Jewel huffed out a breath of disgust and hauled herself up, slapping Vince’s hands away. She set her foot down and winced at the shooting pain in her ankle. Clutching the two broken halves of her glasses, she wound up to toss them into the undergrowth. She cried out when Vince’s hand closed around her wrist just before she winged the lenses.
“Don’t be a fool. You lose those glasses, we could possibly die.”
His eyes gleamed two black fires by the lunar light. She shuddered, captivated by the sudden animal sheen in them. She didn’t need to lower her gaze to see that he stood naked before her. Her peripheral vision, though slightly fuzzy without her glasses, didn’t miss the smooth, rippled, bare flesh, even in the dim light. No, this man’s prowess had a way of perking up all the senses and stimulating new ones she didn’t know she possessed.
Damn the cocky jerk.
“Huh?”
He tightened his grip and lowered her arm. “The lenses. They could be used as a fire-lighting tool. Since we don’t know what resources we’ll have or how long we’ll be here, don’t throw anything out. Got it?”
“Got it,” she replied through clenched teeth. Yanking her wrist from his hand, she asked, “Would you please cover yourself with something?”
He looked down, then back up at her. Of course, she should have known her suggestion would tip him off. He grasped the knot at her breasts and yanked her toward him. Her body slammed against him, and even though the quilt served as a barrier, she could still feel the bulge of his manhood against her lower abdomen. Even more aware of it now than she had been by the sight of it, memories of it ripping into her with passion only hours ago racked her body.
He jerked and pulled until he had the knot untied. The cloth slipped from her in one motion. Despite the shock of it, of the balmy air caressing every inch of her skin, she stood her ground, this time not giving him the satisfaction of so much as a flinch.
His eyes flitted to hers momentarily, and if she wasn’t mistaken, desire bloomed there as he moved his stare down the length of her. A small measure of retaliation, she decided, for he could look all he wanted, but he would no longer get to touch. His straight, white teeth glowed in the lunar light when he clamped the edge of the fabric between them and pulled downward in one smooth action. Soon, a tattered panel of the tan backing was peeled away. He wadded the remainder up and pushed it into her belly. She took it and watched as he fashioned himself a loincloth much like Tarzan might wear. With the moonlight spearing down on his sinewy build, and the new garment he wore now settled snug above corded, long legs, Jewel’s pulse surged up to choke her.
“Better?” He jammed his fists on narrow hips.
No, much more devastating. “Ah…yes,” she croaked. Swallowing a dry lump, she couldn’t help but hone her gaze in on the thickness that swelled from beneath the garment. Her pussy throbbed anew and the beginning traces of want trickled onto her inner thighs. That’s when she decided that naked would have been better. There was something about that uncivilized Tarzan look that proved lethal to her pride and determination to stave him off. So opposite from the well-groomed, well-mannered rogue she was more familiar with.
Trembling, she rewrapped the remains of the blanket around her body.
He turned. “Now watch your step this time. Follow me—and don’t get lost, you hear?”
She didn’t bother answering him. Though she’d give anything to be a thousand miles from him right now, he didn’t have to force her to stay with him. The dark jungle surrounding them, coupled with the eerie sounds and sometimes-suspicious quiet within its depths, was enough to make her hug his heels. She forced herself to keep his sinewy back in her line of vision, for she could swear half a dozen twin pairs of glazed red eyes stared back at her throughout the dense brush.
He trekked through the thickness, batting away draped Spanish moss and leaping over fallen trees. She limped along behind him, her ankle throbbing with pain, and never took her eyes from that broad back. It seemed, she noted, that he headed toward the sound of the rushing surf and open territory. Jewel winced, every now and then stepping on a sharp object or protruding seashell. Long palmetto leaves sliced at her skin like a garden of machetes. Insects buzzed about her head, and she slapped at the relentless pests where they bit into her uncovered arms and legs. Sweat dribbled down between her breasts, pooled in her armpits and gathered on her brow and upper lip. Now in stark contrast to the Arctic they’d just endured, this place was absolutely sweltering! God, what she wouldn’t do for a bath right about now.
