His lips twisted. “Are you always so irreverent about sex?”
“Sure. It’s supposed to be fun, isn’t it?”
“Enjoyable, yes.” He slid his hands up her thighs, rubbing his thumb against sensitive flesh. She saw stars for a moment before rocking her hips against him. “Hot and sweaty and fulfilling, absolutely.”
She moaned, rising up a little as one of his fingers curled into her depths. “Oh, very, very fulfilling.”
“Harry?”
She moaned again, her back arched as he slid a second finger in with the first. “Hrrn?”
He flipped her over onto her back, coming on top of her, pulling her legs around his hips. “I prefer to be on top.”
“Definitely works for me,” she gasped as he slid into her. Her hips rose to meet his as he pistoned forward, his mouth suddenly on hers, throwing her into sensory overload. He tasted so good, so hot, she just wanted to stay there forever, reveling in him, her body welcoming the hard thrust as he invaded her depths. “Harder,” she whispered, her lips trailing along his neck, tasting the saltiness of his skin as he obliged, moving against her with more force. “Faster.”
“My little tempest,” he moaned into her ear. “I should have known you would like it this way, wild and uncontrolled.”
“Uncontrolled is definitely better,” she groaned, her legs tightening around his hips, dragging her nails gently down his spine. “Oh dear god, what you do to me!”
“If it’s anything like what you’re doing to me—”
The rest of his words were lost as she suddenly froze, her entire body perched for one endless moment on the edge of something momentous before she yelled his name and came apart in his arms.
He followed, his hoarse shout of completion sweet in her ears, almost as sweet as the weight of him when he collapsed on her. She stroked his back, not minding that it was slick with sweat, for he definitely had earned it. His breathing was as ragged as hers, hot little puffs of it on her neck as he regained his senses.
He rolled off her, his eyes wide and staring up at the ceiling, his breath still uneven. Harry felt like someone had replaced her limbs with ones that lacked bones. She looked over at Iakovos, about to comment that he could be on top anytime he desired, when she suddenly realized just how big the bed was. “Glorioski, Yacky. This bed is huge.”
His head turned to look at her, his eyes disbelieving. “Pardon?”
“Your bed.” She gestured at the space between them. “You could house a family of five here. It’s massive. What do you need such a gigantic bed for?”
He was back to looking at her as if the boobs were dancing on her head again. “I am a large man. I like to spread out.”
She bit back a smile. She’d noticed that fact in the middle of the night, when she had to use the bathroom. He had been asleep, one arm thrown over her as he lay facedown, spread-eagle on the bed, taking up an enormous amount of space. “Yes. I like that about you. You make me feel feminine. Not a lot of guys can do that because I’m so big, you know. In fact, I don’t think any of them have ever done so to such a high degree.”
“Eglantine,” he said, his lips tightening as he pulled her across the vast miles of his bed to his chest. “I thought we agreed to not discuss our previous lovers.”
“No, you couldn’t count yours, there were so many. I can count mine on one finger.”
His lips pursed. “You’ve had only one lover?”
“Yes. It lasted three years, though, so I think that should count as three. ‘One’ sounds so pathetic, don’t you think?”
“No,” he said, pulling the sheets over them. “I don’t think that sounds pathetic at all. Go to sleep.”
“It’s morning,” she protested, aware of a languid sense that made it seem wrong to want to move out of the soft, warm bed. “I have things to do.”
“It’s early and you’ve only had a few hours of sleep.”
“I should check on the boys. They are probably wondering what happened to me last night.”
“You can speak to them later.”
“I should check on Cyndi and make sure she’s OK.”
“I will call the hospital for you. Sleep now, little storm. You need to build your strength for later.”
“Ha-ha. Very funny.” She snuggled against him, her body relaxing against his warmth, wondering what it would take to stay in his arms forever.
