“Are you all right?” he managed, and carefully slid his hand from her breast.
“Yes.”
He’d told himself that being around Georgeanne would not pose a problem. That he could handle having her stay with him for five days. He’d been wrong. He should have left her sitting on the bench. “I didn’t mean to grab you by your… your, ahh…” Her behind was pressed into his groin, and for one unguarded moment, lust rolled through him like a ball of fire. He lowered his face to the side of her head. Holy shit, he thought, wondering if the side of her neck would taste as good as it looked. John closed his eyes and indulged a fantasy. He inhaled the scent of her hair.
“I think the five minutes are up now.”
Sanity returned and he moved his hands to her waist and put several inches between them. He tried to ignore the desire twisting his gut. He told himself that getting sexually involved with Georgeanne was not a good idea. Too bad his body wasn’t listening.
Since he’d seen her on the beach yesterday in that little halter top and shorts, he’d had to remind himself several times to ignore her long legs and deep cleavage. Even though he’d never thought he would have to, he’d had to remind himself of who she was and what she’d done. But after last night, it didn’t seem to matter any longer.
Last night he’d seen behind the beautiful face and the centerfold body. He’d seen the pain she’d tried to hide with her laughter and smiles. She’d told him of table settings and silver patterns and dyslexia and of growing up thinking she was retarded and feeling lost. She’d said it all as if it didn’t matter. But it did. To her and to him.
Last night he’d looked past the gorgeous eyes and the big breasts, and he’d seen a woman who deserved his respect. She was the mother of his child. She was also the star of his wild fantasies and erotic dreams.
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“I’ll help you back to the bench,” he said, and moved them toward the stone wall. He told himself to think of her as his best friend’s little sister, but thinking of her as his best friend’s little sister didn’t work. He decided to think of her as his sister, but a few hours later, after hitting gift shops and arcades, he gave up thinking of her as anyone’s sister. It just didn’t work.
Instead, he concentrated on his daughter. Lexie and her constant chatter provided the distraction he needed. She was like a little bucket of cold water, and all of her questions gave him the respite he needed from his thoughts of Georgeanne draped across his bed.
When he looked into Lexie’s eyes, he saw her excitement and innocence, and he was amazed that he’d helped create such a perfect little person. When he picked her up and put her on his shoulders, or held her hand, his heart thumped hard in his chest. And when she laughed, he knew that everything was worth it. Having her with him was well worth the hell of wanting her mother.
During the ride back to his house, he kept himself distracted with the sound of Lexie’s little voice raised in fervent song. He patiently listened to the same silly jokes she’d told him two weeks ago, and when they got back home, she repaid him by jumping in the bathtub. He’d listened to her singing, laughed at the jokes, and his little distraction deserted him for a tub full of water and a Skipper doll.
John grabbed a copy of The Hockey News and sat down at the dining room table. His eyes scanned Mike Brophy’s column, but he didn’t give it his full attention. Georgeanne stood at the kitchen counter chopping vegetables. Her hair was down and her feet were bare. He turned to a three-page article featuring Mario Lemieux. He liked Mario. He respected him, but at the moment he couldn’t concentrate on anything other than the chop-chop-chop of Georgeanne’s knife.
Finally he gave up and raised his gaze from the picture of Lemieux getting drilled into the nickel seats. “What are you doing?” he asked her.
She glanced over her shoulder at him, laid down the knife, then turned. “I thought I’d make us a nice salad to go with our lobster tails.”
He closed the magazine and stood. “I don’t want a nice salad.”
“Oh, then what do you want?”
He looked from her green eyes to her mouth. Something real dirty, he thought. She’d put some pink glossy stuff on her lips and outlined them in a darker shade. He dropped his gaze to her throat, her breasts, and then down to her feet. John had never considered feet sexy. He’d never really thought of them much, but the thin gold ring she wore around her third toe did things to his insides. She reminded him of a harem girl.
“John?”
He walked toward her and looked back up into her face. A harem girl with tilty green eyes and a voluptuous mouth asking him what he wanted. After the day in his houseboat, he knew better than to kiss her.
“What do you want?”
To hell with it, he thought as he stopped directly in front of her. Just one kiss. He could stop. He’d stopped before, and with Lexie a room away in the tub playing with her Barbies, things couldn’t go too far. Georgeanne wasn’t his buddy’s sister, or his sister, or Sister Mary Theresa either.
John slid his knuckles along her jaw. “I’ll show you what I want,” he said, and watched her eyes widen as he slowly lowered his head. His mouth brushed against hers, giving her time to pull away. “I want this.”
Her lips parted on a deep, shuddering breath and her eyes fluttered closed. She was soft and sweet and her lipstick tasted like cherries. He wanted her. He wanted to burn. Plowing his fingers into the side of her hair, he tilted her head and dove into a soul-deep kiss. The kiss was reckless and wild. He fed off her mouth, off her desire and his. He felt her hands on him, on his shoulder, his neck, and the back of his head, holding him to her as she lightly sucked his tongue deeper into her mouth. His craving for her churned deep in the pit of his stomach. He ached for more and reached for the bow holding her blouse closed. He yanked and pulled the material wide across her chest, then he drew back, away from her moist, hot mouth. Her beautiful eyes were going all sleepy with passion and her lips were wet and puffy from their kiss. He slid his gaze down her throat to her breasts. Her blouse lay open, the white lacing crisscrossing her deep cleavage. He knew he was dangerously close to the point of no return. Close, but not quite there yet. He had a little more maneuvering room before he was over the edge.
He cupped her big breasts in his palms and lowered his face to her cleavage. Her skin was warm and smelled powdery, and he felt her swift intake of breath as he kissed the scalloped border of her satin bra. He sucked air into his lungs and closed his eyes, thinking of all the things he wanted to do to her. Hot, sweaty things. Things he remembered doing to her before. He slid the tip of his tongue across her soft flesh and promised himself that he’d stop when he came up for air.
“John, we have to stop now,” she gasped, but she didn’t move away, nor did she move her hands from the sides of his head.
He knew she was right; even if it weren’t for their child in the next room, continuing any further was asinine. And while in his lifetime John had occasionally been an ass, he’d never been a stupid ass. Not for the past several years anyway.
He kissed the slope of her right breast, then with his body aching to continue, urging him to push her to the floor and give her nine inches of good wood, he drew back. When he gazed into her face, he came very close to giving in to his physical hunger. She looked a little stunned, but mostly she looked like a woman who wanted to spend the rest of the evening naked.
“Cryin‘ all night,” she whispered, and reached for the edges of her blouse, pulling them together.