"Kell!" she protested, writhing to escape, but he was incredibly strong, despite his half-healed wounds, and she couldn't wrest herself free. "You've got a cruel streak in you!"
"No," he murmured against her breast, licking her nippie through the wet fabric. "I only want to make you feel good. Don't you like this?"
There was no way she could deny it; he could easily read the signs of arousal in her body. "Yes," she admitted, panting. "But I want to touch you, too. Let me"
"Umm, not yet. You make me feel too much like a teenager, ready to go off like a Fourth of July rocket. I'm going to make it good for you this time."
"It was good before," she said, and moaned as his left hand trailed down to the juncture of her thighs, rubbing delicately. Rachel's breath caught, and her hips lifted blindly to his hand.
"I was too rough, too fast. I hurt you."
She couldn't deny it, but the discomfort hadn't been unexpected, and pleasure had swiftly followed. She started to tell him that, but the words were strangled in her throat. The gown had been pushed between her legs by his exploring hand, stretched tightly across her femininity. With one finger he probed the soft cleft, found and stroked her most sensitive flesh. Rachel's body jolted with pleasure, and a low whimper came from her throat.
His touch was firm but tender, with just the right amount of pressure. Slowly her head rolled back and forth on the pillow between the frame of her arms, and her back arched. If he had tantalized her before, this was torture, the sweetest torture imaginable. Hot coils wound inside her, heat spreading throughout her body until she was flushed and damp. Her breasts were so tight that they ached. Kell knew exactly when she couldn't stand it any longer and bent to suck strongly at her nubbed flesh, wringing another soft, wild sound from her throat.
Then his hand was on her bare thigh, under the nightgown, and the relief of feeling skin on skin was so intense that she jerked again.
"Easy," he breathed, and she held herself as still as she could while his warm, hard hand slowly moved upward, stroking her thigh. Her legs were parted already, in aching need, and she strained toward him.
His palm barely brushed her, then moved to her other thigh and stroked until she thought she would go mad. "You just wait!" she both threatened and promised, hissing the words through her tightly clenched teeth.
He laughed aloud, a low, rough sound of masculine triumph. Dimly she realized that it was the first time she'd heard him laugh. "I'm looking forward to it," he said, his voice strained. He was hot and damp, too, his eyes glittering with barely controlled passion, his face taut, with hectic color on his cheekbones and his lips. "Are you ready, love? Let me see." He touched her, and then the light, teasing touches ceased completely. He parted her soft flesh and slid two long fingers into her. Rachel gave a thin, high cry, her hips heaving as she trembled on the verge of ecstasy.
"Not yet," he breathed. "Not yet. Hold on, honey. I'm not going to let you go just yet. Not until I'm inside you."
His low, rough words washed over her shaking, twisting body. Crying a little, tormented by those long, probing fingers as he brought her to moist readiness, she tried again to free her hands, and this time he let them go.
"Now," he crooned, pulling the nightgown up. Rachel lifted herself up to aid in the removal of the frustrating garment, pulling it over her head herself and throwing it across the room. Kell's face tightened even more as he stared down at her naked body, at her flushed, glowing skin. Briefly his eyes closed, and he ground his teeth together as a heavy surge in his loins threatened his self-control.
Carefully he rolled to his back, favoring his shoulder, and guided her astride him. "Slow and easy," he muttered, his eyes glittering like black fire as he positioned himself for her. "Let's go easy, a little at a time."
"I love you," Rachel whispered achingly, closing her eyes at the probing of his flesh against her. She braced her hands on his chest, her fingers flexing in the mat of curly hair, and slid onto him. He made a guttural sound and arched beneath her, his hands clenching on the sheet. "I love you," she said again, and another low animal sound came from him as his control shattered and he grabbed for her hips, grinding her in a rotating motion against him.
"Rachel," he groaned, shaking. His body was taut and straining beneath her.
She moved on him, rising, sliding, falling. Now it was her turn, and she did a primeval dance of passion, slowing whenever it seemed that her motions would take either of them past the point of no return. She was no longer so painfully empty; she was filled with him, an intense satisfaction in itself. Time became elastic, expanded, then disappeared altogether. She forgot everything but Kell, and she gave herself to him in a way she'd never known would be possible. He had become irrevocably hers when she pulled him from the surf, and she was irrevocably his, perhaps by the same power. For as long as she lived, she would be his.
She was crying again, but this time she was oblivious to the tears raining down her face. "I love you," she choked, then abruptly she crested, surging against him while her soft inner quivering made the world explode, then fade away and there were only the two of them, straining together, until he cried out hoarsely and heaved beneath her. Later, as she slept in his arms, he lay awake staring into the night, and though his face was as blank as usual, there was a look of desperation in his eyes.
"Let's drive into town," he said the next morning after breakfast.
She drew a deep breath, her hands stilling for a moment before she resumed washing the last plate. She handed it to him to dry, feeling the dread rising in her chest to choke her. "Why?"