by Lydia Burke
He wrenched his mouth from hers to rasp, "Not here," then swooped her into his arms and out of the kitchen. She buried her face in his neck. She nuzzled his throat, seeking out his warm skin with her lips and tongue as he carried her. Excited by his moan of pleasure, she kissed and nibbled and licked at the sensitive nerve endings between his shoulder and ear until, with desperate, coaxing movements of his cheek against her hair, he nudged her head back and found her mouth again.
Jessie wasn't aware they'd reached his bedroom until her feet touched the floor. Unsteadily Ben stepped back, clicked on the bedside lamp and started to unbutton his shirt.
"Take off your clothes," he said, a rough edge to his voice. "Hurry."
His rush to get undressed testified to the urgency driving him. Jessie recognized it, shared it, and understood that there would be no visual savoring of the baring of their bodies, no inclination toward gentle exploration. She didn't want it, either. Need propelled her shaking hands to the buttons of her jacket.
Ben had less to take off and had stripped completely by the time Jessie managed to remove only her outer clothing. Her eyes swept down his well-honed frame and settled on his powerfully engorged erection as she stepped out of her skirt. With a thrill of anticipation she celebrated his size and strength.
Soon, soon, her heart sang dizzily.
"Protection," he muttered between gritted teeth. "I'll be right back. Hurry."
Jessie didn't know whether he'd meant the last command for her or for himself, but she tackled her lacy camisole and bra with renewed, if inept, energy. She was fumbling with her panty hose when he returned with the square packet. He ripped the foil open with his teeth and prepared himself in the seconds it took her to rake the hosiery clumsily off her feet.
Ben didn't wait for her to remove the bikini panties that remained. In one fluid motion he grasped her under the arms, lifted her crosswise onto the nearby bed and slid the panties
down her legs and off. Then he joined her on the bed. Spreading her thighs wide with his knees, he reached down to test her readiness. Jessie cried out when he explored her swollen petals and found the slippery evidence of her desire.
"Jessie," he breathed.
"Please," she begged, close to delirium from the probing of his fingers. She tried to help as he positioned himself between her legs, and he laughed shakily when her hands only got in the way.
"Here, let me," he said unsteadily.
Then he was there, blunt and hard, squeezing his way into her, stretching her until he was buried to the hilt inside her feminine sheath. Her legs bent and wrapped themselves around his buttocks, settling him deeper.
"Jess," he growled, eyes tightly closed in agonized pleasure. "Nothing has ever felt this good before."
She scarcely heard him. At last, she was thinking ecstatically. It was more— he was more—than she'd ever known, ever dreamed possible.
Then, unbelievably, as he held himself rigidly in control inside her, Jessie felt the gathering tightness that signaled the initial shudders of her release. Thrilled, amazed, unable to stop the compelling rush to completion, she ground her hips against him and reached to embrace it, crying out as the undulating waves rolled over her.
"Don't move yet, baby," Ben moaned. "Oh, Jess."
Then he was moving, too, fast and deep, thrusting his hips into the cradle of her thighs until in a final lunge, he found his own prolonged fulfillment. He met it with a strangled groan of satisfaction and collapsed on top of her.
Jessie caught him in her arms and lay under his damp heaviness, happy and replete, listening to the thunder of his heart.
Chapter9
rray to go, Flash, Ben complimented himself derisively when he could think straight again. You really know how to show a lady a good time.
He'd been a mindless pig, and that was putting it mildly. In his headlong race to get inside her, he'd skipped all the parts that made sex good for a woman. Hell, he'd been so carried away, he'd barely remembered to protect her. And once he'd gotten in—the thought was uncomfortable enough to make him wince—it had been all over in an embarrassingly short period of time.
Even so, it had been heaven while it lasted. Ben's modest sampling of women in the world hadn't prepared him for what he'd felt with Jessie. He'd always enjoyed sex, but never before had a woman's body received him so sweetly; never had an orgasm rocked him so intensely. Never had he lost control.
