She was reacting to him. The simple truth was, she was dazzled by him. Everything about him was alien to her. She existed in a place of three piece suits, Ivy League degrees and polite conversation.
He was surely the opposite of everything she knew.
On top of that, they were in what could only be called an unusual situation.
They were isolated, as alone up here as they’d have been on the top of a mountain. No lights. No phone, except for a cell phone whose time on earth might be short. And there was no way of knowing how long their isolation would last.
Almost without thinking, he turned her hand over, lightly rubbed his thumb on the underside of her wrist.
Her pulse went crazy. Jesus. So did his.
He looked up, caught her eyes with his, watched as her pupils all but swallowed the pale blue irises.
The ache in his belly turned into a knot.
And, goddammit, what kind of an SOB was he? Did he need the comfort of a woman’s body so badly that he’d resort to becoming a predator stalking its prey?
Zach dropped Jaimie’s hand, shot to his feet, made a dumb speech about clearing the counter, stacking their dishes in the sink, putting a kettle of water on to boil so they could have coffee or tea.
He knew he’d surprised her, but she made a quick recovery.
“Let me do that,” she said.
He did.
He was brisk. Businesslike. He pointed to the cabinet where she’d find mugs. Tea bags. Cookies or crackers, whatever his housekeeper had bought because he never paid much attention to stuff like that. He liked a good meal as much as the next guy, but mostly food was fuel for the body.
“OK,” he said, in the no-nonsense tone of a dentist about to drill a tooth.
Then he turned from the sink and looked at Jaimie.
Big mistake.
She had set the counter. There was no other way to phrase it. She’d found place mats somewhere. Cloth napkins. She’d put one of the Mason jar candles, the most utilitarian of emergency items, on a small flowered plate he’d never have imagined anyone could find in a kitchen of his. A matching plate held…Oreos.
Yeah, well, his housekeeper had been with him for a while. She knew his tastes ran the gourmet gamut from Oreos to Twinkies and back again.
He stared at all of that. Then at Jaimie.
She looked hesitant.
And delectable.
She’d caught her bottom lip between her teeth and he wanted to replace her mouth with his, nibble on what would surely be sweet, tender flesh, absorb the taste of her lips…
“What’s all that for?” he growled, because growling was safer than what he was feeling.
Color swept into her face.
“I thought—you know, just to brighten things…” She swung away from him, snatched up the napkins and he cursed himself for being not just an unfeeling SOB but an idiot.
“You’re right,” he said, grabbing her wrist, tugging the bits of cloth from her fingers. “We need to brighten things.”
“No. It was foolish to—”
“It was smart. No,” he said quickly, when she shook her head, “really, it was. Morale’s important at a time like this. Keeping things cheerful. Focusing on the positive, not the negative…”
Crap.
He was babbling. Not just babbling. Psycho-babbling, the way some of the shrinks did during debriefings, but he had to say something to turn that lovely mouth up at the corners.
“Just think,” he heard himself say, “if you’d taken me up on my dinner offer, we’d be in some little restaurant right now. Nothing as nice as this. I mean, who’d want linen tablecloths? A waiter hovering over us? And candles. Skinny ones. What do you call them?”
“Tapers,” she said.
“Tapers. The word always makes me think of those animals in South America. The ones that look like guinea pigs on steroids.”
Good. That had won him a faint smile.
“And what would we have had for supper? Surely not Soupe des Légumes à la Maison.”
Yes. A definite smile.
“And then, dessert. Some glop a dude in a cheap tux would light up, tableside.”
She laughed, which was what he’d counted on, and he sent up silent pleas for forgiveness to every maître d’ who’d ever performed magic with Cherries Jubilee.
“Who’d want that when we have this? Heck, the only thing missing is music.”
“Mmm,” she said. “That would be nice.”
She had surprised him with that admission.
She could see it in his eyes.
Well, damn, she’d surprised herself.
An hour ago, she’d been trying to get away from Zacharias Castelianos.
What a mistake that would have been.
He wasn’t only drop-dead gorgeous, he was fun. He was charming. He was a man any woman would want. Well, except her. She was far too busy chasing her new career to get involved with anybody. Besides, he lived in New York. She lived in Washington.
And wasn’t thinking like that ridiculous?
Why did she always have to come up with logical reasons to explain things? She was, OK, she was attracted to him. And unless she’d forgotten everything she’d ever known about men and women, he was attracted to her.
For tonight.
This wasn’t about forever. It was about attraction. Pheromones.
For goodness’ sake, James, it’s about lust.
And if she were a different kind of woman, if she could give herself a good reason to let go and just enjoy whatever the night might offer…
“Such deep thoughts.”
His voice was low and rough. Jaimie blinked, looked up. He was inches away, smiling down at her as she sat at the counter, and what she saw in his eyes left her breathless.
“No,” she said quickly, “not deep. Just—just—I was wondering if there’s any news.”
The hell she was.
Her face was an open book. She’d been thinking the same thing he was thinking. He could see it in the sweep of color high on her cheeks, in the way she suddenly and, he’d bet, unknowingly swiped the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip.
