid. “Have to stop. No condom.”
“No problem.”
He lifted his head, stared down into her eyes and asked, “You’re covered?”
She licked her lips again, driving him further along the road of no return. “I am. I went on the pill a couple of months ago to regulate my period. As long as you’re healthy, we’re covered.”