Adria didn’t really need it but took the time, savoring the moment as she ran her hands over his back, committing every contour, ripple, and smooth plane to memory. Next, she traced her fingers over his broad shoulders, up his neck, and over the close-cropped hair on the sides of his head that was surprisingly soft to the touch.
In turn, his kisses grew more demanding. His mouth opened on her throat and blazed a hot trail down to her breast where his wet tongue circled the hard point. With his long body bowed over her, he repeated the sensual caress again and again, before moving to the other side and teasing that nipple too. At the same time, he rocked into her, plumbing her depths until she thought he had no room left to go, but each time he slid out and returned, he sank in farther, proving her wrong.
Her fingers curled into his shoulders as tingling waves of sensation claimed her lower belly, her thighs, and all the needy, achy parts in between. The whorls of hair on his chest teased her nipples with every thrust of his hips.
“Beck,” she whispered, as the tension grew inside her.
“Relax, darlin’, and go where it takes you.”
Shifting over her, he reached behind him and pulled her feet up higher, so they linked at the small of his back. In this position, she took him deeper, unbelievably so. When he began to move in a slow glide in and out, the fullness and extent of his possession sent her soaring.
For the next several minutes, there were no words, only the sounds of their fevered kisses, breathless moans, and, for Adria, the pounding of her racing heart in her ears. It hadn’t been long since her first release, but every thrust drove her relentlessly toward ecstasy.
“Let go,” he urged. “I’m right there with you.”
At the point of no return, she couldn’t have held off if she’d wanted to. As the first tremor passed through her, she buried her face in his neck and surrendered to it. Hotter and more powerful than before—which she would have sworn wasn’t possible—her climax took hold. With her arms and legs wound around him like a clinging vine, every muscle in her body tightened, and his name burst past her lips in a low, throaty shout.
When the vibrations began to ebb and a warm lassitude claimed her, she watched through half-lidded eyes while Beck sped toward the peak of his desire. While he plunged inside her again and again, she reveled in the knowledge she could bring him the same intense pleasure he’d given her. She knew it was upon him when his jaw tensed, his neck arched, and he drove home once more with a bone-deep bliss-filled shout, finding his own shuddering release.
LYING SATED IN HIS arms afterward, her cheek pillowed on his chest as her fingers trailed up and down the ridges of his abdomen, when his hand slid lower and curved over her tender behind, she was reminded of the precursor to two amazing climaxes.
“Beck?”
“Right here, darlin’.”
She hesitated about broaching the topic but had to know the answer.
His other hand joined the first, and, palming both cheeks, he pulled her up his body until they were nose to nose. “If you got something to say—”
“Don’t let it simmer, I know.” Well, here goes. “You said you weren’t a spanking kind of man.”
He grunted. “I did say that, didn’t I? I guess fear of you winding up drained, shriveled, and no longer with us convinced me otherwise.”
She propped herself on an elbow to see him better while they talked. “It’s been three months, and there haven’t been any more incidents.”
“It’s been three months of investigating, and we still don’t know what happened.”
“All three had the same bites and the same toxic levels of venom in their blood.”
“Yes, but your tests couldn’t determine when it happened. Before or after they died.”
“No. But what else could it be?”
His fingers flexed on her still warm bottom cheeks before he uttered, “Or who else.”
“Who?” she echoed, the single word coming out in a shocked gasp. “What aren’t you telling me?”
He didn’t respond right away, but this close she couldn’t miss the barely perceptible tightening of his mouth. “I shouldn’t worry you. I don’t have proof, just a gut feeling this isn’t over.”
“I get intuitive feelings at work almost every day. Sometimes, it’s all I have to go on. But, Beck, who here would do such an awful thing?”
“No one I know, but someone not from here very well could have.”
She shook her head in denial. Her movements sent a thick swath of hair over her shoulder and onto his chest. It was like a magnet to his fingers, but from the distant look in his eyes as he began to slowly comb through it, his mind was elsewhere.
“How would anyone get past security? One of our ships monitors activity on Terra Nova constantly.”
“According to your military, there are several suppression fields on the planet where a small craft could enter undetected by Primarian scanners. One of them is in the mountains north of the city. Before the global force field became operational a few nights ago, we were vulnerable.”
She lay down again. “I hadn’t realized.”
“Only a few of us did. There wasn’t any point in inciting widespread panic when we were doing everything possible to protect ourselves. By that I mean one of your battlecruisers running twenty-four seven surveillance.” He brought the coil of hair he’d been twisting around his finger to his lips, and, staring pensively at the ceiling, rubbed it across them as if testing its softness. Adria doubted he did it consciously, his mind, again, on something else. “It’s possible I’m worrying over nothing, and it was simply a case of coincidence and poisonous spiders.”
“How often is your gut instinct wrong?”
When he didn’t answer right away, she craned her head and took in his deeply troubled expression, which was answer enough. “I was afraid of that.”
He released her hair, wrapped his arms around her, and rolled them, switching positions. With him on top, both hands sank into her hair. She could read the unease in his crystal-blue eyes as he gazed down at her.
