His chest grew so tight that speaking proved impossible, so he only nodded.
Then Gaby grabbed his crotch.
That got his air moving in a strangling inhalation. His arms fell to his sides, his stomach knotted.
She put her mouth to his throat. “No games, Luther. No lectures or long inquisition. I need you. I need everything you promised.” She bit him, but then soothed the sting of her sharp teeth with the damp stroke of her tongue. “In all my twenty-one years, you’re the only person who’s ever made me forget the ugliness.”
Leaning back, she demanded from him with glittering blue eyes, her features already shifting in that anomalous and hotly appealing way of hers.
“Help me forget, Luther. Right now.”
A thousand thoughts rushed through his mind; with Gaby’s propensity for finding the goriest of evil, anything might have occurred. He needed to know details; he needed to talk with her.
But that thought was obliterated by the anxious way her slender fingers cuddled his length through the denim of his jeans. When her breath hitched he was so lost that he didn’t know if he’d ever find his way back.
Scooping one arm beneath her small derriere, Luther lifted her up and against him. Their mouths met, hungry, demanding, frenzied with pent-up need.
He moved them both into the house and kicked the door shut, then shoved Gaby against it to kiss her harder, deeper. Her long legs wrapped around his waist and she sank her fingertips into his shoulders.
Keeping his mouth on hers, he used one hand to shove her shirt up, to get to her small, firm breasts. She freed her mouth with a harsh groan.
Arching into him, she said, “Let’s get naked.”
Oh God, the things she did to him.
Luther fought for control. He wanted to make love to her gently, to show her how much she mattered to him, to show her all the pleasure to be had between them.
But she bit his chin, his jaw. “Naked, Luther. Now. Don’t make me fight with you.”
A reluctant smile worked through the lust. Yeah, Gaby would probably wrestle him to the ground if she didn’t get her way. “No problem.”
He loosened her left leg from around his hip and helped her to stand. Before she’d even gotten both feet on the ground, he pulled her shirt up to expose her naked breasts while she unfastened that damned sheath and let her knife drop to the floor with a clatter.
Using his foot, Luther kicked it to the side. Keeping his gaze glued to her now-taut nipples, he went to work on the snap at her waistband.
But Gaby was just as busy undressing him, and before he could do more than shove her jeans down her hips, she had his cock in her hands. Staring down at him, she licked her lips and groaned.
He lost whatever semblance of a rational, reasonable man he’d ever possessed. It had been too long, and there’d been far too much between them for him to hold back any longer.
Again locking her against the door, Luther put a foot to the bunched material of her jeans and stepped down, shoving them to her ankles. He used his knee to open her thighs as far apart as possible. It wasn’t much, given that she was practically hobbled, but he’d make do.
Gaby grabbed his ass and pulled him closer, saying in a low, thrumming growl, over and over again, “Yes.”
Raging need had such a stranglehold on Luther, he couldn’t see straight. Blind lust drove him as he cupped one hand under her bottom to lift her enough to align their bodies. With his other hand he guided himself to her, and found her hot, slippery wet, so damn ready.
“I’m sorry, babe.” Grasping her hips with both hands, he drove forward with a hard thrust that buried him completely and lifted her toes from the floor.
Going stiff, Gaby sucked in a sharp, startled breath that froze Luther—until she let the breath out in shuddering, purring pleasure. Against the restriction of her jeans, she brought her knees up to clasp around his hips and wrapped her arms around his neck.
Sinuous and sexy, she squirmed, trying to get more of him.
Her heavy-lidded gaze met his. Her eyes were smoky, intense, the shape more defined with her arousal.
Slowly, she stared down at his mouth and demanded, “Again.”
Luther gave up. He took her mouth even as he pulled out, only to hammer back into her again. Like a cat, she curled closer, hugging herself all around him.
Knowing he battered her but accepting that she loved it, that she was every bit as turned-on as he was, he found a hard, thrusting rhythm that soon had them both on the brink.
How could he have thought, even for a second, that Gaby would be any other way?
She went through life full-force, without constraint or modesty. She didn’t know half measures, had no grasp of social propriety.
For most of her life she’d been without friends, without understanding, without a single caring touch.
Luther vowed to show her the individual satisfaction of tenderness, and lovemaking.
Later.
For now, Gaby demanded a hard fuck, and that worked just fine for him.
“Hold on to me,” he told her through clenched teeth. He wanted to touch her breasts, and more. He wanted to learn every inch of her.
“Yeah, okay,” she agreed around panting breaths. She pressed her head back against the door and pushed her hips forward, matching his rhythm the best she could in their awkward positioning.
When Luther felt the near-painful grip that secured her hold on him, he took one hand from her backside and, using only his fingertips, teased over her stiffened nipples.
Her lips parted on a fractured moan.
Luther saw her through a haze of carnality and . . . much, much more. “You are so incredibly sexy, Gabrielle Cody.”
Maybe because, even now, she couldn’t accept a compliment, Gaby kissed him hard again, making it impossible for him to talk to her.
Luther didn’t mind.
He had the snug clasp of her body on his cock, her mouth sucking at his tongue, and her hands holding him like she’d never let him go. No other man had touched her like this.
No other man ever would.
And that thought pushed him so close to the edge that he was grateful when he felt Gaby’s climax erupting.
Tangling her fingers in his hair, arching her back, she moaned low and long. He bent his head and caught a nipple in his teeth—and she came.
Her reaction was so strong, she damn near toppled them both. Luther flattened one hand on the door behind her head and braced his legs apart to support them both. While his own release boiled up he watched her face, saw all the small nuances as her features shifted, sharpened, and finally softened again.
There was no other woman like Gaby.
And there’d be no other woman for him.
Secure in Luther’s embrace, Gaby rested her head on his sweaty shoulder and tried to assimilate everything that had just occurred. He was still a part of her, still inside her, but not so much now.
She felt the trembling in Luther’s arms, his legs, but she didn’t care.
He wouldn’t falter. Not Luther.
Not ever.
A tsunami of overwhelming euphoria had swept away all remnants of her arrant anxiety. The monstrous depravity of the world remained, but now, somehow, it didn’t cut so deeply into her peace of mind.
Opening her eyes just enough to see Luther’s jaw, Gaby whispered in extreme understatement, “Not bad, cop.”
He turned his head a little and pressed the most tender of kisses to her temple.
Just that, nothing more, but it nearly flattened Gaby.
Because she rested on him like a needy woman. Because she liked it so much.
Because she . . . loved it.
Her heart ached with tremendous trepidation. She wanted Luther to always kiss her like that, with so much unspoken meaning. Never before had she loved anything or anyone.
But that kiss . . .
It amped the euphoria right back up there. Not physically, but emotionally. Phenomenal bliss filled her near to bursting.