by Leanne Banks
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Talk about Paul? Dig up the details of her failed engagement? Her stomach turned. She was sick of exhuming the past. “Not really,” she confessed, and allowed him to draw her against his chest.
Eli paused. “Okay,” he finally said, a wealth of reluctance in that one word.
Silently, he stroked her hair from her face. His strength and his warmth quelled the doubts that had been plaguing her for the past few days. Surrounded by his scent, enveloped in his arms, supported between his hard thighs, she felt both protected and acutely sensitive to his sexual appeal. “How long have you been here?”
“About two hours. I made sure Mrs. Giordano knew I would be gone so she would keep an ear out for Fletch.” He nuzzled her neck and inhaled deeply. “Your perfume drives me crazy.”
“Apricots must make you crazy,” she said.
“Andie makes me crazy,” he corrected her.
Her heart quickened. Lord, he knew how to get to her. Sighing, she sifted her hand through the sandy hair at his nape, and the thought, the wish, the need that had been running through her since she’d first seen him in her den pulled at her again. “Please kiss me,” she whispered before she could stop herself.
She didn’t have to say it twice, and he didn’t give her an opportunity to call it back. His lips descended on hers in a warm caress. His tongue slipped inside to dally with hers. His gentleness, a product of his formidable self-control, made her feel both cherished and seduced. The combination was heady, and her hunger for him grew to a sweet feminine ache.
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you,” he muttered against her lips, then dropped his open mouth to her throat.
Andie sucked in a quick breath and arched her neck. “Ohhh, Eli, I don’t know about this.”
“Maybe you’ll like this better,” he muttered, skimming his mouth down to her chest. He nudged the sleeve of her dress off her shoulder and kissed the upper curve of her breast.
Her mouth went dry. His beard scraped slightly over her tender skin, and she felt her nipples strain against her bra. Before she could tell him to stop or beg him to go on, he drew her lace-covered nipple into his mouth.
Her womb twisted, and her sweet feminine ache turned into a roaring need. “Oh, my God.” She wasn’t sure they should go on, but she didn’t want him to stop. “I—I—”
Eli ran his tongue around the beaded tip and pulled back slightly. “You want?” he asked, watching her with green eyes glinting with desire.
The sight of his mouth so close to her breast was too erotic for words. Andie closed her eyes. “I’m not sure this is such a good idea.”
“Don’t close your eyes,” Eli urged and squeezed her hip. “Look at me.”
Struggling with arousal and uncertainty, Andie did as he said.
“You try so hard not to see everything you do to me.” He cupped her jaw and rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip, a tenderly sensual gesture that made her weak. “Why?”
She swallowed. “It’s hard to believe, and I’m not sure how to handle it. When you touch me...” He continued his tender massage and she sighed.
“When I touch you,” he prompted.
Andie bit back a moan. “I feel out of control.”
He lifted her hand to his chest in a gesture that felt incredibly intimate. “What do you feel now?”
“Your heart beating.”
“You’re an experienced nurse. Would you say it’s beating at the average rate for a physically fit thirty-something man when he’s sitting down?”
“No,” she admitted. “It’s fast.”
“Because I want you.”
His blunt announcement made her puny defenses fold. “Oh.”
He shook his head in wonder. “Every time I learn something about you I want to know more. And I don’t feel particularly reasonable about it. If I had my way, you’d save every minute of your time to be with me because, lady, you’re a cool drink of water and I’ve been in the desert too damn long. You’re the most special woman I’ve ever known. I want tonight. I want more.” He gave a wry chuckle. “But I can tell by your face that I’m scaring you. God knows I don’t want to do that. So, the question is, are you going to let me show you how much I want you?”
Stunned by his declaration, Andie sat there trying to register all that he’d said. No man, not even her fiancé, had been so direct about his feelings for her. What struck her most was that he’d bared himself, yet wasn’t requiring the same from her.
