Caught Up in the Touch (22 page)

That hand. Her knee became the focus of her being. The calluses on his fingers rasped erotically against her skin. His hand would leave to change gears and return, the time between touches tortuous.

His thumb slipped to the underside of her knee and caressed the sensitive skin. The pleasure from the simple touch filtered through her body. Her legs parted a few more inches and her skirt rode up to mid-thigh.

She turned toward him, pressing into the hard muscle of his arm and her face into the crook of his neck. He smelled of lemons and clean laundry with the faint tang of a masculine body spray. She nuzzled the sensitive skin behind his ear, his hair tickling her nose. His hand jerked on her knee.

The truck made a sharp right turn, peeling her a few inches off his side. They were on the track to his house. Pulling close to the front steps, he threw the car in park before he came to a full stop, the transmission emitting a screeching protest. He turned the truck off and pulled her out from the driver’s side.

The dark wildness of the night fed her arousal. As if it was a dance they’d performed many times, she wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his hips as he scooped his hands under her butt.

The pelting sheets of rain had morphed into a soft, steady fall. She tilted her head back, water droplets coasting down her face like tears. The bottom of her skirt was up nearly to her waist, her satin panties settling directly over his erection. Nothing short of a nuclear explosion was prying her arms from around his shoulders and neck.

They ducked under a cover, something hard supporting her back, and she slit her eyes open enough to register that he had pressed her against one of the square columns at the top of the porch. Her head fell back. He kissed and sucked and nipped at her throat. His hips shifted away, and her legs dropped, but her skirt stayed bunched around her waist.

The loss was almost a physical pain. If she didn’t get him inside of her in the next thirty seconds, she might die. Never had she felt so desperate and needy. Never had her body ached to be filled like this. Never had she deviated from her routine of a darkened room and clean sheets.

The rain and wind played music in the trees. A hawk cried overhead, adding a harmonious note. Maybe later she would be mortified or shocked. Maybe she would hide under a pillow and wonder at her outrageous behavior. Maybe she would worry about what he thought of her.

But right now, she didn’t care. Turning, she leaned over the rail and pulled her panties to the side. For a stuttered heartbeat, nothing happened. But before her doubts and insecurities could surface, he grabbed her hips, canted her pelvis down, and slid his finger through her wet folds.

The back of his thighs met hers, his erection pushing between her legs and into her hand. She squeezed the wet end before pressing him against her and working her hips. She was so close to an orgasm.

He thrust into her hand and groaned. “I don’t have a condom on me.”

“I don’t care.” The reckless words keened out of her mouth. She twisted her hips, rubbing along the hard length of him again. A hint of logic inserted herself. “The Pill. I’m on the Pill. I won’t get pregnant. Please, will you just—”

Logan removed her hand from between her legs and set it on the rail, covering it with his own. He was curled over her, his mouth close to her ear. “Thought you were wild, Jessie. Tell me what you want.”

The words were there but stuck behind the lessons of what was genteel.

“Come on, baby,” he urged, rotating his hips.

She didn’t want to be genteel, she wanted Logan. She turned her face to find his jaw and whispered, “Fuck me”—she hesitated, then added—“please.”

His arms tightened around her, and his chest vibrated with soft laughter. “I’ve never met anyone like you.”

He pulled her panties to the side, bent his knees, and pushed inside of her inch by slow inch. He was thick and stretched her, filled her. Her body quivered, and she dropped her forehead to her hands, gripping the rail. The motion shifted her hips up, offering him another inch.

Her orgasm hit like the sudden thunderstorm. It circled through her body without his moving, without touching herself, just from the feel of him inside of her, bare and hot. Sometime during the chaos of her bucking hips and writhes, he started taking short stabs. She moaned and touched herself, setting off either another orgasm or intense aftershocks. She said things in a hoarse voice, things that bypassed the filter in her brain, things about how good he felt inside of her, how sexy he was, how she’d dreamed of this.

She had no idea how long it went on. The combination of darkness and rain shrouded them from the real world and linear time. While she was lost in a haze of physical contentment, he thrust harder. His fingers bit into her shoulders, forcing her body to bow up and pushing her hips against the rail. He grunted and pulsed inside of her. She’d never felt a man’s orgasm.

