by Reina Torres
"Compare what?" He heard the gasp that left her lips, and he fought back a smile of his own. He worked at the buttons, struggling a little to release them with the added weight and pressure of his erection pushing against the denim.
When the last button fell open he heard a breathless moan escape her lips.
If he needed a reminder that he was first and foremost a man beneath all the other titles in his life, this was it.
He looked at Finley, the stiff lines of her body, the tension in her fingers as she clutched the camera like a lifeline.
And the emptiness of sound, as if she'd forgotten to trigger the shutter and hadn't realized it yet.
Roman turned slightly, letting the fractured light echo across his form as he slipped his thumbs between his skin and his briefs, and in the next breath he pulled both down his legs and over his feet.
#
He took his sweet time straightening up again, and Finley nearly cursed as she finally remembered the camera in her hands as he revealed every glorious inch of his bare skin to her hidden gaze.
The light that played over his features had turned his entire body to living marble, tracing light veins across his skin instead of dark, licking along his flesh like a greedy tongue. And the dry desert of her mouth was suddenly gone, her tongue sweeping around to wet every reachable surface.
It was an unconscious reminder of what it felt like to have him in her mouth, and that's when her clothes tightened against her body. The rasp of her nipples against the lace cups of her bra only added to the friction between her legs as she squeezed her thighs together.
Her mind turned against her. Instead of telling her to leave or ask him to stop, it flooded her with indecent thoughts and demands for release.
And yet she'd made the decision not to fall apart in front of him. Not to beg him to help her forget all the promises she made to herself. To remind her that he was everything she didn't want in her life. She'd made the decision above her shoulders, but the rest of her body wasn't listening at all, including the feet that moved her closer and the hands that set her camera aside.
For once she wished that she'd taken up sculpting. She knew he'd be hot to the touch. And the salty taste of his skin on her tongue.
But her focus was on his face. She looked in the darkened irises of his eyes and read so many things in the ridges of light laid bare to her camera. And every single one of those things terrified her.
She should have told him to put his clothes on. Should have turned away from him until she got herself under control. She wasn't ready for the emotion she saw in his eyes.
#
He watched her walk toward him, and he couldn't help the involuntary twitch of his fingers as he struggled to keep his hands at his sides.
Naked before her, he almost laughed. He'd never felt so at ease and uncomfortable at the same time. And she hadn't said a word.
And what, he asked himself, did he expect?
“This seems to be,” her smile was a slow curve of her lips, “a habit with us.”
The cool air of the room seemed to sizzle off of his skin. “What is?” Roman saw her tongue sweep over her lip.
“You naked in front of me.”
He shook his head, eager to play this game. “The other night,” he corrected her, “I wasn't naked.”
There was a light in her eyes, a spark from his challenge, and he was suddenly short of breath. “But,” she looked up at him and with a twist of a smile on her lips, “I'm betting if your phone hadn't gone off, I could have had you naked.”
She didn't wait for an answer, her eyes focused on him, tracing the play of light across the tanned expanse of his chest, the hairs sprinkled across his chest and tapering down his belly.
All those years that they'd hung out together, mostly at the Brady house, or wandering around town looking for interesting subjects to photograph, had she completely overlooked the most tempting subject right there at her side?
His eyes, set deep in the strong angles of his face, met hers and she saw more than just the intensity of his gaze. She saw him. And that was enough to twist her up inside.
It wasn't lust that stared back at her like Will’s easy promise of hot screaming sex.
Roman’s eyes held so much more, and she refused to give it a name.
She knew she should put a stop to this, and tell him to put his clothes back on. But damn it, her body told her mind to shove it. And as his hand slipped down over the ridges of his abs, his fingers riding his muscles, the decision was made by a part of her that had been drowning and finally found a breath.
“I know I’m going to regret this.” She felt the cold tile of the shower beneath her feet as she paced across the small expanse.
His eyes darkened as he shook his head. “I know you won't.”
