by Jill Shalvis
“What?”
“Sex,” she said. “You’re thinking about sex, and I made you think about it. That’s the power. I mean I did that to you. I made you lose your concentration. You know what else?”
He was afraid to know, truly he was. But he stepped away from the camera and walked around the edge of the pool so he could see her face more clearly. “What?”
Her slight smile turned to a full-fledged grin. “I like it.”
His body tightened even more. “You like that you’re driving me right off the edge of control?”
“Yes.” She dipped her fingers in the water and played a little. Splashed him. “But to be honest, I’m also embarrassed.”
“Are you kidding?” He moved back behind his camera. He was safer there. “Why?”
“Because of the view you’ve got.” She wiggled, just a little. “I know the bathing suit is riding up, and with the angle you’re at, I’m wondering what you can see.”
“What I can see…” He took a good long look at her long legs, at the juncture of her thighs, how the black crocheted bottoms outlined her so perfectly. Then she squirmed slightly, and he nearly moaned at the sight. “I can see that you have the most heart-stopping legs on the planet. Your slim back is arched slightly, and the low-riding bikini exposes your butt enough that I can see your adorable twin dimples just above the top of the material.”
“I just had another jumbling emotion,” she said softly.
“Really? Tell me.”
“This is…turning me on,” she whispered.
She said the words in a way that made them seem like a conspirator’s secret, and his knees went shaky. “That’s reaction, not emotion. And it’s not very specific, not as far as your writing goes.” He had no idea why he was doing this, teasing them both into a fiery lather, but he couldn’t stop now. “Be specific, Emma.”
Her eyes were still shut, and he clicked away as she searched for the words or courage to tell him. “My skin feels too tight,” she finally said.
“Good.” He knew the feeling. He took his camera off the tripod and moved back to the side of the pool where he could get a better view of her face tipped toward the sun, eyes closed, the glow of excitement on her cheeks. “More.”
“My heart is pounding like I just ran a marathon.”
He pulled his face away from the lens, stared at her. Suddenly, he couldn’t do it any longer, he couldn’t treat her as a model. He’d never talked to a model like this.
He wanted to treat her as a woman.
For the first time in his career, he set the camera down in the middle of a shoot. He stepped onto the first step of the shallow end of the pool, letting his feet soak up the cool water in hopes it might cool off his overheated engines.
“What else?” he asked hoarsely.
“My nipples…they’re hard and throbbing.”
He understood hard and throbbing.
She opened her eyes “You’re…done?”
“I’m done. Emma, this isn’t the usual photo shoot.” He let out a long, shuddering breath. “I’ve never made it personal before, but this feels pretty personal.”
“What makes it different?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Maybe it’s because it’s your last job. Or…”
“Or?”
“Maybe you were thinking you could get something out of it.”
“No. God, no.” He watched her shoulders relax marginally at his emphatic answer. “It’s you.”
She looked at him for a moment, then dumped herself into the water. She swam toward him, beneath the water, breaking the surface just in front of him. Eyes never leaving his, she started up the steps, the water sluicing off her as her body was revealed, inch by glorious wet inch.
Drawn to her as if they were bound together, he took the next step down, meeting her halfway, and then suddenly they were lunging at each other, hands grappling for purchase, mouths mating, bodies straining while the water splashed around them.
He never even felt the water soaking into his shorts, nor the sun beating down on his back. All he felt was her body coming alive beneath his hands.
His certainly did.
Research, my ass, he thought, one hand skimming up her slim spine, the other cupping her butt in his hand, squeezing just a little, loving the feel of her hot skin and the cool water running down it. She felt so good against him, he would have liked to keep her there for days, until he had lapped her up from head to toe and felt sated.
More than anything, he wanted to have the time to do that, right here, right now.
As for the kiss, it was their first real one. He didn’t count Kauai or the desert. Those had been nice, sweet even, but each nothing more than a quick contact, a tease, a moment of playfulness.
Not this kiss.
This kiss stabbed him deep in the belly with its sharp, needy claws, and had nothing to do with quick or playful. This kiss was the result of weeks of hunger and desire. And though he had never been told of her past, of her sexual experiences, when he opened his mouth and slid his tongue in to dance with hers, he knew.
When she gripped him tighter and let out a soft gasp, he knew.
This wasn’t just two people scratching an itch, this wasn’t research, or a job, no matter what they claimed.
This was just two people, a man and a woman, looking for that elusive thing only a few lucky bastards ever really found.
Looking to be loved.
11
WHEN THEY BROKE APART FOR AIR, Emma gulped in a few breaths and stared at him. She could hear him panting, too, could see him staring at her, as if he wasn’t sure how she’d gotten into his arms.
During the past crazy few minutes, she hadn’t even noticed, but they’d stumbled down yet another step and now stood thigh deep in his pool, skin to skin except for his drenched shorts and her skimpy bikini. It was difficult to look at him knowing that the kiss wasn’t the end to an incredibly erotic experience, but just the beginning.
Her body was shaking, close to the sort of pleasure she usually only dreamed about. She had a hard time understanding how in the past she’d had to strive so hard to climax, and yet all he’d done was kiss her and she was on the edge.