“The planet is locked down, now, but you’re still under guard. That means no more midnight rendezvous in my bed.”
She didn’t like the sound of that at all. “That’s not fair. We’ve just reunited.” Her protests were cut off by his demanding lips as he gave her an intensely hot kiss. It left her rather dazed and ready for amazing climax number three.
“Make-up sex is often inspired, that it was also your first time made it even more so. It’s one of many firsts I plan to introduce you to, but I’m not willing to wait until this mystery is solved to do so. That’s why I’ll be coming to you from now on.”
Lying next to him in her cozy but much smaller bed, which mandated closeness and cuddles due to the size of his shoulders, was a common theme of her dreams, and she couldn’t formulate the mildest of protests. Then she remembered the three hundred tenants in her building, many of whom liked to gossip.
“What if someone notices you coming and going?”
His blue eyes flickered in annoyance. “It’s no one’s business except ours.” Then he sighed deeply. “Although I wouldn’t want your brother to find out from the rumor mill. I suppose we’ll have to be discrete until we break it to him.”
“Break what? I mean”—she waved her hand, encompassing them both—“what is this? For that matter, what are we?”
“Together,” he replied succinctly. “We’ll sort out labels and baggage, which we both have, soon enough. I don’t like clandestine meetings or secrecy; sneaking around gives the impression we’re doing something wrong. We’re two adults enjoying each other’s company. We shouldn’t have to hide out in your apartment all the time, and I won’t give up our pool nights or darts.”
“I don’t want that either,” she agreed quietly.
Together.
On the surface, it sounded wonderful, but it came without a commitment or sense of permanency, which Beck had made clear he didn’t want.
<
br /> What happened tomorrow, or next week, or the week after that? In a month, would she have to smile if she saw him about town with another woman—possibly the pretty blonde—as though it didn’t matter? The last time had sent her into a spiral of depression. But wasn’t whatever brief time she had with him worth it?
It would have to sustain her when she went home to her lonely existence. She just had to hope her heart was in one piece when that day arrived.
She bit her lip, as the insecurities of the past twenty years flooded back.
“What’s that look about?”
After her gaze skittered away, Adria opened her mouth to refute anything was wrong, but he stopped her denial with his thumb.
“I taught you pool and darts, but don’t expect me to teach you Texas hold ’em.”
Her lashes swept up, and her eyes locked with his. “Pardon me?”
“It’s a card game that requires a lot of bluffing.” His fingers stroked the bridge of her nose and her brow. “You have a very expressive face and would lose your shirt. Tell me, what has you frowning?”
“The woman with you in the park the day of the concert,” she blurted out. “Who was she?”
He blinked, clearly not expecting this. “You mean Becca?”
They complemented each other. Beck and Becca. Hell, even their names matched.
“I never mentioned her before, which explains a lot.”
“I should have asked what she meant to you before we—” More than a little self-conscious, heat suffused her cheeks, and, her eyes darted around the room looking at everything except the bed.
“Yeah, you probably should have, but since she’s my sister, we can overlook it.”
“Your sister!”
“Yep, she’s younger by four years almost to the day.”
Half in relief, half in dread at her mistaken assumption, she admitted, “I didn’t know you had family here.”
“Three days away by ship isn’t exactly here. But it’s a damned sight closer than Earth.”
The image of the delicate beauty—creamy skin instead of tanned and white-blonde hair instead of golden brown—laughing up at Beck had burned into her brain.
“She looks nothing like you.”
“If you’d hung around long enough for me to introduce you, you’d think otherwise. Like you and your brother, we have the same eyes. The light blue we inherited from our mother.”
“I assumed—”
“That never ends well, does it?” he scolded gently.
Adria shook her head, feeling worse about her behavior. He had a sister!
“Instead of running, I should have simply asked, but I was shocked to see you there, especially with another woman. The two of you looked close, and so soon after being with me, even though we didn’t leave things well, I thought—”
“That I was a player,” he finished for her. She stared at him blankly until he expanded, “A heartless man who hops from one woman to the next without regard for her feelings.”
“I’ll admit it crossed my mind. But mostly, I thought it was me you didn’t want.”
He curled his fingers beneath her jaw, not allowing her to look away. “I’ve wanted you since the first moment I saw you, and tonight wasn’t nearly enough.”
Beck’s head descended as Adria’s came off the pillow. Their lips met in a passion-filled kiss that proved his words true—neither of them had had enough.
OVER THE NEXT WEEK, they fell into a predictable pattern, not of where or how they were together, but that every spare minute was spent in each other’s arms. They both worked long hours. Adria never knew when his knock would come. It might be just after she arrived, several hours into the evening, or after she’d gone to bed, but he never missed seeing her no matter the hour.
The mornings were the hardest. She’d wake to his side of the bed empty, grown cold because he’d left her before dawn. Usually with hungry kisses, which often led to another glorious joining, but he’d always be gone before the pink fingers of sunlight crept over the horizon signaling a new day, and before her neighbors stirred. Neither of them liked it, but until she had a chance to set up a relay call with Trask, it was how it would be.
