He guided her out of the dining room and up the stairs with firm pressure. They stopped outside her door. Her mouth dried and her toes curled inside her shoes. She inhaled deeply, but the light-headed, surreal feeling remained. Anticipation made her hands shake as she fished her key from her pocket and slipped it into the lock. She shoved open the door and stepped forward.
Gage grabbed her elbow, halting her on the threshold. “Be sure.”
Those two simple words confirmed her decision. That he’d give her an opportunity to change her mind impressed her. Most guys who’d made it this far would push for more whether or not she had doubts. She only had one concern. “This is between you and me? No Trent?”
His unflinching, gold-flecked gaze held hers. “No Trent.”
She dampened her dry lips. “Then come in and make love with me, Gage.”
The hunger in his eyes entranced her. Unable to look away, she backed into her room and he followed, pausing only to lock the door behind him.
The high mattress bumped the back of her thighs. Pulse pounding, she waited for him to close the distance between them. When only inches separated them she lifted her arms and pushed his suit coat off his shoulders. She caught it as it fell and tossed it on her desk chair. Next, she tackled his tie, loosening the knot until she could pull the silk free and drop it on top of his jacket.
He let her undress him. But while he didn’t assist her, she knew he was far from passive. Leashed energy radiated from him. His fists bunched and released by his sides, and his dark eyes watched her, promising passionate payback with every button she freed on his shirt.
She resisted the urge to touch him for as long as possible. She lasted only five buttons before she gave in to the craving to trace the open V of tanned skin with her fingertips from collarbone to sternum to collarbone. His skin was warm, supple, addictive. His scent grew stronger, headier.
His respiratory rate quickened, mirroring hers. She yanked his shirttail free and quickly undid the remaining buttons then spread her hands over his chest, absorbing the warmth of his body and the feel of his heart hammering beneath her palm. She pushed the fabric out of the way, and his shirt fluttered to the floor. Splaying her palms on his chest, she caressed those gorgeous pecs, then his muscled shoulders, biceps and forearms.
The tightening pucker of his tiny n**ples fascinated her. She had to touch him, but the nubs teasing her palms didn’t satisfy her. She needed to taste him on her tongue. She leaned forward and licked him. His fingers speared through her hair, holding her close, and a groan rumbled from his chest, vibrating against her lips. The vibration traveled down her spine to her core.
His grip tightened momentarily then shifted to cradle her jaw and lift her head. He covered her mouth and devoured her with a barely restrained clash of teeth, lips and tongue. His arms looped around her back, yanking her flush against him. But it still wasn’t close enough. Lauren ached for more. Skin on skin. Legs entangled. His body filling the expanding void in hers.
She forced her hands between them and tackled his belt buckle. In a frantic clash of kisses, desperate gasps, fumbling rushing fingers and grazing knuckles she hurried to remove the remainder of his clothing. Her arms tangled with his as he worked on her garments. This I’ll-die-if-I-don’t-have-you-now urgency was totally new to her.
Her skirt slipped to the carpet. Blindly, she kicked it and her pumps aside. The hem of her blouse teased her bottom like the stroke of a fingertip. Her skin was so sensitive that every shift of her clothing seemed like a caress. She reached for the button at her collar, but Gage broke the kiss and brushed her hands aside. “Let me.”
He worked the buttons with more dexterity than she’d shown on his. When he finished, she shrugged her shoulders. For a fleeting moment as her shirt fluttered to the floor, she wished she was one of those girls who liked sexy, daring lingerie. But she’d been born with a practical streak. Her bra and bikini panties were relatively new, but still machine-washable, plain white satin without lace.
If Gage found her lingerie lacking, she couldn’t tell by the hungry way his eyes ate her up with first one blistering sweep from her neck to her toes then with a slower, lingering return exploration. Her n**ples tightened under his scrutiny. She couldn’t wait to have his hands on her. His mouth. The thought stole her breath.
She silently cursed the panty hose required by her uniform. As if he understood her frustration, Gage hooked his thumbs in the unsexy garment and peeled her nylons down her legs. She stepped out of them.
He removed his socks, shoes and pants, and stood before her with his erection straining the silky fabric of his navy boxers.
Eager to touch him she flexed her fingers, but instead, she took the safer option and reached for the hooks on her bra. Gage stepped forward and his chest slapped against hers. He caught her hands behind her back, stopping her short of her goal. The navel to nipple contact and his mild bondage sent a thrill shooting through her.
She undulated against him, trying to get free. “Gage, I want you.”
His nostrils flared on a swift inhalation. The line of hair bisecting his belly erotically tickled her stomach. “And I you.”
He bent his head. His lips landed beneath her jawbone and worked their way south in butterfly-light touchdowns, brief, shocking, exhilarating kisses down the cord of her neck and over her collarbone. She quit struggling, willing to take whatever route he wanted to pursue. His lips traveled down the slope of one breast and up the other. She arched her back, silently begging him to take her into his mouth, but he ignored her plea.