Such a full, perfect, pink bottom lip.
God, he wanted to touch her.
Just once. Just lightly.
Zach let himself reach out and stroke an errant strand of gold behind her ear.
It wasn’t enough.
He wanted to kiss her.
He wanted to strip her naked, sweep everything from the counter, lay her across it and take her again and again until she was mindless with pleasure.
At least he didn’t have to worry about the knot in his balls anymore. It had been replaced by one hell of an erection.
He took a quick step back.
“News,” he said, in the manic tones of a desperate man. “Excellent idea. I forgot all about that wind-up radio.”
He swung away, all but marched to the butcher-block table where he’d stashed the box of emergency supplies. He stood with his back to her and concentrated on cold showers, ice storms, glaciers and whatever other hard-on killers he could think of until it was safe to pluck the radio from the box, carry it across the room, set it on the counter and crank the handle.
“Here we go,” he said brightly. “We won’t get much time out of it, so—”
“…huge software glitch that has affected the grid on virtually the entire East Coast. Authorities have isolated the problem but say they cannot offer an estimate of when they’ll solve it—”
Static. More static, and the crisp intonations of the announcer gave way to…
A piano. Soft, bluesy notes. And then a raw, emotion-filled voice.
“Springsteen,” Jaimie said.
Zach nodded. “It’s ‘Back in Your Arms Again.’”
“I know.” She hummed a little of it. “I love that song.”
He laughed. “It must be almost as old as you are.”
“Not even close,” she said, laughing along with him.
“But I admit, I grew up on this stuff. I have older brothers. One of them is a big Springsteen fan.”
She shut her eyes, hummed softly with the music, head back, shoulders gently swaying.
He watched her for a few seconds. Then he reached for her hand.
She looked at him.
“Dance with me,” he said softly.
Time, the very universe, narrowed down to this moment. He held his breath until, slowly, she rose to her feet and put her hand in his.
He drew her into his arms. She came to him willingly on a soft, sweet sigh. He drew her close, closer still until her could feel the beat of her heart merge with the beat of his.
He pressed his lips to her hair.
She wrapped her arms around his neck, put her head against his shoulder.
They moved slowly to the music. After a while, it faded. Died. Still, they swayed together as the candlelight painted their silhouettes on the walls.
An eternity went by. Then Zach put his hands into Jaimie’s hair and raised her face to his. He knew he would never forget the smoky blueness of her eyes.
“Jaimie,” he said his voice low and urgent.
“Zacharias,” she whispered back.
And then his mouth was on hers, her lips parted to the stroke of his tongue and, in a heartbeat, the night turned to magic.
CHAPTER SIX
He’d wanted to take her right here.
No time wasted.
Standing, her legs around his hips, him thrusting, thrusting, thrusting deep inside her until she came and then he would let go and find his own release.
He was hard, painfully hard, so ready for claiming her that seconds ago he’d felt as if he might explode.
Now, with Jaimie in his arms, her mouth sweet as honey against his, Zach knew that as much as he needed to be inside her, he wanted more.
Jaimie, in his bed, naked, all of her bared to his eyes, his hands, his mouth, her cloud of golden hair spread over his pillow, her breasts uptilted, the nipples pouting for the sweep of his tongue. He wanted to see her raise her arms to embrace him, wanted to part her thighs and see the feminine heart of her, stroke her with his fingers, taste the essence of her on his lips.
But, God, he ached, he ached…and she was moving against him, her pelvis against his, and if he got any bigger, any harder…
What he had not considered was her own impatience.
“Please,” she said, “Zacharias, please,” and he swept everything aside, bowls, silverware, placemats and napkins sliding away on the wide granite counter as he lifted her onto the edge of it, stripped away her sweats, stroked her, found her hot and wet and, God, ready for him, so ready…
“Jaimie,” he said, and he unzipped his jeans, clasped her hips and drove into her.
She screamed his name.
The sound of her voice penetrated the red haze of his desire and he held still, looked down into her face. Had he hurt her? No. No. Her eyes were blurred with want; her lips were parted. She was orgasming around him, the muscles of her vagina contracting around his engorged penis.
He fought against letting go. He didn’t want to come. Not yet. He wanted to go deeper within her silken walls, he wanted to fill her, make her come again and again.
“Look at me,” he said, his, voice a low, harsh growl. “Jaimie. Look at me.”
She blinked. Brought her eyes to his. His hands tightened on her and he drove into her again, again, again, until she was sobbing, reaching for him, and he lowered his head, took her mouth as he was taking her body,, and she arched her back, her body an elegant bow as she came and came and finally, as the world threatened to spin out of control, he groaned, pressed into her, and let go, let go, let go…
He collapsed against her or maybe she collapsed against him, both of them gasping for breath, both their hearts rocketing.
He’d been on missions where his heart had not beaten this hard and fast.
He swept his arms around her. Closed his eyes, buried his face in her hair, inhaled her fragrance. Her face was pressed against his throat; he could feel the warmth of her breath against his skin.
What was she thinking?
