by Julie Leto
She glanced at Viviana’s diary, barely visible beneath the increasingly disordered comforter. She wished she’d taken up the habit of committing her liaisons to pen and ink because, right now, with Grey’s hands inching up her rib cage, his roughened fingertips teasing the sensitive swell of her breasts, she couldn’t remember any other lover with whom she’d shared such an instant, overwhelming connection.
“I don’t write books about sex,” he said. “And I don’t like reading them. Unless they’re a couple of centuries old.”
In the heat of her desire, she’d forgotten about Lane Morrow.
“Can’t blame you,” she answered, swiping her tongue across her dry lips, then doing the same to him, just in case he thought a little reluctance and one bad experience with an unscrupulous woman was going to change her mind about making love to him. “Discretion is a powerful turn-on for me, Grey. Or should I say Zane? I can play whatever game you want.”
Grey growled, dragged her up and kissed her long and hard, his tongue even more insistent, his teeth knocking with hers, nipping at her lips.
“I like games, Reina. But while in your bed, I’m Grey. And I am going to make love to you.”
She tossed her head back, yanked the clip and let her hair fall across her back. “You’re still all talk. Isn’t there anything better you can do with that mouth of yours?”
FIRE. THE WORD POPPED into Grey’s mind in big, bold letters the moment he caught sight of Reina’s eyes. Flames licked the obsidian centers, flashing with the purest heat he’d ever seen—completely purged of any fear or reluctance. He needed to burn with her.
And he would, just as soon as he demonstrated all the delicious things he knew how to do with his mouth, and other parts of his body, to bring her the pleasure she craved.
“Wait here.” He dashed off the bed, escaping so quickly he barely heard her frustrated sigh. After a quick stop in the guest room to retrieve a condom from his overnight bag, he ran down the stairs. He wondered if he wasn’t insane, leaving Reina alone for so long. But she deserved better than fast and furious. He didn’t know if this would be their only liaison, and he wanted to make it count.
He trusted her to be discreet. He trusted her to value creative lovemaking. And as he turned the corner into the old sunroom she had converted into her studio, he trusted her to have what he needed to make their first time unforgettable.
When he returned to the bedroom, he found the lamplight replaced by the glimmering glow of a dozen candles. She’d doffed the bottom half of her pajamas and now reclined on the bed, the comforter folded beneath her feet, in unabashed nudity. He kicked off his pants, then tossed the condom on the side table. His hand, clutching a spool of gold chain he’d pilfered from her worktable, remained hidden behind his back.
“What have you got there?” she asked.
“A surprise. Close your eyes.”
She smiled. “I’m not Viviana, Grey. I’ve known pleasure.”
He chuckled, unwilling to let Reina’s alleged experience dampen his intentions. Grey may have been humiliated by Lane’s book, but his embarrassment didn’t stem from her reports of his prowess as a lover, at least not the parts that were true. Yes, he was an insatiable, demanding bedmate. Yes, his desire could be stoked by something as simple as sharing a delectable dessert or riding around in the back of a limousine during a rainstorm. But he’d never failed to insure his lady experienced an orgasm. Even Lane admitted that in black and white. So no matter how accomplished Reina claimed to be in the pleasure department, she’d never had an orgasm courtesy of Grey Masterson.
“Have you? Really?”
He revealed the spool of glittering gold chain, unraveled a few inches, then dangled the slightly sharp end over her stomach, beneath her breasts, and across one taut nipple. She gasped at the sensation, then closed her eyes as he’d instructed.
7
FOR A BRIEF, SCINTILLATING moment, Reina’s mind shot back to St. Tropez. The balmy breezes. The thrill of the forbidden. The adventure of being young, carefree and careless of consequences—the long-lost treasure of not knowing exactly what would happen next or how it would make her feel. Yet the minute Grey dragged the sharp edge of the chain gently across her neck, her consciousness locked into the present with the man who desired her, who knew his way around a woman’s body, and who had promised to pleasure her beyond her own vast experiences.