He transferred her wrists into one of his hands and snapped her bra open with the other, then dragged one finger forward beneath the elastic, teasing the sensitive underside of her br**sts. Her insides tightened as he lifted the cups, freeing her left nipple with a rasp of fabric across her overly responsive skin, then her right. The pad of his thumb grazed each tip, making her gasp. Her eyes closed and her head fell back as pleasure constricted her muscles. A warm gust of breath was her only warning before his hot mouth covered her.
She moaned and tried to free her hands to no avail. She wanted to touch him. His teeth gently gripped a tight tip, warning her to be still and then his tongue flicked her captive flesh sending an even more intense shock of arousal through her.
When he lifted his head she wanted to scream in disappointment, but then he released her and quickly stripped her bra down her arms. Self-consciousness slithered through her as he stared at her, breathing through parted lips. She worked out and her body wasn’t bad, but she wasn’t lush centerfold material.
She reached for him, her fingers digging into his thick shoulders and pulling him closer. He skimmed his palms up from her waist and cupped her in his hands, his thumbs drawing circles over her aching br**sts.
He bent to suckle her again, drawing deeply on one side while his fingers plucked and gently tweaked the other. Heat pooled low in her abdomen, and she squeezed her legs together, shifting restlessly as need pulsed within her with each draw of his mouth.
He straightened and shucked his boxers. Lauren’s breath stalled in her chest. She hadn’t been with many men, but none of them shared Gage’s bragging rights.
Momentarily shaken over the magnitude of the step she was about to take, she turned her back on him to gather her composure while she ripped the covers down the bed. He wound his arms around her waist. His hot body blanketed her back, and his erection scorched the base of her spine seconds before his hands set her br**sts ablaze.
His teeth and lips grazed her shoulder, the side of her neck, then tugged gently on her earlobe. He pushed her forward, bending her over the high mattress. The prostrate position startled her. She wasn’t used to letting herself be vulnerable. But before she could protest his short nails lightly scored her back, raking over her bottom and plowing a field of goose bumps in their wake.
He dragged her panties down her legs. After freeing them from her ankles, he made the return trip twice as slowly, pausing to tease the back of her thighs with his lips then trace and caress the curve of her bottom. By the time he reached her shoulders again he covered her like a stallion, but without entering her. He pulled away slowly, leaving another trail of kisses down her spine as his body heat eased off.
Confused by his retreat, she faced him in time to see him straightening from the pants he’d dropped on the floor with a condom in his hand.
Protection. She nearly groaned, but assured herself she would have remembered…eventually. She wasn’t careless. Ever.
She had an unopened box in her flight bag. She’d bought it last year after she’d broken up with Whit, with the intention of going out and proving with a series of other men that Whit hadn’t hurt her. But apparently anonymous sex just wasn’t her thing. She hadn’t been able to get past the fact that she had to like and respect a guy before sleeping with him. Until Gage, she hadn’t been tempted by any other man since Whit dumped her.
She took the condom from him and placed it on the mattress. She’d waited a long time to make love again, and she wasn’t going to rush it. First, she wanted to do a little exploring of her own. She lifted his hand and pulled one of Gage’s fingers into her mouth, swirling her tongue around the tip. His muscles jerked tight, cording and revealing his perfect physique. He swallowed hard. She moved to the next finger and then the next until he grasped her hand and stopped her.
She curled the fingers of her other hand around his thick erection. His sharply indrawn breath rent the air. He covered her hand with his and stroked his length once, twice, showing her how he liked to be touched. Hot, satiny skin covered a rock-hard arousal, and caressing him triggered a burst of hunger in her belly. She swept over the slick droplet on his tip with her thumb.
“You do like to play with fire.” His voice rumbled low and deep like an approaching Boeing 787. He released her, gripped her waist and lifted her onto the bed then positioned himself between her knees. The position put them eye to eye until he captured her hands, lifted them over her head and urged her back on the cool sheets with her legs hanging over the side.
The position left her open and vulnerable, a little uneasy and a lot turned on. He captured a nipple in his mouth and stroked downward from her fingertips to her hypersensitive armpits. His hands mapped her body while his tongue traced the terrain of one breast then the other. Gage’s ultralight touch swept her waist, then her belly and thighs, showering her with goose bumps and shivers.
Urgent need coalesced into a tight ball at her bikini line. She wound her legs around his h*ps and pulled him closer, but he didn’t fill her as she craved. He only rested his arousal against her, hot and hard and heavy.
His teasing fingertips dipped closer and closer to her center with each pass until she strained toward his hand. And then finally, finally, when she thought she’d die from frustration, his fingers slid into her curls. He found her slick opening and stroked her. The intense shock of pleasure made her body bow. She cried out. “That…feels…good.”
He zeroed in on exactly the right spot, circling again and again, drawing her deeper and deeper into a vortex where nothing else in the world mattered but the way he sucked, nipped and licked her br**sts and plied her body. Her legs shook with need as she had never felt before, then she was hurled through a wind tunnel of sensation that pulled her in too many different directions to process. All her neurons seemed to crackle and hiss then explode in a shower of sparks.