She gasped. The sound jabbed into him.
He smoothed down lower, over her flat belly, feeling a thatch of hair wisp against his fingertips.
“I thought…” she said, voice breaking apart “…I’d get…hot stones with this…massage…”
“Saucy,” he said roughly, slipping his hands up and over her waist, then her back, then down to palm her ass again. Moving lower, he spread apart her legs, then ran his thumbs into the wet cleft there.
She rocked upward. “Oh-”
He pressed harder, separating her folds, hunger stoked at the sight of her glistening pink sex under candlelight.
Careful, he thought. Slow.
Finding her clit, he circled it. She echoed his movements, clutching the table and bunching the bottom sheet.
He worked her, harder but not faster, drawing out her groans until they grew higher in pitch. All the while, his own libido was expanding, pulsing, nagging him to take this further.
“Wes,” she said against the table. “Oh, Wes…”
As she moaned his name, Wes’s chest tightened.
There was a knock at the door.
He froze in utter disbelief.
Erin jerked away from him, sheened with sweat. It made her skin gold, hazed with a glow.
An erection ruling him once again, Wes covered her with the sheet, cussing under his breath. She’d been saying his name, as if she’d wanted more than just the physical from him…
“One second,” he bit out.
A voice from the other side said, “My boss came in, sir. I’ve gotta-”
“One minute.”
Erin had already jumped off the table, heading for her clothes, which were hanging on a wall hook. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was that curse.”
Wes helped her into her jeans. “I’m starting to know better. I think you need to fully explain this curse to me, Erin.”
Knock, knock, knock.
She tugged her T-shirt over her head, nipples beading against the thin white material. With a jolt, Wes snagged her sweater and wrapped it around her before Justin came in. He didn’t give a crap if the guy saw naked women every day, this was Erin, and Wes wasn’t about to allow some random man the satisfaction.
Justin’s voice filtered in again. “Excuse me, but-”
“One minute!” they both said in stereo.
“The room,” Wes said, pained. “Tell me we’re going to our room.”
Another click of her eye colors-a combination lock securing her thoughts away into a vault.
“Erin? What is it?”
After a beat, she smiled, looking as if she didn’t know what he was talking about. “It’s nothing.” She touched his arm. “Let’s just go back…”
Justin had obviously waited long enough because he jammed open the door. The candle flames waved and angled with the breeze.
“Sorry,” he said, “but my boss showed up and asked me why I wasn’t with my scheduled appointment.”
“That’s okay,” Erin said, tugging Wes away by the hand. “Thanks for trying.”
And they continued on to their cabin, where Wes hoped they could prove that there really wasn’t any damned curse.
5
THAT WAS CLOSE, ERIN thought as she and Wes bolted into their cabin. Close to getting caught, close to actually getting somewhere. Even now, her skin was still slick with oil, buzzing with the imprint of Wes’s practiced hands sliding over her, under her…
At the reminder, she felt a jolt in her sex. She was still primed for him, beating with a plump reminder of what could’ve been.
As Wes shut the door, the ship’s intercom sounded a bell, and the purser’s voice came on. “We’d like you all to join us on deck as we depart-”
“No,” Wes said, stalking over and guiding her toward the bed. “Hell, no.”
She clasped his arms and turned their bodies so that his back was to the mattress. “Exactly. No more interruptions.”
With verve, she pushed him onto the bed, where the edge of it caught the backs of his knees to take him down. Propping himself up on his elbows, he reclined, obviously entertained by her take-charge attitude.
They both laughed. Then her gaze caught his and-
Ja-joom .
Her heart pistoned, jarred to life by his sitting there, just watching her with such casual, frank interest. Black hair slouching over his brow, eyes liquid with dark yearning, his T-shirt straining over his tight abs while the white material skimmed every cut muscle. He was more than she could handle and, for a flailing minute, she didn’t know what to do or how to do it.
Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the ship pulling away from the dock, taking them out to sea. Stranding her with the decision she’d made to get intimate with this gorgeous, hot man who sent tremors to her core.
Not wanting to dwell on what those tremors might signify, Erin pushed all her doubts to the wayside, purposefully moving to the vanity counter, where she’d set down her lollipop earlier.
Shaking with anticipation, she picked it up, making a show of inspecting it: cherry candy, heart-shaped and innocent.
“Do me a favor?” she asked quietly.
Ja-joom . Oh, man, she was really going to do this. Sleep with Wes. Ignore that they had no future and just go for it. Expose herself to a prediction that scared her half to death.
“Name it,” he said, tone low and gristled.
Slowly, she began to undo the candy’s clear wrapper. “Take it all off.”
He slid a curious look at the lollipop, then cocked an eyebrow, clearly up for any request. Rising, he tugged off his shirt, tossing it away to the corner.
Through the window, the harbor glided by: a swollen sky met by wind-ruffled water.
Stomach going goofy-from the thought of sailing, or from nerves?-she went to the window. With a decisive jerk, she closed the curtains, then turned back to Wes.
There. The room was dimmer now, less intimidating. It was a shadowed alcove where she could act out her fantasies without feeling fully revealed or losing her courage under too much illumination.
Tracking her with predatory eyes, Wes had also taken off his shoes and socks while still sitting on the bed. His olive skin looked darker with the lack of light. Exotic, smooth, so masculine.
“And?” he asked, voice edged with the same sexy amusement.
She went hot again, pulse throbbing in a countdown to contact. Instinctively, she ran the lollipop over her lips.
His smile grew.
Moving closer to him, Erin lolled the candy away from her mouth. Screw all the cautious cells bumping against each other in her body in their attempt to get her to reconsider, to take this slower. She was ready to go.
“Your jeans aren’t going to do us much good,” she said.
As he stood and eased them off, she went back to the lollipop, tilting her head and licking the sweet cherry, knowing Wes was taking it all in.
He tossed the denim away, the heavy material hitting the wall with a bunched slap. And there he stood: tall, athletic, his penis half-erect from her preshow.
Erin took the entire sucker into her mouth, then drew it out. “Mmm…”
“Erin…” Wes said. It was as if his voice had been sliced open and was bleeding raw desire.
Infused with the confidence of knowing how much he wanted her, she forgot everything else, moving forward and giving him another slight push to get him back down on that mattress, then tossing him a pillow so he could prop up his head. She knew he’d want to watch; she needed him to do it, too, needed to feel naughty and rebellious.
He understood her intentions, shoving the pillow under his head as she put the lollipop back into her mouth with one hand and pressed one of his legs open with the other.
As she pulled out the sucker, she felt the floor roll beneath her feet. Her head swam.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah.” Taking a fortifying breath, she crawled onto the bed to hover over him. “You think t
he water will be rough out there?”
He closed his eyes, as if he couldn’t believe she was talking instead of…doing. She couldn’t believe it, either, but for a second, she’d felt queasy.
He opened his eyes again, but his hands clutched the pillow under his head. “Ship’s too big for you to feel the waves. Don’t worry about it.”
Don’t worry.
Okay.
She ran the fingernails of one hand up over his leg, his inner thigh. He shifted, his cock bobbing. It made her clit seize, paining for him to massage it again. She sucked hard on the lollipop, juices stinging her mouth.
Traveling higher, she found his sac, tracing her fingers over the softness. He bunched the pillow in his fists, groaning.
Lightly, she rolled his balls with her fingertips, fascinated by the ecstatic agony on his face. Then, while drawing harder on the candy, she ran her index finger up the underside of his shaft.
He bucked. “Erin-”
She cut him off with a low sound from her throat-a strangled longing for him.
Wrapping her fingers around his penis, she took him into her fist, sliding upward. She moved downward, up again, slowly, bringing him to absolute hardness. With every carnal motion, she rolled her tongue around the lollipop.
