LITMIR.BIZ

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“This. Us. Standing here wondering what to do next.”

      A muscle jumped in his jaw.

      “How about we go into the bedroom? At least that’s a first step.” When he didn’t answer, she turned and started to walk in that direction.

      “Angie.”

      She whipped back around, caught him watching her in a way that made her heart thunder like a bronco let loose on the northern plains. Heat and fear; fear and heat.

      “Don’t expect too much,” he said stiffly.

      “I never do.”

      That was a straight-out lie. Seven years she’d been waiting, wondering, ever since her coming-of-age party. Tonight she had expectations, and Tomas had no one to blame but himself.

      He’d asked about her nerves. He’d insisted on the truth. No bull, he’d said, and wasn’t that a load of it!

      Disgusted in himself, he dragged a hand through his hair. She even remembered the damn dress, when all he remembered about that night was meeting Brooke. The only woman he’d ever loved; the only woman he would ever love. The only woman he’d ever taken to bed.

      How the hell was he going to do this? How was he going to walk through that door and take off his clothes and lay down with another woman? What in blue blazes had made him think that doing it with Angie would be easier than with a nameless, faceless stranger?

      And if he wanted honest, no-bull truth between them, why hadn’t he told her about his lack of sexual experience?

      Jaw set, he fought to contain the icy spread of fear through his tense body. Struggled to take the first steps toward the bedroom door, left open like an invitation to sin.

      Only sex, he reminded himself. Sex with a lush, sensual woman who kissed like she loved everything about the whole man-woman intimacy thing. He imagined she wouldn’t be too shy to use that mouth in all manner of ways. He imagined she wouldn’t be afraid to take the initiative once he walked through that door. Maybe he should just take her advice: Lie back, close your eyes and think of Kameruka.

      How hard could that be?

      About as hard as the pounding of his pulse, he thought ruefully. And like a nagging toothache it would only get worse the longer he stood here thinking about it. Better to suck up the fear and dread of the dentist’s chair and march right in there and get it over with.

      If he didn’t think about the intimacy, if he just concentrated on the mechanics of undoing buttons and stripping off clothes, if he focused on the part of him that cried out for a woman’s slick warmth in the dead of night, the part of him that was sick of his hand providing its only satisfaction, then he could do this.

       As long as she didn’t expect too much.

      On the threshold he paused, eyes fixed on the king-size bed that half-filled the room, covers turned back to reveal an expanse of pure white sheets. Twin bedside lamps cast a pale glow that did nothing to warm the starkness of that bed or to prevent the breakout of sweat, cold and sudden on his skin.

      And Angie? His gaze swept beyond the bed and found her standing in front of the dresser, stalled in the act of brushing her hair. Their eyes locked in the mirror, as she slowly lowered her arms and put down the brush. The soft clunk sounded preternaturally loud in the stillness and he realized that her music had stopped. That the silence was so intense he could hear the thick thud of his heartbeat. Too loud, too hard.

      “Damn moisture,” she said, turning to face him. “Once it gets a sniff of steam, I can’t do a thing to contain it.”

      Her hair. She meant her hair. But stupidly it took him a moment to get past the reference to moisture and steam and containing it.

      “I like your hair like that.” His voice sounded gruff and rusty, his compliment about as stiff as his body. “The other way, this afternoon, it was too…sleek.”

      “Really?” She paused in smoothing the thick mass be-

      hind her ears—a pointless task since the curls sprang free as soon as her hand dropped away. “You don’t think sleek is a good look?”

      “Hell, no.”

      “You prefer the wild look then?”

      “On you,” he said simply and her lips tilted at the corners in the tiniest hint of a smile. That probably would have relaxed him a notch, that connection, if her gaze hadn’t drifted off to the bed—that endless stretch of cold, clinical white—before slowly returning to meet his.

      “I intended taking off the robe and being all laid out on the bed waiting,” she said softly. “But I couldn’t do it.”

      “You could have left the robe on.”

      “I could have, if being naked was a problem.” Three slow steps, three thick pulses of blood in his lower body, and she stopped in front of him. “Being naked alone was.”

      “You want me to get undressed?”

      Dark and luminous eyes lifted from his chest to his eyes. She moistened her lips. “Do you mind if I do it?”

       Not if you do it real quick.

      That answer lodged in his throat when her silky female knuckles grazed his abdomen. When he sucked in hard, she got a firmer grip on his shirt and pulled it free of his trousers. Before he could think holymotherofmercy she’d unthreaded every button and pushed the sides of his shirt apart.

      Maybe it was his vision, his thoughts, his whole body that trembled…or maybe it was her hands as they slowly traversed his bare chest, grazing his nipples, fingering the thick growth of hair, tracing the line of his collarbone. With growing confidence, her palms slid over his shoulders and down his biceps in a long, slow caress that peeled his shirt away until it dropped to the floor at their feet.

      “Undo my robe,” she whispered, so close that her breath sloughed over his skin and seeped into his blood. He watched her lean forward and kiss his chest. Watched her eyelids flutter shut and that sight—soft and engrossed and sensual—brought on a surge of lust so intense his knees all but buckled.

      He needed something to hold on to, to ground him against the dizzying roar of heat, and he found her robe, her sash, and a simple knot that came apart in his hands. She made a husky sound of approval as the thick toweling fell open. He made a rough sound of unscripted awe as her breasts came into view.

      Full, luscious female things of beauty, with wide tawny aureoles and tips that seemed to tighten and darken as he watched—and, hell, he couldn’t stop watching until he feared his mouth was watering, until he had to swallow to stop from drowning. Behind his fly, his body pulsed with an ache to reach for her, to drop to his knees and draw those distended nipples into his mouth, to take her down onto the bed and bury himself without preliminary.

      Except he’d be lucky to last a minute and he owed Angie better than that. Only sex, he told himself, didn’t mean it had to be bad sex.

      The hands that itched to shape her body lifted instead to cup her face and he leaned down to take her lips, closing his eyes to shut out the lush appeal of her body. Their thighs brushed and her nipples grazed his chest as she came up onto her toes to meet his kiss. Restless, impatient, her hands shimmied over his ribs and sides before settling against his back and drawing their bodies into perfect alignment.

      Heat billowed, a furnace of desire in his chest and his thighs and everywhere in between. Especially in between. In a slow, deep sweep his tongue stroked over hers and retreated. Her complaint was a rough sound that vibrated low in her throat and her hands tightened their grip on his back, forcing him to take notice, driving him past the edge of his control.

      He kissed her harder, tasting her lips, drawing on her tongue, forcing himself to ease off when he wanted to devour. Only sex, he told himself, only lust, and that was okay. It had been so long, too long, since he’d indulged his male nature. It was understandable

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