by Tina Donahue
In a month from now, she’d said last night, when I return to the circuit.
Away from here. Gone.
What then? Would he still desire her, would he miss her? Or would her time here prove to be nothing more than a pleasant memory of how he’d allowed himself a few moments of joy?
His body tensed with yearning so painful he could scarcely breathe. His battered heart resisted, shaking him back to good sense, warning him of what he’d been about to do.
Grabbing her upper arm, Zach pulled her into the hall, then went into the bath and closed the door, locking it.
Hands on the edge of the stove, Toni lowered her head and steeled herself for the inevitable…Zach finally coming downstairs to the kitchen.
She’d been in here for the last fifteen minutes, dressed to go to the shop, ready to make him breakfast…if either her job or food were still on the menu.
Swallowing hard, she shook her head, refusing to regret his kiss. Every inch of her ached for him, wanting his weight and warmth back on her, inside of her. A pulse beat in her pussy, it creamed again at her memory of his strong body, muscular pecs and masculine scent.
Damn. What was going through his mind right now? How to get her out of his house and shop? Probably.
Toni dragged in a breath, ordering herself to calm down. Worrying wasn’t going to make things better, though this endless wait might just kill her.
He’d stopped showering five minutes ago. She’d heard his footfalls moving down the hall, the uneven sounds telling her his leg must be hurting again. When he’d reached his bedroom, he shut off the alarm finally, cutting it off in mid-screech.
Since then, he’d been in his bedroom, slowly pacing from one end to the other. As he perfected his I’m-firing-you speech?
Chewing her lower lip, Toni pushed away from the stove and went to the coffeemaker, anxious to do something—anything—rather than remain frozen like a helpless victim. Maybe if Zach smelled breakfast cooking, he’d pretend their kiss and his foreplay hadn’t happened. Maybe he’d behave as he had last night after she’d wiped the sour cream from his mouth.
With the coffee finished, Toni draped the last bacon strip across the skillet. Her head jerked up at the sounds of Zach’s footfalls in the upstairs hall, heading for the stairs.
At what was surely coming, a wave of longing mixed with nausea steamrolled over her.
His footfalls drew nearer. His pace slowed. When his boots stopped tapping the hardwood floor, she looked over.
Zach stood framed in the doorway, his powerful body straining against his tee and jeans, utterly masculine, sensuous beyond belief. Unable to resist, her gaze roamed over him. He’d finger combed his damp hair. His face was freshly shaved, his eyes veiled.
Behind her, the bacon sizzled and popped.
Zach’s gaze darted to the skillet and the carton of eggs on the counter. His lips parted as though he intended to speak. In the end, he did not. He looked back at her, taking in her naked feet, blue-jean cutoffs and aqua tank top.
Toni’s nipples constricted with his scrutiny.
He took in a shallow breath, and finally spoke on a ragged sigh, “That shouldn’t have happened.”
Expecting him to say as much, Toni faced him. “Why not?”
His eyes jumped to hers. Obviously surprised, he parroted her words, “Why not?”
“Exactly.” She reached over and turned off the bacon so they could talk uninterrupted. Hooking her thumbs in her front pockets, she turned back to him. “I enjoyed what happened upstairs and so did you. We’re both adults. We both know what we want. We’ve known it from the moment I stepped into your garage.”
His gaze shifted to the side, then returned to her.
“We have a month,” she said, her voice throaty with arousal. “Why not have some fun? Why not enjoy it while it lasts?”
He shook his head. “No.”
Toni refused to back down. Even though he could never give her love, she still craved his warmth and strength. “Why?” She took a step toward him. “You have a girlfriend, a fiancée, an ex-wife you still think about?”
Shoving his fingers through his hair, he muttered, “I told you last night, I’m not divorced.”
“You told me you weren’t married.”
His hand dropped to his side. He heaved in a deep breath. “Or involved. With anyone.”
Toni didn’t understand his resistance to her and was reluctant to question. Had he loved someone who’d dumped him? What woman would be crazy enough to do such a thing? Even if some woman had, his actions upstairs hadn’t been feigned or hesitant. He’d wanted her as much as Toni wanted him.