CHAPTER 4
“Harry Knight, you’re an idiot, falling for a guy you just met.” The words hung in the air as she made a clean dive into the narrow pool she’d found tucked away in a corner of the garden, hidden by tall shrubs. The water wasn’t heated, and shaded as it was, the shock of cold had her gasping for breath as she surfaced and shook the water from her eyes before she picked one of the four lanes and settled into an easy crawl stroke meant to wake her up after a morning of lovemaking so mind-bogglingly good, her body still hummed with awareness.
Not awareness of herself, but of him.
Iakovos. She let the name roll around her mind as she swam lazy laps, trying to pinpoint just what she thought of him.
He was sexy, definitely. Just looking at him literally had her drooling, and made her feel somewhat giddy, like she was fifteen and in love with a rock star.
He was caring. He didn’t just use her body, giving nothing of himself. He made love to her with his whole being, his whispered words of what he was feeling, what he was thinking, how much he liked her response almost as wonderful as the touch of his body. She didn’t have a lot of experience with men, but instinctively she knew that Iakovos’ behavior in bed went above and beyond the call of duty.
She flipped over onto her back, her arms and legs moving mechanically as she swam the laps, her attention caught up with how much she liked his mind. She had thought at first that he was a typical arrogant, stick-up-his-butt hunk, half in love with himself, and more than a little smitten with his own consequence. But by the time she kissed him in the hospital, she’d realized that he wasn’t anything like that. Oh, he liked to talk the talk, but the second he realized that she saw through the facade, he didn’t even bother to try to maintain it.
Iakovos was, she suspected as she watched the cloudless blue morning sky while she swam, quite simply a very nice, very intriguing man, and if things didn’t come to an immediate and complete halt, she was going to fall madly in love with him.
A shadow fell over her face, causing her stroke to check and leaving her sputtering in the water for a moment.
“Eglantine. We meet again,” a deep, lazy voice said.
She shook the water out of her eyes and treaded water for a moment, looking up at where he stood at the side of the pool. He was dressed in a pair of navy blue swim trunks and was carrying a towel.
“Yacky. I’m sorry,” she stammered, unable to take her eyes off all his exposed flesh. “I didn’t realize this was your pool.”
“They’re all my pools,” he said, humor lacing his voice. “It’s my island.”
“No, I meant . . . I guess I didn’t think. This looked like it was an unused lap pool. I didn’t mean to use it without permission—”
“Sweetheart, you’re welcome to use whatever you want here, and that includes me, an event that is going to happen sooner rather than later if you keep looking at me like that.”
She grinned, slowly swimming away. “I can’t help it. Have you ever heard of a tongue cleaving to the roof of a mouth? Looking at you makes my tongue cleave, Iakovos.”
“I have better things to do with your tongue.” He dove over her head into the lane next to hers, emerging from the water with his black hair slicked back. He had a slight widow’s peak, and wore his hair a little longer than most men she had met, long enough that it brushed the tops of his ears. It was as soft as silk when it ran through her fingers, she remembered with a little shiver.
He was looking at her with an indescribable expression, his eyes glittering like the morning sun on the cool water. “If you keep looking at me like
that, Harry, I’m going to make love to you again.”
“Oh, I have no problem with that,” she said, giving the idea her full vote of approval.
He started to move toward her, then stopped and shook his head. “I always swim in the morning.”
“Then by all means, swim. Will it bother you if I do a few more laps, too?”
“Not at all.”
He moved over to an outside lane, she assumed so he wouldn’t splash her. She watched him for a moment as he swam off in a smooth Australian crawl before resuming her own laps.
She had just finished four laps of a particularly sloppy breaststroke when she became aware that he was watching her. She tossed him a curious look. “Something wrong?”
“Not at all. You swim very well.”
She shrugged, and went back to the previously interrupted backstroke. “I get by. It’s not often I have the chance to swim, so when I do, I try to take advantage of it.”
“You should do it more,” he said, mirroring her backstroke. She peeked at him from the corner of her eye. His crawl was much better than his backstroke. “You could be quite a good swimmer if you gave it a little time.”