She found that his gaze was on her mouth. Was he picturing her tongue on him?
She coaxed the candy out, a slurp echoing in the room as she nonchalantly held him in her hand.
Slowly waving the sucker back and forth, she felt more flirty and powerful than ever, knowing she had him at her mercy. This was what she’d been missing before Wes came along-a sense of mutual giving and getting.
“You wondering what I’m going to do next?” she asked.
A harsh, choked sound was his only response.
On a whim, she took one more taste of the candy, allowing her tongue to linger and invite. A muscle jerked in his cheek as she leaned the sucker away from her mouth and licked her lips.
Then she whispered, “All those long hours in the store. Staring at those creamy candies, the suckers, the bonbons…It does things to a girl. It makes her create diabolical daydreams. New ways to use all those sweets.”
She slid her lollipop back inside her mouth, wet it thoroughly, then took it out and carefully placed it on the tip of his penis. She circled the head, coating him with sticky promise.
After she was satisfied, she lowered her mouth, licking the sugar from him, taking her time as he moaned beneath her. Stoked by his reaction, she took it one step further, winging her tongue back and forth over his head to tease him.
By the time she came up for air, he was breathing hard. “You…learn that from your L.A. friends?” he asked, clenching his jaw.
“Nah, I’m not so L.A.” She repeated the process by sucking on the candy again, then this time very deliberately bathing his entire length in lollipop-slickness, avoiding getting too close to the dark patch of hair nesting his erection. “The place is Cheryl’s home base. I just moved there to open the business with her.”
Business. Why the heck was she talking about it again?
She bent to lay her tongue to him, this time concentrating on his shaft. Greedily, she tasted him up and down as he encouraged her with building groans. Cherry, skin, Wes…
Stimulated by his enjoyment, she took him all the way into her mouth, swirling her tongue around him, up and down, sucking, lingering, getting a sugar rush that hummed in her veins.
Oh, he tasted so good…delicious…
His hands bunched her hair, and when he came, he filled her mouth. She savored that, too, swallowing. She rubbed her cheek lower, against his inner thigh. His leg hair crisped against her skin, the scent of sweet male satiating her.
Dizzy, she rose away from him. Sweat beaded his chest, his upper lip, and he was gasping for air, just as she was. Her pulse jackhammered from her chest to her sex, tearing her into a thousand pieces, making her tummy roil again.
“Come here,” he whispered raggedly, reaching for her.
Her stomach jumped, but she obeyed, falling over him, mouth seeking his. She grinded her hips against his to alleviate the pressure that’d built between her legs. Even though he’d climaxed, he was still going strong. She rocked against him, wishing she didn’t still have her jeans on, wishing he was inside of her.
As they devoured each other, nipping, sucking, tonguing, the world rolled inside Erin’s head.
Words flashed through her, blinding her sight with neon distraction: You can stop looking for the man of your dreams.
She tried to shut out the fortune-teller, instead reaching for her zipper to undo it. Fun, freedom, immunity from seriousness, that’s all she wanted right now.
You’ve already found ‘the one.’
Panic began to overtake Erin, materializing in clumsiness as she fumbled with her jeans. The sea seemed to lift the ship, and it got to her, making her come up from Wes for a deep breath.
Again, a wave seemed to rock the boat, and Erin’s head went tight.
You reject what love has in store for you, and you twist karma around until it comes right back at you with negative energy.
Closing her eyes, Erin backed away from Wes, holding her forehead. “Dammit.”
“Hey…” he said, cradling her face.
But she pulled away, lying on her side until the ship stopped moving. “Are we in bad weather or something? I…”
She stopped, the taste of candy suddenly like copper in her mouth. Wes was just a short fling, no more, that’s all either of them wanted from each other-
Wes was stroking her hair, obviously concerned. “The ship’s not moving. What’s wrong?”
