Soon, his breathing evened, the mumbling stopped and his tight muscles softened under her hands.
“That’s better,” she said, intending to go back to her own room, but she was warm, comfortable and exhausted.
It didn’t take much for her to drift off, too.
REECE WAS HAVING THE time of his life.
All drivers dreamed of the perfect race, and in his case, he was living the dream.
He was strapped into his Ferrari F60 so tightly that he could only just about breathe. The heat was intense, the wind bruising and the G-forces flattened him against the seat.
He was in sheer heaven—and he was in second place.
There was nothing in the universe except for his car, the road and the car in front of him. Adrenaline fueled his laserlike focus, strategy a constant clicking in his brain. Second would be his best in a World Cup race, but second wasn’t good enough. Reece was pulling out all the stops and racing for first.
It had been raining. The roads were wet, but that was nothing. He knew this car like his own body, and when he was driving it, there wasn’t any difference between the two, the way he saw it.
He edged up on his competitor. Overtaking wasn’t common on Formula One tracks, but he had a shot as they came around the final turn. He hit the accelerator as they rounded, positioning himself to make the most of the aerodynamics of the high-tech car he drove. The back wheel of the guy in front of him was spinning close by when Reece heard the whining noise, but he didn’t catch on at first that something was wrong. He’d blown out the front driver’s side tire.
He’d skipped that last pit stop. A calculated risk. A mistake.
His car could go on three tires in some conditions, but not rounding a curb, not at his speed, not on wet roads. His mind didn’t anticipate the worst—he adjusted and focused on cold calculation of how to maneuver, still thinking about the win as he felt himself propel sideways, lurching hard.
Reece sometimes felt like he was flying when he drove, but something told him that for a second, he was actually airborne.
Everything was black, and then it was very, very bright.
The pain was intense, and he was trapped. He fought to get out, at least, he thought he did. He had no idea where he even was.
He couldn’t seem to open his eyes, no matter how hard he tried. He wanted to speak but couldn’t, and while there was noise in his head that wouldn’t stop, he couldn’t make out anything understandable.
Panic set in, fear clawing at him, and he tried to calm down, but it just made it worse. He lunged forward, reaching out, trying to get through the blinding brightness, the deafening noise, but he couldn’t.
Was this what dying was like?
His heart felt as if it would explode from his chest when he felt something, finally. Someone touched him, and he reached, finding a hand he could grab on to. He held it like it was his only connection to life, and maybe it was.
He still couldn’t speak, or hear, but he could touch.
His heartbeat slowed, the panic subsiding slightly. He was alive, connected to something. Not alone.
For that moment, it was enough.
BEFORE SHE EVEN REALIZED IT, Abby opened her eyes to the soft, pre-dawn light, and to Reece’s silver eyes watching her.
“Change your mind?” he said softly.
“Hmm?” she said, not sure what he was saying, or why he was in her bed, or… Her eyes flew open and she started to push up, but Reece’s arm was over her, holding her snug against him.
“Steady,” he said.
Morning brain-fog assaulted her, and she fought for words, but ended up sputtering, becoming increasingly aware of the warm, hard male body aligned with hers, both buried under the soft quilt and blankets.
“You were dreaming,” she finally managed to say. “You broke your lamp. I thought you were an intruder,” she explained, hoping he was awake enough to interpret her garbled, simple sentences.
As she shifted, it brought her closer to him and she knew he was very awake.
“You thought there was someone in the house, so you decided to crawl into bed with me?” he asked, his brow furrowed.
“No, I thought there was an intruder, but when I came to get you, I saw you had broken your lamp and were having a nightmare. Do you remember?”
He shook his head, then closed his eyes. “Vaguely. I’ve had it before, or other nightmares anyway. I don’t know if it’s the same one. I can never remember the details.”
“You were thrashing around, so obviously it was…bad. I tried to wake you up, but you were out cold, so I thought maybe if I just sat with you for a while you’d be okay,” she said, shrugging.
“You could have been hurt. Stepped on glass,” he said, frowning.
“I was fine. You were the one hurting, apparently.”
“And you helped,” he said softly, looking at her strangely, like he was remembering something, but he didn’t say anything, so she did.
“I meant to go back to my room, and then I guess I fell asleep.”
“I see,” he said, his eyes warm on her face.
“I should probably go,” she said.
“Do you really want to?”
Did she?
Of course she did, but…but what?
All of her reservations seemed so flimsy. Sure, she might get hurt, but she was a big girl. This was her chance to experience something wonderful, and there might never be another chance.
Reece would sell this winery, leave, and the odds were that she’d never see him again, except on TV.
Already, it hurt her heart a little to think about that, but so what? She’d survive, and she’d have some great memories. Maybe it was impossible to live your fantasies without some risk of being hurt. Maybe that was the price.
“No, I really don’t,” she said.
“Good, because I really want you to stay.”
Her decision made, she smiled and slid her arm around him, too, enjoying how he pressed fully against her in a move that left her in no doubt that he wanted her—a lot.
