by Ally Blake
She shot to her feet, the fresh air swarming between them allowing her to catch her breath.
Then his hand wrapped about her ankle. She got such a fright she dropped everything in her hands. Make-up wipes floated to her floor like snow.
‘Dylan,’ she warned, her voice husky.
‘Wynnie,’ he returned, in a voice she’d never heard before. It was so deep, so dark, so blatantly hungry she actually shivered.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked.
His cheek lifted. His hand slid further up her calf, sliding the wide hem of her track pants with it. ‘What do you think I’m doing?’
Something you shouldn’t, she thought before her eyes drifted closed and she breathed out hard through her nose.
Accidental touches, touches under the guise of being polite or professional—to this moment that had been it. And each and every one of those innocuous touches had set her nerves alight. His purposeful touch was irresistible.
‘What are you doing all the way over there?’ he asked, giving her a tug and putting her off balance.
‘I’m done,’ she said. ‘You’re on your way to being healed.’
‘Honey, we’re not even close to done.’ He sat up, slowly, his eyes not leaving hers, his hand sliding up her leg till it rested on her outer thigh, holding her in place. ‘Tell me why you brought me here?’
‘To fix your war wounds. You stood up for me and I felt beholden. I always pay my debts.’
Dylan just laughed, the sound trembling down her thighs into the backs of her knees. He tugged, she twisted and she was beside him on the couch.
‘You don’t owe me a thing.’ He reached up to sink a hand into the hair at the back of her neck. ‘And you brought me here because this has been inevitable.’
‘What?’ she asked, the word barely making it past her lips.
‘This.’
He pulled her to him, his lips sliding over hers, a perfect fit, as though they’d been there a thousand times before.
Every other sensation bombarding her, on the other hand, felt entirely new. The way her whole body melted against him like a fire had been lit beneath her. The need to wrap her arms tight about him so that she could be as close as she could possibly be. The build-up of relieved tears behind her eyes.
Then she remembered his split lip. She pulled away as quickly as she could, which was embarrassingly sluggish. Her finger hovered above his lip. ‘Doesn’t it hurt?’
‘Not a damn bit.’
He sank his face into her neck—it lost all bone structure and fell back to give him all the access he would possibly need.
‘You taste like heaven,’ he murmured near enough to her ear lobe that she shuddered deliciously.
‘Say that again,’ she begged.
She could feel his smile against her neck. And this time as he said the words his breath deliberately teased her ear and she let out a groan she could no longer suppress.
He slid her sweatshirt over her head. She tore so furiously at the front of his shirt several buttons popped right off. The sound of them hitting the polished wood floor felt like pebbles pelted hard against the inside of her head.
She let go of his shirt, and sat back with her hand over her mouth. ‘Oh, God, I’m so sorry! I broke your shirt.’
He didn’t even look to check; his eyes remained locked on hers. ‘Not to worry. I have more.’
Of course he did, but that wasn’t what had psyched her out. Her own wild abandon, the effortless loss of control—how deep could those untapped dimensions of herself possibly go?
In the resultant silence, she realised she wasn’t the only one who was caught in the deep end. Dylan’s breaths came thick and fast. The tendons in his neck stood out as if the blood flowed through his body at twice its normal rate. His eyes were so dark she wouldn’t have known their true colour if it weren’t permanently etched on her mind.
Her hand dropped from her mouth to grab the edge of the couch cushion for balance. Strands of her hair were stuck to her neck with sweat. Her heart rate was frantic. Her legs were wrapped about his hips and from the waist up she wore nothing but a delicate lace bra.
But she might as well have been naked for the way the look in his eyes made her feel. There was nowhere left to hide. Not behind her job, her name, her past. And for the first time in her life she felt herself living, right smack bang in the middle of the moment.
And then he slowly undid the rest of his buttons, and slid his jacket and shirt from his back.