Anxious to settle this, she spoke quickly, “Are you worried I’ll want something more than just sex? Do you think I’ll hold your garage or this place hostage?” She put up her hand, stopping him from answering. “I told you last night at the shop, I’m not a thief. And I’m certainly not going to call in a team of lawyers to slap you with a sexual harassment suit. I’m the one who just spent a few days in jail, remember? You’re the upstanding citizen. They’d believe you in a heartbeat.”
He sighed. “Good god, I never thought any of that, all right?”
She advanced another step. “Then you’re concerned there’s something wrong with me or I’ll get pregnant?” Before he could answer, she spoke softly, sincerely, “I’m clean, free of disease, Zach, and as far as having a child, it won’t happen. I’m fully protected. I know what it’s like to be alone, to be without a father to protect and love me. I’d never force a baby on a guy who didn’t want it. I’d never do that to any child, especially my own.”
Zach’s face flushed. For a moment, he looked lost, exactly as she’d felt for too many years. “Why are you so alone? What happened to—”
She cut him off. “No. Don’t go there…please.” She forced all emotion away, refusing to cry, to let him know how vulnerable she was. “This isn’t about my past. It’s about here and now. You and me. Having some fun. Then I take off. No harm done. You go back to your life. I go back to mine.”
Shoulders slumping, he lifted his face to the ceiling as though he couldn’t bear to hear another word.
Despite it, desire radiated from him, charging and thickening the air.
Desperate to be back in his arms if only for a little while, Toni murmured, “I know you want me, Zach. You’ve had a hard-on since we met. A few minutes ago, up in the hall, you proved it.” Her gaze dropped to the solid ridge of male flesh behind his fly. “You’re hard now.”
His nostrils flared as he inhaled deeply. He spoke in a choked voice. “So what if I am?”
“So do something about it.” Please.
A pulse in his throat jumped. His chest expanded with his fitful breaths.
Never had Toni seen a man struggle so hard to control the male animal within. With the other men she’d known, especially Joe, there had been little concern over crossing boundaries.
Why Zach was so different, Toni wasn’t certain. Nor did she care.
Passion sang in her blood. Her body buzzed with energy. She advanced another step, determined this moment would play out even if she had to goad him. “What’s the matter, Zach?” Cocking one brow, she reduced her voice to a sultry purr. “What’s the real problem? Don’t you know how to satisfy a woman?”
He went completely still, not even finishing his breath.
Several moments passed. The only sounds were the hush of the air-conditioning and the rapid thumping of her heart.
Lowering his head, Zach met her gaze with hooded eyes, his expression changed. He wore the look of a rutting animal, male, feral. He spoke through his teeth. “Sweetheart, you have no idea what I can do to you.”
Excitement snaked through her. Her cunt felt heavy and achy, needy of his cock. “You’re right.” She held his gaze. Challenge rang in her voice. “So why don’t you show me?”
Zach’s lids slipped down, hiding his eyes. As he opened them, danger continued to flare in his expression
and voice. “That’s enough. This conversation is over.”
“We’re not finished.”
“I said, knock it off.”
“Make me.”
Swearing, he crossed the room to her so quickly that Toni’s initial reaction was to step back. She did not. Head lifted, pulse racing, she stood her ground, looking at him looming above her. Formidable. Aroused.
“Make me,” she whispered.
Breathing hard, Zach slung his arm around her waist, using its weight and strength to haul her into him. His free hand went to her throat, his thumb beneath her chin, tilting it up. His powerful voice rumbled, “You have no idea what you’re asking.”
Imprisoned, with her mouth so close to his, Toni could barely breathe. Her lids snapped closed as he gave her a deep, brutal kiss, taking exactly what he wanted, precisely what she craved.
On a guttural moan, Toni sagged into his hard length, slipping her arms around his broad shoulders. With her anchored to him, he lowered his hands to her buttocks, cupping them, pulling her up until she’d wrapped her legs around his lean hips, her ankles crossed.
