Dark hair curtained her face and shoulders, shielding and revealing her velvet skin as she removed the blouse. She had a fresh, tawny beauty, and the way she exposed it inch by hesitant inch only made her more enticing.
Curving tan lines edged her bra as she bent to strip away her ski pants. Where had she sunbathed? Ryder mused. Definitely not in Florida, judging by her mispronunciation of Miami.
Suppressing the urge to rip off his flannel shirt, he eased out of it. Even so, she shot him a startled look as he shrugged free, tossed it aside and reached to unbuckle his belt. What did the lady expect? For him to take a shower with his clothes on, maybe make love that way?
She was still staring at him, drinking in the sight of his bare chest. Surely she’d seen muscular torsos before, and no doubt more sculpted, flamboyant ones than his. At the beach, if not in the bedroom. Unless, of course, she swam only at a private pool, in restricted company.
He was experienced at putting clues together, and several of them clicked into place. She wore expensive clothes. She didn’t want to say who she was or where she came from. And, he recalled wryly, she hadn’t a clue how to do something as routine as opening a can of soup.
Lisa must be someone’s pampered daughter, very pampered. Her slight accent, along with her fractured pronunciation of a common city name, indicated she hailed from a foreign country.
Except for the green eyes, she appeared Hispanic. The name Schmit or Schmidt could be assumed, or she might have German ancestry. That wouldn’t be unusual in certain regions of South America.
“Argentina,” he guessed.
Lisa stopped with her pants halfway down her hips. “I beg your pardon?”
“You’re from Argentina.” She shook her head. “Paraguay? Uruguay? Some other ‘uay’?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Who are you?” he said. “Really?”
“Does it matter?” Her frank expression indicated she’d prefer not to tell him any more lies, but she wasn’t about to admit the truth, either.
“I want one promise from you,” Ryder said.
Gravity pulled her pants the rest of the way to the floor, where they puddled around her feet. In her filmy bra and panties, Lisa stood gazing at him as solemnly as Eve contemplating the apple tree. “What would that be?”
“That this isn’t a game. Some kind of rich girl’s scavenger hunt.” His jaw tightened. “And I’m not your trophy.”
“Scavenger hunt?” She regarded him in astonishment. “Do people really do that? Something as intimate as making love, to score points with their friends?”
“Men do,” Ryder said. “So I’ve heard. And I have great respect for the ability of women to do anything a man can do. No matter how foolish.”
Dismay puckered her forehead. “To use someone else for sport! I can’t imagine it, Ryder.” Stepping out of her pants, she approached to stand on tiptoe, one hand reaching to brush his cheek. As their gazes locked, he felt as if they were connecting on several levels at once, plugging into each other’s subconscious, infiltrating each other’s pasts, opening doors long blocked and throwing windows wide.
If this was a game, she played it brilliantly.
Her mouth met his, tentative and light. He let her take the lead, enjoying the sensitivity with which her lips probed his. Then her tongue traced the corners of his mouth and sharp need sliced through his body. Catching Lisa’s waist, Ryder pulled her close.
Her eyes drifted shut and she melted into him. He wanted to take her right now. On the floor. In the bed. Anywhere. And he would have, except that a shift of position sent a wallop of pain roaring through his ankle. A guttural noise wrenched from his throat and he staggered against the door frame.
“Ryder?” Lisa inspected him with concern. “I’ve hurt you! I’m sorry.”
His moan turned to a chuckle. “You, sweetheart, are pure pleasure. The pain is a whole lot lower down.”
Her glance fell to his ankle. “I forgot.” She stepped away, hands fluttering. “What can I do?”
What could she do? He had a ready answer on that score, but the momentum between them had been broken. If he hadn’t felt covered with sweat from the ski slope, and she hadn’t been redolent of tomato soup, Ryder might have suggested they put their clothes back on. But, he reminded himself, Lisa needed help to forget the man who had hurt her. He would bring her along gently.
“I could use a little help with these pants,” he said.
“As in, getting them off?”
“That’s the general idea.”
