by Janet Dailey
With no effort at all, he visualized Sloan standing beneath the spray, water sluicing down her shoulders onto her breasts and stomach. It was an easy leap to imagine himself showering with her, his hands gliding over her slick skin in an exploration of its rounded curves.
The blood started hammering so loudly in his head that he never heard the hair dryer click off. But the clear sound of Sloan’s voice penetrated to shatter the images in his mind.
“Why don’t you go watch some television while I finish getting ready?” The tone of suggestion was in her voice, but her hand was reaching for the bathroom door as if to close it on him when Trey jerked his gaze back to her. “The remote should be on the stand by the bed.”
Not trusting his voice, Trey nodded and turned from the opening. He was conscious of the bathroom door swinging shut as he took his first steps away from it. That forward impetus carried him partway into the room. Then he halted at the foot of the bed.
Television held no appeal to him, not with all these fevered longings coursing through him. They left him raw and hungry for the feel of Sloan in his arms. With all his senses sharpened by it, he turned the instant he heard the releasing click of the bathroom door latch.
Chapter Six
Sloan stepped out of the bathroom clad in a simple tan dress that intensified the golden hue of her skin. A smile curved her lips, the warmth of it matching the glow in her eyes.
“I told you I’d be quick. Unfortunately”—she turned, presenting her back to him—“I think the material’s caught in the zipper. Would you get it for me?”
It was a task Trey had performed countless times for his sister. But this wasn’t his sister. This was Sloan.
Rather stiffly, Trey crossed the intervening space to stand behind her, conscious of the roiling needs within. His hands shook when he fumbled with the zipper, finding it hard to concentrate on anything but the nearness of her skin over the ribbon of her spine.
“Your hands are trembling,” Sloan murmured on a marveling note.
“Damned right they are,” Trey admitted with some force. “That’s because they’d much rather be figuring out how to get this zipper down than up.”
With a turn of her shoulders, she gave him an over-the-shoulder look that held amusement and something else. “Most men wouldn’t admit that to a girl.”
“I’m not most men.” The curtness of his reply was a reflection of the tight control he was exercising over his baser instincts.
“I’m beginning to realize that.” There was a new light in her eyes, a darkening and deepening of interest that seemed to mirror his own.
His own desires were too close to the surface for Trey to care whether he had imagined it or not. He gave up any pretense of interest in the zipper and took her by the shoulders, turning her to face him.
“Do you have any idea how many times I’ve made love to you in my mind?” His voice was thick and husky.
But it was the possessive darkness in his gaze, so stark and hungry, that stole her breath and charged her senses. Her hands rested lightly on his chest, yet she could feel the heat of his body through his shirt. And it was a barrier she didn’t want. The certainty of that made her bold.
“Did I enjoy it?” she asked, her lips parting on the last word, and her head lifting in invitation.
“Let’s find out.” It was a challenge and a statement, issued an instant before his mouth covered her lips.
The kiss was rough with need, filled with pent-up longings that awakened her own. Eagerly she returned its hot urgency, ready to be swept up in its seductive force and a little stunned that she hadn’t realized she could want this much.
Delicious shudders quivered through her when she felt the zipper slide apart and the air touched her bare skin, but not for long. His big hand took its place, the hint of callus on it creating a pleasant rasp to go with its searing warmth. She swayed against him, her body arching under the slow stroke of his hand.
It seemed the kiss had barely begun when he dragged his mouth away from her lips and onto her cheek, yet her lungs were starved for air. But the breath she took ended in a gasp and a moan when he nuzzled that sensitive hollow near her ear, igniting a dance of erotic shivers over her skin. They only increased when his tongue traced the inner shell of her ear.
For a moment she was lost to the delights of his nips and nibbles and the moist heat of his breath on her skin. When his hands first pushed the dress off her shoulders, she resented the subsequent pinning of her arms to her sides and initially resisted until she realized his intention. In an eager and liquid move, she lowered her arms and quickly pulled them free of the garment’s sleeves. The dress slid to the floor, puddling around her feet.
The lacy slip she wore beneath it was like a second skin, blocking none of his body heat or the sensation of his caressing hands. When his attention shifted to the long cord in her neck and the pulsing vein that ran alongside it, Sloan tipped her head, giving him greater access and thrilling to the fresh wave of shivers that swept over her.
She felt a great welling up of need within her, rising and expanding until she thought she would burst with it. She was slow to realize that part of the sensation was caused by Trey’s hands, traveling up from her hips to her rib cage and drawing her slip’s silken length along with them.
This time she knew instantly that his intention was to rid her of it. It was what she wanted, and yet a sliver of panic raced through her as Sloan realized that if she didn’t take control, she would soon lose it. Self-protection came into play, born of a need to keep from becoming too emotionally involved.
“Let me,” she whispered, as she stilled his hands. Her voice breathy with the disturbances he’d created within.
His fingers released the folds of her slip. She imagined that he expected her to remove it. Instead she went to work unfastening the buttons of his shirt. He was quick to help her by tugging the tails loose from his jeans. With the release of the last button, he shrugged out of it and gave it a toss behind him, leaving Sloan free to feast her gaze on the breadth of his shoulders and all his tanned, hard flesh.