As he turned a slow circle, favoring his good leg, they each fought for control of the kiss. Zach triumphed, crushing her lips with such force the edges of Toni’s teeth bit into her flesh.
She dug her fingers into his tee, making fists around the fabric. With a muffled groan of pleasure, he took several steps forward, his uninjured thigh bumping into the table. Its legs skittered across the tile floor, plates and utensils clattering.
Breaking their kiss, he snuggled his face against her throat, his lips suckling it, tongue stroking.
Toni gasped in delight, the sensations he created nearly too much to endure. Sucking air, she shoved her fingers through his thick, wavy locks and lowered her face to his neck.
Zach’s body trembled as she licked his clean skin. He said something crude beneath his breath and moved his head, trying to get her to stop.
She would not.
On a new oath, he tightened his arm around her waist as he leaned forward, using his free arm to push the plates and utensils aside. A knife or fork fell to the floor. Its metal tinged against the tile, followed by the whap and rapid rattling of a plastic plate.
Lowering her to the edge of the table, Zach broke Toni’s hold on his neck and unwound her legs from his hips. “Lie back,” he ordered, his voice gruff, “arms above your head.”
Toni swallowed. The muscles in her sheath pulsed. With one elbow on the table, she slumped to a prone position, pulling her arms above her head. The edge of her tank top wiggled with her rapid breathing. She mewed as he slipped his long fingers beneath her cutoffs’ waistband, deeper than they needed to go, making his actions deliberately intimate as he unbuttoned and unzipped the garment.
Intent on stripping her, Zach breathed hard as he lowered the denim, each inch showing more of her skin. At her pubic hair, he stopped and looked up, his expression one of surprise and supreme pleasure that she hadn’t worn panties.
“Fuck me,” she begged.
His Adam’s apple bobbed with his hard swallow. Beads of perspiration dotted his forehead. He seemed ready to burst…ready to love.
Maneuvering the shorts past her hips and thighs, he pulled them from her legs hurriedly, dropping them on the floor, then turned back to her.
At the untamed lust in his eyes, Toni forgot to breathe. The room spun crazily. Squeezing her fingers for some measure of control, she stared at his fly, expecting him to unzip it and free his ponderous cock, tunneling the organ inside her, burying his sex to its root.
To her surprise, Zach sank to his knees, his head between her legs, his voice another command. “Put your feet on my shoulders.”
Spread wide, she shivered at the cool breath of air-conditioning falling on her damp pussy. With the heels of her feet against his shoulders and her toes curled down, Toni struggled to pull in a full breath.
Just as she succeeded, Zach stole it.
Back curved, she mewed in delight at his fingers burrowing into her opening, not stopping until he could go no farther.
Trapping and holding her with his indecent embrace, Zach ran his tongue up her moist cleft.
Toni cried out, the sound seeming too large for this space. She gasped at his tongue flicking her hard nub—his mouth’s wet, silky heat, the sensations it engendered. Ribbons of delight coursed through her, tightening the muscles in her shoulders and arms, the tension becoming so unbearable her body surrendered, growing limp, yielding. Relaxing her fingers, she gave herself fully.
Zach abandoned her clit, tracing the contours of her vaginal lips with his tongue, lapping her juices noisily, growling in pleasure. He worked her sheath with his fingers, pulling them out, driving them back inside as he returned to her nub. With his mouth latched onto it and his fingers invading her depths, Toni ground her teeth, wanting to hang on to the delicious feelings, unwilling to come too quickly.
Zach made certain she did not.
He kept pausing to suckle the inside of her thighs, which trembled with her arousal and struggle against climax. He licked her dark curls, catching a few between his teeth, tugging them playfully.
After too many minutes and her choking pleas, he returned to her clit.
Toni lifted her chin to the ceiling. Heels digging into his shoulders, her toes splayed, then curled with his steady suckling, the tip of his tongue flicking her small rise of flesh, his fingers driving in and out of her sheath, mimicking the actions of his cock.