“Will that make your ankle better?” she asked dubiously.
“No, but it will keep my pants dry,” he said. “I’d recommend you finish undressing, too. Unless you prefer washing out your underthings while you’re still wearing them.”
A trace of laughter fleeted across her face. Then, lower lip caught firmly between her teeth, she bent and tugged at his jeans.
*
When she’d contemplated losing her virginity, Lisa hadn’t given any thought to the details. She had assumed that the man would handle everything. Apparently matters didn’t work that way in real life. Not with this man, anyway.
Awkwardly she fumbled with Ryder’s snap. She snatched her hand away when it came into contact with the hard bulge beneath, then forced herself to return to her task as if nothing had happened. Even through her uneasiness, she wanted him. Her erect nipples strained at the flimsy bra, and a totally unladylike urge kept seizing her to press against him, kiss him, stroke him and make that bulge even larger.
First she had to get his pants off. Finally the snap popped open. With clumsy fingers, Lisa unzipped him, then knelt and eased the pants around the wrapped ankle. She pulled them off and stepped back.
When she straightened, she got her first good look at the man in his underwear. Lisa had seen men in skimpy swimsuits, at a distance. None of them compared to the gleaming perfection of Ryder, from his taut jawline down the flat expanse of stomach to his muscled thighs.
A problem occurred to her. “You don’t want to get this bandage wet, do you?” she said.
“I’ll stick it out the shower door,” he said.
“Won’t the water run out?” In her parents’ château, a leak on a wooden floor meant lingering dampness and possibly stained plaster on the ceiling below. “It’ll make a mess.”
“Ever heard of evaporation?” he asked.
The bathroom floor, she saw at a glance, was covered with tile and probably impervious to anything short of a major flood. “Sure,” she retorted. “They even have evaporation in Argentina.”
“So that is where you live?”
“They have evaporation everywhere.” She brushed a cascade of hair from her face.
“You’re determined to keep me guessing,” he murmured, tantalizingly close to her ear.
“Not guessing. In the dark,” Lisa admitted.
“Underwear,” he reminded her. When she touched the elastic around her hips, he added, “Mine.”
Lisa shook her head. “You can remove your own.”
“But I’m in such terrible pain,” he deadpanned. Only the glint in his eyes gave him away.
“I think you’re faking this whole injury.”
“I wish I were.” Releasing an exaggerated sigh, he folded his arms and watched her, wolflike in his stillness.
“In a minute,” she said, working up her nerve.
“Take your time.”
As she unhooked her bra, she felt his scrutiny fix on her breasts. With deliberate motions, she slid down her panties, stepped out of them, and heard a soft, involuntary whistle. Keep going. You can do this.
Crouching in front of Ryder, Lisa looked away as she reached for his waist and pulled down the wisp of cotton. She moved back quickly. He didn’t stir, but she could sense tension rippling beneath the surface.
When she dared to look, she saw that he was unabashedly ready. Very ready.
Intense curiosity gripped Lisa. She wanted to unleash
the feral hunger she sensed beneath his iron self-control. She wanted to experience this man with every part of herself. Her breasts felt full. Swollen, aching to be caressed. If only she could bring herself to approach him.
Ryder turned away, into the bathroom. The stiffness of his back betrayed how tightly he was holding himself in check. In his restraint, she perceived the man his résumé had described. An ex-Marine. A former police detective. A hard man, an experienced one. Although she needed all that experience, the hardness frightened her a little.
The shower burst into life, echoing off the walls and filling the bathroom with a rushing noise. The air grew misty. Ryder hobbled into the vertical stall, leaving the frosted glass door open wide enough to accommodate his bandaged ankle. “We should put a plastic bag over it,” he said. “Got one handy?”
Lisa shook her head. She should have thought of that. But she had no intention of scampering to the kitchen stark naked.
“Then you’d better scrub me in a hurry.”
She grabbed a washcloth off the rack. She had helped scrub down one of Nicola’s show horses, before her friend’s divorce. This shouldn’t be any harder, should it?
