An Accidental Gentleman (22 page)

“I hear you, Brian.” She gained strength in each whispered syllable, driving through the thick wash of fear remnants. “Show me. The things you’ve wanted to tell me all these weeks and I haven’t let you say. Show me, Brian. Talk to me in a way I can understand.”

She sought his mouth, to finally kiss the lips she’d watched from the day they’d met. No more denying herself. No more cutting herself in two and leaving half to starve. From now on, she would be one woman who feasted with the man who loved her.

* * * *

She kissed the way he’d imagined, pressing with the force of her whole body. Aggressive and bold, yeah, but in rising and ebbing waves. Giving him space to claim her in return as the currents carried them together.

While their tongues tumbled against each other and she clutched his back, he stroked her neck. He followed her smooth, graceful curves out toward her shoulders, again and again. From the pointed tips of her pixie cut past the open vee on her dress. Christ Jesus, she’d worn a dress for him.

And not only the dress. Sweet little heels and cock-hardening black stockings his hands had been begging to touch for the last two hours.

Withholding sex from her now would make him the coward. In the language she understood, he’d be telling her he lacked faith in her. Didn’t trust her to keep trying, to give their fragile relationship a chance to grow once the clothes had come off.

Her being here tonight represented a victory—an overture of peace. Compromise. And if what she needed in return was to feel desired? Well fuck. He’d held that piece in reserve from their first meeting.

He slipped free of her hungry mouth. “Katherine.”

Kiss-swollen and pink-cheeked, she gazed at him with pupils dark and irises sparkling. “Are we stopping now?”

Her shoulders sagged beneath his clasping hands. From her falling lips to her shifting feet, her body confirmed she expected him to say yes. To reject her need for physical proof and bid her goodnight, as if their relationship lived or died by his rules.

“I have dessert in the fridge. Some cake thing.” Damned if the name would pop in his head now. He poured the last of his confidence into his voice. God only knew whether the move would be the right one. “But what I really want to taste is you.”

She gasped. “I don’t—” Shaking her head, she tugged her lower lip behind her teeth.

Icy, heart-stopping plunge. He fumbled for a quip, a take-back, anything to reverse course and unwiden her eyes. Before he got the breath, she covered his mouth with her palm. Soft skin he yearned to kiss.

Her hand shaking, she traced his lips. “Yes. Because it’s you.”

Warmth spread from her gentle touch.

He caressed her past the swell of her breasts and down her sides, molding her dress to her flesh. The inward tuck of her waist. The sexy fucking flare of her hips. “Because it’s me?”

Nuzzling alongside his nose, she brushed their mouths together. “Were you thinking of my thighs when you shaved? Because I don’t think your fuzzy wanna-be beard would’ve been nearly enough to scratch me.”

In his curled fingers, he shortened her dress an inch at a time. If she intended to distract him, she’d have to find a stronger diversion than a half-hearted jest about his facial hair. The edge of her dress folded into his palms and left him grazing bare skin. “I’m always thinking of you. Tell me what you meant.”

She stiffened. He could’ve softened the demand with a please, but she deserved to know he’d seen the evasion. Understood how her mind worked and would chase her anyway. That he’d risk losing the surface Kit to have the real Katherine.

“I don’t let them.” She drew back, and the fire in her eyes flashed. “I’ve never wanted that from them.”

The men she took to her bed. No—the men she fucked. Katherine slept alone. Maybe she would leave him, tonight, without nestling in the sheets he’d bought for them to share. And that would have to be all right. He’d damn well better reconcile himself to her skittishness before he soured them with regret. Because someday she would stay. Neither of them had caught this wave before. They’d have to learn it together.

“But you want that with me?” He ached to savor her on his tongue. To flood his senses with her from the source and not rely on her sweet musk clinging to his fingers like that first night. But he had to be certain she wanted his love, his translation from words to action.

“I’ve always hated”—she licked her lips and blew out a hard breath—“making myself vulnerable. The sex I wanted wasn’t about that. The power belonged to me, you understand?”

“I know.” He’d felt her power when she’d led him into the back room and set the rules. Whatever kernel he’d claimed for himself existed because she hadn’t objected. “And that was fine. For them.”