Her eyes roved hungrily over his chest. His tanned skin was sculpted, smooth and perfect. The arrow of dark blond hair beginning at his navel and disappearing into his black trousers made her mouth turn completely dry.
No one human being had the right to look the way he looked. And she knew he was no angel. The fact that her skin felt hot, and slippery, as if it were tugging from her body, certainly assured her of that.
But now she had the taste of him in her mouth, the scent of him in her nose, on her clothes, constantly wafting across the back of her mind, reason took a backseat.
He reached out, his hands sliding around her waist, and he pulled her more fully into his lap. What little breath remained in her lungs left in a heady whoosh.
‘No regrets,’ he said, his voice rough.
She shook her head. She wouldn’t be sorry for this. It was inevitable. It was chemical. It was nature’s intent. And who was she, a hippy child from Nimbin, to argue with nature?
Wynnie slid her hands over his shoulders, the heat and curve of hard muscle giving her strength. She let temptation continue to guide her as her fingers delved into the short thick hair at the back of his neck. It fluttered through her fingers like velvet.
Then she leant in and kissed him. Open mouth. Tongue. Eyes closed. Luscious. Wet. Decadent.
He groaned into her mouth as he wrapped his arms so tightly around her she could barely breathe. But she didn’t care. All she needed was his hot skin, his undisciplined grip.
Only this time she really let go, and just let whatever would happen happen.
Every sensation heightened. Every touch, every shift of skin on skin, every catch of breath, every aching groan, every tantalising breath that whispered across her neck, her ear, the swell of her breasts, her hot lips. She imagined this must be what it felt like to be high.
Dylan Kelly was her drug of choice. And, despite the pleasure bombarding her from every angle, she knew he was the most dangerous kind of addiction she would ever know.
His hands moved to the clasp of her bra, unlocking it with practised finesse. He’d done it before. Many times if rumours were to be believed.
She closed her eyes tight to shut out the thread of doubt that brought on. The extent of his experience was the only hope she had that they’d be able to find a way to be professional after they were through.
Slowly, deliberately, his thumbs traced the outline of each and every rib as though it was something he’d fantasised about doing. His fingers slid around her sides to press firmly into the always tight muscles below her shoulder blades causing her to arch towards him.
Then his mouth moved to her breast, his breath washing across the taut peak sweeping every thought from her mind but pleasure. She cried out her thanks and arched closer.
The feather-light touch of his tongue circling her nipple was too much. But then it was nothing compared with the heat that rocketed through her body as he took her breast in his mouth.
She bit her lip to stop from crying out that he take her then and there. Because no matter how great the ache, it was an ache she found herself imagining she could live with for the rest of her life.
His teeth scraped painfully around her breast before pulling away. The cooling night air tickled at the moist spot and she broke out in an array of goose bumps.
His brow furrowed, and then he set to righting the wrong, his hands again running over every exposed inch of her.
‘Your skin,’ he rumbled. ‘It’s like fresh butter.
I’ve never in my life felt anything so soft.’
He slid from the couch and sank to his knees before her. Then he leant in and ran his tongue along the curve of her lowest rib. She breathed in deep as it curled into her navel and along the top of her track pants. He nudged them downwards so that he could scrape his teeth gently along her hip bone. She wasn’t sure whose moan was louder.
‘God,’ he groaned, running his thumb along the smooth skin an inch below her hip bone, ‘could you possibly taste any better?’
‘Caramel tart,’ she said on a sigh. ‘Tonight at the ball, there was a spare seat next to mine. I had seconds. By now it’s probably leeching through my skin.’
His laughter reverberated through her bottom half. The delectable shudder that followed was worth it.
His breath whispered against the rise of her belly as he said, ‘Mmm. I’m not sure that’s it. I have the distinct feeling the taste I can’t get enough of is all you.’
Using the finger stroking her hip, he tugged at her track pants and her bottom shifted lower on the couch. Another tug and they were gone, leaving her naked in the moonlight, bar a nude, seamless, barely there G-string tiny enough not to have shown under her silk dress.