“You’ve got the strangest expression on your face,” Ryder said.
“I do?”
“Steely determination.” His eyes narrowed in contemplation. “Afraid of catching a hoof in your side?”
“How did you know?” she asked in amazement.
“Rich girls always have horses,” he said.
“They weren’t mine! They were the baron’s!” She stopped in dismay, halfway into the stall. How much had she revealed? There were a lot of barons in the world, weren’t there?
“The baron?” Ryder shook his head. “This creepy ex-boyfriend of yours was a baron?”
Water sprayed her face, and she realized it must be drenching the bathroom. Lisa hustled inside and closed the glass door as far as she could. “It was a nickname,” she protested, and knew instantly he didn’t believe her.
“As far as I know, they don’t have barons in Argentina.” Ryder propped one elbow on an oversize soap tray for support. He emitted a spicy male scent, rich with exertion and laced with subliminal allure. “Europe, then. Your name’s Schmidt, so you’re from Austria? Germany?”
“Would you like to see my lederhosen?”
“Some other time.”
Lisa snatched the bar of soap and rubbed it across the washcloth. Briskly, she polished Ryder’s chest and shoulders.
A large hand clamped onto her arm, and Ryder removed the cloth. “No, Lisa,” he said. “Let me show you how it’s done.”
“You don’t have to,” she gulped. “I can try it again.”
He started to laugh. “Were you this uptight with the baron?”
“No! Yes!” She wasn’t sure what she wanted him to believe.
Retracting his leg through the door, and heedless of the water drenching the bandage, Ryder pinned her against the fiberglass wall. “Stop wiggling or I’ll never get you clean.”
“Your wrapping! It’ll be soaked.”
“We can do it over. There must be a first aid kit around here somewhere.” He bent over Lisa, large and powerful. Despite an urge to squirm away, there was no room. Anyway, the soapy cloth was swishing across her neck and shoulders so gently that she began to calm. “Step away from the wall. So I can wash your back.”
At least she wouldn’t have to face him anymore. “I’ll turn—”
“No, you won’t.” Standing in front, he reached around Lisa and stroked her back with the nubbly cloth. She couldn’t help bumping into him, her bare skin rubbing his. When she did, he held her tightly in place, so that she felt the whole man along the length of her body.
His legs were corded and lightly furred. His chest and upper arms had turned slick, and his hair smelled of herbal shampoo. She was still registering her impressions when his hand on her elbow turned her slightly, and Ryder washed her side, then adjusted her so he could reach the other one.
“You’ve done this before,” she observed. “You said you were cautious.”
“Cautious. Not monastic. Besides, I used to wash the family dog.”
“I beg your pardon!”
He chuckled at her indignation. “Rich girls have horses. Kids who live in trailers have dogs.”
“I remind you of washing your dog?” she sputtered.
“Trust me, it wasn’t nearly this much fun,” he said, and drew the washcloth along the valley between her breasts. The sensation was so intense that Lisa gasped.
Ryder’s lips quirked with satisfaction at her reaction, and then, bracing one hand against the fiberglass, he bent and caught one nipple between his lips. Pure agonizing desire wiped her mind and spirit clean. The sensation that licked through her was a flame, swiftly roaring into a fire.
Lisa’s hand cupped the back of Ryder’s head, holding him against her and urging him on. He released the nipple and moved to the other one. Her back arched instinctively, and her free hand moved along his hips. He shifted back and forth between her breasts until heat suffused her, and steam seemed to rise directly from their skin.
To her astonishment Lisa felt no shyness at all. No hesitancy as he pressed tighter against her. She wanted this. Needed it. Ached for it. When he lifted his head to study her, she caught his mouth with hers and yielded to the acute urge to press against him.
Strong fingers caught her buttocks. He was groaning, low and deep, and then suddenly, painfully, he drew away.
“What’s wrong?” she rasped. “Is it your foot?”
He shook his head, spraying droplets of water around the stall. “I forgot about protection.”
“What?”