A few days into the week, he surprised her with lunch, arriving with sandwiches from the lunch counter. Something he called brown bagging it, apropos since he arrived holding a brown paper sack.
It gave her something to look forward to in the middle of her workday. Not due to the quality of the food, since, often, that was wolfed down at the last minute when the kisses and touches they shared turned intimate. The first day when they sat in the open cargo hold of his work vehicle, other residents going about their days around them, the lack of privacy turned into a frustrated half hour of yearning. After that, Beck did his best to find a quiet spot where they wouldn’t be seen or disturbed.
She was cleaning up at the end of a trying, hectic day, the growing number of children on the colony with various minor illnesses—sniffles, coughs, tummy aches—keeping their walk-in clinic busy, when a softly uttered, “darlin’,” in Beck’s husky voice surprised her enough to make her jump.
In her excitement, she turned so fast she bumped into the cart of supplies she’d been restocking the exam room from. Several items fell to the floor with a crash, which brought two of the technicians running.
“It’s fine,” she assured them. “Just me being clumsy.”
Her cheeks were flushed with embarrassment as she bent to pick everything up. They squatted alongside her and helped despite her protests. Very soon, with everything put to rights, they left her alone with Beck.
“I didn’t mean to startle you, but I had to see you.”
She glanced at the clock. “It’s only been a few time cycles since lunch.”
“I know, but five hours seemed like a year. I couldn’t get you out of my head all afternoon and was getting nowhere with work.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips, the sweetly romantic gesture making her heart race.
“I’ve been distracted, too. This wasn’t the first thing I’ve dropped today.”
“All the sneaking around is getting to us,” he told her pointedly.
“I’ve sent a message to Trask that I need to talk to him, privately, though I’m not sure what I’ll say.”
“The truth might be best.”
“I’m heading out, Adria.”
They both turned to see Juna in the doorway.
“Hi, Beck. Nice to see you again.” A knowing smile curved her lips, since they’d chatted when he came by for lunch earlier.
“Doc,” he acknowledged.
The other woman’s eyes slid to her. “See you in the morning, Adria. Have a good night.”
Though she wouldn’t swear to it, she thought she heard her chuckle as she walked away. “She knows.”
“Probably,” he replied. “Another reason to tell your brother.”
“But tell him what? That we’ve moved beyond friends with benefits? Is there an Earth term for that?”
The hand holding hers tightened. “Do we have to define it?”
“If I’m going to tell Trask, probably.”
“Isn’t there such a thing as dating in your world?”
“No.”
He grunted. “Who is escorting you home?”
“It’s Thursday, so it’s Tarus’ turn.”
“Call him and let him know you’re having dinner with a friend who will see you home afterward.”
“I am?” His tawny brow arched, and she smiled. “I guess I am.” She reached into her uniform pocket, fished around past the stash of bright-colored adhesive bandages she kept there for the children, and pulled out her communicator. “Please, not Milton’s,” she entreated as she accessed the device.
“No. I had a much better place in mind.”
“Really?” Intrigued, she glanced up from the screen. “I hadn’t heard of a new restaurant opening.”
“You’re in for a treat. Casual dining with great atmosphere,
and no one else knows about it, so we’ll have the place to ourselves.”
“Where is this place?”
“On the edge of town, not far from here. It’s called Kincaid’s.”
She found it impossible not to return his disarming smile. “It sounds like my kind of place.”
“Call him, and let’s get out of here.”
They were starving by the time he opened his door, but not for food. Once inside, he slammed the door and pushed her up against it as his mouth swooped down and claimed hers.
“I can’t seem to get enough of you.”
“Me either,” she breathed between kisses as she shoved his heavy coat from his shoulders. When he shrugged it off and let it drop to the floor, she grabbed fistfuls of his T-shirt and tugged it out of his jeans. Desperate to be next to him, skin to skin, she shoved up the material to get to him.
He pulled it over his head, which left him bare above the waist. Hungrily, with her hands racing over his back, his sides, and the light fur on his front, she leaned in and licked up the midline of his belly.
Having grown more daring in the course of the past week while spending every night in his arms, she veered to the right, lapping at his nipple before circling it with her tongue.
Beck’s hands sank into her hair, and his head fell forward, hitting the door with a thud. His groan sounded pain-filled, but she suspected the ache was about three feet lower and not from a bump on his forehead.
Adria sucked on the hard, flat masculine nipple, flicking it with her tongue as her fingers fumbled with the buckle on his belt.
“This ends here if you don’t slow down, darlin’.”
“When I said I couldn’t stop thinking of you, this is what I meant, Beck. You’ve tasted me every time, and I can’t keep from wondering what it would be like to return the favor.”
She eased his zipper down and reached inside. Her fingers curled around his hard, hot length as she tipped her face up to his. “I want a turn,” she entreated in a throaty whisper rife with desire. “Please.”
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