“Rafe—”
He lowered his head and kissed her again, a slow, deep, wet kiss, before slowly pulling back. “Stop me, Emma. Stop me now.”
No. No way. She took in the tic in his rigidly held jaw, the pulse at his temple, the way his fingers dug into her. He wanted her. He wanted her more than she could remember being wanted. No way was she going to stop him now. She slid her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck and tugged, trying to bring his mouth back to hers. At the same time, she practically crawled up his body, wrapping one leg around his hip, opening herself up so that she could slide against him.
This wrenched a rough groan from his throat, but he held her off, moving his hands to her hips. “Emma, if I kiss you again, we aren’t going to stop there. If I kiss you again, I want you naked, beneath me, gasping my name as you come.”
Her knees liquefied. “How do you know I’ll…come?”
“Oh, baby, you’ll come.”
That cocky statement should have irritated the hell out of her; instead she ached for him to prove it. So she pulled him in for another kiss, fisting her hands in his hair to hold his head, but he didn’t try to get away. One hand moved back to her bottom, the other moved to the string ties of her bikini at the back of her neck. He tugged at the knot until she felt the bow give.
He drew back slightly so that the cups of her top loosened, threatening to expose her breasts, but not quite. He picked up the very end of one string and dragged it along her collarbone, nudging the material away from her skin as he skimmed the string down the line of her cleavage. Then both his hands drew the cups down, spilling her free, exposing her to the opposing sensations of the cool water dripping from her hair and the warm spring day.
His gaze was locked on hers, and the heat and hunger there made her
shudder.
“You said you wanted hot and wild,” he said.
“For my research.”
“We both know this isn’t about your research.” He dropped the strings of her top and covered her breasts with his hands.
“It…isn’t?” she managed to say.
“No.” He replaced his hands with his mouth.
Her legs weren’t going to hold her and she heard a horrifyingly needy whimper—her own.
“Yeah. Love that sound.”
Her nipples had been hard from the moment he’d answered his door shirtless, but they pebbled even more now as he teased first one and then the other with his tongue, his eyes burning with the knowledge that this wasn’t about work but about them and what they did to each other, with the knowledge that he could make her so helpless, she could hardly speak. He showed her even more, bending her over his arm a little, looking his fill first, then using his thumb to slowly and maddeningly rasp over one wet and aching nipple while blowing his hot breath on the other.
She couldn’t suppress her cry, or her shiver.
“Cold?” he whispered, and since she didn’t have a voice, she could only shake her head. “No? Good.” He got a good grip on the second black string of her top and pulled, all while watching her with those dark, dark eyes.
The black crochet fell away from her torso completely and hit the water. His palm skimmed down her belly and her eyes drifted shut.
“No fair hiding.” His knuckles brushed over the material barely covering her mound. “Open your eyes, Emma.” And he slid the very tops of his fingers just beneath the material.
Another whimper escaped her. Already her hips were moving in an age-old rhythm. She needed him, needed this so desperately she couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, could hardly draw air into her lungs.
He slid his fingers a little lower, gliding them through her thin strip of closely trimmed hair until they hovered right above where she needed him most.
Almost out of her mind, she gripped his wrist in her hand and tried to guide him to the right spot, clamping her thighs tight, holding him in place so that he couldn’t move.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he promised softly, mouth to her ear.
“I need—”
“Tell me.”
His voice was soothing, his fingers were not.
“Mmm, nice.” His finger stroked once over her, unerringly finding the right spot.
Her eyes flew open and she bit her lip to hold back the sounds trying to escape her throat, but he shook his head and leaned in, pulling on her lower lip with his teeth, then kissing the spot to soothe it. “Don’t hold back, please don’t hold back.”
He wanted in, wanted all the way in. As if to prove it, he kept his hand in her bikini bottoms but stilled his finger, making her squirm and arch, urgently in quest of his touch.
“Tell me what you want,” he coaxed. “Anything.”
“You know what I want.”
“Tell me.”
She stared at him, words escaping her.
“Anything,” he whispered again, and put his lips to her throat, dragging a hot kiss over her jaw to the sensitive spot beneath her ear, just as his fingers started moving again. Slowly he rimmed her opening, up one side and down the other, spreading her own wet heat as he went, easing his way and increasing her pleasure. “Anything, Emma…”
All she had to do was tell him, but she couldn’t talk, she could only feel and what she was feeling so overwhelmed her that she had to blink rapidly just to keep her in focus.
“What is it? An orgasm?” He took more of her weight over his arm, licked the rim of her ear as he lightly skimmed his finger over the very center of her being, just a teasing, butterfly touch that was pure torment.
She stifled a cry and he let out a hot breath in her ear as he gave her another stroke. “Is that it? You want me to touch you there?”
Her face against his throat, she nodded vigorously. Yes. Yes, she wanted him to touch her there. She wanted an orgasm. And she was almost there, almost—
“Tell me.” He sucked the lobe of her ear into his mouth and slid one long finger deep inside her.