The look of sheer hunger on his face made reason disappear. His lips were just a scant breath from hers, and she could hardly believe this was truly happening.
“Here’s the thing, sweetheart,” he said against her lips. “I don’t care if an asteroid hits outside the window, nothing is interrupting us this time.”
“Got it, no asteroids,” she managed to say before he was kissing the life out of her, pushing her back until she was pinned between the warm, soft mattress and about six feet of hard, delicious man.
His mouth rubbed over hers erotically as he stopped to nip at her lower lip, his tongue darting out to lick the spot he bit before plunging deeper.
She arched into him, kissing him back with every ounce of passion she’d been holding back, tasting him as deeply as he tasted her. The faint scent of cedar, pine and smoke clung to his body from the night before, and she inhaled, loving how it mixed with his natural manly scent.
She barely recognized herself as she clung to him, wrapping a leg around his hip, arching into his hardness, rubbing and moaning into his mouth. She enjoyed sex, but she’d never felt so voracious about it. But right now, she wanted skin-on-skin, and pushed at the elastic band of the shorts between them.
He was of like mind, sliding his shorts off, then reaching for the edge of her flimsy cotton nightgown and pushing it upward until there wasn’t anything hiding her from his gaze.
“Oh, sweetheart, this has been so worth waiting for,” Reece said as he took her in. His hands drifted over her, learning her softness, studying her body so intently that she would have felt self-conscious if his touches weren’t rendering her mindless.
“Um, I’m on birth control and I’m, you know, healthy. I haven’t been with anyone in a while,” she admitted, feeling a little awkward. But while they were old friends, they were new lovers, and certain things had to be said.
He nodded while nibbling at her shoulder, sending shivers ev
erywhere.
“Me, too. Like I mentioned earlier, there’s been no one since before the accident, and I’ve been thoroughly checked for everything with all of the time I spent in hospitals,” he whispered against her ear.
She remembered how hard and urgent he’d been the day before when she’d stroked him to orgasm in the kitchen, and it was enough to make her shudder, reaching for him, wanting to make it happen again. The idea that she was his first lover after such a long time was important to her. Maybe that meant he wouldn’t forget her later, either.
“Good, so we know we don’t have to worry about any interruptions,” she said with a smile.
She didn’t want anything between them, and let him know by reaching down to find him, closing her fingers around him with a sigh of satisfaction. She opened her thighs and used her hand to slide him against her already slick sex, arching and then closing her legs to trap him there.
“I love how you feel next to me,” she said, moving her hips against him, enjoying the slippery friction of their bodies. “But I bet it’s not as good as you’d feel inside me.”
“You make it tough to go slow,” he said, pushing against her, sliding along the wet V of her flesh in a way that made her whimper and dig her fingers into his shoulders.
“Who wants slow?” she said, biting his shoulder. “Aren’t you supposed to like speed?”
She yelped and then laughed as he found a ticklish spot and capitalized on it, then grabbed her hands and pinned them up over her head. She struggled slightly, and he could see it just excited her more when he pressed down, holding her in place.
Another little discovery about Abby.
“Now I’ve got you right where I want you,” he said with a delicious smile. “And I plan to take my time. Maybe some guys make love like they race, but I think women and wine are more alike, they need to be savored,” he said against her lips, catching her lower one between his teeth, then drawing it in and sucking before taking her whole mouth in a deep, carnal kiss. “We have time. Let’s get to know each other,” he said softly.
“But I want—”
“I know, me, too, and we’ll get there. Promise,” he said.
“You’re such a tease,” she accused, the last word ending on a moan as he ran his tongue along the shell of her ear, his cock still prodding and sliding along her sex, but not even coming close to where she wanted him.
“Can’t help it when it comes to you,” he said, moving lower to draw a nipple between his teeth, nipping lightly and making her arch, the slight pain making the drawing pleasure of his mouth a moment later even more intense.
He let her arms go and looked at her, his voice stern.
“Leave your hands there. Don’t move them. I want to find out what you like, what you want,” he said, his hands moving over her experimentally, lingering in places that made her react, moving on past the ones that didn’t. “But if you move, I have to stop.”
She nodded, moaning a little.
He was studying her body the way he must have studied a race course, or more accurately, tasting her like a good wine, she thought hazily, too immersed in sensation to argue. She’d been done plenty of times, but she’d never been paid attention to like this.
He dragged his lips down the inside of her thigh, and worked his way back up, nudging her legs apart with his shoulders.
His tongue found her, but only lightly, flicking at her clit, a butterfly touch that had her nearly screaming, writhing on the bed.
“Reece, please, I need you,” she said, panting, but she obeyed, leaving her hands where he’d put them. It was driving her crazy, in the best possible way.
He licked her a little harder this time, and his fingers found their way inside of her—one, then two and then, making her eyes widen, another teased the other opening to her body, penetrating slightly. She tensed at the unexpected sensation, then relaxed. Her entire body shivered with the pleasure of his fingers and mouth everywhere.
“That feels so good,” she said.