“I’ve got to find some—there must be a condom somewhere in this house.” He uttered a low oath, then apologized. “It’s frustrating, that’s all.”
A condom? Ryder wanted to use a condom? Lisa couldn’t believe it. She might lose her virginity with no chance of getting pregnant? She would never find another man like him. An apparently clean medical slate, character references and— So intense. So sensual. His bronzed skin gleaming in the shower.
“I’m on the pill,” she lied, and suffered a prick of guilt. As if she hadn’t already told enough lies to brand her as a complete fake!
Better change the subject in a hurry. Brushing a wet strand of hair from Ryder’s temple, she fingered a jagged white line above it. “How did you get this scar?”
“A Marine rescue operation,” he said. “There was a revolution in central Africa. We had to go in and pull out the American citizens.”
“You got shot?” she asked.
“Potted.”
“What?”
“Somebody threw a pot at me,” he said. “Whacked me right there. I was so dazed, I still had the pot in my hand when I got onto the helicopter.”
“Did everyone get out safely?”
“Heck, yes,” he said.
“You were a hero.” She felt worse and worse about tricking this man. And better and better about his becoming the father of her child.
“They would have been okay, anyway,” he said. “The revolution was over by the time we landed. We just didn’t know it.”
Lisa started to laugh. “You make it sound so casual.”
Ryder watched her with amused fascination. “You’re lovely when you laugh. I shouldn’t tell you that, though.”
“Why not?”
“Gives you too much power,” he said.
“You’re the one with the power,” she replied, and drew his hips against hers. Until that moment, Lisa had tried not to think about what she was doing. Now, she couldn’t not think about it. Because, in that instant, she knew that she was incomplete and would never be whole unless she possessed Ryder. Unless they coupled, mated, filled each other. It was more than an urge or a need. It was a compulsion.
She could feel the change in him, too. His hips moved in a rhythm of their own, while the arms encircling her waist hardened into a
viselike grip. There could be no more space between them, anywhere. In a blur of spattering water and with a few stifled expletives when Ryder put too much weight on his ankle, they shifted out of the shower stall onto a fluffy bath rug. The contrast in textures between wet and dry, cold air and stray drops of hot water, faded before the all-encompassing yearning that only Ryder could satisfy.
Lisa yielded to an elemental force that was partly herself and partly this man. She stroked him everywhere, with every part of her body, and opened herself to him without reserve. He entered her with a long, pulsing stroke. There was a momentary twinge, and then he plunged further. Crying out, Lisa kneaded his back, yearning for more but unsure what more there could be.
Lifting himself on his elbows, Ryder withdrew. As warm water dripped from his skin to hers, Lisa heard him suck in a harsh breath. She didn’t feel finished. Yet they’d had intercourse, hadn’t they?
“Ryder?” she whispered.
“I don’t want this to go too fast.” A line furrowed his forehead. “Were you—Did I imagine—”
She passed one hand along his bare hip and felt him shiver. Curving against him, she discovered he was still hard. There was more. There had to be, because if he didn’t take her again, she would explode into a ball of steam. “Kiss me,” she said.
“Like this?” His lips caught hers, almost roughly. She could feel the teeth behind them, the wolflike ferocity. “Or this?” As his tongue invaded her mouth, he drove between her legs and held her pinioned.
Lisa had never been so close to delirium. She wanted everything at once, and yet she was completely in his power. He began to thrust slowly into her body... and at the same slow tempo, explored her mouth with his tongue.
Writhing against Ryder, she knew a keen joy when he responded with swifter movements. The joy heightened and concentrated into almost unbearable pleasure.
Wildness engulfed her. She rode a crest of fireworks, sizzling and snapping with impossibly pure crimsons and golds. Lisa clung to Ryder as if they might both rocket off the face of the earth and felt his entire being vibrate in response.
He called her name, over and over, and somehow that sound, deep and ragged, brought them both safely to earth. She lay in the glow of his arms, vaguely aware of a wet rug beneath them and the thrum of the shower a few feet away.
Let's Make a Baby! Page 5