There was no stifling her cry this time, and the ache became unbearable, the gripping need for release so strong that it took on a life of its own. “Oh, please.”
“I’ll please anything.”
He added another finger to the first, pressing deep into her as his teeth nibbled on her throat. In and out…in and out, until she was panting, whimpering, writhing. His thumb touched the swollen hub of nerve endings, pressing until her toes started to curl.
But then he eased away, and she let out a desperate, frustrated sob.
“Emma?”
She fisted one hand in his hair, the other over his chest, which was damp and thumping hard with the beat of his heart. “Make me come,” she demanded.
He cupped her again, then circled his thumb over her hard little center. “Like this?”
“Yes!”
“I want to watch you,” he whispered. “I want to hear you—” Around…and around…in exactly the right motion and pressure, as if he’d known her body for years. Her entire body stiffened as it started to happen. She couldn’t believe it. He was making her come and she was letting him. She’d lost all the power, all the control, as it burst over her in a thousand points of light.
He kept touching her, whispering sweet nothings in her ear, telling her what else he wanted to do to her. “Yes,” she gasped. “Yes to all of it.”
She slid her hand over his erection, so impressive behind his soaked cargo shorts. It wasn’t enough. She reached inside and found smooth, hot, hard heaven.
“Emma.” He caught her hand.
She looked into his eyes, saw the sudden regret, and went still. “You don’t want to…?”
“Are you kidding? I want to, I’m dying to. But when it comes to being inside you, I don’t want to rush.”
She stared at him. “I thought we had plenty of time.”
“Had. We’ve used it all up.”
No. No.
“I’m afraid Stone’s going to show up, and not only don’t I want to rush once I get inside you, I don’t want him to walk out here and see you.”
“But…” She could barely breathe, much less talk. “What about you?”
“Maybe a cold shower will help.”
Rafe didn’t miss the telltale stiffening of her demeanor at that. Only a moment ago she’d still been panting for breath, and now, though she was still right here in his arms, she was as good as gone.
“I’m sorry—” he said.
She stood and backed away so fast she nearly slipped deeper into the pool, would have if he hadn’t surged up and steadied her.
She pushed him away. Avoiding his gaze, she adjusted her bottoms and waded through the water for her top, which was floating by the raft. “We’re done shooting, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then, I’ll be out of here.”
“What’s the matter?” he asked quietly. “Did I see too much of you?”
“Well, you did see quite a bit.” She tried to tie on her top but her fingers were shaking.
Moving close, he took over, noting that as he did so, she covered her breasts with her hands. “A little late now, given that I’ve licked and sucked and tasted every inch of them.”
She blushed at that, a fine shade of red rising up her neck and throat and over her cheeks.
When her bathing suit was in place, she sighed. “Rafe.”
“Emma.”
She stared at his chest rather than his eyes. “I’m not good at this.” She glanced at the pool, then closed her eyes briefly. “I know I gave you the impression I’m wild and free…but I’m not. I mean, yes, I wanted to…I asked you to…”
“Make you come?”
“I don’t usually…”
“Ask, or come?”
“Either. Both.”
He nearly laughed, but she wasn’t kidding. Had she real
ly never had an orgasm with a man before? How was that possible, as beautiful as she was, that no man had ever—
“I’m not like that—” She broke off when he cupped her jaw and lifted her face.
“Are you somehow trying to apologize for the fact that you had a climax?”
“Well, mostly I don’t—”
“You are,” he said with an amazed laugh. “You’re trying to apologize.” He put his mouth to hers, kissed her until he felt her start to melt against him again, and then slowly pulled back. “Let’s get one thing clear,” he whispered against her mouth. “Your pleasure is my pleasure.”
“But you didn’t—”
“Next time.” He kissed her again.
She stared at him. “Next time?”
“Oh, yeah.”
EMMA DROVE HOME on autopilot, her body vibrating with the effects of what she’d let Rafe do to it. Even as she got herself on the freeway and tried to stop thinking, she continued to relive it.
His hands all over her, pulling off her top, slipping into her bottoms—
A little cry escaped her lips and she cranked up the music. But not even the rocking beat could take her mind off the fact that certain parts of her anatomy were still suffering little aftershocks of their pool adventure.
She’d let him—He’d—
Her hand darted out, slipped into her purse and found her cell phone. Watching the road, she punched in her sister’s mobile number.
“Emma, I’m right in the middle of getting a tan here,” Amber answered a little crankily.
“A tan,” Emma said tightly. “You’re getting yourself a tan while I live your life for you. Well, it’s over, sis. You’re on your own regarding the fantasy calendar. I don’t know where or when your next shoot is because—” Because I just came with your photographer’s mouth on my breast and his fingers in—No. Don’t go there. She gulped in a deep, calming breath. “Well. Let’s just say that I quit. Okay?”
“Jeez, how did you get your panties all in a twist?”
It hadn’t been panties, thank you very much, but a bathing suit, and it had gotten twisted by Rafe’s most amazing, talented fingers.
But that was another story entirely. “Look, it doesn’t matter—”