Still, the electric hum of innocent anticipation remained.
Amazing.
“Lift your head a little,” he instructed.
She complied, knowing he intended to wrap her in the gold just as il Gio had done to Viviana, knowing the chain he’d stolen from her studio was heartier, thicker than what the mistress had described, but trusting Grey nonetheless. The metal chilled her skin. As he manipulated the gold around her breasts, her nipples puckered, the press of each individual link arousing her as if he had a thousand fingers to ply on her skin.
“Your breasts are amazing.” He circled her right breast once, then curled the chain across to do the same to the other. “No tan lines. So round, so sensitive. Can you feel how your nipples reach out to me?”
She sighed in response, well aware that he didn’t need her to answer his question. He wanted to stimulate her with his words as well as his actions, making her totally conscious of each and every response in her body. She concentrated on increasing tautness as he wound the chain back and forth, shaping an increasingly smaller figure eight from one breast to the other, working the gold closer and closer to the sensitive points. Then, anticipating a jolt of sensation when the cool links finally met her aching tips, she inhaled sharply. But, instead, he redirected the chain down her belly, leaving her nipples free to pout for his touch.
“Lift your hips, chère.”
She folded her knees up, cognizant of how he allowed only the chain to scrape her skin. His body, his hands, remained a billow of heat directing the gold down her torso, between her legs, pressing aside one lip of flesh before he twined the chain beneath her thigh and back around her hip.
“This is like wrapping a present,” he whispered, “and opening the gift at the same time.”
She kept her hips off the mattress while he plied his magic weave around her stomach, then down again to tug the other lip open. When he finally instructed her to slowly relax, she did so with care, hissing with intense pleasure as the chain tightened ever so slightly against her sensitive skin. She had to keep her knees raised, her legs spread, to insure that the links didn’t move from their delicious position.
She’d never felt so exposed, vulnerable and cherished all at the same time. Her nipples ached for his tongue, her center trickled with another wave of hot moisture. Her mind reeled from the countless possibilities of what he’d do next, particularly after she felt the grasp of the chain around her throat.
“Can I open my eyes?” she asked.
“Not yet.”
She heard him pad away, toward her dresser. He returned, laid something flat and heavy beside her, then left and returned again.
“Now?”
“Not quite. One thing first, to complete the picture. I’m going to touch your mouth, add some of that color you wore earlier, that, for the record, drives me wild.”
He smoothed the sponge tip of her crimson gloss over her lips slowly, like an artist putting the final touches on his masterpiece. The tiny detail surprised her, heightened her curiosity about him, about what he intended to do with her next.
“I never would have pegged you as a visual man,” she said, listening as he closed the cylinder of gloss. “You make your way with words.”
“But I am a man, and we’re an inherently visual species. And what I’m seeing right now is most stimulating.”
“Too bad I can’t see for myself.”
The mattress purled as he lifted the flat, heavy object he’d laid beside her. “But you can, Reina. Turn your face toward me. Open your eyes.”
Her lashes fluttered, her eyes taking
an instant to adjust in the dim light. When the image focused, she saw herself, reflected in the gilded hand mirror she’d bought in a French Quarter antique shop. First he allowed her to see only her face—eyes wide with desire, lips glimmering with dark scarlet gloss. She glanced up at him, standing beside the bed in breathtaking, naked glory, but he admonished her to keep her eyes on the mirror.
He stepped aside, turning the mirror so she could see how he’d twined the gold around her breasts, tight enough to cause soft indentations in her skin, to make her nipples higher, her breasts taller. He then leaned the mirror over her, following the single linked path down her belly, then reflecting back the full picture of her desire.
“Have you ever seen yourself so aroused, so erotically arranged?”
She would have shook her head, her tongue thick, but she was afraid the movement would dislodge the intricate web of gold.
