Montana Wildfire (28 page)

His hand lifted, skimming her ribs, settling only a scant inch from where it needed most to be. The undercurve of her breast felt firm and inviting against the sensitive webbing between his thumb and index finger. He nudged her, squeezed gently, testing her firmness and fullness through the cloth.

His hand turned inward. He didn't cover her, the way his palm begged for him to do. That would be too quick, too unsatisfying. He'd rather linger, let the delay feed the fire building within him, within her, before he extinguished it. Only once he'd made the need unbearable for them both would he give her his full touch. Only then.

He began at the very base of her breast. With an upward stroke he slowly,
slowly
swept over her from the tips of his fingers to the heel of his palm. He paused, sucked in sharp breath, rolled his palm back down, then up once more. He felt her nipple pucker beneath the cloth, felt it burn like fire into the center of his palm. He curled his fingers inward.

Amanda's response was immediate and sharp. A bolt of awareness shot like liquid lightning through her blood. Her back arched off the ground. If it wouldn't have been too bold, she would have peeled free the buttons of her blouse and removed the barrier separating flesh from hot, hungry flesh. What Jake was doing felt wonderful, sinfully erotic. No man had ever touched her like that. Now, she wanted to know his touch without the obstruction of calico and linen. She hungered for it, was desperate for it.

Jake fed her desperation. And in so doing, he fed his own. He didn't remove the hindering blouse, the way they both wanted badly for him to do. Instead, he tested the size and shape of her breast in his palm. And marveled at the fit. She was firm and round and perfect. On second thought, "perfect" didn't come close to describing how it felt to touch this particular woman, in this particular way.

Had any woman ever nested into his hand so flawlessly? None that Jake could remember. That might be because, at that moment, he couldn't remember having been with any woman before this one. His entire life stopped and started right here, right now, with her. No one came before Amanda Lennox, no one would come after her. Not like this, not ever. He knew it.

Jake's hand moved to her buttons. Skill had little to do with his ability to slip them free. His fingers were shaking, his movements awkward and schoolboy-clumsy. He managed to work each pearly disk from its hole only by focusing the core of his attention on the sweet rewards that would be bared once the chore was done. Warm white skin... hard pink nipples...

The buttons came undone in record time.

Jake parted the calico placket wide, his gaze drilling into the splash of white linen chemise beneath. The fragile laces closing the front looked impossibly complex to his passion-dazed mind. Desire was riding him hard. In his current state of mind, the thought of wasting time untying those laces was beyond him.

He shifted, reaching down to slip the knife from its sheath at his belt. The blade glinted in the muted sunlight; the steel was wet, rain-slickened. His gaze volleyed between the knife and the woman, then settled on the latter. He scanned Amanda's face. Beads of rain made her skin shine like moist porcelain. Her eyes looked large and round, slightly dazed as her gaze locked on his.

The knife lifted.

Her eyes rounded, she trembled, and for a split second he thought she was going to scream. She didn't. Instead, after a telling hesitation, she surprised them both by arching one brow and tilting her chin up to allow him better access.

The metal glinted wetly in the dim light as it arched toward the chemise, and its intricate crisscross of laces. Jake's fingers had been trembling before. They weren't trembling now. They never did when he held a knife. His strokes as he cut through the obstructive ribbons were clean and precise, fluid. They were also purposefully slow, revealing her inch by tantalizing inch.

The laces severed, he returned the knife to its sheath, and feasted his gaze on her. In color, her skin wasn't too different from the chemise. He could tell at a glance that the two were worlds apart in texture. Linen was cool and smooth... forbidden white skin was hot and silky and tempting as all hell.

Something tickled the hollow of Amanda's throat where her pulse throbbed. She shivered when she felt Jake's warm, rough fingertip stroke a burning path downward, pausing when he reached the valley between her breasts. He nuzzled the shadowy cleft, slipping his finger between, stroking the full underside of each until she burned and whimpered.

It wasn't until her breathing went shallow and gaspy, when she strained against him, her body begging intimate attention, that his fiery touch melted away.