Finley raised her hands and reached for his chest, stopping just short of touching him. She held them there, hovering as if he was fire and she was afraid of being burned.
Roman took in a breath, a long slow inhale that brought his chest even closer. “It's up to you, Fin. I'm here if you want me.”
She snatched her hands away, backing up from him, lifting her eyes to look at him. He was too close. She couldn't breathe. And yet she felt heat prickle all over her skin.
Life with Russ had been a whirlwind, moving from country to country, hotel rooms, small cottages, and seaside villas. They ate in four star restaurants, candlelit cafes, and around campfires with traveling nomads and enjoying the hospitality of tribesmen. They travelled and he’d changed lives, building roads and irrigating crops.
And yet when they were alone, the way he'd touched her had been odd, distant. He'd never made her want to drown in him the way she wanted Roman.
It scared her. Instinct told her to walk away.
She opened her mouth to tell him that, but what came out was, “I want you.”
Finley didn't know which one of them was more shocked by her admission, but it was Roman that recovered first.
His hands were on her face, cradling her cheeks, but it was his mouth that stole her breath. As her lips parted beneath his, his hands stole between their bodies, fingers making quick work of the button on her waistband, and her zipper.
Finley pulled him closer, rising up on her toes as she met his open mouthed kiss with her own. She felt the rough scratch of his tongue against hers, the heat of his breath filling her lungs.
When he pulled away a moment later, she gave him a narrowed look. Her protest became an unintelligible sound as he dropped to one knee before her. He peeled her jeans back over her hips and over the curve of her backside, his fingers hooking into the waistband of her panties and pulling them down to her thighs.
“Move back, a few steps.”
Finley heard the words and obeyed. She wasn't able to do much more than step back as Roman peeled her jeans off of her legs and left them on the floor, an arm's reach away.
He wrapped a hand around her ankle and looked up at her, his eyes making their way up the supple length of her body. With the warm sunlight glowing from the walls of the shower she could see the way he looked at her, she could see the heat and hunger in his eyes.
He nudged her legs apart, using the wall at her back to keep her balance. His hand traveled up from her knee. His thumb swept up the sensitive skin of her inner thighs, widening her stance without asking. A touch of his lips in the wake of his fingers brought a soft, needy sound from her lips.
"You don't have to," she barely made a sound when he laid a kiss on her other thigh, an inch higher.
"I don't have to do what?"
She moaned. "Torture me..."
"You want me to stop?" The rough scratch of his tongue soothed the sting. "Or should I go higher?"
The glass tile didn't melt under her palms, but she was sure it would if his lips moved just a little higher and, "Yes." Her head fell back and met the wall with a hollow thud as his tongue swept over her heat. "Yes."
Finley dug her fingertips into
the subtle ripples of the glass tiles and he leaned forward, taking advantage of the added room and the instinctive tilt of her hips. His long fingers parted her folds.
She wanted to look down and see exactly what kind of magic Roman was working on her body, but that would have involved coherent and conscious thought. And with his hands holding her in place, all she could do was drag one ragged breath into her mouth at a time.
Her toes curled against the tiles as he branded her tender flesh with his touch. He may put out fires all over St. Helena, but when Roman set his mind and his mouth to the task, he quickly set her aflame.
“More-”
His answer was a soft burst of vibration against her body and Finley’s hand groped for more purchase on the wall, and found it.
The soft raised pattern gave way to the frantic press of her fingertips, and a steady beep sounded through the haze of her thoughts. "What is that noise-"
He shifted on his knees, bearing down with a little more pressure, and the question left her mind in a rush as something clattered to the floor.
“Dear mother of-”
Water rained down from above and Finley tasted the warm rush in her mouth, swallowing a full gulp before she understood. It was a secondary splash of water across her hips that pulled her gaze down.
Shaking his head in the ongoing spray of water from the shower, Roman looked up and his smile continued the simmer of blood in her veins. “Now I'm regretting leaving your shirt on.”
The spray collected in rivulets that rode the flattened waves of her hair and coursed down her chest, pasting the thin cotton tunic to her skin.