Honest, straightforward, no games. Her head spun, but the culminating moment hung between them. It was a moment when she had the power, when she could play it safe and close the door or take a double dare and open it. With his face mere inches from hers, his gaze holding hers, her indecision faded. She shouldn’t allow her past to decide her present. She couldn’t run from Eli anymore. She didn’t want to. “Yes,” she whispered.
His eyes darkening to forest green, he leaned nearer until she closed her eyes and he kissed her as if he would never stop. The deep kiss went on for long soul-stirring moments. His hand squeezed her waist, and distantly she felt the hem of her dress pushed up to her hips. He flicked the peak of her nipple with his thumb.
A million sensations coursed through her as she clung to him.
“Tell me what you like,” he murmured, gently biting her earlobe.
Her heart pounding in her head, Andie swallowed. “Everything.”
He chuckled and the sound sent a shimmy of vibrations through her blood. “That covers a lot of ground, Andie. I’m not sure we have time for all of it tonight.”
Heaven help her, she hoped they found the time. Her zipper made a soft hissing sound when he pulled it down. He kissed her again, an open-mouth promise of what was to come. By the time they came up for air, her dress was on the floor beside the chair. Her bra straps hung limply on her arms, her breasts swelled against the lacy cups.
He drew his finger across her cleavage. “So pretty.”
When she saw the way Eli looked at her at this very moment, Andie believed pretty was a possibility. When he unsnapped the clasp and her bra fell to her waist, he hiked her up so that he could take her breast into his mouth again. He moved from one breast to the other, sucking her sensitive nipples until she felt a rippling tension between her legs.
He pulled away and eased her back onto his thighs. His eyes hooded with arousal, he drew in a deep breath. “I’m overdressed. Your turn. Unbutton my shirt,” he told her.
With unsteady fingers, she released the buttons and pushed his shirt aside. A shadow of uncertainty came over her. She hesitated. What if she didn’t please him?
“Do you want to touch me?”
“Yes. I was waiting for—”
He shook his head. “You don’t have to wait for anything. I’m yours for the taking.”
Her heart contracted. She sank her fingers into the soft hair covering his hard chest. He sat still and quiet as she played her hands over the muscular planes of his chest and shoulders. When she skimmed her fingernail lightly over his flat brown nipple, he jerked. His reaction gave her more than an incredible sense of power. It made her hot. Her gaze flicked up to meet his and she slowly lowered her head to slide her tongue around his nipple.
She felt his body tense beneath her and did it again. He slid his hands through her hair. “You like this, don’t you?”
“Like what?”
“Being in control.”
Andie hadn’t thought much about it, but she supposed she’d been fairly passive in her intimate relationships. She’d never felt secure enough to be any other way. If truth were told, her longest sexual experience had lasted about fifteen minutes. Old doubts crept in. She wondered if she’d misread his pleasure. “I don’t want all the control. I just want to share it.”
She tried to pull away, but he scooped her in his arms and dragged her back against him. “What’s going on here?”
Andie bit her lip. Suddenly she felt too b
are. “I—uh, I wasn’t sure if you liked—”
“I want everything,” he told her, his voice an intimate caress. “Every touch. Every kiss. Every word. I want inside.” He swore softly. “When you put your mouth on me, I started reciting chemical equations in my mind to keep from exploding.”
“Chemical equations?” she echoed. Her confidence swiftly soared, releasing a wave of sexual energy in her veins and a thud of arousal in her femininity. She backed slightly away. “I just wasn’t sure—”
Her explanation fizzled when he took her hand and eased it slowly but deliberately to the hot, swollen ridge in his jeans. “I like it. I meant it when I said I’m yours for the taking.” He moved his hand away and looked as if he expected her to remove hers, too.
She didn’t and was shocked and secretly pleased at her boldness. His invitation was irresistible. He was irresistible. His blatant desire made her ache in all the right places. Unfastening his jeans, she watched his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. “This isn’t going to be over in five minutes, is it?”
“It could be,” he said in a low, strained voice, “if we don’t share a little of that control.” He took her curious hands and pulled her against him, distracting her with a kiss. He slipped his hand beneath her panties to cup her bottom. “These pretty little panties are going to be history soon.” He moved his fingers around to her moist femininity and gently stroked her. “You’ve got the sweetest...” He kissed her again.