“And this?” he whispered against her sex, so softly she wasn’t sure he really said anything before he kissed her again on pulsing, sensitive flesh.
“Yes,” she said desperately, wanting more of everything, thrusting against him. “Please,” she begged.
Reece was someone she’d known for so long, but she knew in that instant that she didn’t know anything about him at all. He seemed to know what she fantasized about, what she wanted that maybe she didn’t even know to ask for. He continued to press, to lick and to thrust until she cried out, arching off the bed, her body bent in ecstasy.
He moved back up, and levered over her, pulling her legs up over his shoulders.
“I need this so much,” he said roughly, staring down into her face as he poised himself before her, rubbing and teasing her sex with his cock until both of them were mindless. When she was about to beg, he eased forward, sliding inside and filling her deeply, adjusting her legs so that he could go even deeper.
Oh, thank you, Abby thought, her entire body expressing a sigh of wonder as he started moving.
“You’re so wet,” he said, his jaw tight with the effort of control he was exerting. “So hot inside,” he said, continuing to describe what he felt, what he wanted to do to her, in exacting detail until she wanted to just beg him to make it all real.
There was little she could do to control the pace at her angle, so she traced her hands and lips over hard lines of his chest, shoulders and hips. Every muscle was tense as he rocked into her in a steady rhythm.
She ran her fingers over his scars, exploring the different textures of his skin, then across the light hair on his chest, and over male nipples that beaded, drawing a groan from him as she pinched.
“You moved your hands,” he said breathlessly.
“Do you mind?”
“Not at all.”
He turned his face to the side, planting wet kisses on the side of her knee, and she whimpered as the sensation traveled all the way back down through her thighs to the eddy of pleasure between her legs.
It was all too good, but she needed more. She was so close, and reached down to touch him as he moved in and out, her fingers firm around the base of his erection.
“That’s so hot, Abby,” he said, watching.
She pressed on her clit then, rubbing, knowing what she needed and liking the way he watched so greedily. Hot sensation immediately coursed through her body, everything tightening, her muscles clenching down on his cock so hard it almost ached.
“Oh, yeah, Abby,” he ground out, thrusting faster, deeper.
Suddenly all of the tightness melted, her climax overcoming her and drawing him along as well. Abby had never felt anything quite so pure in her life, she was sure of it.
Minutes later, Reece released her legs and fell to her side, pulling her over next to him as they both caught their breath, calming down from what Abby was sure had to be the most intense, incredible sex she’d ever had.
“I may not be able to move from this bed today,” she said jokingly, though when she did try to move her leg, it felt like spaghetti. Her muscles felt as if they actually had melted.
“You’ll get no arguments from me,” Reece said with evil glee, propping up on one elbow at her side. He ran his finger along her sternum, down her belly, and stopped at the edge of her sex. “I thought about tying you to it at one point.”
She was surprised, then she smiled.
“Maybe we could take turns.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“I still can’t feel my legs,” she admitted, laughing.
“I’m a bit dizzy myself, but even so, I want more,” he said, leaning in for a kiss.
“Me, too,” she said, touching his face, running her finger along his lips. He darted his tongue out to taste her. “I want more, too.”
“We can do anything,” he said. “Everything. Whatever you want or need. Just say so.”
In the years since her few crazy experiences in coll
ege, her lovers had been nice but uncreative men, the sex more or less vanilla, and she hadn’t realized how many fantasies she had packed away. If Reece was willing to explore them with her…?
“Maybe I should write up a list, you know, like for Santa. All the things I want you to do to me, and what I’d like to do to you,” she said naughtily, grinning.
“Hmm…that could be interesting. We could make it our goal to make sure every item is attended to,” he said, trailing his hand over her breast, in long strokes up and down her torso, down her arm, back up again, back over her breast until she trembled.
She wanted him again, right now. Amazing.
“Roll over.”
“Why?”
“Just do it,” he said, commanding but gentle.
With a little shiver of pleasure, she did, snuggling down into the soft material of his comforter. It was warm and soft, smelling like sex, and she was in heaven.
Reece pushed up, balancing himself as he levered over her, straddling the backs of her thighs, and then she felt the next-best thing to sex that she could imagine as his hands slid up either side of her spine and continued to massage in slow, thorough motions.
“That feels amazing…where did you learn to give massages?” she said.
“Here and there…but giving a massage can feel as good as getting one,” he responded.
As he worked her neck, she sighed. “Somehow I doubt that,” she said on another sigh, followed by a moan as he leaned forward and was inside of her again, moving in a lazy rhythm that matched the motion of his hands.
She’d never even imagined so much physical sensation being possible. He kept rubbing, moving over her and inside of her until she was clawing her fingers into the quilt and rotating her hips beneath him. It was so slow, it was torture. It was perfect.
His hands slipped down to work their magic on her derriere, massaging and squeezing. She pushed up on her elbows, thrusting back against him, seeking more. He kept up the constant gentle rhythm, a steady beat of pleasure, as if making love to her was a song. She fell to the bed again, giving herself up to him and enjoying every second of it.
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