This frantic taking was not his usual style at all. As one woman in his past had told him, he had what that old song called "a slow hand." He liked to draw out the preliminaries, to savor the gradual climb to climax. His partners had seemed to appreciate it.
But he'd taken Jessie like an animal.
Carefully he eased up and off the quiescent woman under him, his sticky skin peeling reluctantly away from her naked body. Jessie opened her eyes and shivered when the cool air hit her. She was flushed and damp and incredibly beautiful lying there in lavish nudity, wet little tendrils of hair clinging to her cheeks and temples.
"Whew!" She smiled. "We didn't waste any time, did we?"
Ben felt heat climb his neck to spread in his face. "Yeah, well-"
"Ooh, I feel...." She stretched sumptuously, her raised arms lifting her lush breasts into perfectly rounded mounds on her chest. "Energized! Like I could—build a house, or something."
Ben's eyes flew to her face. "You do?"
"Damn that Antonio, anyway," she said cheerfully. "I guess we showed him!"
"We did?" Ben heard his puzzled question and grimaced. He was starting to sound like a fool without an original thought in his head.
"We did." Jessie put her hand behind his neck and pulled him down for a soft kiss. "You're quite a man, Ben Sutton."
Ben almost said, "I am?" but caught himself in time. Her hand drifted down to dally in his chest hair. Little tracks of heat trailed behind her fingers.
"You aren't disappointed, then?"
Feathery lashes lifted and blue eyes, dark and glowing with mischief, pulled him into their mystery. "Fishing for compliments?"
Compliments?
Her lips curved into a sultry smile. "Well, much as I hate to feed your ego, I have to oblige. How could I be disappointed? I didn't know making love could be so... so..."
"Quick?"
She laughed seductively deep in her throat. "Uh-uh," she corrected with a shake of her short curls. "More like... explosive. I'll tell you a secret." Her voice softened and she blushed becomingly. "That was the first time I ever...you know. Thank you."
Her ingenuous disclosure caused Ben's chest to expand, and he felt a queer tightening in the region of his heart. He should
say something, but there woe no words for the relief, tenderness, pride and other more indefinable emotions pulling at him. Taking refuge in action, he stole a brief kiss and drew back with a smile that felt lopsided* "I'm glad you were satisfied, honey, but that was only the appetizer."
"Oh?" Jessie looked at him from voider half-closed eyelids and a naughty anile curved her lips. "Then I can't wait for the banquet."
Her playful challenge arrowed straight to his manhood. Ben leaned over and caught her mouth once more. Deliberately he limited his tongue to a single, teasing dip inside, then forced himself to back away.
"You'll have to give me a minute. Don't move so much as a centimeter from this spot until I get back."
She grinned saucily. Ben jumped from the bed and hurried into the bathroom. Quickly he took care of necessities and fumbled for another foil packet from the box he hadn't bothered to put away earlier. Then he paused. A.vision of Jessie as he'd left her, stretched out on his bed clothed only in her skin, filled his brain. He grabbed the whole box and rushed back to the bedroom.
There he found her under the covers, the sheet tucked up to her chin.
"You moved!" he complained.
She smiled at him, but the devilish glimmer was nowhere in evidence. Instead she looked unsure. "I got a little chilly."
Ben w
alked to the bed and put the box of condoms on the nightstand. "Having second thoughts?"
"I don't think so," she said cautiously. "I'm a little nervous, though."
"How come?" He lifted the covers and slipped in beside her. To his relief, she didn't resist when he drew her into his arms.
"It's just that I've never been very good at this. What happened before was really a fluke. It might not happen again."
He chuckled and gave her a squeeze, causing her breasts to move up delectably against his upper arm and chest muscles.
"No, I'm serious," she said. "I'm just loaded with inhibitions, and I never know what to do...."
Ben understood. Someone—he was pretty sure he knew who—had done a number on her confidence. Too bad she'd
had time to remember it. Her ex-husband had a lot to answer for.
"Tell you what," he said, nuzzling into the curls at her ten-pie. "Just make believe we're on an expedition, sort of like Lewis and Clark mapping out the Northwest Territory.''