Something deep inside her ripped open, and want and need flew out of control. Andie moaned at the sensations rocking through her. She’d suspected that making love with Eli would turn her heart upside down, but she’d never dreamed how much he could make her want. With each stroke, the coil inside her tightened. Aching with the need to be closer than close, she slid her hand inside the opening of his jeans, past his briefs, to his full arousal.
He stiffened, but didn’t pull away. “Andie, I’m gonna end up making love to you in this chair if we don’t get to your bed.”
Despite his protest, he continued his ardent caresses and she continued her upward spiral. His tongue thrust into her mouth, and she felt the fine sheen of his perspiration mingle with hers. She could feel the battle for restraint raging inside him, but she didn’t want his restraint. She rubbed her thumb over the moistened head of his full arousal.
He tore his mouth from hers and exhaled in a long hiss. “Andie,” he said in a warning voice.
“I don’t care where,” she whispered, urgency driving her, sudden and intense frustration bringing tears to her eyes. She’d denied the truth too long. “I just want you.” She heard her voice tremble and couldn’t do a damn thing about it. “Now.” She arched into his hand. “Please say you have something,” she said breathlessly.
He swore and fumbled in his pocket. Clearly loath to pull away from her, he shifted her slightly and stopped his excruciating caress long enough to retrieve a plastic packet and open it.
Boldness and need had her taking it from his hand. With his help, they pushed his jeans and briefs past his hips. Her hands trembled, but she managed to slide the protection on his jutting masculinity.
His aroused gaze holding hers, he got rid of her last silken barrier and supported her over his hard shaft. Slowly, deliberately, he lowered her onto him. She held her breath while she adjusted to his fullness and watched him shudder with pleasure. “You are so tight, so sweet,” he whispered, rocking his pelvis so he thrust deeper inside her. “I want—” he shuddered again “—as close as I can get.”
His words wrapped around her heart and took a piece of her soul. Could he know what he was doing to her? Could he know that she’d never be the same? Emotion surging through her, she flowed against him and he pumped inside her. She could tell by the sheer tension emanating from his whole body that he was riding the edge. His face drawn tight with arousal, he shook his head and lowered his hand between them. “Oh, no, sweetheart,” he assured her, finding her most sensitive spot with unerring accuracy. “I’m not going anywhere without you.”
He moved his fingers in heart-stopping strokes and murmured dark words of sensual praise that turned her to liquid in his hands. She spiked, then jerked, suspended with Eli inside and out. Holding on to his shoulders, clinging to his gaze, she cried out and they tumbled over the edge together.
A full moment passed before Eli could see straight. His mind-blowing climax had commandeered every nerve ending in his body. His chest heaved with the effort to breathe, and the woman responsible for his pleasure was struggling for her own breath.
His pounding heart turned over and he sifted his hand through her hair. Still intimately joined with him, she lay like a wilted flower on his chest. He liked their position. He liked the sensation of her clinging to him. He liked the idea of her doing it for the rest of the night.
He liked the idea of her doing it for a hell of a lot longer. She was his now, and though he’d known one time, even one night with her wouldn’t be enough, he hadn’t known he might want forever.
All his life, he’d sensed something was missing. From a human genetics standpoint, it was as if part of his DNA had malfunctioned. Although he’d been productive, he’d always felt a gap, a lack. With Andie the gap was closed, the lack was filled. What she did went deeper than his heart. It was as if she provided the missing cells that made everything come together.
Eli stared at her and a primitive possessiveness raced through him. She might not know it yet, but she belonged to him. And the fact that she was gloriously wasted after they’d made love filled him with masculine pride. Reluctantly, he shifted her beside him and pushed his jeans the rest of the way to the floor.
When he turned back to her, she extended her arms so trustingly that it turned him inside out. “I’ll always have a fondness for this chair,” he said, “but I think it’s time for bed.”