“Then come up here and take it off.”
“Maybe later.”
With the shower pelting down a spray of warm water over their bodies, he used his tongue and the firm pressure of his lips to turn her knees to jelly.
“Oh, yes-” her head tilted back nearly drowning herself in water, but she didn't care. What mattered was the mind numbing pleasure that Roman was inflicting on her. “Just,” she managed the words past the fall of water, “there.” Finley felt her breath seize in her lungs and with a gasp, and a sharp exhale, she went over in a rush.
#
She was pinned against the wall, breathless, as the tremors in her body slowed.
Roman stood, sliding his body along hers, inch after glorious inch, until she shivered, feeling the rasp of the hair on his legs against her smooth skin. The clinging fabric of her blouse rolled tight between them, and the tight twist of the fabric sent droplets of water sliding between them. He drew her closer, her hands sliding up his arms to the back of his head.
He couldn't help the deep rumble of a moan that stole between them, his forehead lowering to touch hers. Finley’s breath fanned over his chest, mixing with the misting of water coming down over her shoulders. “Fin?” He leaned back to look at her, searching her light hazel eyes.
“Yes?” She smoothed her hands down over his back, her gaze roaming hungrily over his chest.
“I don't want to wait.”
She let one hand skim the taut flesh of his belly, the backs of her fingers trailing through the sparse hairs trailing from his stomach and down past his hips. With a smile, she nodded. “Now,” she closed her hand over his length, and her fingers gave him a gentle squeeze, “unless you want me to give Will a call, and-”
His mouth slanted over hers, stealing her breath again, as his tongue slid against hers with an insistent rasp.
And then he was gone, fishing through his discarded clothes for his wallet, and then he had the foil packet between his fingers. Moments later he had her by the waist, pressed between his body and the wall. “Put your arms around my neck, Fin.”
"Wait." Her hands fumbled with the wet hem of her tunic, barely managing to pull it up over her head. The fabric hit the floor with a wet plop. The snap of her bra between her breasts came apart easily and with Roman’s muscular thigh pressed between her trembling thighs, it too was discarded at their feet.
Her arms wound around his neck, followed quickly with her legs around his waist, as he lifted her higher against the tiles, tilting her hips to meet his long deep stroke.
Finley gasped, her eyes widening as her head tipped back to the wall, the sudden sensation filling her, setting her body on fire.
He blew out a long breath, leaning his forehead against the tiles beside her ear, water sluicing down his neck and over the rippling muscles of his back. "So tight."
The man certainly had a way of stating the obvious. In a single moment he'd given her a new understanding of why this whole sex thing was so popular. The press of their bodies under the spray of the shower left her nowhere to hide. His hard length touched places she'd never known existed. The ache in her body should have been satisfied with him.
Maybe she was just greedy, but she wanted more. And she went after it.
She shifted against him, her muscles clenching, pulling him closer. Finley turned her head, her lips trailing along his jaw.
Roman groaned, felt the flex of his muscles as her movements brought him to the edge of his control. “Careful,” he hissed between clenched teeth, “keep that up and I won't be able to hold ba-”
She closed her mouth over the pulse in his neck and he shot out a hand to brace himself against the wall, a rough growl vibrating through his chest.
Finley caught his eye and gave him a breathless smile. “I'm not going to break, Roman. I need this.”
And truth be told, so did he. He looked into her eyes, watching them turn from soft hazel to a pale glittering gold. He felt her melt against him, heat building between them until he couldn't hold back any longer. Bracing his feet on the wet tiles his next stroke brought a throaty sigh from her throat. Before long he made her scream.
Chapter Nine
The next day, the Sweet & Savory was busy as usual, but Lexi had managed to save a table in the corner for Abby. And when Finley arrived she found herself welcomed with a hug and a cup of Lexi’s signature 50 Shades of Chocolate. Stunned and grateful, she sat down across from one of the princesses of St. Helena and barely managed to absorb the surreal quality of the moment. She'd known the DeLucas and the Baudouins in school. Who didn't?