She didn’t know how much time had passed, six, maybe eight hours, perhaps? It seemed the jungle went on and on, never-ending, despite the constant sound of the surf looming ahead. Disoriented, irritable, tired, thoroughly parched and hungry, she battled with her own mind. Was this all a nightmare, or was it real? How could all these discomforts feel so real if they were only in her sleep-filled mind? Oddly, the sun seemed to be on a schedule of its own, and she wondered if it were day, night, winter or summer.
Finally, she could take it no more. “Vince.”
He stopped and turned. His body glistened in the moonlight, the sweat shimmering diamonds on his finely cut frame.
Winded from both the sexy sight of him and the relentless journey, she panted, “I need to rest, to…to go behind the bushes.”
He nodded, jutting his chin toward a cluster of small, immature pines. “Go there. I’ll be able to keep an eye on you while still giving you your privacy. After you, I’ll take a turn, and then we better keep moving. I can sense the shore up ahead.”
It didn’t take them long to take care of the necessities. By the time they resumed the hike and broke through the edge of the mangrove onto a beach set within a lagoon, she was stripping the thick quilt from her drenched body. The water called to her, lapping, crashing into the narrowed mouth of the cove and onto the private beach. She couldn’t breathe, and desperately needed to feel the cool waters on her fiery skin. Tossing the broken glasses onto the pile of her torn and now filthy garment, she hobbled barefoot across the still-warm sand. The pain in her ankle became secondary to the immediate need for cooling relief. A blissful sigh escaped her when a balmy wind blew inland and ruffled her hair up and off her perspiring neck. It dried and cooled the ardor between her legs, making her long for nothing but the privacy of a refreshing dip in the water.
She could feel those eyes on her, branding her cooling flesh, but she didn’t care. Jewel stepped into the lapping waves, ignoring the sting of saltwater upon her many scratches and abrasions. In heaven now, she kept walking until the water swallowed her whole and blessed relief cradled her from head to toe.
* * * * *
Vince stood glued to the sand. Spellbound, he watched as she shed the barrier and walked right into the surf. He thought of a voluptuous mermaid, her abundant breasts free and gleaming in the silver moonlight, her body transforming from full woman to half-creature with each step she took into the sea. The lunar light made the golden blonde of her medium-length hair shimmer with tiny jewels, crowning her, further emphasizing the mystique of this woman he never truly knew before arriving on this island. His gaze moved down the long length of her, tracing every cushy curve, every inlet. He visually caressed his name etched upon her ass. Hot blood rushed to his cock and he knew a desperate need to follow her into that revitalizing lair. His breath quickened and he smacked his lips, savoring the taste of her that still lingered in his mouth. Sweat poured down his face and chest. He longed to cool his flesh yet stoke his ardor at the same time.
He had her back. The mere thought of it overjoyed him with giddiness. She was here, in his life once again. For four long years, he’d endured that empty, lonely life of trying to convince himself his carefree existence without her was every man’s dream. He’d been a lucky bastard to have all those women fawning over him—or so he’d insisted at the time. Vince snorted to himself. Well, that lifestyle of numb emotions and selfishness wasn’t his any longer. His dream stood before hi
m, a proud, beautiful siren of the sea. For the first time in his life he saw his future, he had direction. Direction that led him straight to her.
And he wasn’t letting her or anyone else tell him otherwise.
To prove that little point to her, he waded in, ignoring the insistent pounding in his loins. He walked into deeper water until he stood chest-high in the bay. His sweat-beaded skin sizzled against the cool waters. The gentle waves lapped against him, almost lulling him with their comfort and weightless quality upon his body. Weary, tired bones and muscles relaxed as he waited for her to rise out of the water.
She broke the surface closer to shore, her face tipped toward the starlit sky so that her hair slicked back across her scalp. It left her heart-shaped face prominent and unframed for his perusal. She sighed her relief and opened her eyes at the same moment his breath clogged in his throat. Twin orbs of palm-frond green stared back at him in the moonlight.