“I’m not sure I can walk,” she confessed.
“You don’t have to,” he told her and lifted her naked body in his arms.
Her heavy eyelids fluttered in surprise. “You keep surprising me. Are you staying?”
He laughed at the question. No chance in hell of him leaving. “Yes,” he said, walking toward the hall. “This way?”
She nodded. “I need to thank you.”
Eli looked at her in disbelief.
“Not for that, but—” She stopped and her voice grew husky. “Well, I guess for that, too. But the reason I wanted to thank you was for being here when I came home. It meant a lot to me.”
He stepped through her doorway. “Should I say you’re welcome?”
She tugged his head down and pressed her lips to his. “I think you already have.”
In the soft darkness of her room, his heart raced and he took her mouth in a long, intimate joining. When they pulled apart, she took a deep breath. “Before I forget, there was one thing I wanted to ask you.”
He gently set her on the bed and followed her down. “Anything.”
“How long have you carried that condom around in your pocket? You must have been pretty sure of me.”
Hearing the faintest bit of feminine pique in her voice, Eli chose his words with care. “I was sure I wanted you. I’ve been carrying the condom since the night of the party.”
“Oh,” she said, her indignation melting. Her brown eyes softened.
His body hardened with arousal. Eli kissed her neck and skimmed his hand down her bare side. He smiled at her delicate shiver. She would be his again. The knowledge filled him with pleasure and anticipation. “I had one condom, so a more pressing question, before I forget, is do you have any more?”
Chapter Eleven
Andie woke to his kiss.
“I need to go,” Eli told her in a morning-husky voice. “I should be home when Fletch wakes up.”
“Okay,” she murmured, forcing her eyes open. Dressed in his jeans and partially buttoned shirt, he looked appealingly rumpled as he leaned over the bed and watched her with a bone-melting gaze. After last
night, she would never be able to look at him the same way. He had taken her body and given his, repeatedly, and sometime in the night, he’d touched her heart. The shadow of his beard, rough and masculine, made something inside her twist and turn. How many times had he rubbed his cheek against her cheek, against her breast and belly? She reached up to touch his jaw.
He captured her hand and pressed it to his mouth. “I’ll see you tonight.”
She nodded, then stopped and shook her head. Her mind was sludge. “I’m working the next four nights. Saturday afternoon?”
“Okay,” he said, but he continued to stand there looking at her. A full moment passed. “I don’t want to go.”
She could see it on his face, the war between doing what he should and what he wanted to. “It’s not that long,” she told him and waved her free hand halfheartedly. “Shoo.”
He frowned at her. “You could show a little more reluctance.”
Andie laughed. “I need recovery time. This incredibly sexy research scientist invaded my home, kept me awake all night and did shocking things to my body.”
Leaning closer, he allowed his hand to stray beneath the covers. “Like this.”
“Yes, but—Eli!” she said, when his palm found her breast. Sexual adrenaline bolted through her.
“Shocking things all night,” he prompted, clearly waiting for her to expound.
“Yes. It was wonderful. On a scale of one to ten, you were fifteen. Is your head big enough now?”
He bent his face down to hers and brushed his open mouth back and forth against hers, just barely touching her lips. She lifted her head to increase the erotic pressure, but he backed away, promising, but not delivering. Arousal burned inside her. “You’re teasing,” she said accusingly.
He nodded with a wicked glint in his eyes. “Sharing the control is what you called it.” He stood and, as if he were relishing the prospect, he said, “Your turn next.”
Andie scowled and threw a pillow at him.
Dr. Frankenstein just laughed.
* * *
Eli’s brother Ash paid an unexpected visit on Saturday, so Eli and Andie couldn’t manage more than a few private moments together. Although she missed him, she shrugged it off and looked forward to their date on Thursday night. Unfortunately, Eli had arrived at a strategic time-intensive phase in his research. He began pulling long hours at the lab, and she didn’t see him for several days. He sent her roses when he had to cancel the date on Thursday. He called her on the telephone and told her he missed her.