Before she had the chance to even wonder about her bikini line, the G-string was gone—sliding down her legs, scraping delectably along her calves, and over her feet, and gone. Flicked away. Hanging from a palm frond in the corner of the room.
If she hadn’t known she was in the middle of the most decadent night of her young life, that clinched it.
Her eyes were drawn back to his. And it was only then that she realised he was still covered from the waist down, and thus, to all intents and purposes, dressed.
Her knees pressed together and she pulled herself into a more dignified upright position. ‘Somehow the balance of power has gone all your way,’ she said.
‘Wynnie, my sweet, you have got that all wrong.’ His eyes roved over her body, adoring it, worshipping it as he said, ‘You have me in your complete thrall.’
She crossed her legs, and crossed her arms. ‘So if I brought out a certain contract and waved it before your nose…’
His eyes turned so dark she thought she might have pushed her luck a centimetre too far. Until he grinned like a shark and lay his hands upon her knees, drawing them back apart. ‘How could I hope to hold a pen when my hands are so pleasantly occupied otherwise?’
How indeed.
Ignoring her round-about request that he disrobe, he instead returned to focus on her. He caressed her right leg, from her knee to her toes, massaging, melting. Then when he had her completely boneless he lifted her leg and lay it atop his shoulder.
The pure audacity sapped her breath from her lungs and her wide eyes shot straight to his. He smiled, and waited. Making sure she was okay.
She wasn’t exactly sure how to tell him she was more than okay, bar smiling back. Her cheeks felt shaky, her lips swollen and halfway numb. But it was obviously enough.
His mouth hovered at the juncture between her legs. It took every ounce of strength she had not to delve her fingers into his hair to guide him.
He looked up, and his eyes pierced hers. ‘Now tell me why you really brought me here.’
She slapped a hand over her eyes and bit back a scream. ‘Are you truly going to make me say it?’
‘I’m the devil, remember. It’s par for the course.’
She licked her lips as his breath washed across her thighs. ‘Fine,’ she croaked. ‘I brought you here because I wanted this. All of this. From the second you came strolling through that crowd outside your great big phallus of a building and saw me handcuffed to your statue like dinner waiting for you on a plate, I wanted you.’
And any other words she might have had in store were lost in a groan as he lowered his head.
Her arms shot out and her hands gripped the back of the couch. Her eyes slammed closed and her head snapped back.
His absolute tenderness astounded her. His deftness did not. It met her expectations and then steadily blew them out of the water.
Sweet agony lapped at her core. Wave after hot, liquid wave swelled and surged until she no longer had any control of her mind, or her body.
‘I can’t do this.’
‘You can,’ he murmured, kissing one thigh, then the other, letting her come down off the crest of the wave just long enough to catch her breath before taking her higher still.
Her skin prickled with sweat, her fingers grew numb from hanging on so tight, and every nerve felt aflame as the pressure inside her built to a beautiful crescendo.
And on and on it went. Higher, harder, deeper, bliss. Building still until she was sure she would faint from the violence of the pleasure rising inside her.
And just when she thought she couldn’t take it any more numbness overcame her, the eye of the storm giving her respite, making her feel as if she were floating above the couch.
Then pleasure as she had never known crashed over her, and she shattered into a thousand hot, dark, beautiful pieces.
Cruel as he was, Dylan didn’t even give her a chance to live out the waves cascading over her. He kissed her thigh, stroked her hip, ran his tongue up her waist and the edge of her left breast. It was torture, pure and simple.
He ran his hands along her arms, uncurling her fingers from their death grip of the rug-covered leather, and slowly lay her back on the couch.
Replete, boneless, weak, she stretched her arms over her head and twisted her body back into a more normal shape.
Dylan, now standing over her, watched her with his hand on his fly. ‘Why do I get the feeling you have no idea how beautiful you are?’