She nodded. “For them. Intimacy was never currency in that exchange. But with us…”

He waited. With her bare thighs swaying against his fingertips, a sign her stockings stopped before her panties started. He’d know if he glanced down, but watching her face mattered more, despite the opinion of his stiff cock.

“Intimacy is the language we have to practice.” She smiled, finally, a cheeky grin. “I guess you’ll get to take the first lesson. Better aim for high marks.”

Hell yes. He edged his fingers higher. “So, your dress?”

Her face turned feral, her bared teeth a teasing threat and her eyes a blazing command. “Lose it.”

He sluiced the whole thing over her head and dropped it to the carpet. With her trembling fingers clasped in his hands, he stepped back to the edge of their reach and let himself look.

He’d meant to worship her slowly. Every inch of her kissed and cradled, a lesson in the sexiness of gentleness, so when she came on his tongue she’d have no doubts about how deep his love ran.

“Fucking—fuck.” His cock jerked. “Katherine, you—”

Staring at his beautiful lover, Christ himself would revise his game plan. She wrapped femininity around strength. The slim muscles he’d felt beneath her skin at the shop transformed her into a goddess here, bare and defiant, challenging him to be worthy. Black fabric, modest half-cups, lifted her breasts for his mouth. Freckles dotted her creamy stomach, falling in an arc toward the black panties with their iridescent sheen and picking up again beneath, in the space before matching stockings snuggled her thighs.

“Fuck, I don’t have the words.” Their arms bridged the gap between them. He could keep staring, forever, as he crushed her fingers because he couldn’t stop needing to hold her tighter and remind her he’d never let go, or he could map the landscape she offered him. His Katherine, whole and complete under his tongue.

She giggled, the light trill delicate and unexpected. “It’s okay, Brian. We agreed the words won’t show me as much as actions.” Wriggling her fingers free, she stroked his wrists and tugged. “Not half as much as your face shows me. No man’s ever looked at me with so much—awe.” Her skin flushed across the tops of her breasts. “So much love.”

Thank God. Thank God she saw the truth he’d tried to shove deep down for weeks so as not to scare her away. Thank God she pulled him closer now, as he backed her toward the couch and left her standing as he dropped to his knees.

The curve of her belly called to him. He pressed his cheek against her. Rubbing her soft skin beneath his nose, his lips, he marked her for his own. He grasped her hips, fingers falling across bare skin and panties alike and stroking both, curling the fabric and teasing.

The rhythm of her breathing quickened with each kiss he laid on her freckled skin. Shivering, she rocked her thighs toward him.

The panties slipped lower. Deep auburn curls swept over the top edge, and he nuzzled those, too. Damp, they carried the intoxication of sweet-salt and the promise of heady flavor in her depths.

As he peeled the panties to the tops of her stockings, she laid her hands on his head. She held him firm, her fingers eight points of pressure against his skull and her thumbs ruffling the combed-down fringe of hair brushing his forehead.

Mouth closed, he kissed the rose-pink swell peeking from the center of her curls. “My language skills must not be up to par, or my memory’s failing, because I could’ve sworn I imagined a million ways to tell you how beautiful you are, how much you squeeze my heart, and now I can’t grab a single one from my databanks.”

That giggle. Rippling her stomach, swaying her thighs, flashing more rose and pink for his tongue to explore. She scratched his scalp in a tugging invitation. “You’re telling me.” Her voice hardly rose above a whisper, but her steadiness washed him free of doubt. “Not with words, but you’re telling me.”

She stepped out of her shoes. Flexing her toes, she woke his desire for another nibbling feast. One for a later time, because as he guided her panties down her legs, he silently promised to leave the stockings in place. She’d put on finery for him. And though she was finer still, her gesture deserved sincere appreciation.

So he kissed his way back up. Slowly. Bent over himself like her humble servant, he mouthed the tops of her feet and the knobs of her ankles. The rounded fullness of her calves twitched in his hands as she widened her stance. He laid kisses against the soft inner creases of her knees.

As he rolled his tongue in waves, mimicking the plans he held for the bare skin tantalizingly close, she let out a low moan and sank to the couch.