It took a few seconds before his statement sank in. When it did, she stopped and glared at him. “Are you implying that just because I’m not some gazillionaire rich most wanted bachelor that I’m not a good swimmer?”
“Most eligible bachelor, not most wanted,” he corrected, not bothering to look at her, damn his arrogant hide. “And all I said was that if you practiced it more, you could be quite good at it.”
“Oh, those are fighting words, buster,” she said, swimming to the steps that led out of the pool.
“I didn’t intend to insult you—”
“Like hell you didn’t!” She pulled down the back of her suit that always rode up over her butt cheeks and strode to the opposite end of the pool. “Come on, out of the water. You’re going to put your money where your extremely sexy and almost irresistible mouth is.”
“What exactly do you propose? A wager?” he asked as he slowly climbed out of the pool.
“That sounds good. We’ll have a little race, shall we? Winner has to . . .” She paused, trying to think of a suitable prize.
“Have sex with the other person?” he suggested, a slow, sultry smile curling his lips as he strolled toward her, the water glistening like scattered diamonds on his chest.
“Deal. How many laps are you up to?”
His gaze moved slowly over her body. “I’ll let you set the course, but I should point out that I have an unfair advantage over you.”
“Because you’re taller than me?” she asked, doing her own visual inspection. Just looking at him made her heart rate pick up. Before he could answer, she held up her hand. “Wait a second—uncleaving tongue.”
He laughed and shook his head. “No, the advantage is due to me having access to a pool on a daily basis. And as for tongues . . .” He bent down and took possession of her mouth, his tongue a brand on lips made cool by the water. “As I said, I can think of so many other things to do with them.”
“Well, you’re going to have an advantage if you do that again,” Harry said, pushing back after a few minutes of burning under the touch of his hands and mouth. “You do something to my bones to make them go all wobbly.”
He lifted his hands in a show of surrender and backed up. “I wouldn’t wish to be accused of cheating. Shall we say four laps? Any particular stroke?”
“What’s your strongest?” she asked. “Crawl?”
“Crawl is fine,” he agreed, and she knew without a shred of a doubt that he intended to let her win the race. She smiled to herself, sure that she could change that intention in under a minute.
“You want to count us down?” she said, taking up a position at the middle left lane. He chose the one next to her.
“You can do the honors.”
“OK. Dive on five.” She spread her feet and dropped her hands until her fingers dangled just above the floor of the pool decking in the classic starting pose. “Ready?”
He gave her a curious glance, then mimicked her pose. “Ready.”
She counted them off, giving him a half-second start before diving into the pool, adrenaline giving her a little kick as she undulated underwater for the allowable distance before breaking the surface and immediately taking up a fast but maintainable pace. After one lap, she was a full body length ahead of him. She slowed up just a hair as she did an underwater turn, so that he could catch up to see that she was having no problem outpacing him.
She knew the moment he realized that. His smooth crawl suddenly went choppy as he tried to power through the stroke to build up speed. Mentally, she shook her head and cranked her own stroke up a notch, enjoying the rush of endorphins as she made the second turn, now two body lengths ahead of him. By the time she was on the last lap, he was breathing with every stroke, a sure sign he was running out of steam.
She finished almost half the pool length ahead of him, turning around to watch him approach. He didn’t bother touching the wall, just stopped next to her, wiping the water from his eyes and nose, his breath as ragged as when he had made love to her this morning, his big chest heaving with the effort to get much-needed oxygen into his lungs.
“You . . . swim . . . professionally . . .” he panted, sweeping his hair back, his eyes accusing.
“Nope. But I was on my high school and college swim teams.” She smiled, and swam over to him, sliding her hands up his chest. “You’ve got a lot of power, Iakovos, but no style, no finesse. Your legs were all over the place, and I’m willing to bet your pull and recovery arm positions were way off.”
He grabbed her, pulling her against him, his hands hard on her behind, growling into her mouth as he said, “I’ll show you who has no finesse.”
