What to Read After FSOG: The Gemstone Collection (WTRAFSOG)

by CJ Roberts

  Reluctantly, Travis pulled his mouth from her bruised lips. “Do you know how many times I’ve wanted to do that?” His face burrowed against the side of her neck, his teeth nipped at her earlobe. His fingers firmly and gently caressed the sensitive skin of her breasts. They responded of their own volition, swelling into his palms. “I have been very patient for the last two weeks. You have totally ignored my emotional seduction. Tonight I thought I’d get physical.”

  Casey stared at him, her emerald eyes wide with wonder. Her fingers traced the delicacy of his eyelids, the dark fan of lashes, the hard curve of his cheekbones to the corner of his sensuous mouth. “Oh, Travis.” She sighed, snuggling against his hard body. She felt warm and profoundly content.

  “Don’t oh, Travis me!” His hands tangled into her hair, pulling her head back until her throat and breasts were exposed to his lambent half-hooded eyes. “You’ve been a major disturbance since I first saw you. You fill me with desire in virtually every situation, from standing on your head to eating. I can’t believe you are deaf, dumb and blind. You ignored all my advances. Do you know how many sleepless nights and cold showers I’ve had because of you?” He gave her a gentle shake.

  A soft, seductive chuckle escaped from Casey’s throat. Her face glowed with passion. “I’ve been having those same sleepless nights and taking the same cold showers.”

  “We should have taken them together; the water would have boiled.” Lightly and quickly, Travis kissed her nose, her lips, her chin, the pulse beating at the base of her throat. His mouth blazed a fiery trail across her full aching breast, his tongue savoring the delights of her taut nipples.

  The muscles in Casey’s stomach fluttered amid the burst of heat that exploded deep inside of her. Her body vibrated, her skin growing exquisitely sensitive under Travis’s stimulation. Her tongue tasted the salty dampness hidden in his ear. Her fingers teased the hard nipples that were buried under the dark curly hair on his chest. She could feel his muscles expand and contract beneath her exploring hands and felt him quiver with pleasure. His rigid hardness teased against the mound of her sex.

  “Why don’t we finish this discussion in bed?”

  Casey’s body temperature dropped ten degrees, her breathing slowed to one half the normal rate, and her limbs went rigid.

  He sensed the change and looked at her. “What’s the matter?”

  “Why should we destroy everything – our whole wonderful relationship – for just a few minutes in bed?” Her passion disappearing under mounting inner trepidations.

  He grinned at her, his teeth flashing wolfishly in the moonlight. “I can guarantee it will be more than a few minutes. And if you’re worried, I just had a complete physical and I’m perfectly healthy.”

  “That’s not what I meant. I know you wouldn’t put me in any danger.” Casey pushed at her tumbled brown hair, averting her eyes from his piercing gaze. “Look, you don’t understand. I –”

  “I love you.” Travis said in a calm quiet voice. His knuckles gently caressed her cheek. “I had become jaded and bored. Life lost its freshness until I met you. I honestly love you.”

  Casey sat up, completely astonished by the sincerity of his declaration. “But you can’t! How could you? No one has ever loved me.”

  Travis slipped his arms around her body, hugging her tight against him. “I love everything about you. Your eyes, your face, your voice. I love the way you walk and talk and the way you eat.” His voice deepened with emotion. “You’ve captured my mind, my heart, my very soul. I love every inch of you.”

  Casey gave an inward wince at the word inch. She was nervous and afraid. There was no way she could mask her own timidity and fear. “You deserve someone feminine and delicate – not seventy-three inches to love.”

  “Casey, you are crazy.” Travis pushed her back down on the cushion, his long legs intimately entwined with hers. “You are equating large physical size with being unfeminine, and that is just not true. You are the most sensuous woman I have ever met. I’m not young boy. I know what I want and I want you. I love you.”