Of course, she’d never had sex without a condom before either. Oh. My. God. Not only that, but she’d never had sex outside or without even taking her panties off. And she begged him to … she couldn’t go there again, not even in her head. At least she’d asked him politely. Her mother would be so pleased.

A giggle, half-hysterical, half-disbelieving popped out. He slid out of her. She readjusted her panties, yanked the hem of her skirt down, and rebuttoned her shirt, her fingers shaking. When she stood up straight, his sperm soaked through the thin satin of her panties, the clammy mess stamping out any lingering aftershocks of pleasure.

Cold fingers of panic trailed up her back and tightened around her throat. She couldn’t even do a walk of shame to her car. The only option was to ask for a ride. There was no easy escape.

Her ankles turned weak in her heels, and she wasn’t sure she would even make it down the porch stairs to his truck without help. She clutched the rail, a splinter cutting into her palm. The rain turned misty, punctuated by an occasional shot of lightning and diminishing thunder. The storm was over.

His zipper closed, the sound unnaturally loud. He circled his arms around her, binding her arms to her sides in a tight, bear hug. He kissed the curve of her neck where it met her collarbone. “That was so hot I’m surprised the house isn’t a smoldering pile of rubble.”

He let her go, and she swayed on her feet before finding her balance and sidestepping to the porch steps. He weaved their fingers together and pulled her in the opposite direction than her momentum carried her. She stumbled into his arm, the hard muscle of his biceps pressing between her breasts. The coward in her told her to keep her gaze at their feet, but pride forced her head up.

“I’ll need a ride,” she said.

His smile held questions, as did the sparking gold in his brown eyes. “Sure thing. I’ll drive you back to town. Later.”

“L-later?” The questioning hesitancy in her voice never happened either. Except around him.

“I told you I was taking you to bed, and I keep my promises. Although taking you from behind in those sexy heels fulfilled a particularly naughty fantasy of mine.” He pulled her inside to a small foyer. Mail was stacked on a small side table, and he dug his truck keys out of his pocket and dropped them in a green-tinted glass bowl.

Her mind whirled on the possible implications. Were they actually going to have sex again? His unbuckled belt jangled on his quick step up the stairs. He didn’t loosen his grip on her hand, and she allowed him to guide her through a narrow hallway. He backed into the last room, grabbing up her other hand and pulling her forward.

A dark-stained four-poster king bed dominated the room. The bedding was an unembellished dark blue as were the drapes. The only light came from the hallway.

He circled his hand around her neck, his thumb caressing her cheekbone. His gaze stripped away any protection she’d managed to cobble together in the five minutes since he’d been inside of her, the caress of his eyes more intimate than the sex.

She dropped her eyes to a button on his shirt, blocking out his intense inspection. “I need to clean up.”

“Bathroom’s back out in the hall to the left.” She heard his hesitation, as if he planned to say something else.

Her butt-bone hit the old-fashioned glass doorknob on her shuffling retreat. She whirled away and locked herself inside the bathroom. Bracing her hands on either side of the porcelain sink, she met the eyes of the woman in the mirror, barely recognizing herself.

Her hair was mussed, her cheeks flushed, her lips swollen. Red splotches on her neck brought back a weakening wave of memory—his teeth nipping and his beard stubble scraping her delicate skin.

Her shirt was askew where she’d rebuttoned it incorrectly, making her look even more disheveled and shameless. She fixed the alignment and then pulled her skirt up, her panties down, and plopped on the toilet to do her business. Covering her face with both hands, she leaned over and rested against her knees. Should she insist he take her home? Or should she see how this played out? What did she want? What did
he
want?

She kicked her shoes off and rubbed her feet in the blue fuzzy mat. Her panties fell to her ankles, and she slipped her feet free. After stuffing the damp cloth into the toe of her shoe, she flushed the toilet and smoothed her clothes down, hyperaware of her pantyless state. With every step, the stirred air caressed her and made her imagine Logan’s hand on her inner thigh.

