It wasn’t easy, but an instinct she’d thought had been burned out of her wanted to do precisely that. To give over and give in. She dropped her arm back to her side and took him at his word.
His hand drifted to her hip. Her breath hitched. On the way back up, he barely skimmed the apex of her thighs through her jeans, and a sound passed her lips.
Two minutes ago, she’d been so nervous about him coming anywhere near her, and now she was losing her mind, all but whimpering at a teasing glance across her sex.
Murmuring words she couldn’t hear against her neck, he skated his hands up and down her body, flirting with but never quite making contact with the places that were slowly starting to strain for it. When another, breathier sound of desire escaped her, he groaned, pressing himself tighter against her spine. Letting the line of him sear its way into her, until she was liquid, yearning for his touch.
He didn’t have to ask a question. She closed her eyes and answered it. “Yes.”
“Good girl.”
It should have been cold water on her flame, but somehow it was anything but. She wanted that praise again, wanted that soft, gravelly voice telling her she was exactly what he wanted her to be.
Sucking the lobe of her ear between his lips, he rubbed the hem of her shirt between his fingertips, transcribing what he was going to do and giving her room to tell him no. Her breath went shallow as he rucked the fabric upward, skimming warm fingertips over her abdomen. He didn’t push it all the way up, though. Pausing with her breasts still covered, he ran the corners of his knuckles around the outer curve.
“Can I?”
She nodded minutely, arching forward and holding her breath.
He didn’t grab or squeeze at her as he finally let his hand traverse the center of her chest. She exhaled shakily with the relief of his gentle touch, pleasure simmering with the graze of his thumb across her nipple, the pressure of a broad palm encompassing the full swell of her breast.
He nudged at the hem of her top again, and she lifted her arms. He stripped her out of it and let the material fall to the floor before molding himself to her spine again, running his hands more freely over bare skin. Electricity seemed to trail behind every touch, winding her up higher and higher until he dipped into the cup of her bra, brushing the hard, naked nub at her peak, sending crisp and white sparks branching. Panting, she turned her face into his neck, and he held her, even as he was cupping her more firmly, sliding his hand in deeper beneath the satin.
“No one ever took their time with you, did they? Never got you screaming for it before they tried to get theirs, huh?”
She’d thought she’d gone slow before, but it had never been like this. She wanted to twist all the way around inside his grasp. Open her legs and wrap them tight around his hips. She felt so empty and hot and soaking with how much she wanted this.
“Gonna take my time with you,” he promised, gravelly against her cheek. “Gonna take you apart all night, until you’re shaking.”
“Please.”
Her little begging gasp echoed in the room so loudly. Before she could even muster up the presence of mind to be ashamed of it, he was picking her up. Her eyes flew open, a scream forming in her throat as she scrabbled to keep from falling, but then her spine hit the soft surface of the mattress. She looked up, and he hovered over her, on his knees between her spread legs, staring at her like she was something to eat.
No. Like she was something to treasure.
Her breathing sounded deafening to her own ears as he stared down at her, blue eyes pinning her, the sharp point of his jaw and the lines of his cheekbones glowing gold. Without looking away, he undid the buttons of his shirt and shrugged it off his shoulders, then reached over his head to grab the neckline of his undershirt. His face was obscured for a moment as he tugged it off, and she took the chance to glance downward.
A fine trail of dark hair led into the waistband of his jeans, and above that was the smooth plane of his abdomen, lightly defined musculature glinting in the lamplight. His chest was just as sculpted, widening out into the broad cut of his shoulders before drawing the eye inward to the dip of his collarbones and the hollow of his throat.
And there, dangling from his neck, a plain silver chain.
She didn’t have a chance to see what was hanging from it as he dropped the ball of cotton to the side. Leaning over her, he grinned, clearly having caught her ogling, but the smirk receded into an expression that was quieter and more intense. Her chest heaved as he perched on his haunches over her, the muscles in his biceps flexing as he laid his palms on her knees. Slowly, looking up at her through thick lashes, he dipped his head. Placed one kiss and then another on the inside of her thigh, trailing upward, and she could hardly breathe. She clenched her hands as his nose nudged the crease of her hip through her jeans.
Oh God, he’d said he wanted to taste her, but would he? Like this?
He lifted up a fraction of an inch to look at her squarely, and her heart was beating overtime, all her nerves firing off at once, every inch of her body concentrated on the space between her legs. He hadn’t even really touched her yet, and already she was gasping for breath.
Her whole chest felt like it was caving in when he lowered his head again, and Christ, God, he pressed his lips right to the center of her jeans, right over her clit. She could feel the warm rush of his breath even through the fabric, the weight of that touch pushing her to the point where she thought she would explode just from this.
Light-headed, her belly and her sex alive with heat, she arched her spine. She’d never had a man make her come before, but the feeling was already gathering, an ache that bloomed and spread, familiar and foreign all at the same time.
He pressed a little harder, sending a wave of heat through her, and she tightened her muscles, unable to believe this was really happening. But then he lifted his mouth to look up at her, and he was smirking. All at once, the tension that had been building within her dropped away, and she clenched, restless around nothing. As she groaned in frustration, soft lips pressed to her abdomen, then an inch above her navel, then higher and higher. He kissed the tops of both breasts, dragging his torso through the valley of her legs.
“So,” he said, hovering above her, face to face. He held himself up with both hands planted beside her head, his knees between her calves, hips a firm presence against her pelvis, warm and vital and there if not yet grinding in. He kissed the corner of her mouth and then the other, sliding the tip of his nose against her cheek. “Is that a yes to letting me taste you?”
And she couldn’t stop herself. She laughed, sliding her hands into his hair and letting the thick strands twist between her fingers. He’d gotten her so close. She’d probably say yes to anything. “It’s definitely not a no.”
“I can work with that.”
Shaking her head, she tugged more insistently at his scalp, drawing him up her body. Half-naked like this, he was all warm skin and the scent of amber and lust. He lowered onto her, fitting hips to hips, and oh, there was that pressure again, right where she wanted it. Letting out a noise of pleasure of his own, he thrust against the cradle of her thighs, and she felt like she was melting as their lips met. The kissing and the weight of him overwhelmed her, making the air too thick and her lungs tight.
He dragged his lips along her jaw to her ear. “Do you think you’re wet for me?”
She wasn’t sure she’d ever been slicker. But the words, so easy for him, wouldn’t come to her mouth. With a sound that was half whine and half hum, she put her hands on his back, running them over hot, smooth flesh, then lower, to the waistband of his jeans, trying to urge him on.
It was encouragement enough. He kissed the shell of her ear before sucking at it. “Bet you’ll be so sweet.” Encompassing her hip with his palm, he ground into her harder. “Think you’re ready for me to find out?”