“What?” She blinked the droplets from her eyes. “What are you looking at?”
“You.” He turned and trudged toward her, never taking his gaze from her shocked expression.
“No!” A hand shot out of the water halting him. “Don’t you come any closer. Stay away or I’ll—”
She stumbled back into shallower water as he approached. Shaking her head frantically, she backed away from him, tripping on her own fear. She faltered, he knew with certainty, against her own temptations.
“Or you’ll what, Jew—Jane?”
He delighted in the gasp his slipup tore from her depths, even though he’d vowed to himself to play along with her farce. The jarring mistake made her completely lose her footing. She tumbled backward so that she landed on her ass, the water at waist level.
“What did you call me?”
He neared, dropping to his knees as the water surface rose to surround his hips. Vince crawled toward her where she lay sprawled in shallow water, her eyes round moons of fear.
“Jane. I called you Jane. That’s your name—isn’t it?”
She swallowed audibly. Leaning back on her elbows, she pushed with her feet against the underwater sand, attempting to crabwalk out of his reach.
But he anticipated her tactic long before she’d executed it. Snatching her uninjured ankle under the water, he yanked her toward him so that she became pinned beneath him, unable to escape.
“Isn’t it?” he asked again.
“Of course it is.” She pushed against his unyielding chest. The scent of her warm, salty flesh filled his nostrils, driving him wild with a need to taste her. “Now get off me.”
“Oh, I’m going to get off, all right. You can count on that, Jane.” Relief washed over her face at his casual use of the fake name. Obviously, she’d convinced herself he still believed her to be Jane. Which suited him just fine for the time being.
Her dazed whimper barely had time to escape before his mouth descended on hers. She struggled against him, her muffled cry and thrashing limbs further inflaming him. He swept her mouth with his tongue while his hands gripped her wrists and held them pinned above her head. Water lapped around her, making her appear all the more mermaid-like. Jewel bucked against his weight, but her wild, angry groans soon turned to reluctant moans as he wiggled his hips in between her legs. Under the cool water, the tip of his cock brushed her hardened clit. She stilled her fight and slowly her legs relaxed and spread wide. He twined one hand around both of her wrists, freeing one of his own hands for exploration.
Tearing his mouth from hers, he rained kisses over her bowed neck and panted, “Why do you fight me? Why do you always say no when you really mean yes?”
“No…” she cried softly. “Please, you don’t understand.”
“Oh, I understand perfectly. You see, me Tarzan, you Jane.” He filled his free hand with her swelling bosom and sucked a sea-bathed nipple between his lips. Warm, salty flavor burst in his mouth while his tongue dueled with the taut pebble. She arched against him, her cry of ecstasy rising up into the moon-glazed sky, out over the rush of the tide beyond the cove.
“And since you don’t seem to want to face your own body’s obvious desires, well, then…we’ll have to go at it primitive-like…” he snarled as he pushed aside the loincloth and aligned himself with her cunt. Alternating, she nodded and shook her head madly, as if a split personality battled in her head. “See? Indecisive female breed that you are, if you choose this route, I can be that jungle animal you secretly desire. I’ll choose for you. I know you. I know what you really want, Jane.”
“No—yes!” she screamed as he tore into her with the desperation of a wild beast. The fire of her passage made him shudder. The drastic change in temperature from the cool sea to her warm juices shocked him with blissful pleasure. He throbbed, nearly spilling his seed with the single motion of that one deep stroke.
“Tell me you want me.” He had to hear it from her lips before he went any further. He kissed her with sudden tenderness, her mouth, her cheeks, her chin, even as he held her down with brutal force. The sexual rage eased from him when she lifted her head, chasing his mouth with hers. Her full breasts rose and fell with each ragged breath she took, sliding sensually against his naked chest. The song of lapping waves around their joined bodies surrounded them.
Finally, she nodded and whimpered. “I want you, Vince. I’ve always wanted you, damn it.” She tore her wrists from his grip and stabbed her hands into his hair. Her legs clamped around him, imprisoning him in the trap of her womanhood. Even if he’d wanted to, there was no escaping her now. The primitive creature in her emerged, no longer the hunted, but the hunter. Her mouth found his with a rabid growl, the bittersweet flavor of sex still on her lips.