She gurgled. "What?"
"You know, explorers. We'll pretend there's all this unknown terrain in front of us, and all we have to do is find our way through it."
"What a concept for foreplay. Did you get it out of a manual?"
"Nope. Just thought of it. What do you say? You'll like it, I promise."
She pretended to think. "Lewis and Clark. Are we looking for anything in particular?"
"Well, the end point of the journey, the ... climax, so to speak, is the Pacific Ocean. But our real objective is to chart the wonders we find along the way. We can't hurry past a majestic mountain or an enchanting little valley without giving it our full attention." Ben's hands were busy as he lectured.
Jessie tilted her head back and warm blue eyes sparkled into his. "Mountains and valleys, huh?"
"Right. Plains are nice, too, of course. Not really flat like a lot of people think. They're actually full of interesting swells and ridges and hollows."
"Hmm. I see what you mean. I believe I may have discovered a swelling ridge already."
"See what a natural you are?" Ben inhaled sharply. "Uh, Jess, we'd better leave that for now and come back to it late-." He moved her hand to his chest and she giggled adorably. "In fact," he said with a kiss to the tip of her nose, "why don't you just lie back and let me lead this expedition for a while?"
"Okay."
Jessie rolled onto her back, her uncertainty gone. Anticipation brightened her eyes.
He threw back the covers. "Turn over, sweetheart."
like a curious bird, she cocked her head. Then, with an implicit trust that caused the same squeezing sensation in his heart he'd felt before, she smiled at him and tinned onto her stomach.
By heaven, Ben vowed, he'd make this the most memorable night of her life. She was a desirable, passionate woman and he would prove it to her. He surveyed the beautiful offering displayed before him and bent to his pleasurable task.
Her responses were hesitant at first, the clutch of a pillow, the catch of a breath, a muffled cry. But he was patient. He traced the curves of her feminine form, outlining it with his hands from the indentations under her arms to her slender ankles. He ran his fingers over the smooth line of her calf and thigh. He kissed the tender hollows behind her knees and the twin dimples at the base of her spine. He rubbed his cheeks savoringly across the voluptuous swells of her buttocks.
With each caress, every kiss, he praised her beauty, her satiny skin, her softness.
Her first moan came when he nibbled his way up her backbone. She moaned louder and managed to prop herself on her arms when he found the juncture of her neck and shoulder with his tongue and teeth. He tormented that sweet spot until she threw her head back and began planting clumsy, desperate kisses in his hair, on his ear, and anywhere else her lips would reach, punctuating each with a breathless cry. Sensing her need, Ben dragged his mouth to hers and gave her his tongue, at the same time slipping a hand under her arm to cradle her warm, heavy breast in his palm. She covered his hand with hers and pressed. She was awkward, unskilled. Wonderful.
"Jess," he whispered. "Do you know how it feels to have you want me this way?"
"Please, please," she whimpered. "Let me turn over."
Ben raised his upper body and she flipped neatly to her back, reaching immediately to wind her arms around his neck and pull him down for a soul-deep kiss. She groaned, she panted, she writhed under him until he was close to losing his head. He wanted nothing more than to nestle between her legs and let his straining, eager hardness find its snug haven.
Somehow he mustered the strength to break the kiss. "Wait, honey."
He levered his body to the side of the bed and made himself ready for her. Jessie watched, her slender rib cage lifting her opulent breasts with each unsteady breath she took. His pulse quickened. The feast he'd been waiting for was just ahead.
Ignoring the throbbing in his groin, he winked at her. "Now this side."
He'd saved the best for last. He pleasured her breasts in every way he knew, wallowing in their glory. They were sensitive to his thumbs, palms and trailing fingertips. He buried his nose in their fragrant cleft and Jessie delighted him by pushing them in from the sides to trap his face in a prison of softness. And when he put his mouth to the pale, delicate nipples, she nearly went crazy.