“No,” she said with a rasp.
“Reminds me of that piece in your gallery, the seashell with the pearl.”
She swallowed deeply, knowing precisely the design he meant, a piece she’d created not too long ago from a shell she’d found during a trip to the Caribbean. The deep pink hue of the inner shell, the slightly teardrop shape of the natural pearl. She’d fashioned the ocean treasures as an allusion to female arousal, but she’d never expected to be so accurate.
He dropped the mirror on the bed, but the image remained imprinted in her mind. He’d only just begun to orchestrate her pleasure, and she couldn’t imagine wanting a man inside her more than how she wanted Grey.
Apparently in no hurry, he strolled around to the other side of the bed. With her promise to keep her eyes closed forgotten, she feasted on the sight of him—his torso lean and muscled, his erection long, taut and ever so slightly curved. A second wave of anticipation surged through her. She’d made love to enough men to know which shape suited her, and he would be perfect. With the chains holding her open to his perusal, the sensations of blood rushing to her center intensified.
She held her breath and remained incredibly still.
He slid beside her on the bed and retrieved the dangling end of the chain that he’d dropped at her throat. He flicked the gold across her skin, tugging just enough so that her breath caught when the links tightened around her neck.
“You shouldn’t move too much,” he warned. “You’ll undo all my handiwork.”
“I won’t.” She relaxed into the pillow and closed her eyes. “But you shouldn’t waste all this handiwork, either.”
His sapphire irises gleamed with reflections of candlelight and gold. “Unlikely, Reina. Very unlikely.”
He took her hand, free of the gold chain, and lifted her fingers to his mouth, kissing each one softly, then blazing a path down her arm, across her shoulder. When he met the chain, he licked a trail, following the links down to her breast, swirling his stiff tongue along the edges, spiraling from one side to the other until he’d moistened all her flesh there with his mouth, until her nipples strained for his attention. With slow precision, he traced around her wide areola, then, finally, slipped her hard nipple into his mouth.
The sensation rocked her. She arched her back, pressing her flesh farther into his mouth until the chain reminded her to relax. By the time he attended her other breast, the warring instincts to remain still and thrash with pleasure lulled her into an erotic stillness she’d never known before.
His mouth descended, following the line of gold. Grey shifted his body around her raised knees and poised his mouth where she wanted him most. But how could she not move when his tongue thrust inside her?
“Grey,” she managed by way of warning.
He answered her uncertainty with a wicked grin, then after a pause, he stretched upward, bracing his nude and glorious body over her in rigid parallel. The muscles in his shoulders bulged at the strain, but he loosened the chain around her neck.
He paused, stared straight down into her eyes. “I don’t want you constrained, afraid to move, when I taste you.”
She searched his eyes, nearly losing her sanity in the intense blueness. How could a man appear so nefarious yet so selfless at the same time? “Kiss me first.”
He pursed his lips, considering, then shook his head. “Oh, no. When I kiss those ruby-red lips again, I’ll be inside you. One kiss might distract me, keep me from pleasuring you the way I promised. Are you willing to wait a few moments more?”
With his mouth, he retraced his downward course, following the path still damp on her skin, plucking each nipple with his teeth before slipping his arms beneath her knees. He captured her gaze with his head poised inches from the dark curls of her mons. But instead of his tongue, he slipped a finger beneath the chain and jerked, pulling the links tight against her swollen flesh.
“So sweet,” he murmured, then lapped at her, gently at first, then with increasing intensity until Reina nearly flew out of her skin.
She grabbed his head, moving him, directing him, remembering somewhere in the back of her mind that this man didn’t know her, hadn’t been taught her likes and dislikes, her preferences or predilections. He pulled back and censured her with an indignant look.
“Relax, Reina. You asked me if I could do anything better with my mouth than talk. I’m about to show you. Trust me.”