Perfect. Stunning. Katherine, hazy-eyed and vulnerable, trusting him. Allowing him to set the pace and claim the intimacy they needed to move forward.

Gripping behind her knees, he slid her to the front of the cushion. An unhurried push spread her thighs, left her open as he knelt before her. His Katherine, rich with pineapple and salt and a deeper musk. Her lips shining and unfolding in a sea of curling breakers. She created her own tide with her panting breaths and her pulse, the blood rushing beneath his hands where he held her thighs.

“Paradise.” With sweeping thumbs, he surfed closer to her center.

Shuddering, arching toward him, she flexed into his grip. “Please. Show me, Brian.”

Now.

He buried his face in her secret hollows. With her heat cresting over him, he breathed deep and drowned himself in her. Wet and trembling, all of her. Filling his nose and mouth with her thick scent, her slippery rush. The sweet tang of the tropics, of wishes granted.

Her panting breaths turned to a siren song luring him deeper. With her groaning chorus and her biting nails in his hair, she urged him on. She broke beneath his hands, battering him in her storm.

He feasted until her hands fell slack and her toes no longer curled and danced along his ribs. Lifting his head, he gazed once more at perfection.

She lay sprawled against the cushions, her arms outflung and her head back. Heavy-lidded eyes and upturned lips greeted him.

He couldn’t help but beg for more. One more intimacy, to hold her close before she regained her senses and hid herself away. “Come to bed, Katherine. Stay with me awhile.”

* * * *

Brian. He’d asked her something, his lips shining as they moved. His cheeks, too. He still clasped her thighs, working his hands in a deep massage while she shivered. He’d performed miracles with his tongue. All of him might destroy her ability to remember her own name, not just to hear and understand his words.

Tumbling thoughts backward, she rewound the moment. Something about bed. Another new joy to discover. Shrugging her clothes back into place rarely took more than three minutes, and leaving took less than that. She laid her hands over his. “Time to move the party?”

But Brian, kneeling in front of her, bowed his head and glanced away. His hands clenched once more before he let go.

Fuck. She’d said the wrong thing, focused on the wrong words. Falling asleep in any bed but her own might prove impossible, but she could lie beside him. Already she ached for the feel of him, for his shoulders under her hands as he moved above her. Maybe she’d allow herself another kiss, the real and intimate kind, while they fucked.

She pushed herself forward. Without the cushion at her back, her head floated, too light to be real. She clamped her knees around Brian for balance. Gripped his face in her hands and forced him to meet her gaze. “Take me to bed, please? I want to lie down with you, and your tiny couch can’t handle both of us.”

Staring up at her, he let out a single laugh. “Did you hear any of what I asked you?”

“Not really, no.” An honest answer for an honest man.

He lunged forward. Hands tangled in her hair, his mouth wet with her strong, salty musk, he kissed her breathless. When he drew back, their harsh gasps punctuated the silence. He slipped his hands down her arms and stood. “I love you, Katherine. Even when you can’t hear how much I’m telling you.” He squeezed her forearms, his hold tight below her elbows. “Now let’s get you to bed.”

Her legs wobbled. As he raised her from the couch with his steady support, weak in the knees finally made sense. “So that’s what they mean.”

“Who mean?” He draped her arms over his shoulders and cradled her to his chest. His racing heartbeat passed beneath her lips on his neck. “About what?”

“The people who say love makes you weak in the knees. And all of those other silly things.” She wrapped her arms around him and clung with all the ferocity her satisfied muscles could muster. “Because your love sweeps me off my feet.”

“You think so?” The twangy amusement in his voice warned her in the second before he dipped his arm and scooped her up. “It does now.”

She nestled closer without half-trying. Lazy contentment overrode her usual controlled rush. This gentleness, fuzzy and warm, with her head on his shoulder, granted more peace and joy than successfully reviving a malfunctioning gizmo. Fucking was about shutting down her worries and taking—taking control, taking the pleasure she wanted—in those few minutes. She walked away with a heady rush and zero emotion. This, though. This might be better.

Carrying her into the next room, he clutched tight behind her back and knees. He breathed into her hair, tickling her scalp, and set her down on the bed before flicking on the bedside light.