Amanda opened her mouth. Jake's lips smothered what she was about to say. He covered her lips in a grinding kiss. While he let her respond to him, that was all he let her do. When she surrendered with a low, husky moan and tried to lift her arms to caress his back, he batted her hands away.

His tongue was like fire, plundering, claiming. Years of suppressed desire flamed to his kiss, to the sharp nips his teeth made at her lips. Amanda's spine arched, and she molded her breasts to his chest, lifted her hips, straining for more.

Jake had always sensed fire in this woman. Even from the start, when it had been concealed beneath a veneer of ice, her passion had always been there, simmering beneath the surface. She'd just needed the right hand to spark the fire. His hand. He wanted to brand her with his touch.

Again, she tried to move her arms, this time to curl them around his neck. Again, he wouldn't allow it. Jake found her wrists and, ensnaring them in one fist, tugged her arms over her head. The method of restraint was double-edged. The position pressed her more fully into his length. The feel of her breasts crushed beneath his chest made his blood boil, his senses reel.

His free hand skimmed the curve of her hip. The indentation of her waist. Higher. Her bodice and chemise parted. The gaping cloth welcomed the fingers he snuck beneath the cloth. So did the warm fullness of her breasts.

Skin to skin. Jesus, the feel of her in his hand was everything he'd imagined it would be, and more. Her breast was full, ripe, her nipple already rigid. He flicked his thumb over the tip, bringing it to an even harder peak.

Jake captured her hot, airy groan with his mouth even as his hand closed over her. His touch was skilled, her reaction strong and uncivilized. She twisted beneath him, at the same time matching the urgency of his kiss with a wild, hungry response of her own.

The fingers manacling her wrist melted away. The second his grip loosened, Amanda slipped her hands free. She stroked his long, sleek, rain-dampened hair. Her fingertips acquainted themselves with the width and strength of his shoulder, the strong, rippling cords of his upper arms, the firm expanse of his back. As pleasurable as it felt, she wanted to feel it all again...
without
the obstruction of cloth.

Jake's mouth left hers. He sipped hot, moist kisses over her chin, down the sensitive taper of her throat. "I'll say it again, princess," he groaned against her. "You're no lady. And... damn but I have to respect you for that."

Amanda shivered when his tongue teased the pulse pounding hard and fast in her throat. Her voice sounded low, husky, passion-strained, even to her own ears. "I was taught that a lady represses her feelings," she murmured shakily.

"Repress? Jesus, princess, if you're
repressing
now, I think there's a good chance you'll kill me from sheer pleasure when you finally let loose."

"No, Jake, you misunderstood. I said that's what a
lady
does." She felt him tense, and before she knew it he'd risen up and was staring down at her. His silvery eyes were hooded, but none the less bright, none the less hot as his gaze stabbed into her. Raindrops dripped from the ends of his hair. The beads of water felt warm from the heat of his body as they splattered on, and soaked into, her shirt, her skin, her blood. "In case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm not feeling like much of a lady right now."

His response was choked. "No? Then what are you feeling like?"

"Not 'what,'
how."
Her eyelids felt heavy, languid. Was there as much longing in her gaze as there was humming through her body? Amanda hoped so. She wanted Jake to see it. All of it. She wanted him to know how good, how very unladylike he made her feel. "I'm feeling hot, Jake. Very hot. For you."

His jaw bunched hard as he lowered his head until their rain-moistened foreheads touched. His sigh felt misty and warm against her mouth. "Damn, princess, you aren't the only one. Trust me."

And she did. She had to. She wouldn't be letting him do this to her if she didn't, in some essential way, trust this man. Maybe not with information, no, but with her body. He wouldn't hurt her. She didn't know how she knew it, she just did.

There was enough space between his heaving chest and her own for Amanda to sneak her hands between them. Her fingertips hesitated on the second button of his shirt. She felt his hot skin through the cloth. Her fingers shook, which made slipping the buttons free seem like an impossible task; one she didn't do gracefully. By the time Jake's hungry lips had settled on the upper swell of her breast, she'd resorted to ripping most of the buttons free.

He moved, just a slight angling of his head.

It was enough.

