Facing It (13 page)

God help him.

“Don’t say that.” Jennifer stared at Beecham. She clutched the door, as much to keep from falling as to prevent herself from reaching for him. “Don’t say that to me unless you mean it.”

A deep breath shook his frame. He still looked as though he might throw up. “I wouldn’t say it unless I did.”

“Oh my God.” Jennifer let go of the wooden slab and covered her mouth. Harrell Beecham telling her he loved her, and goddamn it, she didn’t have a clue how to handle it. She continued to stare at him, her pulse jumping under her skin.

His hold on the door tightened, knuckles glowing white. “I shouldn’t have—”

“No.” She stepped forward, laid her palm over his heart. His lids lifted and he regarded her with wariness and something more. She’d have almost called it desire, except it went deeper. Yes, he
wanted
her, but he also wanted
her
. She moistened her lips with the very tip of her tongue and moved even closer. The sharp, clean scent of him wrapped around her. “I mean, yes, you should have.”

Under her hand, some of the tension drained out of him. She flexed her fingers, stroking a little at the tight muscle of his pectorals. She lifted her other hand to touch him, palms flat on his chest, and held his gaze for a long drawn-out second.

From the room next door, canned laughter from a sitcom filtered through the wall. Jennifer slid her fingers up his chest, to his shoulder, to curve around his nape. One more step brought her almost into direct contact with him, little more than a breath between them.

“Tell me again.”

A pained frown brought his brows down and together; the wariness in his eyes ratcheted up to very real fear. “Jen—”

“Please.” On tiptoe, she brushed her lips over his. “Say it again.”

He moved then to touch her, sifting his fingers through her hair, cradling the back of her head. “I love you.”

She slid her caress from his nape to his jaw. The sudden freedom to touch him thrilled her almost as much as his declaration. “And that scares you.”

He nodded, the smooth warmth of his clean-shaven cheek gliding against her gentle touch.

“Do you think I’d hurt you?” She whispered the question along his lips. “Or let you fall? Haven’t I always had your back, Beech?”

Turning his head, he pressed a fierce kiss into her palm. “Told you, Jen, it’s not you. It’s
me
.”

She wanted to catch that kiss, hold on to it, keep it forever. She feathered her lips along his cheek. “Do you trust me?”

He pulled his head back, far enough to meet her gaze. “Implicitly.”

“Then let yourself love me.” She cradled his face in both hands. “Let me love you.”

His fingers came up to wrap around her wrists. “It’s not that easy—”

“Ssh.” She rubbed one thumb across his mouth, the silencing caress turning to an exploration of his lower lip. “It can be that easy.” She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pressed close, determined to ease that fear, to take him through it. “Let me show you.”

Holding him, she took his mouth in a slow kiss, tangling her tongue with his, thrilling to the mingled textures of smooth and rough, the clean blending of mint and sweet tea and saltiness. He groaned deep in his throat and slid his hands to her hips, lifting her against him, deepening the exchange.

How long they stood in the doorway, wrapped around one another, the kiss going on and on, she wasn’t sure, lost in him, in the slow swirl of passion and desire. He settled his hands on her back, his fingers and palms tracing an unhurried path along the exposed length of her spine.

Twirling her tongue around his, scraping the edges of his teeth, she freed his tie and let it hang, unbuttoned his shirt and parted it, almost moaning in frustration when she discovered a soft white undershirt rather than bare skin.

“You wear too many clothes,” she murmured into his mouth, tugging the undershirt free of his waistband, affording her access to his leanly muscled abdomen.

“You don’t wear enough.” He dropped his lips to her bare shoulder and she felt his smile there. “Makes us even.”

Squirming a little in his embrace, she pushed his shirt from his shoulders and down his arms in a rustle of starched cotton. It fell to the floor and she gripped his undershirt to strip it over his head.

She’d seen him naked from the waist up before, plenty of times during that undercover assignment in South Carolina and even before that, after he’d been swimming or while they’d talked over case details in a dozen different nondescript hotel rooms just like this one.

This was different. This time he was hers and she could see him, touch him, taste him, however she liked. She didn’t intend to waste a second of it and refused to rush. Instead, she would savor every inch of him.

She rubbed her palms up and down his biceps, unable to resist the smile pulling at her mouth. “You’re beautiful.”

Surprise flared in his eyes and he laughed, a rusty sound that rumbled from deep in his chest and reverberated under her touch. He shifted, a tight movement that whispered of a man discomfited by her words. “Women are beautiful. I’m not—”

She stopped him with a single fingertip. “But you are.”

Her gaze traveled over defined shoulders, tight pectorals, a trim waist and delineated abdomen. The body of a man who was serious about his health and his training. The body of a man who claimed to love her. She ran questing fingers along the lines, the planes and angles and shadowed indentations of those muscles, relishing the play of skin and movement beneath her touch.

He hissed in a sharp breath as she rubbed along the contours of his flat belly. “What are you doing?”

She caught her tongue between playful teeth. “Loving the feel of you.”

“I think you’re playing with fire, Settles.”

She leaned in toward him, ran her tongue along his lower lip. “I think I’m setting a fire, Beecham.”

His hand dipped to rub at the small of her back, laid bare by her halter top. “What if it gets out of control?”

“I want it to,” she whispered, their lips touching with the words. She pushed into him, breasts to his chest, abdomens flat together. “I want you to burn me all over.”

This time he took her mouth, but there was nothing slow about this kiss, his tongue slipping past her teeth, invading her mouth in a steady rhythm that set desire pulsing in her veins. Without breaking contact, he backed them into his room, continuing to caress the line of her spine in sweeping strokes that tingled and sizzled through her.

Finally lifting his head, he nuzzled her ear and danced his tongue around the shell. Her knees threatened to buckle as sheer sensation zapped along every synapse she possessed. He stroked her shoulder. “Still want me to make you burn?”