They didn’t, much to Iakovos’ dismay, make love there in the pool, but it was a near thing. He remembered just in time that although none of his family members ever used his lap pool, some of the houseguests might choose to do so, and being caught buried up to the hilt in his wonderful sea-witch had the potential for exposing her to ridicule.
That she had beaten him when he had been so sure he would easily be able to outswim her both surprised and delighted him. That’s what he got for assuming she was like any other woman—it was perfectly natural that a tempest, born of the sea as she was, should swim as fast as a dolphin. He released the breast he had been suckling, pulling up the top of her one-piece swimsuit with reluctance, once again pleased with the dazed look that came over her eyes whenever he touched her.
“I can’t think of a time when I’ve looked forward more to paying the penalty for losing a wager,” he told her, possessing her mouth one more time, just because he couldn’t stop himself. “But I will gladly do so tonight.”
“Sounds good to me,” she said, sighing happily.
He looked down at her for a moment, at her flushed face, the long tendrils of hair streaming out behind her on the water. Although he wasn’t responsible for entertaining Elena’s friends, they were guests to his home, and he should put in an occasional appearance. He’d put off business concerns for the few days that he’d devoted to his sister’s birthday celebration, but there was always work to be done. Just because the woman whose body pressed so enticingly against his was different from all others didn’t mean he had to sate himself on her. She was just a woman.
He looked deep into her eyes made warm with passion, and knew it was stupid to lie to himself. He didn’t care about playing host and he didn’t care about conducting business. He wanted to spend time with Harry and see what delightful things her mind would think to say and do. “Do you have plans for today?”
He had her so flustered, it took her a moment to collect her thoughts. That, also, pleased him. “Cyndi will be released this afternoon, so I should probably be there to get her.”
“The others can do so. I will put a boat at their disposal.”
“I’m supposed
to be their manager,” she reminded him.
He didn’t like the idea of her at their beck and call. “I’ll have Dmitri make sure they don’t run into any issues.”
“Dmitri?”
“My assistant.” She looked like she was going to protest, so he kissed her again to muddle her mind.
“And then they’re sure to want to rehearse,” she said a few minutes later, clutching his shoulders, her mouth hot on his neck. “I should probably be there in case they need something.”
“My staff can attend to whatever they need,” he said, his hands on her ass as he gently pushed her toward the metal ladder. Dear god, how he loved that ass. “Get dressed, and I’ll take you to Krokos. You’ll like it—it’s not too far down the coast from here, but is off the tourist path.”
“I shouldn’t . . .” She climbed out of the pool.
He followed her, lifting her chin in order to bite her bottom lip.
“All right,” she said after a moment’s hesitation, water streaming down the slick black swimsuit. He watched a couple of drops roll down between her breasts, and felt his groin grow hot. “But I warn you, if you take me anywhere private, I’m likely to ravish you.”
He grinned, unable to keep from pulling her to him for one last plundering kiss. “I’m counting on that, sweetheart. I’m counting on that.”
Harry was in heaven, or as close as she could come to it on earth. She looked back from where she perched at the bow of Iakovos’ zippy little speedboat, the spray and wind whipping her hair around as if it had a mind of its own. The speed at which they were moving made it impossible to carry on a conversation without shouting, so she contented herself with admiring the view, which mostly consisted of Iakovos. He wore a pair of black pants and a thin red cotton shirt, open just enough at the neck to let her see his sexy neck spot and a hint of the chest hair that she knew was as soft as the finest silk. She loved his chest, couldn’t stop wanting to touch and taste it.
He was watching her, as well, sitting with one hand casually on the steering wheel, the other resting on his thigh.
She loved his thighs, too. He had the long muscles of a swimmer, and was unexpectedly ticklish on his inner thighs. Her toes curled in her sandals as she remembered giggling earlier that morning when she gently dragged her nails up his thighs and made him squirm.
It's All Greek to Me Page 5