He’d been with women who liked sex done this way. Hard. Fast. Without any sense of time or place, but she hadn’t seemed the kind who would want something like that.
Should he apologize? Explain? Ask that time-honored question, Are you OK?
Jesus. How about a better question?
“Jaimie.” He cleared his throat. “I can’t believe that I—I didn’t use a condom.”
She made a little sound. Sort of as if she were clearing her throat.
“I’m on the pill.”
“Good. I mean…” He drew back, just an inch or two. Framed her face with his hands. “Hey,” he said softly.
Not brilliant, but it made her open her eyes and look at him. Ah, God, that look! Pleasure. Shock. How could it be both?
Maybe the moment was right for that time-honored question after all.
“Honey? You OK?”
She sucked in a breath. Swallowed. Color swept into her face.
“Yes.”
He nodded, as if she’d just solved all the mysteries of the universe.
“I wasn’t too quick? I mean, I—”
She put her fingers lightly over his mouth.
“You weren’t,” she said, and the color in her cheeks deepened.
“Good. Good. Because—”
She brushed her lips over his.
“Because,” she whispered, “that was—it was—”
He stopped the softly spoken words with a kiss. The glow in her eyes, the delicate feel of her mouth told him all a man could possibly want to know.
A tremor went through her.
“What?” he said.
“Nothing. It’s just—it’s cool in here.”
It was, a little, but he suspected there was more to it than that. Was she already regretting what they’d done? No way was he going to let that happen. He drew her closer and scooped her into his arms.
“I know exactly how to warm you up.”
“Zacharias.”
No one had called him that in decades. The fact was, nobody but his old man had ever used it, and then only in moments of a kind of biblical fury. Zach had long ago stopped responding to it. The few strangers who made the mistake of using it when addressing him never made the mistake twice.
“It’s Zach,” he’d say coldly. “Zach Castelianos.”
But it sounded different, coming from the woman he was carrying through the kitchen. It was like a code, one known only to him and to her.
“Zacharias?”
“Yes, honey.”
“Where are we going?”
They’d reached the long hall that led to the stairs. The darkness was absolute, especially now that they’d left the candlelight behind, but Zach knew these rooms as only a man who’d spent much of his life in dark places would.
He broke his stride just long enough to kiss her, to feel her lips part beneath his.
“To bed,” he said in a growl he barely recognized as his own, and she made a little hum of pleasure that almost brought him to his knees.
* * * *
The storm had ended.
There was no roar of thunder, no drumming beat of rain. The rooms they walked through—the steps they climbed—were sheathed in ebony darkness
Jaimie wondered why she’d feared darkness.
Darkness was wonderful. Exciting. It meant the heightening of all her other senses. Taste. Touch. Smell.
The salty tang of Zacharias’s throat against her mouth. The feel of his hard arms around her. The smell of him, hot and male and dangerous.
Her breath caught.
This was all dangerous.
Sex with a man who was little more than a stranger. She wasn’t into hookups or whatever you called meeting someone and falling into bed with him. Actually, sex at all could be dangerous. She was an intelligent woman, a woman of the twenty-first century.
Maybe the danger was part of the excitement.
Doing something she’d never done before, never imagined doing before..
Never wanted to do before.
There was no reason for him to know it. No reason for him to know he was the first man she’d been with in a very long time.
Now was all that mattered.
This man, carrying her through the night. Laying her down on his bed…and if her heart beat any faster, surely it would explode.
He drew back. She heard the rustle of fabric and then he was on the bed beside her, gathering her into his arms and, God, his shirt was gone.
Oh, the feel of him.
Warm skin. Hard muscles. She stroked his shoulders, his biceps, heard the hiss of his breath as she caressed him.
She put her hand between them, ran it down his chest, felt a whorl of silky hair, the tightly defined abs.
He was—he was glorious to touch. To experience. But it wasn’t enough.
“Wait.” The command was low. Sexy. His fingers closed around her wrists and he drew her arms down, slid them, one by one, from the sleeves of her T-shirt, her sweatshirt, eased the shirts over her head and she cried out at the feel of him against her, bared skin against bared skin, her nipples budding as he shifted his weight, brought her beneath him.
She was completely naked.
He was still wearing jeans.
The feel of the soft denim against her belly, her thighs, the feel of Zacharias, in her arms…
“Please,” she heard herself whisper.
“Please, what? Tell me what you want.”
She tossed her head from side to side. She was burning up. Her skin was hot. Tight. She needed—she needed—
“Tell me what you want,” he said roughly, and he kissed her. Long. Deep. Hot. “Tell me,” he demanded, and when she couldn’t, he clasped her hands and drew them high over her head. “Is it this?” he said, his mouth closing on first one nipple and then the other and she gasped as he drew the tender flesh deep into his mouth. “This?” he said, kissing his way down her belly, nipping lightly at her flesh, nuzzling her thighs apart. “This,” he whispered, burying his face against her, inhaling her scent, parting her labia with strokes of his tongue, and Jaimie screamed with rapture as the world came apart.
Jaimie: Fire and Ice Page 8