Wynnie curled onto her side, still warm and buzzing. ‘Flattery will get you everywhere.’
‘Maybe so, but I’ve never found cause to use it.’ He pulled down his zip, then after that his trousers, until he stood before her—naked, ready and godlike.
Silver moonlight caressed his muscled form as though it had merely been waiting for the chance to do so. Every dip and depression seemed caved from marble. Every curve and rise all man.
He was right. He’d never need to use flattery to get what he wanted. He just had to ask.
She pushed herself up on one arm and held out her other hand. He knelt over her. She wrapped her arms about his torso, arching into him as he pressed her back on the couch. And their kiss was like nothing she had ever known.
Heat exploded through her body, spot fires sprang up all over her skin. She wanted him so badly, but even though she could feel the tension in his arms, in his legs, in his kiss, he still spent every second making sure her pleasure was paramount.
Sweeping her damp hair from her face. Tugging at her bottom lip, which made her moan every time. Sliding his free hand down her side, teasing, lightly caressing the outside of her breast when she wanted his whole hand thereon. Brushing her hip bone with his knuckles with a whisper-light touch that had her arching higher towards him, wanting more. Then from nowhere sinking his fingers deep between her legs, drawing her back to the brink of destruction again and again.
Need and desire were the only two things keeping them on that couch. The fact that he had a condom on hand now felt like a miracle, as well.
He sheathed himself. She wrapped her legs around him. And finally he sank into her with a shuddering sigh.
He filled her and then some, stretching every part of her until she felt more, on every level there was, than she’d ever felt before.
Her breath came in gasps. Her fingers dug into his back. Beauty and exhilaration overcame her. Time expanded and compressed as her world shrank to the size of her couch as she rocked with him, pressed into him, enveloped him, took of him everything he had.
With the brakes off it felt as if they were careening down a steep hill. She could barely breathe; she could barely think. It was terrifying and exhilarating and she didn’t want it to end.
And then the rhythm changed, hastened. Power surged thr
ough her, giving her the knowledge that it was her turn to bring him release.
She looked deep into his eyes, the deepest ocean blue, and he looked right on back as together they reached the highest heights before sliding into oblivion.
And as she fought her way back into consciousness Wynnie felt the heart whose life force had long since been compartmentalised to care for greater causes, the heart she had been sure would never truly be touched again, make a hot, heavy return to life.
CHAPTER EIGHT
AS DYLAN sat upon the overly soft green couch on the set of the Sunday-morning chat show, eyes closed tight as his face was powdered, he tried his very best to concentrate on what he had to say over the next ten minutes, and not on Wynnie as he’d left her less than eight hours earlier.
Standing in the doorway of her home, a short satin robe barely wrapped about her deliciously naked body, her bare legs twisted together, her dark hair cascading over her slender shoulders, her hand wrapped loosely around the doorframe as she leant up to kiss him goodnight.
It had all been so civilised. As civilised as he’d ever known it to be. So why then did he feel more like a tightly coiled spring than he had before releasing every ounce of energy he had inside him with the best sex of his life?
‘Dylan!’
He blinked and the bright lights of the TV studio came back into focus to find Rylie Madigan, the anchor of Daybreak, and one of his sister’s best friends, slapping him across the upper arm.
‘Where the hell are you?’ she whispered between her perfectly capped teeth.
He thought cooling thoughts, flapped his suit jacket and repositioned himself on the over-soft couch. Through gritted teeth he said, ‘Same place I am every Sunday morning, my backside parked on this exact spot as I prepare to pass out the good investment word to your loyal viewers across this fair land.’
Rylie tilted her chin so her long blonde hair could be fluffed and coiffed. ‘Sweet cheeks, don’t go acting like you are here out of the goodness of your heart. I should be getting a finder’s fee for the mum-and-dad clients who flock to your business because I let you and your pretty face charm the sense out of them on my show.’