His lips closed over her nipple in the same instant Amanda yanked the shirtsleeves down his arms. She was unsure which felt better; what his mouth was doing to her, or the feel of his flesh coasting beneath her open palms. His skin felt hot. The way he made her blood pound through her veins was hotter still. Unbearably hot.

Jake suckled her nipple into his mouth. He rolled it with his tongue, nibbled, tasted and teased. His hand trailed a fiery path down her waist, over her hips, skimming the inside of her thigh. Her skin skimmed warmly beneath his palm as he dragged the skirt higher, bunching it around her waist. His fingers launched an intimate investigation, combing downy gold curls. Jesus, she felt good. So damned good!

Until she tensed.

Jake's sexual expertise was lacking when it came to seducing innocents—especially white ones. He had little experience to draw on, only instinct. Still, he wasn't stupid. He knew virginal shyness when he felt it, and the way her thighs trembled and then closed against his searching hand was certainly that. Didn't she know it was too late to stop?

He frowned. Or was it too late? If she asked, would he stop?
Could
he? Maybe. For her. He prayed to be spared that test. He wasn't at all sure he could pass it to her satisfaction. He wanted her too damn badly.

"Let me," he rasped, his nose nuzzling the soft, flowery scented hollow between her breasts. Heaven. He'd found heaven. His tongue darted out, licking her. They both shivered. She tasted like rainwater and sunshine. An erotic flavor, one to be savored. "Open for me, princess. Let me touch you."

"Not there, Jake. Please. I—I can't—"

"You can."

"But I shouldn't."

"A lady shouldn't," he agreed throatily. "But I don't want a lady right now, princess. A lady isn't what I need. I need... God, I need to touch you—now, everywhere—so damn badly it hurts. Let me. Please."

It was the please that decided things for her. The word tripped rustily over his tongue, and she did as he asked, albeit timidly.

Her action was a bit martyred, Jake thought. But it wouldn't be for long, he promised them both. Slowly, slowly, his fingers shimmied down. He stroked, inflamed, sought out and probed the moist heat of her. He slipped inside of her, deeply, searching and stretching, preparing her for what was to come.

Amanda stiffened and grew very, very still. Her breathing shallowed until it was almost nonexistent.

He hesitated, waiting until she was used to the invasive feel of a part of him embedded in the most womanly part of her. Then, with an expert flick of his wrist, he began moving. His strokes were slow, long and smooth, oddly gentle. Insistent.

He lifted himself, gazing down into her passion-darkened green eyes. She looked surprised, somewhat dazed, and pleased. Very pleased. Her enjoyment pumped through Jake, and he couldn't help but grin. "Think of it as like... making love," he murmured, as his hand increased the pace.

His words fanned the fire in Amanda's blood. Her hips arched into his touch, initiating a swifter rhythm which instead of satisfying the peculiar ache building inside of her, made her want to cry out in frustration. Something was brewing within her, something white-hot and wonderful. Yet every time she got close to finding out what it was, Jake pulled back. His movements slowed, the feeling ebbed briefly... until he moved, and it all started to build again. And again. And again.

Steady, but not jerky. You want to get that friction started. Back and forth, back and forth. I can't tell you how important rhythm is. Once you've established the pace, you can't let up or you'll have to start from scratch. Understand?

She hadn't understood at the time. Not really. She was starting to understand now. If only he wouldn't stop. If only he would continue to feed the fire in her until it blazed...

The fire in Jake had never died, but her response to what he was doing made the flames glow red-hot. He lowered his mouth to hers, and the taste of her on his tongue made him impatient to taste more of her. All of her. Now. The feel of her nestled in his hand was driving him insane, chipping away his normally staunch patience, chipping away his usually powerful self-restraint.

A minute was too long to wait to be buried inside of this woman. Sixty more seconds of this would kill him, Jake was positive of it.

That was all the time it took for him to ease away from her, to impatiently rid them both of their rain-dampened clothes.

When they were finally naked, he laid Amanda back down on the ground and let his gaze devour her. The way she was spread out before him made her look deceptively slender, almost fragile. Almost. Her skin was moist from the drizzling rain. The way the water shone against her pale white flesh made Jake ache to sip the wetness off of her skin with his tongue and lips.