His kiss was not enough.
Her arms slipped up around his neck, holding him, fingers caressing the softness of his hair, brushing along the exposed skin at the nape of his neck, kneading the taut muscles she found there. And all the time she was drawing his head down closer, needing the pressure of his mouth to be harder, stronger—more.
He took her parted lips with a skill that had her sighing, the sigh opening her mouth even more to him, letting the slide of his tongue move along the sensitive inner tissues, tasting her, enticing her, seducing her.
If she stood on tiptoe then she could increase the pressure of his mouth on hers in response to the rising heat in her blood, the singing in her nerves. Still holding his proud dark head where she wanted it with one hand, she let the fingers of the other trail down the side of his face, feeling the faint rasp of black stubble under her fingertips as she followed the line of his forceful jaw. She caught Raul’s indrawn hiss of breath and smiled against his mouth as she kissed him again, this time taking her caressing fingers down his throat to slide in at the open neck of his shirt, stroking the smooth, warm flesh she found there, tracing tiny circles in the crisp body hair.
‘Alannah…’ Raul said again but this time her name was a growl of response against her lips.
‘Mmm?’ Alannah sighed, wriggling even closer, pressing herself against him and hearing the beat of his heart kick up a notch under the powerful ribcage.
‘Dios! You devil woman!’ he muttered against her mouth and the hands that had held her held no more. Instead they roved hungrily over her body, powerful fingers curving over and cupping the soft curves of her buttocks, pulling her in even closer to the heated force of his erection.
‘I only ever needed to take one look to want you more than any woman in the world. I still do.’
‘Me too … I want you too.’
Alannah felt the words slip past her guard with a tiny sense of shock. Even when they’d been together, she had never been brave enough or bold enough to admit to her sexual need of this man. Oh, she’d felt it often enough. And she’d shown him in wordless, physical ways, by her responses to his kisses and his caresses, just how much she desired him. But she had never actually come right out and said it in so many words.
She could only imagine that two long years of loneliness, of missing him, missing his touch, his kiss, had driven her into a state of sensual starvation, one in which she no longer had the strength or control to impose any restraint on her tongue so that Raul’s kisses had loosened even the weak grip she had on it.
Raul’s kisses and the very basic, very simple need for human comfort after the loss and misery she had endured so recently. Life was too short, too precarious to be lived at a lukewarm temperature. She’d welcomed the heat of her response to Raul as a way to melt the ice that seemed to have formed around her heart, shutting her off from the world, from all emotion.
Here at least was proof that she was still very much alive—and feeling.
‘You do?’
Her new openness had stunned Raul too. His dark head went back, deep-set eyes narrowing until all she could see was a tiny strip of burning gold gleaming between the thick black lashes that fringed them.
‘Is this the truth?’
Some of her unexpected courage deserting her under the intense scrutiny of that smouldering gaze, Alannah felt hot colour flood her cheeks, her mouth drying sharply so that she could only nod in silent acquiescence. She wanted to look anywhere but into his eyes, unable to meet them and answer the question in them when they were fixed on hers, so she lowered her gaze hastily, meaning to stare at the floor.
Instead she found that her eyes were caught by the broad expanse of Raul’s chest under the fine linen of his shirt. Where he had tugged his tie loose and unfastened a single button at the neck the tanned skin of his throat seemed impossibly dark—burnished almost—in contrast to the immaculate white and the shadow of the black, curling chest hair that showed faintly through it. The memory of how it had felt to smooth her fingertips over that hair, feeling it crisp and springy under her touch, made her swallow hard, fighting the urge to lift her hands to his chest, unbutton his shirt, to know the feeling all over again.
In an effort to resist the temptation, she forced her eyes lower, only to find the colour rising higher in her face, heating her blood, as her gaze rested on the silver buckle and the polished black leather of the belt that fastened around the narrow waist. There was no possibility that she could be unaware of the way that the fine material of his trousers stretched tautly over the heated bulge of his erection, the force of his reaction proving physically the truth of his uninhibited claim to want her …
More than any other woman in the world?
Privately, Alannah doubted that. But for now she’d take this, she told herself. For now, simply knowing that this devastating man, the only man she’d ever wanted to sleep with, still desired her was balm to her wounded soul, a promise of delight in a world that until now had seemed to have turned completely black.
‘Then what about him?’ Raul pressed, the unexpectedness of the question slicing into her heated thoughts and jolting her so that her eyes flew back up to his face, a faint frown of confusion creasing the space between her finely arched brows.
‘Him?’ she echoed in bewilderment. ‘Who? Who do you mean?’
‘Who else but your other man, of course?’
Raul’s tone was light, almost casual, but there was a new sharpness in his scrutiny, a watchfulness in the eyes that were once more fixed on her face, that told her that his words were meant far from casually. And in the same moment that the realisation of just what he meant hit home, the recognition of the fact that it truly mattered to him rocked her world with the sense of a blow to her head, making her thoughts spin dizzily.
‘My other man…’ was all she could croak, her voice deserting her as she struggled for control. ‘Who…?’