But, she'd never been comfortable in her skin back then. When she'd gone to events, it had been with Roman at her side, quietly urging her on. Not that it had worked much. After all these years, she was still painfully shy, but at least she was better at this whole friend thing or so she hoped.
Setting her tablet on the table, opened to the file of photos she'd done the day before, Finley felt her heart climb into her chest. Taking photos of hot guys and making them look hot wasn't much of a challenge. But taking photos of Abby's development was a huge step for her. This wasn't capturing the homey warmth of a yurt, or the cozy inside of a suk. Photos of real estate of this caliber deserved to be the best. Finley had no idea how much time had passed, or how long she'd gone without breathing, but when Abby oohed and ahhed over the photos, Finley indulged in a long sip of her drink, easing the scratchy heat in her throat. She sat back and watched the emotions cross Abby’s face as she looked over the proofs. The warm glow of satisfaction gave her a giddy feeling of delight when she heard Abby’s unguarded comments about her work. “Oh, I like these.”
Finley leaned slightly forward to see the pictures on the screen. The pedestal sinks and the tub, the scene that she’d shot while Roman had scrubbed and dried the shower. The new round of photographs had been perfect. The light was just as inspiring as Roman’s hands smoothing over her back. Okay, almost as inspiring as Roman’s hands… not to mention his mouth.
As Abby talked about the angles and the lighting, Finley struggled not to fall into the warm haze of those thoughts. This was a ‘business meeting.’
Abby sighed, leaning back in her chair with a thoughtful smile. “You know what strikes me about these? You make the bathroom look elegant,” she enthused, “but you also make it look… intimate.”
Finl
ey choked on her drink, barely managing to keep anything from spilling onto her blouse.
"You okay, Finley?"
Waving off Abby's concern with a laugh, Finley pulled out her planner. Together they set dates to finish the first house and begin work on the next. A friendly hug from Abby and she was gone, leaving Finley with some time on her hands and the rush of confidence flaring in her veins. Finley picked up her phone and called Roman, asking him to meet her. A few minutes later, after ransacking the savory section of the cafe, Finley put the boxes in her car and drove to the fire station. The men greeted her with smiles as she made her way to Roman's office.
Before she could manage to open either box, Roman proved that he was more interested in discovering the taste of her, rather than the food.
#
It went on like that for weeks as Roman worked out a delicate balance between home, work, and private time with Finley. Private time that involved an awful lot of sexy and very little clothing.
While they were together, there were two subjects they avoided talking about: Matt and beds.
Roman was a good guy. He didn't break the rules. He also had no problem finding places to play that didn't involve a box spring. While he certainly was game to explore anything Finley could think up, he was struggling to understand this side of Finley.
In her head, children and beds meant obligation and mind numbing drudgery.
Finley knew that her thoughts about children came directly from her father. "Count yourself lucky," he'd told her over and over again, "if you don't have children. Waste of time and money if you ask me." She hadn't asked, but then again, he didn't usually care about things like that after the third beer, and that was only a way for him to drink through half a dozen beers on any given night.
And beds, well, her opinion came from one source. Russ. Her art school had been in a busy downtown office building in Sacramento. Floors ten through fourteen had housed the Hollingsworth Art Institute, the premiere art school in Northern California, with a photography program that Finley had only dreamed about, and thanks to her best friend, had become not only possible, but a reality. Roman had not only driven her up to Sacramento to interview at the school, but he'd driven her back up and gotten her situated in her dorm. It wasn't until he'd left her to return to St. Helena that the reality of her situation had hit her square in her chest. With Roman by her side, she had been full of confidence and excitement. Alone, she was filled with fear and worry, and for a few brief moments, she'd contemplated running down the street after his truck, begging him to come back. But while she knew he would have helped her pack everything back up and driven her right back to St. Helena, it would have meant failure. It would have meant that she wasn't strong enough to make it on her own.