She studied the complex roping of muscle, lean, and sharply defined, as if by a sculptor’s hand. From the ridged flatness of his stomach to the broadening sweep of his chest and shoulders, there wasn’t an ounce of fat to be found. He was the image of youthful manhood, virile and strong.
“I wish I had my camera,” Sloan murmured even as she smoothed her hands onto the center of his ribs.
“Oh no you don’t. You aren’t hiding behind any lens tonight.” His voice had an edge to it that held its own warning.
“Not tonight,” Sloan agreed and let her hands glide up to invade the wiry nest of chest hairs, then traveled on to the masculine flatness of his breasts and their pebble-like nipples.
Curiosity had her lipping one, an action that drew a half curse from Trey. She smiled, pleased that her touch disturbed him, and let her hands slide down to his waist.
Moving against him, she used her hands and her body to nudge him backward toward the bed. “I’ll help you off with your boots,” she told him, tipping her head to smile at him.
He responded with a small, negative shake of his head. “Nope. Your slip, then my boots.”
The smoldering darkness of his gaze had her heart tripping over itself, but she managed a soft laugh. “A negotiation, is it?”
“Or a fair trade.” His quick hands had already caught hold of the slip and gave it an upward pull.
Acquiescing, Sloan raised her arms. Like liquid, the slip slid up and over her head, then went sailing after his shirt. When she focused on his face again, her breath was taken by the caressing way his gaze moved over the lacy cups of her underwire brassiere, then down to her matching lace briefs.
There was so much desire in his face that it took her a moment to find her voice. “Your boots.” In another attempt to seize the initiative, she gave him a quick, firm shove, overbalancing him and sending him backward onto the bed.
“You push. I pull,” she instructed.
Just as she tightened her grip on his boot, he clamped his hands on her waist and pulled her sideways and down, onto the bed beside him. The suddenness of it drew an outcry of surprise from her, then a laugh when she bounced on the mattress.
“That’s not fair,” she protested.
“It wasn’t fair that there was no place for me to do any pushing, not as dirty as the soles of these boots are.” He leaned forward and proceeded to tug off his own boots. “As attractive as the view was, it would have taken too long.”
“I could have managed,” she murmured idly, taking advantage of the chance to study, unobserved, the rippling movements of his arm and shoulder muscles.
“But I couldn’t.” One boot after the other thudded to the floor, followed by his socks. Swiveling around, he leaned back on an elbow beside her. “The trouble is—a man has no graceful way to get out of his clothes—not like a woman does.”
She marveled that he would think that. Honesty made her say, “It feels just as awkward for a woman.”
“That’s reassuring.” The slow spread of his smile was incredibly sexy and warm. Sloan couldn’t help being moved by it. Like him, she found herself wishing there was a way to take the mundane and make it rare—as rare as the feelings within.
The instant that thought crossed her mind, she banished it as foolish, as the kind of thought that invariably ended in disappointment. Even though the number of lovers in her life had been few, it was a lesson she had learned well not to let her expectations get too high.
“What is it?” His hand touched her cheek, his gaze narrowing on her in sharpened study.
“Nothing.” Her smile of assurance was quick, a little too quick. She saw at once that he didn’t believe her.
“Sloan…” he began.
Instinctively she silenced him with a kiss that was as hungry for love as her heart was. But her heart’s hunger wasn’t something a kiss alone could satisfy.
She rolled her mouth over and around his lips, murmuring against them, “We’ve already talked too much. Let’s not spoil it with more.”
With her lips moving hotly all over his, talking was the last thing on Trey’s mind. Earlier he had been willing to indulge her essentially playful antics, but this was what he wanted, what he needed.
Using the weight and length of his body, he pressed her backward onto the mattress, not caring that the spread still covered it. He made short work of stripping away her lacy bra and panties and shedding his own clothes.
As he rejoined her, he was glad of the room’s light that allowed him to see every feminine inch of her. There was high satisfaction in knowing she was his to explore. And there was much to discover, from the rounded shape of her small, firm breasts and the rosy brown nubs of her nipples to the sexy little bulge of her stomach and the silky matt of her pubic hair.
The pressure grew with every touch and every taste, the heat mounting like a wildfire about to rage out of control. He didn’t need the urging of her hands and hips or the little mewling sounds that came from her throat. The instincts that drove him, shifting him onto her, were much more primitive.
Some sane part of him registered the wondrous cry of pleasure that slipped from her when he filled her. Then it all blurred together, bodies straining in rhythm, blood pounding, hands digging, the ache intensifying, coiling into an ever tightening circle. The release, when it came, was like an explosion of sensation that shook and shattered even as it melted away all the tension, leaving them both limp and trembling.
Body slick with sweat, Trey drew her along with him when he rolled off her and onto his back, lying in a loose, spent sprawl, yet keeping one arm securely hooked around her. His heart had yet to slow its rapid beat, and his chest continued its rise and fall with the quick, deep breaths he took.
But nothing registered as strongly as the feel of Sloan curled against him, the feathering of her hair on his arm, and the warmth of her breath on his skin. She stirred, and he automatically tightened his hold to keep her close.
