Love in Bloom

by Alison Kent

  She'd shrugged off the extra layer, which left her in the decidedly too tight pullover she'd worn for Zack's shoot today. At least it was dark and Carson wouldn't notice how tight the shirt had grown beneath his gaze, a gaze all the more intoxicating for appearing otherworldly under the flickering lights from the television screen and the shadows shifting through the room.

  Eva's standing vantage point caused Carson to continue to look up, and his eyes reflected the motion of the movie playing against her back. By this time his gaze had reached her face, and he blinked slowly, lazily, seductively, before saying, "I was waiting for you to undress me."

  She was not going to get into this with him. She refused to get into this with him. No matter how much she wanted to get into this with him, she wouldn't.

  He didn't wait for a response, but straightened from his reclining position and poured the Merlot into both glasses. "Time out, Eva. Sit. Drink with me. Watch the movie. Let's call a truce. Pretend we're old friends."

  "I doubt we can do that."

  "We can give it the old college try."

  "Hmph." Eva reached for the wineglass, turned around, and sat on the edge of the sofa, not close enough to Carson to appear to be offering him any sort of invitation, but not far enough away to be rude.

  They could do this. Drink together. Watch the movie together. Call a truce and pretend.

  Of course she'd barely managed one sip before Carson scooted closer. She gave him a sideways glare, ignoring the tingle where his thigh brushed her thigh. Ignoring as well his hip nudged to her hip.

  "What happened to the old college try?" she asked.

  "What? Two friends can't sit close and watch a movie together?" His arm went around her shoulder then, and he pulled her into his side, leaning them both back into the huge cushions. "Besides. I walked out in the middle of my second year."

  She knew she should be fighting harder against Carson's hold, but was it such a bad fate, really? This temporary weakness of being held by a man who'd known her half a lifetime ago? Whose chest was strong and warm and supportive? Whose hip cradled the curve of hers? Whose thigh was solid beneath the length of her leg?

  Oh, he felt so good. He felt so incredibly good.

  This sitting with him here in her home on her sofa, even after so many years, seemed so right. And though she knew she needed to straighten her backbone, she slumped against Carson in the pure physical enjoyment of being with a man, savoring the textures, the strength and resiliency of his body so different from hers.

  In silence they watched the movie for several minutes more. Or at least Carson watched as Hawkeye saved the life of a lone runner with his long rifle. Between the wine and the warmth, however, Eva was too relaxed to watch anything, or to notice much at all beyond how comfortable she'd become with the same man she'd slapped in her kitchen not long ago.

  Eyes closed, she gave herself permission to enjoy this time with Carson, to take full advantage of these stolen moments, to not analyze the feelings and look for meaning and depth where none would be found. But no matter how loudly repetitive were her mental admonishments to feel and not to think, she couldn't rid her mind of the words proclaiming a thin line between love and hate.

  What exactly did she feel for this man? What was she doing here with him, anyway? Were they friends? Or only old lovers who'd never learned to let go? And what did that say about either of them if the latter was true? How could two well-adjusted successful adults be so hung up, so caught up, so wrapped up in the past?

  A part of Eva's subconscious realized that Carson had grown still—not that he'd been overtly moving, but now he'd almost ceased to breathe. His body had grown tense. A different tension from the stiff supportive effort of sitting beneath her weight. This tension was bone deep, pore deep, and it seeped into Eva's relaxed state of body and mind.

  She lifted her wineglass for a thoughtful sip, her gaze caught by the picture displayed on the television screen. It was Hawkeye. Heading for the hospital in search of Cora. One-hundred-percent-pure-male intent darkening his expression. He found his woman. And Cora went with him willingly, placing her hand in his, welcoming him as his one-hundred-percent- female counterpart, his mate, his love.

  Eva watched the on-screen lovers kiss and touch. Watched life flare between soul mates. Watched love weave golden ribbons in and out of their hair and sprinkle stars in their eyes. Watched as they took emotion to the end of the line while fiddles and soft flutes and deep bass tones spun a musical web of romance.

