Caine's Reckoning (20 page)

His response was immediate, deep and hoarse. “No.”

The man definitely liked her hair. She cracked her right lid. The homey kitchen that had been so alien and scary an hour ago seemed intimate and comfortable now. The knowledge that something about her pleased him gave her hope, because based on his ability to resist falling on her with the urge to rut, there wasn’t much about her that did appeal to him. The comb reached her scalp. He’d worked that far already? “That cream of Tia’s must be a miracle.”

“Tracker and Tucker swear by it.”

The image of the two men came to mind. Both men had long thick hair, not all dry and shaggy like she was used to seeing men’s hair. “I hope Tia scents it differently for them.”

That vibration in Caine’s touch must be laughter. “After the first time, when they came out smelling as pretty as a spinster at a social, she saw the necessity.”

There was more to the story than he was telling. “Why?”

“Because the rest of us couldn’t help teasing, and they couldn’t help responding.”

“You fought?”

She tried to imagine all those men fighting and couldn’t. It was too violent an image. Caine ran the comb through her hair one last time. There was a soft click of something being placed on the floor and then his hands were on her shoulders, kneading at the tension that had gathered there. “More play than real, but when we broke one of Tia’s tables, she’d had enough.”

“You think a lot of Tia, don’t you?”

“Yes. Though she wasn’t in the best shape when we met her, she opened her home to us.”

“She’d been hurt?”

“Seems like back then everyone had been hurt. Tia’d lost her husband, her baby and other things she’s never talked about, and yet when she saw us, she just started over, making a new family of us all.” He shrugged. “There isn’t anything any of us wouldn’t do for her.”

And no wonder. Desi rocked her head from side to side. “Don’t you have to rinse this stuff out?”

“In a minute.”

His drawl was as lazy as she felt. Her lids drifted down. His stroke grew longer as her limbs grew heavier. God, he had wonderful hands. “All right.”

“A husband likes to know his efforts are appreciated.”

He kept hammering that term as if she were a stubborn nail and if he just found the right angle, she’d cooperate with his plans. And if her body wasn’t so strangely tingly and heavy, and if she wasn’t so close to sleep, she’d probably come up with all sorts of reasons why it wasn’t going to happen, but right now she was just too incapacitated to do anything but yawn.

His chuckle seemed to come from afar. His hands continued to stroke, the movements getting slower, broader, stretching over her collarbone down to the tops of her breasts in slow easy circles, the abrasion of the hard calluses on his fingers smoothed by the water.

Another scent blended with the lavender. It took three heartbeats to identify it. Caine. She took a deep breath, experimenting. Instead of disturbing her calm, knowing he was there—that he wouldn’t let anyone burst in on her—just increased her sense of security. There was something to be said for a possessive husband.

His hands lifted off her shoulders, riding up the arch of her neck, pressing her head back against the flat ridge of the tub into the cushion of his chest by stroking along the underside of her chin with his fingertips. They trailed back down the same lazy path, lightly grazing her skin, skimming over her collarbone and then the tops of her breasts. The fingers opened and stretched, extending until they reached the plump middle of her breasts, holding there a heartbeat before retracing their course. Over and over, he did the same thing, keeping her cocooned within the arc of his shoulders, within the lure of safety he presented. His hands felt so good she didn’t complain as he took the massage further, extending the touch as she sank deeper into the cotton-soft well of pleasure he created so effortlessly. He compelled her into the hard cushion of his chest. She couldn’t suppress a moan when on the next pass his fingertips reached the edge of her areola.

The shock of her own voice making that sound popped her eyes open. She looked down. His hands were shockingly dark against the white of her sin. Big and callused, the backs crisscrossed with scars, they dwarfed her chest. And below, her nipples strained, hard and puckered as if from cold. Except she wasn’t. As she watched, those fingers slid farther, grazing the hard peaks in a rasp of sensation. She jerked away.

“No, Gypsy.” Caine’s forearms hooking over her shoulder kept her put for the next caress. His chest shifted behind her as he bent to whisper in her ear. “This is just another way to make you feel good.”

The husky announcement slid along her nerves with the same finesse his fingertips slid over her nipples. Smooth and sure, sending little shocks outward that seemed to blend into the heaviness in her core. She’d had many men touch her breasts. No one had ever made her feel like this. As if another person had taken over her body, she sat there and let Caine touch her.

“Good, sweetheart. You just lie there and let me do everything.”

As if she had a choice. Not only was he her husband, he was apparently a warlock with the ability to steal a person’s will. Over and over he perpetuated the broad caress, starting at her shoulders before slowly sweeping down to her nipples, circling them with his fingertips before retreating. And with every pass, the tingling grew, and along with it, a sense of impatience. She wanted more.

On the next pass, she arched. To no avail. He had her pinned. She was treated to another aggravatingly light, barely there grazing of her nipples. Water sloshed as she twisted her hips, and the waves bathed her woman’s place with little pulses of sensation. That fast, the tingling in her breast found a new place to make its presence known. Her knees fell all the way to the side, her legs too heavy to support. More ripples of warm water slid through the swollen folds, picking up the heat of her flesh and reflecting it back.

As if hearing the call, Caine’s right hand slid over her nipple and kept on going, the rough palm startling a bolt of sensation as it caught on the tender tip. Her gasp prompted the hiss of his breath. A hiss she echoed as she watched his large hand graze her stomach, the fingers spreading and arching until only the middle one road her skin, sliding through the water-darkened patch of curls covering her mound, hesitating a second before it dipped down the center.

“I—”

She never got to finish the thought because his left hand, still at her breast, turned, cupped and contracted. A sharp ache surged in her womb. Before she could get her breath back from that, Caine had her nipple between his fingers and her sweet spot under his control. He rubbed gently while his fingers squeezed, every move a delicate coaxing rather than the rough demand she’d expect of a man of his size and reputation.