His swift dark frown reproved her and she knew that he believed she was playing with him, not understanding simply for the hell of it, deliberately being provocative in order to rile him further.
‘Let’s get one thing straight, querida,’ he muttered, low and harsh, ‘I don’t sleep with other men’s women, no matter how strong the temptation.’
‘Other men’s women!’ Alannah spluttered indignantly. ‘Let me tell you that I’m no man’s woman! I don’t belong to anyone and—’
‘Then the new lover is no longer in the picture?’ Raul shot at her, the question getting under her guard like a sharp stiletto knife in her ribs.
‘There is no new lover!’ she flung at him then, her throat closing up in horror as she saw his dark head go back and realised what she had said and how much she had given away. She could almost see his mind going back over their last day together, reliving the scene, recalling everything she had said …
‘So you walked out on him too, hmm? But perhaps you gave the poor fool more than the few months you gave me. And then …’ pausing to stare deep into her eyes, he lifted a hand and ran it softly down the side of her face, smiling darkly as he watched her automatic reaction, the way she arched slightly into the caress, her eyes half closing sensually ‘… his loss is my gain …’
And, bending his head, he took her mouth again in a kiss so deeply sensual that it made her head swim, had her clutching at his shoulders, crushing the fine material of his jacket under nerveless fingers as once more the tidal wave of sensation took her by storm. The heated caress of his hands, sweeping down her neck, over her shoulders, along her arms, made her shudder in pleasurable response and she pressed herself closer to the warm power of his body, needing more than such a gentle touch. Raul laughed softly, deep in his throat, and drew her in, holding her close as he tilted up her head so that he could plunder her mouth more effectively.
The hand that was at her back moved up to the V neckline of her dress, sliding in, finding the warm skin underneath and stroking softly. When he heard her murmur of delight and fel
t the way that the light touch made her squirm against him he dropped the hand that had been under her chin to the same sensitive area, tracing erotic patterns with his fingers outwards and downwards, moving towards the spot where her tight and swollen breasts pressed against the confines of her bra. In the moment that those tantalising fingertips brushed over the sensitised peaks under the pale green satin, Alannah gasped aloud in shocked delight to the fierce intensity of feeling his touch created, heat pooled low down between her legs and she pressed her mouth harder against his, mutely encouraging more of the arousing delight. With one hand he held her there while the other moved down the front of her dress, wrenching open the small pearly buttons that held it fastened with hungry impatience. When his hot fingers closed over the swell of her breast in the silk and lace of her bra, thumb and forefinger scissoring together to tweak the already straining nipple into stinging life, Alannah gasped again, her head falling back as she reacted to the electric jolt of pleasure that burned through her.
The movement gave Raul even more access to the front of her dress, ripping open buttons with such force that several flew away from her, bouncing off the table, the arm of the chair. Bent backwards on his supporting arm, she felt him ease one aching breast out of the silky cup of her bra, lifting it so that the pouting nipple was exposed, easily accessible to the hotly tormenting caress of his mouth.
‘Raul…’ His name was a crooning sound, a note of wonder and almost disbelief at the pleasure he was giving her.
She felt him half walk, half carry her part way across the room, knew the pressure of the seat of the settee at the backs of her knees before she tumbled down onto the black leather, crushed against the cushions by the weight of Raul’s body following her.
‘You are eternal temptation,’ Raul muttered against her neck, where his burning mouth was now working another sort of magic, one that involved the delicately erotic patterns his tongue was tracing over her skin, making her writhe in delight. ‘And I have never ever been able to resist temptation.’
Each word was punctuated with another kiss, hard, demanding, possessive. Making her his, stamping her with his brand.
‘Never …’
And, now that she had come so near and yet so far so many times, the flames that were waiting to engulf Alannah’s body, her mind, flared and raged out of control in the space of a frantic heartbeat. She didn’t have time to think or even to breathe as Raul crushed her under his weight.
His mouth was fierce on hers, his hands urgent, burning as they explored every shivering inch of her. Those wicked fingers had now opened the front of her dress right down to her navel so that they could slide in further, pushing under the yielding elastic at the top of her knickers, reaching down to where the need pulsed hardest, making her whimper in hungry response.
‘No …’ he muttered when he was forced to snatch in a rough, ragged breath—it was either that or suffocate.
No? The question sounded in her head; she didn’t have the strength or the ability to actually voice it, let alone understand the harsh-voiced Spanish snarled against the side of her neck. How could he mean no when she wanted this so badly and she could have sworn…?
‘Not like this,’ Raul responded impatiently. ‘Not here—the bedroom …’
‘Yes …’
Alannah managed a gasp of sound. She had no time for more because as soon as she had spoken her lips were claimed again and Raul lifted her right off her feet and bundled her out in the direction she had indicated so fast that her head spun. His mouth was still hard against hers, weaving a sensual magic with his lips and his tongue, and the hands that held her were clamped around her hips, managing to caress her in a way that stoked the fires of her need at the same time that they lifted her and carried her, in the direction of the bedroom.
‘This will have to go!’