  Eva wasn't stupid. Nor was she unaffected.

  So while the two lovers embraced, she leaned forward and set her wineglass on the table. Slowly, she eased back, fully aware that she was tossing caution to the wind. That she was taking a chance and reaching for whatever this night might bring.

  Tucking her shoulder into the cove of Carson's, she shifted on her hip to the side just enough to enable her to look into his eyes. What she saw there ... oh, what she saw there. Her hands began to tremble. She held them still, lacing her fingers together. The look in his eyes promised rapture and Eva could hardly breathe.

  He emptied his wineglass with their gazes locked, but didn't bother with the coffee table. Instead, his glass disappeared between the sofa cushions behind him. The arm supporting Eva's shoulders drew her closer. And then his mouth was on hers. His eyes remained opened. And while he kissed her, he watched her.

  He tasted of Carson and he tasted of wine, dark and mysterious and rich and seductively warm. He was not gentle with his body when he turned and pressed her into the back of the sofa. He was not gentle with his eyes when he refused to release his hold on her gaze. He was not gentle with his tongue when he demanded she open her mouth.

  She opened willingly. Tears rose in her eyes, tears that sprang from the sob lodged in a hard ball above her heart. Oh, Carson. He had never had to demand. He would never have to demand. She'd given him her all years before. And now she gave him even more.

  She had never stopped loving him. She had never put her life on hold. She had never shut herself off from emotion.

  The love she felt for Carson had continued all these years to reside in the deepest secret part of her heart. And in her mind as well, letting her know now exactly how strong a hold he had on her. As strong as the hold she had on him.

  Whether fate or luck had brought them together this night, whether tonight was only a moment out of time or the beginning of a second chance, Eva wouldn't take time to examine. That would come later. Much much later. After his hands had finished testing the elasticity of her pullover, after seeing for himself exactly how the fabric fit her rib cage and the not-so-flat flat of her stomach.

  He didn't bother checking to see how the material molded to her breasts—the one place she most wanted him to explore. He obviously found that endeavor a waste of time, moving instead straight to her hem and wiggling his big fingers underneath until he had the whole of his hand on her skin. The heel of his palm settled above the dent of her navel; the tips of his fingers grazed the cups of her bra.

  He levered himself above her, moving his knees to either side of her hips, bracing himself with one arm behind her head along the back of the sofa. His weight, she had forgotten. But she had known him at a different time. With a different body, yet a body that was still the same. His taste was the same as well. But his kiss was not one of memories. It was of the moment. And she felt that they were making love for the very first time.

  The hand beneath her shirt made quick work of the clasp of her bra, and Eva quivered at the teasing flutter of his fingers. And then his palm was measuring her fullness, her weightiness, his fingers drawing her nipple into a peak. A peak that invited his mouth. He lifted her shirt hem to her shoulders, but that wasn't enough for he was impatient.

  He groaned and he growled. "Sit up." Again demanding. Again there was no need. She even helped him strip off both the pullover and the bra he found to be such a nuisance.

  And then he had her flat on her back, and he set
tled his knees deep in the sofa cushions on either side of her thighs, hovering over her and alternately kissing, suckling, licking, and learning the changes to the curves of the body he'd introduced to passion.

  Her breasts were going on thirty-seven, not barely eighteen. They showed the effects of age and gravity and too many uncomfortably hot Texas summer days spent without a bra. He didn't care. He didn't care about anything but filling himself with her. He hummed and growled, panted and blew, the noises and the brush of his breath as arousing to her as they were a release to him.

  "I wasn't lying, you know," he said, dragging his tongue from one nipple, between her breasts, and taking the other peak into his mouth.

  She arched her back. "Lying?"

  "In the rain, at Blooms." He dropped a line of soft kisses up the length of her neck to her chin. "When I told you how beautiful you are. That you're more beautiful now than you were when we were lovers."