In a burst of sound, Toni shouted, cursed, whimpered as her orgasm crested and broke.
With the climax’s undeniable force, her body shuddered uncontrollably. Held captive by pleasure, she couldn’t manage any control or propriety, allowing her legs to bow outward, exhibiting her partial nudity.
Zach took full advantage, nuzzling his face against her thatch of hair, making her want him more than any man she’d known.
After three tries, Toni forced down a swallow, then begged once more, “Fuck me, please.”
He stopped kissing the sensitive skin near her upper thigh and eased his fingers from her. With his mouth to her cunt, he spoke, his strained breaths warming her skin. “No.”
Her heart fell. Hadn’t he believed her about being protected? If so, didn’t he have any condoms? How was that possible for a man his age with his obvious sexual appetite?
Disheartened, she asked, “Why not?”
“I’m saving that for tonight.” He licked her still too sensitive clit, then promised, “All night.”
Chapter Six
Unsettled and distracted, Zach went through the morning, opening the shop, handing out work orders, adding up receipts, taking payment, his mind continually unfocused, snagging on what had happened this morning at his house and his subsequent promise to fuck Toni all night.
You have no idea what you’re asking, he’d said to her.
Zach had no idea what he was doing. One minute, he’d been ready to flee the kitchen and all the complications she represented, the next he was feasting on her and enjoying it as he had nothing before.
He rubbed his aching shoulder, trying to relax the muscles and stave off a tension headache. Since he’d lost Meg, he’d contented himself with lovemaking that was relaxing and enjoyable, not reckless, wanton, wild.
There wasn’t anything dainty about Toni. She held nothing back, except her past. She was guileless, blunt, earthy, sensuous, alive.
He swallowed and looked at the time. Only ten o’clock. Hours and hours before the day’s end and the promise of her stripped bare, spread wide, her cunt wrapped around his cock, her flesh yielding, demanding.
Elbows on his desk, Zach bunched his shoulders and hung his head, wondering what tomorrow would bring after tonight. Just as quickly, his mind shut down, not wanting to go there and consider the consequences.
Why not have some fun? she’d said.
Made sense. As she’d pointed out, they were both adults. They’d enjoy each other for a mo
nth.
Are you worried I’ll want something more than just sex? she’d asked.
Zach pressed his fingers against his forehead, rubbing it hard, wondering about the answer. Not for her, for himself.
She kept changing his mind about things. Hiring her. Allowing her to stay in a house that should have belonged to Meg. Wanting a measure of happiness and peace he’d once craved and hadn’t really allowed himself for nearly two years.
Indecision crowded him, making his snug office seem claustrophobic.
Through the glass window facing the shop, he heard its intrusive noise. Machinery whirred, engines raced. Toni, Angel and Robbie bantered, shouting their comments above the din and the top ten Country-Western hits blasting from the radio.
Her earlier words whispered in Zach’s mind.
This isn’t about my past. It’s about here and now. You and me. Having some fun. Then I take off. No harm done. You go back to your life. I go back to mine.
Leaving his office, Zach went up the street to walk off his tension, to avoid thinking. Agitation would have pushed him clear past the town limits if not for his bum knee and leg. Just short of the Last Chance Diner, he had to stop, his injured muscles hurting like a son-of-a-bitch.
One of the surgeons who’d operated on him had warned he might never be the same.
The fool had no idea.
The diner’s door opened, its bell tinkling as an elderly couple left. Snatches of conversation and chilled air poured out. The day’s heat wrapped around Zach, the breeze so dry his skin stung.
Hissing air through his teeth, he entered the diner to sit down and cool off.
At the counter, Em delivered a customer’s order and looked up, her smile halting when she saw his face. Instantly, she rounded the counter and went to him. “Hey, what’s up?” she asked, her tone worried. “You look weird.”
“Leg’s hurting.”
Her brows arched at his admission, something he’d never done before, always pretending he didn’t experience any pain.
“Let’s get you a seat. You can have your choice of booths in the back.”