Jewel rammed her pelvis up against him, drowning his cock in her tightness. But carnal, animal instinct took over. She suddenly released her legs and pushed against him, rolling him over in the water. Still joined, she came over him, moaning her pleasure when her weight pushed him deeper inside her as she straddled him.
Looking up at her now, he thought of that sea siren. The full silver moon shone behind her head, crowning her with an ethereal glow. Behind him, the trees in the forest rustled in the balmy, coconut-scented breeze. His back lay against packed, wet sand while his rapid thrusts into her core caused the intermittent rise and fall of their joined bodies upon the incoming waves. Her breasts jiggled above him, the tight, knotted peaks dark candy morsels glistening in the night. He reached up and squeezed the fullness, twisting and pinching the nipples, further luring out the hidden animal in her.
Though she now dominated him by positioning herself on top, he remained in control. He saw who she was, knew it better than she did. She bounced on top of him, skimming her hands over first her body, then his, in an obvious frenzy of need. Her eyes went limpid and a guttural sound erupted from deep in her throat. That sticky canal tightened around his dick, and at that very second, she sucked in a breath and held it.
“I’m about to…”
“Oh, honey, yes. Let it out.”
She threw her head back and howled to the moon. Her luscious body twitched around him. A ferocious uprising of lust overpowered him. He slapped his hands down on her hips and dug his fingers in, holding her in place as his balls exploded. Erupting with a force to rival that of a volcano, his deep moan rose just as her cry died out. She collapsed upon his chest, and even though cool water surrounded him, his flesh burned in celebration at having her back in his arms again.
He gathered her close and glanced over her shoulder. Petting her back, he rubbed his palms over the moist, soft texture of her sea-soaked skin. Squinting, he gazed up at the moon—and swore he saw a raven-black, winged horse glide across the cratered surface carrying a man and woman.
But there wasn’t time to study it further. Jewel’s sobs drew his eyes back to Earth. The gulps started off soft, almost indiscernible, and escalated to full-blown wails.
“What…what’s wrong, babe?” He cupped her face and lifted her head so that he could look int
o her face. And what he saw there startled him. It far surpassed the emotion he’d seen the night she’d come to him with the marriage ultimatum. Her eyes glittered with a frightening mixture of torment and anger. The lips that only moments ago had devoured him with hunger, now tightened with restraint as she fought to suppress hiccups of pain. Every muscle in her body stiffened.
And without warning, she ripped herself from him. His cock jolted against the assault as cold water rushed around him. “What the hell?”
She leaped to her feet and marched from the shallow water. He swiveled his head, blinking as water sprayed his face. Watching her retreat, bafflement kept him floating there, speechless at the sudden change of mood.
“You bastard!” She bent and snatched up the blanket, presenting him with the luscious angle of her slit. “Don’t you ever do that to me again. Do you hear me? Huh? Do you hear me?”
He sighed, dragging himself up to a standing position. “So, we’re back to that, are we?”
“So, we’re back to that, are we?” she mimicked, snapping the sand from the cloth. With adept precision, she swirled it around her body and secured it with a knot at her breasts. Tattered now from their long journey through the jungle, it dragged the ground behind her in a train of torn scraps. His gaze moved lower to the legs that peeped out as she walked. And his eyes widened in disbelief.
“Why didn’t you tell me about that?” He waded from the water.
She followed the path of his stare and flipped the edge of the quilt over the wide, oozing gash on her ankle. “It’s none of your business,” she snarled.
“Jesus, woman, it’s going to get infected if you don’t do something with it.”
She crossed her arms over her abdomen and sauntered right up to him, accidentally brushing his lower abdomen as she did so. Awareness of her smell, her heat, even her remembered taste, burst in his brain. Looking up, she spit twin darts of fire at him. Tears had been replaced by a new more noble cause.
Me Tarzan, You Jewel Page 9