  "You're just horny." She laughed. It had to be nervous excitement. Then she swooped in a sharp breath as he pulled hard on her skin with his lips. "Don't. You're going to leave a mark."

  "I've had a hard-on since I walked into your shop, Eva." He'd moved lower on her body and he mumbled the words against her rib cage, but she heard them clearly enough. "Don't tell me. Don't."

  Hours ago, days ago, she would've taken offense. Now she knew the nature of the beast that was this attraction between them. A beast with long legs and strong arms. A beast that fed on lust and drank of romance and cultivated a feeling strong enough to have lasted for so many years.

  She wasn't offended.

  Only equally aroused.

  And determined to take her equal rights.

  She crawled out from beneath him, until her head hit the arm of the sofa. She used the heels of her palms to push herself into a sitting position, used the same two hands to push Carson down flat on his back.

  He didn't argue or complain. At least he didn't after he had untangled his legs from hers and from the sofa cushions and returned his cast to the floor. She planted her knees over his in a mirror of his earlier position. She splayed her hands over his pectoral muscles, and regretted not stripping him bare before getting him where she wanted him.

  He seemed to feel the same, because he quickly shed his black T-shirt and threw it over the back of the couch. Then he took her hands and returned them to their previous position on his chest. And he circled his arms around her waist, resting his wrists on her hipbones.

  "Much better," he said, and Eva nodded her agreement. How could she not agree when her skin was on his skin? Her hands, which were no longer a model's hands, on the chest of the man who was no longer a boy?

  The fuzz of hair on his chest was thicker but not too dense, just enough to tickle her palms and the pads of her fingers. Using only her fingertips, she gently massaged her way to his collarbone and his shoulders, then back down his chest to his flat belly and the softer, longer whorls of hair bisecting the ridge of muscle below.

  "This is better, isn't it?" She continued to explore and indulge in the tactile feast beneath her. She'd forgotten he felt this good. He'd never felt this good. This man's body rising beneath her, the pressure of his erection hard and straining upward in the cradle of her bottom, was at the same moment new and as old as time.

  Carson reached behind her, moving his hands from her waist to her backside and lower, his fingers exploring, pressing, kneading, squeezing. Eva ground against him because he'd managed to find— or had he remembered?—that incredibly erogenous spot between her legs where her inner thigh met the curve of her pelvic bone.

  She lifted her chin, tossed back her head, allowed him to work his magic. With her hands flexing into his shoulders, Eva's frustration grew, climbing until she let out a near agonized cry.

  "You know, this would be a lot better if you'd take off your pants."

  A thrill raced from Eva's fingers twined in Carson's soft hair down to that part of her beneath the black denim he wanted to remove. It was a tempting proposition, getting naked with this tempting man, and probably not the wisest move for her to make at this time in her life.

  But she didn't care. Not about wisdom and caution. Or about what was right and what she needed. Because this was what she wanted. This man, this night, all of the here and now for as long as it lasted.

  She'd been alone for too long.

  Pushing against Carson's body for leverage, she got to her feet and there in her living room, with the renewed sounds of battle raging on the screen behind her, she stood half naked in the darkness and allowed Carson to watch while she worked open the button, worked down the zipper of her jeans.

  And then she stopped and smiled down at Carson where he lay on the sofa, hands stacked beneath his head, watching her, waiting for her to finish. She could see by the hot gleam in his eyes that he was anxious for her to finish, way beyond ready for her to finish.

  But she preferred more even odds in this game. I suppose you're just going to watch."

  He rocked his head in a thoughtful sort of nod. I was thinking about it."

  "You were thinking wrong." Bare-breasted, she planted her hands at her hips and dipped her chin toward the lower half of his body. "Your pants have to go."

  "I was thinking about that, too. Thinking you could help with that." His hands went to his fly and he made quick work of his fastenings, giving Eva the barest glimpse of white cotton before he swung to a sudden sitting position. "Right after I help you get out of yours."

