When he’d decided to come to America, Luke had known Camry was somewhere around five feet three, but had hoped herweight had blossomed to four hundred pounds. And it wouldn’t have hurt, either, if she’d sprouted horns soon after the photo had been taken that he’d found of her on the Internet. Considering his track record with women, he’d have preferred that Dr. MacKeage be anything but gorgeous, because he hadn’t wanted even a hint of sexual tension to creep into their work.
So much for that pipe dream. Hell, if they both hadn’t been so beaten up that first morning, he wouldn’t be bored to tears right now because he would have spent the last four days making love to her.
Not that he hadn’t tried.
It had become somewhat of a game between them—or maybe challengewas a better word—where they flirted right up to the edge of fullblown passion, then withdrew into what Luke could only describe as salacious hell. He was so sexually frustrated, and so damned in lustwith Camry MacKeage, that the next time she kissed him he wasn’t going to care if the dogs watched, he intended to take her right here on the couch.
Hell, he’d nearly nailed her this morning, when he’d awakened to find herin hisbed. Looking him straight in the face with the same piercing green eyes as her father, she’d had the nerve to say she’d heard him whimpering in his sleep but had fallen asleep before she could return to her bed.
Fiona, apparently not the least bit impressionable, had breezed in, popped a pill in each of their mouths, and told them she was running out to buy groceries. Beginning to suspect the romantically inclined teenager was keeping them drugged so they would keep playing musical beds, Luke had started hiding his pill in his cheek, then slipping it behind the headboard the moment the girl turned her back.
If Camry had a mouse problem, they were certainly happy rodents now.
In an attempt to distract himself from his raging lust, Luke had tried focusing on Fiona instead, specifically on finding out her last name so he could locate her parents. But apparently teens today were much sharper than he had been, because when hehad run away from home, he hadn’t made it ten miles before his stepfather had found him. André had dragged Luke home, handed him a crosscut saw and ax, and made him cut, chop, and stack eight cords of firewood by hand while he contemplated the hell he had put his mother through.
Luke hadn’t run away from home again until age twenty-four.
He heard the bedroom door open and knew that Camry—likely armored in lilac-scented soap for another one of their salacious battles—was heading over to sit down beside him while Fiona took the dogs out for their morning walk. The winter solstice was only a week away, and Luke figured he had only one or two days left to talk Camry into going home before she claimed he was fully recovered and kicked him out on his sexually frustrated ass.
He sighed, scooting over to make room for her on the couch as he patted his pocket to make sure he’d remembered the condoms. It was time, he’d decided this morning while shaving, to launch a full frontal attack: first on Camry’s body—because he really, painfully wanted her—and then on her conscience.
“I’m heading out to walk the mutts,” Fiona said as she put on her jacket. “Is there anything either of you need before I go?”
“A beer would be nice,” Luke said, not caring if it was only ten in the morning, because he was so damned bored. Dave had brought him a six-pack, but Fiona had hidden it, claiming he couldn’t mix beer with the drugs she thought he was still taking.
“If you don’t take your afternoon pill, you can have one tonight with supper,” she promised, snapping leashes on the four tail-wagging dogs and heading outside.
“You seem to be getting around quite well,” Luke said when Camry swiped his bag of corn chips. “How’s the ankle feeling?”
“Ready to run a marathon,” she said, stuffing her mouth with chips.
“Are you going to waste time eating, or can we go straight to the necking part of this morning’s entertainment? They’ll only be gone an hour.”
She looked over at him, blinking her pretty green eyes, and Luke realized there had been an edge in his voice. He grinned. “Or we can skip the necking and just kick things up a notch. But I suggest we use your bed, because the spare really isn’t large enough for the two of us—as you found out this morning, when I gallantly saved you from falling out on your sexy little . . . behind.”
She blinked at him again.
Okay, so maybe directwasn’t the best approach after all. He threw his arm over the back of the couch behind her, drove his other hand into the bag of chips, and munched away while he waited for her to make the first move.
Assuming she made it in five minutes. He figured he needed at least forty-five minutes in the bedroom, and that gave him only ten minutes’ leeway in case Fiona walked fast today.
Camry attacked him in three.
The bag of junk food suddenly went flying and she scrambled onto his lap; before he’d even finishing swallowing, she cupped his face in her delicate hands and kissed him. Quickly recovering from the surprising assault, Luke wrapped his arms around her and let her have her wicked way with him, because . . .
Well, because just as soon as she got herself worked into a really good frenzy, he was hopefully going to use two of the three condoms in his pocket.
And once she was so exhausted she couldn’t speak, and hopefully too mellow to care, then he would casually mention who he actually was.
Then he’d tell her what he’d done to Podly.
And then he would very nicely ask her to help him find the little satellite so they could bring it back to her mother, and the three of them could lock themselves in Gù Brath’s lab until they had a viable propulsion system to present to the world.
Realizing he was about to pop the zipper on his jeans, and seeing how Camry had his shirt unbuttoned and was doing wickedly delightful things to his nipples with her tongue, Luke cupped her backside, stood up, and headed toward her bedroom.
She didn’t even notice the sudden change of venue, she was so busy working herself into a frenzy. And when he laid her on the bed, settled his sexually frustrated body beside her, and started undoing her blouse, she very kindly helped.
Surprised he even had the sense of mind to glance at the clock on the nightstand, Luke gave himself five minutes to get her naked.
Only she had him naked in two. And herself naked in one.
Luke began to wonder who was seducing whom.
“Beautiful,” he murmured, his mouth trailing down her throat on its way to her lovely breasts, and his hands . . . hell, he simply touched her everywhere, since every damn square inch of her turned him on.
Though he thought she had already worked herself into quite a frenzy, Luke discovered she was only getting started. Camry turned so suddenly wild and urgently aggressive, she reminded him of the blizzard that had all but immobilized him for two entire days with its intensity.
She didn’t waste time exploring any parts of his body that didn’t seem immensely interesting. Her hands went straight to his groin, and Luke pretty near bucked them off the bed when she wrapped her fingers around him.
Where in hell had she thrown his pants with the condoms?
Alarmed to see her head dipping in the same direction as her hands, and fearing four days of building frustration would be over in three seconds if he didn’t get her under control, Luke took hold of her shoulders and hauled her up beside him.
But then he had to pin her hands over her head and throw his leg over hers to keep herfrom bucking them off the bed.
“Slow down,” he rasped, trying to catch his breath.
She was also panting, as if she really had run a marathon, and Luke worried that if just getting naked left them both winded, full-blown sex might actually kill them.