Impatience had got the better of him and he propped her up against the wall again, taking the now loosened dress by the hem and wrenching it upwards. For a moment Alannah was blinded by the green cloth over her face but then he pulled it free again and tossed it aside, careless of the way that it landed on the polished wooden floor in a crumpled heap.
‘Better …’
Dark eyes dropped to the spill of her breasts from the confines of the pale green satin and he drew in a deep, uneven breath.
‘Much better.’
Alannah’s own breath was snatched in as he curved his big hands under each breast, cupping and lifting them to the caress of his mouth, the wicked, tormenting flicker of his hot tongue. Almost unable to bear it, Alannah writhed against the wall, colour flushing her face, heat flooding her body, the intensity of arousal so sharp it was like a stab of pain.
‘Raul …’
It was a moan of protest—or encouragement, and even she couldn’t have said which. With her back still against the wall, she edged her way inch by inch towards the door at the end of the corridor that led to the bedroom. The burn of his touch on her sensitised skin was wonderful, and the flare of need it woke inside seared through every nerve, every cell of her body. But if he dragged this out any longer then she was going to go up in flames like a forest fire, raging through paper-dry undergrowth.
‘Raul—please …’
A laugh, low, dark, triumphant, greeted her plea and, catching hold of her again, keeping her still with the strength of one arm around her, Raul captured her mouth, subjecting it to a sensually tormenting onslaught as his free hand swiftly and efficiently dealt with the clasp of her bra, freeing it and tossing it aside, somewhere in the general direction of the already discarded dress.
The feel of his hands on the bare skin of her breasts was almost more than she could take. Her head went back against the wall, a low, wild moan escaping her, and she sagged at the knees, coming close to collapse in delight.
‘Raul—please …!’
Another laugh, even rougher this time, sounded low in his throat as he pressed a line of hot kisses along her shoulder and into the small hollow at the base of her neck. And all the time those wicked, knowing, tantalising hands played havoc with her senses as they touched and stroked and teased and tormented the stinging tips of her breasts, one moment gentle, then tugging on the swollen nipples until she felt she might actually pass out with the force of the sensations she was feeling.
But then suddenly it seemed that Raul lost all patience. No longer prepared to anticipate, to delay, to drag out the pleasure for a moment longer, he gave a low growl and snatched her up into his arms, swinging her high as he strode the few metres down the corridor to the bedroom, kicking open the door and carrying her in.
Marching over to the bed, he dropped her onto it with little ceremony, obviously impatient now, nearing the end of his control just as she had almost lost hers. Eyes that were black with passion locked with Alannah’s as he stripped off his clothes, letting the elegantly tailored suit, the crisp white shirt fall where they would as he tossed them aside without any concern.
And Alannah couldn’t look anywhere else. She didn’t want to look anywhere else. She was transfixed by the sight of the fabulous body that he was revealing, each discarded item exposing another part of the male beauty that was Raul Marcín. He was broad and strong, with straight, powerful shoulders and torso, his chest hazed with the black body hair she had glimpsed so faintly before. Exposed like this, it was darker than ever, curling and crisp, then arrowing down past his narrow waist to disappear into the waistband of his trousers.
She might have thought that as she lay there, with no touch, no kiss to stoke the fires of need he had awoken, those fires might ebb, but the truth was that the opposite was happening. Every inch of tanned olive skin that was revealed made her pulse beat stronger, harder; her blood burn hotter. Now she felt she understood just why she had never been able to replace this man in her mind and in her heart. The truth was simply that there was no one else for her; no one who could match him against her personal blueprint for the perfect man. In the few short months that they h
ad been together he had stamped his brand on her as surely as if she had been some long-ago slave, marked as her owner’s possession; his to do with as he would. And nothing had changed.
When black boxer shorts were his only clothing he came back to her, bending over the bed to take her lips in a long, lingering kiss that sparked off once again all the sensations that had driven her to distraction before. Hungrily she reached up, fastening her hands around his broad shoulders, wanting to draw him down to her, but Raul stilled her with a touch, pressing her back against the pillows while he eased the small green slip of her underwear from her body. The next moment he had pressed his mouth to the smooth flesh his hands had exposed, kissing a trail of fire the length of her body.
‘Dios, but I need this.’
Raul’s voice was raw, thickened by the hunger that she could feel tensing his body; the same hunger that was burning between her legs, making her shift restlessly on the bed.
‘Me too …’
Perhaps if she soothed him, stroked him in the same way that he was touching her then he would relent and give her the satisfaction she craved. But when she smoothed her hands over his hot, bronzed skin it seemed to have the opposite effect of soothing. Instead she saw the feverish glitter of hunger in his eyes, the red slash of colour on those high carved cheekbones and heard his breathing coming rough and ragged as he fought for control.
A control she didn’t want.
And when his kisses caressed her breasts, moving over the soft curves until they found the pouting pink nipple, then she could hardly find the strength to bear it.
‘Raul—please—come to me …’
Her fingers fumbling in their haste, she tugged at the black boxer shorts, hearing his harsh intake of breath as he helped her with them, shrugging himself out of his last item of clothing. And then at last he was right with her, his hot body heavy on top of her, his hair-roughened legs pushing hers apart, opening her to him.
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