She made him greedy. He tongued his way down her rib cage and stomach, kneeling between her legs. He paused to linger at her navel and had just dropped a first soft kiss on the puff of hair guarding her womanly secrets when he noticed her sudden stillness.
"Jess? Does this bother you?"
"I... don't know."
"Should I stop?"
"Yes. I don't know. Maybe."
Ben grinned when he saw her eyes were tightly dosed. "Can we just try it? I want ail of you."
She lifted her lashes. "Really?"
"Really. If you don't like it, I'll stop. Just tell me."
"O-okay, then."
Her attack of nerves was short-lived. He separated the feminine folds with his fingers and placed his tongue on her sensitive flesh. She gasped. Ben's own arousal grew as her enjoyment rose by degrees from sighs to cries. In minutes her hips were arching to meet him, and he felt the singular tightening under his mouth, foreshadowing her release. Excitement gripped him as he applied himself more diligently to her pleasure. She gave a lusty shout and the contractions began.
Ben was ready. He was on her and in her before it was over. He held himself high and unmoving within her heat, close to dying with the pleasure of feeling the fluttering aftershocks of her climax around him.
When at last she was still, he rested on his elbows and kissed her tenderly. "You're beautiful."
"You don't have to say that." She was flushed and breath-less.
"It's true."
Just then his strict control slipped. Without warning, he jerked inside her.
"Oh!" Jessie's eyes widened.
Ben smiled. "Hello. Think you can handle some more?"
She squeezed him with her inner muscles and he closed his eyes. "Oh, baby, that feels good."
He withdrew slightly and she squeezed him again, holding tight this time while he pushed his way back.
Ben groaned. "Jess, honey, I wanted this to last."
She looked pleased with herself. "Should I stop?"
"Hell, no. I'll try to bear up."
To his delight, Jessie caught fire again and made the ascent with him. It didn't last as long as he wanted, but by the time he reached the top, Ben didn't care.
"So what do you think of exploring?" he asked her when they lay recuperating in each other's arms.
"Don't bother me—I'm lying on the beach," she said dreamily. "And the ocean is beautiful today."
"What time is it?"
"Dunno. Nine or ten maybe..Past supper time. Are you hungry?"
"Not hungry enough to get out of bed."
"Good. Me, either."
"I wonder what Allie's doing."
&nbs
p; "I'd just as soon forget about your sister right now."
"Oh, no! I did forget—for hours. Ben, my twin sister is in terrible trouble, and I've scarcely given her a thought."
"And it hasn't made her situation any better or worse. Relax, Jess. There's nothing you can do for her until she calls. I, on the other hand, could use a little body heat, and would greatly appreciate it if you'd lie back down."
"I suppose you're right."
"That's better. Damn right I'm right."
"Ben? Were you dating Allie?"
"Uh-uh."
"You kissed her, though."
"Her car broke down one night and I gave her a ride home from work. She kissed me. Once."
"Do you think she's... interested in you?"
"Nope. It wouldn't do her any good if she was."
"Why not?"
"What kind of question is that? I think I've made my choice between the Webster twins pretty clear."
"Still... most men like Allie better, even though we look alike. Even Antonio said he married the wrong twin. At least when we were in the bedroom."
"Your ex-husband is a selfish, stupid son of a bitch. And anybody who picked Allie over you obviously hadn't conducted a kiss comparison."
"Ha! As far as I know, you're the only one who managed that."
"I'm a very enterprising kind of guy."
"Yes, you are. You're also a very... good... kisser."
"You... inspire me...."
"I'm embarrassed."
"Why?"
"I've never been so... unrestrained."
"Yeah, you're pretty loud."
"You needn't sound so smug."
"Why not? I deserve some of the credit for all that panting and groaning."
"When I think back, I can hardly believe that was me."
"It was you, all right. The woman who said she was inhibited."
"I'm serious now, Ben. Did I make you feel—awkward? Did I make a fool of myself ?"
"Honey, you turned me on like I've never been turned on in my life. I love it that I can make you forget yourself like that. You're wonderful."