  “You love linguine and scotch and science fiction,” she returned sharply, pushing his arms away. “If you met me in any other social situation, you would have been courteous, intrigued, perhaps mildly amused. Be sensible, Travis, it’s just because we’ve been trapped here alone. You ate too many olives at lunch, all that sunshine vitamin D has made your hormones over produce. Your libido is out of whack.” Casey knew she was babbling like a fool. She was frightened by the things she felt for Travis and the things he said he felt for her. “Why don’t you go into town tomorrow?” Her voice was strained and on the verge of hysteria. “They have girls there. I’ll loan you the money. Then things can go back to the way they were.”

  “Casey, you are being silly.”

  “Travis, please!” Pushing him away, she scrambled to her feet and pulled the front of her pajamas together. “You are pressuring me, and I don’t like it! I don’t know what I’m feeling.” She made a frustrated gesture with her hands then bolted for the secure haven of her bedroom, and the lock on the door.

  It was not a night for sleeping.

  6

  They met the next morning on the eighty-ninth stone step. He was going up; she was coming down. They both showed the ravaged effects of a sleepless night.

  Casey shifted the surfboard in her arms, protectively concealing from his gaze the bare expanse of skin her modest black bikini bathing suit afforded. “I’m going to the bay for a swim,” she mumbled, deliberately keeping her eyes focused on the blooming red hibiscus plants that bordered the path down to the sea wall.

  “I’m just back from the village.”

  Her heart leaped from her chest to her throat. Casey looked at him, her cheeks flushing in embarrassment. “Well, I guess you decided to take my suggestion after all.”

  Travis grinned at her, then lifted a net bag that had been hidden from view against the side of his jean-clad legs. “I went for bread and milk and fruit, not for sex.” He folded his arms across his chest; his voice was quiet and calm. “While the ladies in town are lovely and willing and cheap, I am perfectly happy and content to wait for you.”

  Casey slammed the bottom of the surfboard into the ground, her emerald eyes blazing their message into Travis’s tawny gaze. “You can wait till hell freezes over! You’ve got some nerve. Why can’t you take no for an answer?”

  “The only part of you that said no last night was your voice and it didn’t sound too convincing.”

  “That’s a rotten thing to say.” She was completely incensed at the accuracy of his statement. Casey continued to glare at him, all seventy-three inches of her body shaking with indignation and frustration. She found his cool control infuriating. She wanted to strike out at him, to hit him into sensibility, but her hands clenched to impotent fists at her side.

  Travis remained an all-powerful obstacle. He stood tall and formidable. The sun glinting on the rich blackness of his hair, the breadth of his shoulders and chest emphasized by the bareness of his red tank top, a relaxing but predatory stance to his rangy body. The complete, confident, competent male animal stalking his prey.

  While he had made no move to touch her, his eyes were more expressive than any physical caress, studying and undressing her with obvious pleasure. A weakness assailed Casey’s knees, she felt the twisting burn deep inside. Suddenly, she felt vulnerable and scared. Once again, she grasped the surfboard as a shield. “I did not come to Mexico to spend my time in a horizontal position under some man’s body.” Her voice was stiff and formal. “I am a valuable person, not just a sexual outlet. Go find someone else to screw!”

  “I am not looking for just anyone to screw, as you so euphemistically put it. As you get older, you realize that more than sex is needed for a relationship. You are a very valuable person. I readily admit I want to possess your body, but I also want to share your creativity, your intelligence and your spirit. I don’t want to add to a collection or contr
ol you. I want to be part of your life.” Travis smiled into her confused, troubled features. “Casey, I realize that entering your body will activate a whole new dimension for us, and I’m ready to commit myself to it.”

  The startling inference of his words shocked Casey, driving her frazzled emotions nearer to the edge of hysteria. Wordlessly she pushed past him, fleeing down the cracked stone steps to the sanctuary of the sugary white beach and the serene waters of the bay.

  “Some liberated lady you are!” Casey slapped the orange surfboard she was lying on, her hands paddling aimlessly in the gently lapping tide. “You behaved like some hysterical virgin.” It would have been easier if she were a virgin. She knew she wouldn’t have hesitated a second to be in Travis’s bed. But last night, she had panicked. She couldn’t bear to have him know just how inadequate a woman and lover she really was.