She swallowed her reply, closed her eyes and tried to do as he asked. Trust him? Not since Martine had she allowed a lover to explore her body without direction, without him knowing precisely what she wanted him to do to her and when. How could she trust him? If he didn’t please her, if he didn’t make the spontaneous decision to sleep with him worth her while, what would the affair mean? How would she justify the decadence?
And yet, as the skillful twirls of his tongue caused a renewed wave of captivating sensations to roll over her body, how could she not trust him?
Her faith was instantly rewarded. He used his mouth, he used the chains, he used his fingers until she reached the precipice of delight and willingly jumped without hesitation. She cried out his name, urged and demanded, until her insides exploded in pulsing waves. In the psychedelic world of the downward slide, he unwound the gold chain from around her, donned his condom, then lay down on the bed beside her.
She followed her instincts and curled into his hot, hard body. She’d been sated, but the effects wouldn’t last. An insatiable thrum echoed through her. Until he was inside her, until she experienced the full breadth of this man, she’d never be completely satisfied.
“So you are talented with your mouth,” she murmured. “How about showing me your other aptitudes? Or, better yet, giving me a chance to show you mine.”
He chuckled, having no idea how rare her offer was. Reina nearly couldn’t believe she’d said anything so…ribald, so forward and lusty. She’d made love dozens of times with dozens of men—men she chose carefully, knowing from the first kiss precisely how much of herself she’d be willing to share, in bed and out. But Grey roused a rare side of her—the natural side, the impulsive side, the part of her that desperately wanted to show a lover all she was, all she could give…if only she could discover the secret to opening her heart.
Yet when he finally kissed her, his mouth possessing hers entirely, the taste of her sex flavoring his tongue, all doubts evaporated, all expectations floated away in a rush of hot need. He’d showed her the intense pleasure of surrendering control to a lover, but old habits were hard to break. She pushed him onto his back and straddled him. Before her mind could fully register the concentrated bliss of his hard tip pressed to her pulsing lips, she eased him inside her and straightened her spine.
Instantaneous delight jolted her. Beneath her—his hands clamped on her hips—he grinned.
“Shaped just right for you, aren’t I?”
She couldn’t answer, fearing that the movement of just speaking would toss her into another orgasmic wave before she’d had a moment to catch her breath. But Grey took the upper hand and shifted beneath her. She shook her head, trying
to deny the electric storm sizzling deep inside her, but he merely lifted his body higher, deeper. He slid his hand between them and with one finger, unlocked the last of her control. From that moment on, time passed in a mindless flurry, ending when both of them came long and hard and loud.
GREY HAD NO IDEA how long Reina lay over him, her body still joined with his, her breathing alternating between labored and nonexistent, as if she held her breath every so often in an attempt to calm the rapid pants. He knew she didn’t like to lose control. Hated surrendering control even more. Still, he’d managed to take the reins long enough to show her just how incredible yielding to a lover could be. He hardly knew her, but the truth of what this woman needed seemed just as clear to him as black-inked words on a crisp white page. What puzzled him was why he felt so compelled to fulfill her need.
When he heard her exhausted sigh, he rolled her over, withdrew from her warm and luscious body. He blew out the candles, then pulled the tangled comforter over them, ignoring the signals she sent that told him she’d prefer he go to his own bed. Too late. He’d already tasted the manna of overriding Reina Price’s desires. So long as he was able to replace them with something better, something that she possibly didn’t even know she wanted, she’d have to do something less subtle than rolling a few inches away and hugging the covers tightly to change his mind about her.
She’d been made love to before. She’d admitted that truth with great pride and no shame. Good. But he’d bet the entire advertising revenue of the newspaper that she hadn’t allowed a man freedom with her body since that young stud on the French beach.
But she’d let him. Somehow, he’d won a level of trust from her that he doubted any other of her lovers had ever achieved. He couldn’t help the pitch of pride rolling through him, or the mystery her choice presented him with. Why him? Why now?