Maybe it was the confusion of that very thing that had her lying there accepting it, or maybe it was the novelty of the achy tingling his touch engendered that had her staying so still. Whatever it was, she didn’t fight, and didn’t resist. Just sat there, a helpless victim of the magic Caine wielded so calmly.

After a few minutes the magic began to ebb, and she was left with just the sensation of his fingers delicately pinching the swollen nubs and his finger rubbing between her legs. It wasn’t enough. She needed more. She lifted herself into his touch.

A hoarse whisper approved her response. “That’s my Gypsy girl.”

And the pressure increased. She’d never felt anything like the sharp stab that went through her at the deeper pressure.

“Oh…”

“Like that, do you?”

“I’ve never felt—” Thank God she bit her lip before she finished that scandalous statement.

“Now that’s a pure shame. Every woman should know how this feels.”

She twisted into the pinch of his fingers on her nipple, losing the sensation on her clit as she did.

“Now look what you did,” Caine murmured against her ear, his deep drawl as seductive as his touch. “You messed with my rhythm.” Pressure on her right shoulder dropped her back into place. “No moving. Your job is to just sit there and feel good.”

“I can’t.” Everything in her gathered into a foreign demand to move, to entice.

“You will.”

She tried, she really did, but every time he milked her nipple and then rubbed her clit, bouncing her from one sensation to the other, it got harder and harder.

His hand stilled on her clit.

She shook her head. “Don’t stop.” She didn’t want this to go away. It had never felt good before. She hadn’t known it could.

“Shh, sweetheart. You’re going to like this.”

“This” was his fingertips closing around her swollen clit the same way they embraced her nipple. The roughness was more evident there, more welcome, and as he drew them up the short distension, she had to bite her lips to keep from crying out.

“No.” His tongue flicked the corner of her lips, slipped between, eased down the crease, forcing her lip free of her teeth. “Let me hear you, Gypsy girl. Feel you.”

He nuzzled her cheek as he pinched her nipple stronger than before. The hot little ache had her whimpering. The heat that followed had her grinding her hips into his hand for the echo of pleasure he’d trained her to expect. He gave it to her in a short pump. She twisted her head, unsure of what she was feeling, how to react. Was it pain? Pleasure? He did it again and she didn’t care what it was as long as he did it longer. Harder.

“Caine.”

“Right here.”

He kept up the steady rhythm and after a couple minutes, she knew what she needed. Her hips twisted and rose. Water sloshed. Her face muscles ached from the grinding effort to keep her shameful needs under control. Tears burned down her face. Caine’s hands stilled. A sob broke past her control.

“Shit.” The unrelenting pressure on her nipple and clit eased. “Am I hurting you, Desi?”

She couldn’t form words, so she just shook her head as more frustrated tears welled.

There was a pause and then the flick of his nail across her clit. Fire seared her nerve endings and a high-pitched cry broke from her control.

“Ah.” His cheek pressed against her as she felt his smile. “You’re a hot little thing, aren’t you?”

The shame of that burned right along with passion, but it wasn’t enough to stop the growing hunger. Especially when he flicked her clit again. The sensation wasn’t as sharp this time, but it fed the humming expectation of more. And the tension that held her enthralled now had more to do with hope than dread.

He gave it to her, milking her clit and her breast, encouraging her gasps and cries with husky grunts of approval, keeping her torso pinned with his forearms but allowing her hips to arch into his touch, answering her demands with harder strokes, longer pinches, laughing when she thrashed beneath him. Oh, God, she couldn’t stand this.

She turned her head and bit into his biceps, primitive satisfaction welling through her as his shout rose above her moans, barely restraining herself from savaging his arm as he clamped down on her nipple with restrained force. The ensuing delight dug deeper into the ache in her womb, amplifying it.

“Son of a bitch, scoot forward.”

She did, her attention mindlessly focused on the fingers holding her clit. Would he do the same to her there?

The shock of his big body sliding down behind her in the tub was a splash of reality. His grip switched to her waist. Her nipple ached in the cool air as he lifted her up. Water spilled over the side in a violent wave as Caine worked his legs between hers. “Straddle me.”

She scooted her feet forward.

“No. Kneel.”

She did, wiggling her feet under his ribs, bracing her hands on his knees for leverage as she wedged her knees between his hips and the side of the tub. His hand slipped between them from the front, the hairs on his wrist teasing her sensitive clit as he pulled his cock through.

“Now bring yourself down.”

More water splashed. “The floor—”

“Will clean, now bring yourself down on me.”

She did, straight on the wide plane of his cock. She caught her breath at the sheer size of him.

“This is going to feel so good.” His fingers parted her pussy lips. Spreading them, finding her sweet spot and aligning it with the center of the thick column. “Oh, yeah.” He circled the turgid nub, bringing it smartly to attention at the familiar caress. “That’s what I want.”

His left hand came back to her breast, enfolding it in heat and pressure. Once again he began the game, light pressure that teased and tormented, that called up the demand, but didn’t answer it until she couldn’t stand the lack any longer. When she was twisting on him, grinding down on his hard shaft, he tipped her forward with a forefinger between her shoulder blades. He kept pressing until the angle of her body held her swollen clit against the hot length of his cock.

She caught her breath as his hissed in. His left hand maintained its presence at her nipple while his right cupped her buttock. His thumb dipped between the crack to rest on a place no one had ever touched and gave her one command. “Move.”

In a shock of sensation, her entire focus centered on that thumb. When he punctuated the order with a slow pressure, she rose up on her knees, dragging her clit along his cock. His thumb was with her all the way, circling and pressing, distracting her from the pleasure riding his cock gave her. She reached her knees but not the end of his cock. He was massive.