  Casey sat up and straddled the board, legs dangling in the warm surf. Her pensive green eyes tried to follow the refracting beams of sunlight that slanted into the blue depths of the sea. Her thoughts digressed back to the first time a man had made love to her. She had been a junior in college and totally infatuated with the center guard on the basketball team. She wasn’t sure whether his main attraction was the face he was five inches taller than her or the fact he was the first man who had ever paid her any attention. Casey had thought she was in love and assumed he was too. But he had just used her as a physical release, another notch on his jockstrap, and, according to him, she had been a failure. Unfortunately, it hadn’t been just him.

  The outgoing tide carried Casey far out in the bay. She drifted near the coral barrier reef, a solitary figure bobbing gently in the vast sea. Alone and lonely – this was the way she had lived all her life. Over the years she had never thought much about sex and herself. She had turned to her career for fulfillment. While she was assertive and independent and popular on the job, she was insecure and uncertain and anxious about forming an intimate relationship with a man.

  Casey directed the board toward the opposite shore. The beach seemed very far away, but it was low tide and the ocean beneath her was calm and easily swimmable. A sudden wave of seawater washed over her. Alarmed, Casey quickly turned, then breathed a sigh of relief. It was one of the sleek, gray bottle-nosed dolphins that inhabited the bay. His torpedo-shaped body propelled itself quickly and easily through the water. He made another playful run at her, his hook-shaped dorsal fin disappearing beneath her surfboard.

  She had been delighted to find such amiable swimming companions. There were three dolphins that frolicked in the secluded cove. They were friendly and harmless. Their short beaks gave the impression they were always smiling. Casey knew that where there were dolphins there were no sharks. She had found a book on the mammals in the villa’s library and after studying it, Casey felt a special affinity with the marine animals. While the female dolphins took care of their young calves, nursing and protecting them for more than a year, the male dolphins took no part in raising their offspring. This, too, had been her legacy.

  Cameron Reynolds excelled in one area and one area alone–sports casting. He was a master at dissecting every game, every player, every move, and every ruling. He had no peers. He was the heralded king of an elite group. He was a popular, dynamic and forceful broadcast personality and his own collection of coveted sports trophies and broadcasting awards were enviable. They had dominated the living room of every apartment she had ever inhabited.

  While Cameron took the time to learn about every sport in every country of the world, he never took the time to learn to be a parent. It had taken Casey a long time to realize that the anger she felt over her mother’s dying was compounded by the ache of losing her father as well. She strived to gain his love and approval, hoping he would toss her some crumb of attention. But nothing she did was ever good enough.

  There had always been a bareness about her life and she had struggled to develop on her own in the dark. The struggle became a veritable war when at age thirteen she grew to a staggering seventy three inches in height. Her father showed a marked aversion to his tall daughter, forever denigrating her with terms like clumsy or horse and she had become ashamed of herself.

  In a society where the average woman is five foot three and the average man is five foot nine, Casey felt an oddity. The leading beauty and fashion magazines perpetrated the myth that all women were like the models that graced their pages – icy, cool, and thin.

  It had taken years of dieting, grooming and exercise before she had made herself the best she could be, finally accepting her height and her full-bodied figure. That acceptance went hand-in-hand with her blossoming career in journalism. Her writing had gone virtually unacknowledged by her father. Yes, she had been a finalist three times but never a winner, he had pointed out. The year she had won, he had died in an air crash just three months before the Pulitzer Prizes had been announced. She still wondered if that would have made him love her.

  That was two years ago – a lifetime. Since then, she had revolted. She had left her job with her popularity and success at its zenith. Three weeks ago, she had come to Mexico to start a brand new chapter that would give her pleasure and satisfaction. And then, she met Travis Craig.