His own action surprised him. With other women, this was usually when he tried to figure out some tactful way to slip free and get dressed. But this time was different. Everything was different, Trey realized, and it had been from the first moment he met her. He had felt that it was different then, and the feeling was even stronger now.
In a slow, catlike movement, Sloan lightly rubbed her cheek against his chest. “I suppose we should get dressed and go eat, but I don’t feel like moving.”
“Me either,” Trey agreed, his voice a low, lazy rumble. “Too bad we can’t call room service.”
There was amusement in the dismissing breath she released. “You can forget that.”
“I know.” He rolled onto his side, shifting her from his body onto the bed, giving him his first look at the contented glow in her eyes. “I’m in no big hurry, anyway. Are you?”
“No.” Her hand came up and traced the line of his jaw with her fingertips, then lingered near his mouth, touching the heads of perspiration along his upper lip. “You’re all sweaty.”
“I wonder how that happened,” Trey mocked lightly, his eyes agleam with amusement and satisfaction.
“I wonder,” Sloan murmured in return, a smile deepening the corners of her mouth.
“It couldn’t be that you had something to do with it, could it?” he challenged, unable to remember a time when he had enjoyed this intimate kind of banter.
“Maybe a little,” Sloan conceded with a touch of smugness.
“Little, hell,” he growled and claimed her lips in a quick, punishing kiss. One taste only made him hungry for more. He nuzzled a corner of her mouth. “That shower of yours looked big enough for two. Care to join me?”
“Only if you promise to scrub my back,” she whispered in answer.
“That’s a deal.”
Just as he had imagined, Trey washed much more than her back. Wrapped in a cloud of steam and pummeled by the shower’s pulsating jets, they made love again, this time with slow and infinite pleasure.
The bathroom mirror was completely misted over when they finally emerged from the shower and toweled dry. Finishing, Trey wrapped the damp towel around his hips tucking in a corner to hold it in place.
His gaze slid to Sloan, watching as she squeezed the excess water from her hair. Her kiss-swollen lips lay softly together, and there was a kind of inner beauty to her face that gave it a new radiance. A possessiveness rushed through him with a potency that shook him.
“Must be nice to have short hair,” she observed idly.
“It has its advantages,” he admitted absently. “This is just about where I came in—here you are, fresh out of the shower, your hair all wet.”
“But this time I’m not even going to try to dry it.” She ran a comb through it, slicking it away from her face. “It will be a lot quicker just to braid it.”
“While you do that, I’ll go round up our clothes.”
The minute he left the bathroom, Sloan felt his absence. But it was eased by the small sounds she heard coming from the outer room. A heady contentment hummed through her, making her feel all tingly and warm.
When Trey returned a few minutes later, fully dressed, to deliver her clothes, Sloan was struck by how natural it seemed, as if it had always been that way. It wasn’t a feeling she examined too closely; experience had taught her to live in the moment. And she was determined to do that.
The restaurant was crowded when they arrived, but Trey managed to find a booth tucked in an out-of-the-way corner. They sat on the same side, without an ounce of space between them. A lot more snuggling and kissing went on than talking. But words seemed unnecessary when there was a much more satisfactory and elemental form of communication to be enjoyed.<
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It was nearly ten o’clock by the time they finished and headed back to the motel. Nothing was said; it was simply understood that on this night Trey wouldn’t be leaving Sloan at the door.
Trey followed her into the room and paused to shut it behind him, flipping the dead bolt into its locked position. When he turned away from it, Sloan was nowhere in sight. Three steps into the room, he spotted her perched on the edge of the bed by the nightstand, her back to him. He dropped his hat on the low bureau and turned toward her.
Curiosity made him ask, “What are you doing?”
“Setting the alarm.” The task accomplished, she rose from bed, an easy smile curving her lips when she turned to him. “It’s back to work for me tomorrow.”
Some of his earlier resentment flared at the thought of the camera claiming her time the next day instead of him. “Haven’t you taken enough pictures?” He managed to keep the challenge light, but just barely.
Her smile widened. “Don’t you know that’s one of a photographer’s secrets to success? We play the numbers game. You take a couple hundred shots in hopes of getting one that’s really good.”
“That’s the key, is it?” There was a touch of grimness around his mouth, but it faded as she wandered toward him while reaching behind her head to pull free the elastic band securing her braid. The action drew the dress’s tan material across her breasts, outlining their perfectly round shape and drawing his attention to them. “What time are you planning to get up?”
“Six.” She swept the loosened braid onto a shoulder and finger-combed her hair free of its plait.
“Why so early?” Displeasure put a hard edge on his voice, but Sloan didn’t appear to notice it. “Nothing’s going on at that hour. Competition doesn’t resume until the afternoon.”
“I know, but I want to get some early-morning shots when it’s all deserted and it’s only the horses in the pens. I have my fingers crossed that it will be chilly enough to see their breath.” Her attention was turned inward, picturing the ideal shot in her mind. Belatedly she focused on him. “Actually, that was how I planned to spend my morning today, but somebody took me out for a picnic breakfast instead.”