  Ah. Finally. The full contact participation she'd been waiting for. Carson settled his hand on her hipbones, his fingers grazing the bare skin just above the loosened waistband of her jeans. He pulled her forward one step, then another, made sure that she faced him directly, then buried his face in the open V of her unzipped jeans.

  His breath was warm and his lips pliant as he kissed and nipped at her skin, healing the tiny love bites he took with the press of his tongue. Eva held his head, threading her fingers into his thick hair and closing her eyes to the unraveling going on deep in her core.

  When Carson moved his hands around to her back, hooked fingers into her waistband, and began working down her jeans, she couldn't hold back a whimper. He heard and was obviously pleased, the arrogant beast, because he chuckled against her skin and dipped his tongue under the elastic band of her practical athletic gray panties.

  "Don't stop," she gasped. He could be as arrogant as he wanted as long as he didn't stop. She blew out a breath of longing. Nothing had felt this good, this right for a very long time in her life. And nothing had ever felt like Carson Brandt.

  His teasing had never been fair. Had always brought her to the edge long before she was ready to go over. He knew that now because he'd known that then. And that was why he was doing what he was doing with his tongue. Moving from hipbone to hipbone while his hands worked her jeans over her backside to her knees, where his fingers stayed to tickle.

  The touch brought her close to falling. She moved her hands to his shoulders, bracing herself to kick out of the jeans, leaving her in panties damp from his mouth as well as from her response. She might as well have been naked. She felt that bare, that exposed.

  "Carson." She moaned, wanting to bare more, to expose more.

  "Eva," he replied, drawing his palms up the backs of her thighs, sending his fingers upward into the leg openings of her panties and urging her apart.

  She felt the press of each fingertip between her legs and wiggled, wanting his touch deeper. He shook his head, knowing what she'd asked though she hadn't said a word. He gripped her elastic waistband with his teeth, snapped it gently against her belly, then gathered the fabric of her panties and pulled them to her feet.

  He settled his mouth where she wanted his mouth, where she wanted his fingers, where she wanted his tongue. His tongue was smooth, it was sandpaper rough, it was hard as an erection, it was soft. It was all she could do not to come in his mouth.

  But holding on and holding back was even more a
rousing. She allowed him to play for a couple of minutes more. Then she had to stop him because it was time to turn the tables.

  She stepped back, and watched Carson's frown deepen as the television images flickered over his face. "Time to take your clothes off, big boy. Time to rise and shine."

  She said that because she knew how he would look. How full his penis would be. How slick the shaft. How taut the head. And he did not disappoint, removing everything he wore until he stood before her in his cast and in the dark, the room and his skin lit by only the movie.

  He was gorgeous, beautiful, incredibly male, broad in the shoulders where he needed to be broad. Wide in the chest, strong in the biceps, narrow and lean where it counted on a man, in his hips and his stomach. His legs were a runner's legs, no, a sprinter's legs, with the muscle required for power rather than for endurance.

  His endurance was evident elsewhere. Oh, so evident as he propped his hands at his hips and said. "I'm waiting."

  "And so you are," she answered, then sat where he'd been sitting, while he stood where she'd been standing. She intended to return every long licking inch of the torture he'd inflicted on her.

  But Carson had other plans. "Later," he said, and shook his head, reaching for her hand and drawing her to her feet. "I need to feel you. All of you."

  She moved into his embrace, wrapped her arms beneath his and around his back, stepping as close as she could, running her hands from his shoulder blades to his backside and settling her palms at the dip in his lower spine, a mirror image of where his hands had settled on her body.

  They stood entwined for a long moment, full of so many memories and so many years gone by and so many "what ifs" and "what might have beens." And then Carson throbbed, once, twice. Pressed as his erection was between their bodies, Eva couldn't help but notice the way he pulsed. And then he pulsed again, and she knew he'd done so for her benefit.