  Would an affair with him become a chapter in that new life? What would happen if she risked herself, risked her body, risked exposing more of her feelings to this man? She had given herself mentally and emotionally right from their first meeting; she was now just a virtuous physical holdout. She wasn’t worried about getting pregnant. She had been taking the pill since she had started going into Boston’s rougher neighborhoods in search of stories. Three of her female journalist friends had been rape victims and that security seemed a sensible precaution. Casey wished she had another woman to talk to and confide in – she needed advice.

  The waves had beached her at the far end of the shore. The verdant hills high above the seawall elegantly framed a flamingo-pink villa that rivaled the colorful flowers. It was home to Ricardo and Inez Castillo, two very successful architects whom Matt had introduced her to on their summer visit to Boston. She and Inez had taken to each other immediately, lunching, and shopping and chatting as though they had known each other for years. Today, she felt in need of Inez’s quiet sensibilities. Casey took a deep, determined breath, staked the surfboard into the sand, and began to climb the stone steps that led to the Castillo’s villa.

  Her arrival interrupted a sombrero-hatted gardener busily pruning a thorned hedge. “Buenos dias. Busco Señor y la Señora Casillo.”

  A smile broke in the gardener’s wrinkled face. “El no esta, Señorita. El sabado.”

  Casey sighed expressively. The Castillo’s wouldn’t be home until Saturday – three days from now. “Gracias.” She nodded and began her descent. It seemed she would have to resolve this dilemma by herself. She would have to face her fears and make a decision. She gritted her teeth furiously. Why did sex carry such a heavy weight for her? Why did it rob her of her poise and self-confidence, making her feel vulnerable and anxious?

  She was strong, stable, intelligent, successful and almost thirty years old, and here she was, still embarrassed over her body and her inadequacy to satisfy a man. She felt it was perfectly moral to give herself to a man she respected, liked and was sexually attracted to. Travis Craig was all those things and more. She liked everything about him and saw no reason to make him over. What made the situation even more precarious was the fact that she and Travis had been intimately relating to each other on a daily basis since they had started sharing the villa.

  Casey couldn’t deny the electricity that sparked between them. Call it biology, chemistry, karma – Travis excited her like no other man she had ever encountered. His masculine amatory style was devastating to her emotions. She liked having his arms around her, she liked the pressure of his mouth on hers, she liked the feel of his flesh against her skin. Casey shivered, visualizing Travis making love to her – his hard lean body on top of her. Inside her. His lips
and tongue tasting every inch of her.

  An imperceptible tightening and strain fell over her nerves. She dragged her surfboard through the sand until she was in front of Matt’s villa. Shielding her pensive green eyes from the sun, Casey looked up at the house, wondering what Travis was doing, what he was thinking. Her emotions ranged between calm and turmoil, while he seemed so cool and confident. Did he really love her? Or was he saying the one word all women want to hear?

  Weary of thinking and weighing her feelings, Casey collapsed on the beach. She stretched herself face down on the white sand, her head resting on her folded arms. Her emotions were engaged in a tug-of-war and, coupled with last night’s lack of sleep and her surfing, she was exhausted.

  She wondered what Travis’s reaction would be if she marched up the steps into the house, whipped off her bathing suit and said, “Take me.” She giggled. Her body squirmed deeper into the warm sand. She only wished she possessed that much bravado and grit. Casey yawned sleepily. Her eyelids felt heavy and soon the dark fan of lashes fluttered closed. The relentlessly beating sun, cooled by an ocean breeze, soothingly caressed her emotion-battered body.

  The continual slamming of cabinet doors woke Travis, instantly dissolving his dream. It was the same dream he’d been having all week – his body on top of and inside Casey. He could feel her tight sex pulsing around his hard, throbbing cock as he moved slowly in and out…in and out.

  Damn! He shook his head to clear it, pushed himself off the leather sofa and slowly walked up the steps into the kitchen. An expanse of broiled pink skin greeted his eyes. “Wow! I knew there was a fire beneath your surface, but I never expected to find it quite this way.”