She approached the cracked door on tiptoes. Pushing it open, she poked her head around the doorjamb. The drapes had been pulled open. The night sky had cleared and a shaft of moonlight illuminated Logan as if some Hollywood director had staged the scene.

He was propped against pillows on the bed, bare feet crossed at the ankles. His jeans were still on, his zipper halfway down, his boxer briefs standing out like a red flag to a bull. His shirt was puddled on the floor at the side of the bed, his torso dark against the stark white pillows.

Sweet Lord, his chest. Dark hair dusted over his pecs, continuing in a sparse trail south of his belly button. His chest was thick, muscled, sexy as hell.

A picture flashed of him tied him up spread-eagle on the bed. She would drive him slowly crazy. The urge to straddle him and lick from his flat stomach up to his nipples had her shuffling forward a few feet into the room, a shoe clutched in each hand at her chest. She cut her legs together in an attempt to alleviate the throbbing, but sans underwear, the motion only emphasized her growing arousal. She had zero self-control around him. None. Zip. In fact, she might have veered into negative territory.

His gaze was like a physical touch, and she shifted her shoes to hide her pebbled nipples. The atmosphere thickened, grew electric as if the storm had moved inside, and his voice rumbled like thunder between them. “Come here, Jessie.”

The sexy-sweet sound ran like honey through her body. She loved when he called her Jessie. It made her feel like a different person, helped justify her very un-Jessica-like actions. She dropped her hands, and her shoes clattered to the floor.

Slowly, like prey unable to resist the bait of a trap, she walked to his side of the bed. He released the buttons of her shirt, this time slowly, drawing out the moment. Her breathing rate increased with each button that slid free, baring another sliver of her skin. He pushed the shirt over her shoulders, and it fluttered to the floor to lie beside his. Before she could say anything, he pulled her across his chest and rolled them to the middle of the bed, his weight pressing her down.

He held himself over her on one elbow, brushed her hair back from her forehead, but made no move to kiss her. One of her arms was trapped against the heated skin of his side. Her other hand fluttered from lying flat on the bed to fisted on her stomach.

“Damn, you’re beautiful.” He stared at her breasts, spilling out of her too-small bra.

Her hand landed across the swells as if she were some medieval maiden trying to hide her goodies. “I need to lose some weight.”

Laughing, he popped to his knees and found the side zipper of her skirt. “Not a very subtle way to fish for a compliment.”

“I wasn’t…” She turned her cheek into the thick down of his comforter at a loss for words.

“You were serious?” His voice registered disbelief. She didn’t know how to answer. He straddled her hips and pushed both her wrists by her head. “Look at me.”

Biting the inside of her mouth, she took a deep breath and looked straight in his eyes. They were almost nose to nose. “You are the sexiest, most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. You’ve got to know that. Your hair, your curves, your legs. I’ve been dreaming about getting my hands on you, your legs around me since the day you walked into Adaline’s, all proper and fierce.”

Considering where she lay, his lip service wasn’t to get her into bed. Warmth flooded into a dark emptiness she hadn’t even recognized since she’d lived with it for so long. Maybe from the first comparison with her sister, so young she couldn’t even remember.

Her arms trapped, she lifted her head, pressed her mouth against his and whispered, “Thank you.”

His lips curved against hers before he slipped his tongue inside her mouth. Gently, sweetly, sensually. He rolled to his side, pulling her with him. Working her skirt down, he shifted to pull it off. The clasp of her too-tight bra released, and he drew it off. Like a white flag of surrender, it disappeared into the darkness.

She was naked. The seams of his jeans abraded her legs, and the hair on his chest tickled her breasts. He kissed her again, flicking his tongue against her lower lip, the corners of her mouth, sucking her bottom lip between his. Her world reduced to sensation, the worry of him discovering her scars fading into nothingness.

She arched her back, her body seeking his. He danced his fingertips across her collarbone and down her arm, his hand landing under her breast, almost cupping it.

“Touch me.” The husky command was unrecognizable to her ears.

With a sighing moan, he moved his hand up and lifted her breast high, his thumb flicking over her peaked nipple. He pushed her to her back. “Get your hands over your head.”