“Yes,” she murmured, digging her fingers into the thick springy waves of his hair.

He stepped back and the way he looked at her burned along the line of her body, set off a deep, fluttering ache low in her belly, a stinging need to have him fill her completely.

Trailing a finger along her shoulder and arm, he walked around her in a small semicircle, until he stood at her back. She caught a glimpse of them in the mirror over the low bureau, found herself drawn to the way the low light gilded his bare torso, to the way her body seemed to vibrate visibly at his proximity.

He traced the back of his index finger down her biceps, the simple touch bringing all awareness to those few inches of skin. He kissed the curve of her shoulder. “Where do you want me to begin?”

“I don’t care.” That maddening finger feathered over the sensitive inside of her elbow and along her forearm, and the tender throbbing between her thighs pulsed harder. She swallowed, fighting not to close her eyes. “Anywhere.”

“Anywhere?” He dragged the lightest of touches over her wrist and to her palm. She’d wanted him to burn her, but this felt more like…she didn’t know. She felt swollen and sensitized all over, as though her body was ripe for this man and whatever he chose to do to her.

“Yes.” Her head fell back, resting in the curve between his neck and shoulder while he traced a maddening circle on her palm. Heaviness settled inside her, flushing her. How could such a simple touch make her feel like she was going to come apart? “Anywhere you want.”

He cupped her other shoulder, sliding his thumb against her skin there. Pushing her hair to lie over that shoulder, he unclasped the hook holding her halter in place and swept the straps apart.

The thin fabric pooled at her waist and she couldn’t tear her gaze from the mirror, from the picture they made, her skin a shade darker than his, golden tanned against his ruddy tone, the agonizingly slow sweep of his hands along the length of her arms, the curve of her breasts, nipples furling into hard, red peaks of excitement.

She moistened dry lips. She needed him to touch her
there
, to shape and heft her breasts, to tease and torment her. In the mirror, she caught his gaze and the smile that spread over his face. She’d told him she wanted him to make her burn and something told her he was going to do so in typical methodical Harrell Beecham style.

He palmed her rib cage, thumbs scarcely brushing the undersides of her breasts, and she hissed in a sharp breath as that barest of touches arced straight to the heart of her swollen sex. A rough chuckle growled from his throat and he flattened those wonderful, torturous hands on her abdomen, where desire fluttered and ached for him. Easing strong fingers inside the band of her skirt, he teased the sensitive area where her thighs joined her pelvis.

She caught his wrists, a shaky laugh rushing from her. “My knees are weak.”

Her zipper rasped, the material sliding down her legs to the floor in a swish, leaving her wearing only the briefest of panties. “I’ll hold you up.”

“That’s supposed to be my line.” Was that breathless whisper hers? And when had everything shifted, so that he was in control and she was hanging on edge with everything he did?

She swung around in his arms and reached to curl her fingers in his waistband. He grabbed her forearms and used her momentum to spin them both to the bed, where she ended up on her back with him leaning over her, a roguish glint in his eyes.

“You said you wanted me to make you burn,” he whispered.

“I didn’t think that meant I didn’t get to touch you.”

“Time for that later.” He lowered his head, nuzzling along her throat, nipping and sucking. He grasped her wrists and pushed them over her head, fingers dancing along the sensitive inner skin. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to touch you?”

“How long?” Her voice broke slightly as he nibbled at her collarbone, the wall of his chest rubbing against her sensitized breasts.

“Honestly?” His nose brushed the delicate curve of her underarm and he dropped a kiss on the far upper side of her breast. She resisted the urge to squirm under him, to lift her hips and push against his pelvis.

“Honestly.” She fully expected to hear him say South Carolina, when they’d first begun living together as a sham couple, when she’d found herself wanting his touch, wanting him.

He pressed open-mouth kisses down her sternum, tasting and teasing. “Since Arkansas,” he mumbled.

“Arkansas?” The surprise squeaked in her voice. “That long?”

His lips moved against her navel and he cradled her hips in his hands. “Yeah. That long.”

The admission shot a thrill of warm emotion through her. Over a year. She stirred then, tangling her fingers in his hair, caressing his nape. He glanced up at her, wickedness shining in his gaze while he peeled away her panties. He curved his hands around her thighs, separating them with a gentle push. A different thrill, one of liquid, wanton desire, traveled over her nerve endings. He dipped his head and she tightened in anticipation.

The first swipe of his tongue over her swollen clit almost did her in. She moaned, and he chuckled, the deep sound vibrating all the way through her, increasing her arousal. She was wet and open already, she could feel it, and the dance of his mouth on her had tension and electricity stinging through her.

She arched, fingers digging into his hair, the heat of his touch separating her further for his marauding tongue. Slowly, he pushed first one, then two fingers inside her, creating a rhythm in sync with the magical ministrations that were turning her inside out, pushing the pressure higher, expanding the swollen feeling in her lower belly until she was shattering, clutching at his hair and pressing her hips upwards, until a low, keening cry ripped from her lips.

Gasping, she stared at the ceiling, trying to put all the pieces back together and catch her breath all at the same time. He turned his head and pressed a kiss to her thigh.

“Beautiful,” he murmured and levered himself away.

Her eyes slid closed while she attempted to regulate her breathing. Metal clinked, a zipper rasped and cloth rustled before the bed dipped and those fabulously tormenting hands framed her hips. She felt the brush of his body between her thighs a split second before he closed his mouth around one taut nipple.

The sensation arced straight to her too-sensitive sex and she smothered another soft cry. He rolled the tight flesh between his teeth, rubbing the rough surface of his tongue against it, and the swollen pressure in her belly unfolded again, unfurling, curling another urgent ache through her.