The answer was clear.
Cursed.
Her karma truly was bent out of shape, and seasickness was the price she’d have to pay this time.
6
IT’D BEEN A ROUGH NIGHT.
And it hadn’t been because Wes had stayed up half the time making sure Erin was taken care of, either. No, he hadn’t minded running a washcloth under water so he could put it on her forehead. He hadn’t even minded going to the gift store for aspirin and those “seasick” bracelets, which were like sweatbands with a bead that pressed against the pressure points on your wrist to cancel the nausea.
Uh-uh. The night had sucked because, once again, he and Erin had been getting so damned close to what he wanted. But it’d also been much too far away.
Fighting his pent-up, eternal state of arousal and the hope of the closeness that might come out of all this, he left Erin sleeping and went to a buffet, bringing back some breakfast for them to share. But upon his return, he found her out of bed and in the shower. So he left the pastries and took a quick trip to the fitness room, where he worked off a load of frustration on a rowing machine.
Of course, that didn’t do crap. He was still wound up and ready to blow. Last night’s candy-coated games and intimacy had only given him a taste of what was in store with a woman like Erin, and it wasn’t enough.
Not nearly enough.
When he came back to the cabin, Erin was off somewhere, so he showered and, by the time he stepped out of the small bathroom, she’d left a phone message for him to meet her for a fresh-air Ensenada jaunt. She said she’d be in the atrium, where she was accessing her business e-mail via a bank of computers. He didn’t feel the same compulsion, seeing as Wall Street was closed.
No, he felt a much different urgency. But when he saw her in the Internet Café, her complexion was still a little wan, so he didn’t suggest going back to the room. She was right: the fresh air and solid land of an off-ship excursion would do her good.
Now, as they checked out and strolled down the gangplank to encounter the cool, misted air outside, Wes told himself that, yeah, this really was the right thing to be doing: being a gentleman and not jumping all over her when she was under the weather.
A gentleman, he thought, biting back a smile. Sure.
Immediately off the deck, they entered a building
with a sign that said Welcome To Ensenada and that held an assortment of tourist shop stalls. Some sold imitation designer watches, some sold salsa and colorful Mexican blankets.
Erin meandered over to a table decorated with a selection of leather bracelets. Lingering over a particular one with flowers, she held it against her wrist, smiled a little, then put it back down.
“You don’t like it?” Wes asked, surprised to find that he was actually into watching her shop. But, hell, didn’t every one of her moves hold him in thrall?
“It’s not me, I think.”
He glanced back at the bracelet, straightforward in its elegance. She’d look great wearing it, even though the band was simple and no doubt inexpensive. She was worth diamonds, he thought, but there was something about her that made him think more of a buried earthiness where diamonds would be discovered and later polished to a shine.
When Erin wandered over to a toy stall, he quickly asked the shopwoman, “¿Cuánto?” and paid the ten American dollars she asked for. No normal wheeling and dealing today.
Tucking the purchase into his leather jacket pocket, he grinned at the woman, thinking that Erin would be surprised later by seeing the bracelet. Misinterpreting his gesture, the shopkeeper blushed and tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear.
Oops.
Wes turned around, joining his…What was Erin to him? Girlfriend? Bed buddy? More?
He turned over that last possibility in his mind as Erin bought something from a different shop. Seconds later, she turned from the salesman to show Wes what it was, her gray eyes twinkling.
“It’s for one of my nephews,” she said, showing him a small jack-in-the-box.
A nephew. A sign of everyday life outside of this cruise. For some reason, the mention of that sort of thing scared Wes, maybe because it drove home that she’d become far more important, far more real, to him in just a couple of weeks than any other woman in the course of his lifetime.
“How old is he?” Wes asked as they started to walk toward the building’s exit.
“Three. Look.” She turned the side crank on the box, and “Pop Goes the Weasel” chimed out. She hummed along with it.
Jinxed! Page 19
