Crossfire 01 Bared to You (18 page)

Gideon cursed and gripped my hip with his free hand, urging me to lean backward as his chest heaved with frantic breaths. The position altered my descent and I opened, accepting all of him. Immediately his body temperature rose, his torso radiating sultry heat through his clothes. Sweat dotted his upper lip.

Leaning forward, I slid my tongue along the sculpted curve, collecting the saltiness with a low murmur of delight. His hips churned impatiently. I lifted carefully, sliding up a few inches before he stopped me with that ferocious grasp on my hip.

“Slow,” he warned again, with an authoritative bite that sent lust pulsing through me.

I lowered, taking him into me again, feeling an oddly luscious soreness as he pushed
just
past my limits. Our eyes locked on each other as the pleasure spread from the place where we connected. It struck me then that we were both fully clothed except for the most private and intimate parts of our bodies. I found that excruciatingly carnal, as were the sounds he made, as if the pleasure was as extreme for him as it was for me.

Wild for him, I pressed my mouth to his, my fingers gripping the sweat-damp roots of his hair. I kissed him as I rocked my hips, riding the maddening circling of his thumb, feeling the orgasm building with every slide of his long, thick penis into my melting core.

I lost my mind somewhere along the way, primitive instinct taking over until my body was completely in charge. I could focus on nothing but the driving urge to fuck, the ferocious need to ride his cock until the tension burst and set me free of this grinding hunger.

“It’s so good,” I sobbed, lost to him. “You feel…Ah, God, it’s too good.”

Using both hands, Gideon commanded my rhythm, tilting me into an angle that had the big crown of his cock rubbing a tender, aching spot inside me. As I tightened and shook, I realized I was going to come from that, just from the expert thrust of him inside me.
“Gideon.”

He captured me by the nape as the orgasm exploded through me, starting with the ecstatic spasms of my core and radiating outward until I was trembling all over. He watched me fall apart, holding my gaze when I would’ve closed my eyes. Possessed by his stare, I moaned and came harder than I ever had, my body jerking with every pulse of pleasure.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he growled, pounding his hips up at me, yanking my hips down to meet his punishing lunges. He hit the end of me with every deep thrust, battering into me. I could feel him growing harder and thicker.

I watched him avidly, needing to see it when he went over the edge for me. His eyes were wild with his need, losing their focus as his control frayed, his gorgeous face ravaged by the brutal race to climax.

“Eva!”
He came with an animal sound of feral ecstasy, a snarling release that riveted me with its ferocity. He shook as the orgasm tore into him, his features softening for an instant with an unexpected vulnerability.

Cupping his face, I brushed my lips across his, comforting him as the forceful bursts of his gasping breaths struck my cheeks.

“Eva.” He wrapped his arms around me and crushed me to him, pressing his damp face into the curve of my neck.

I knew just how he felt. Stripped. Laid bare.

We stayed like that for a long time, holding each other, absorbing the aftershocks. He turned his head and kissed me softly, the strokes of his tongue into my mouth soothing my ragged emotions.

“Wow,” I breathed, shaken.

His mouth twitched. “Yeah.”

I smiled, feeling dazed and high.

Gideon brushed the damp tendrils of hair off my temples, his fingertips gliding almost reverently across my face. The way he studied me made my chest hurt. He looked stunned and…grateful, his eyes warm and tender. “I don’t want to break this moment.”

Because I could hear it hanging in the air, I filled it in. “But…?”

“But I can’t blow off this dinner. I have a speech to give.”

“Oh.” The moment was effectively broken.

I lifted gingerly off of him, biting my lip at the feel of him slipping wetly out of me. The friction was enough to make me want more. He’d barely softened.

“Damn it,” he said roughly. “I want you again.”

He caught me before I moved away, pulling a handkerchief out from somewhere and running it gently between my legs. It was a deeply intimate act, on par with the sex we’d just had.

When I was dry, I settled on the seat beside him and dug my lip gloss out of my clutch. I watched Gideon over the edge of my mirrored compact as he removed the condom and tied it off. He wrapped it in a cocktail napkin; then tossed it in a cleverly hidden trash receptacle. After restoring his appearance, he told the driver to head to our destination. Then he settled into the seat and stared out the window.

With every second that passed, I felt him withdrawing, the connection between us slipping further and further away. I found myself shrinking into the corner of the seat, away from him, mimicking the distance I felt building between us. All the warmth I’d felt receded into a marked chill, cooling me enough that I pulled my shawl around me again. He didn’t move a muscle as I shifted beside him and put my compact away, as if he wasn’t even aware I was there.

Abruptly, Gideon opened the bar and pulled out a bottle. Without looking at me, he asked, “Brandy?”

“No, thank you.” My voice was small, but he didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe he didn’t care. He poured a drink and tossed it back.

Confused and stung, I pulled on my gloves and tried to figure out what went wrong.

I
don’t remember much of what happened after we arrived. Camera flashes burst around us like fireworks as we walked the length of the press gauntlet, but I scarcely paid them any mind, smiling by rote. I was drawn into myself and desperate to get away from the tension radiating in waves from Gideon.

The moment we crossed over into the building, someone called his name and he turned. I slipped away, darting around the rest of the guests clogging the carpeted entrance.

When I reached the reception hall, I snatched two glasses of champagne from a passing server and searched for Cary as I tossed one back. I spotted him on the far side of the room with my mom and Stanton, and I crossed to them, discarding my empty glass on a table as I passed it.

“Eva!” My mother’s face lit up when she saw me. “That dress is stunning on you!”

She air-kissed each of my cheeks. She was gorgeous in a shimmering, fitted column of icy blue. Sapphires dripped from her ears, throat, and wrist, highlighting her eyes and her pale skin.

“Thank you.” I took a gulp of champagne from my second glass, remembering that I’d planned on expressing gratitude for the dress. While I still appreciated the gift, I was no longer so happy about the convenient thigh slit.

Cary stepped forward, catching my elbow. One look at my face and he knew I was upset. I shook my head, not wanting to get into it now.

“More champagne, then?” he asked softly.

“Please.”

I felt Gideon approaching before I saw my mother’s face light up like the New Year’s ball in Times Square. Stanton, too, seemed to straighten and gather himself.

“Eva.” Gideon set his hand on the bare skin of my lower back and a shock of awareness moved through me. When his fingers flexed against me, I wondered if he felt it, too. “You ran off.”

I stiffened against the reproof I heard in his tone. I shot him a look that said everything I couldn’t while we were in public. “Richard, have you met Gideon Cross?”

“Yes, of course.” The two men shook hands.

Gideon pulled me closer to his side. “We share the good fortune of escorting the two most beautiful women in New York.”

Stanton agreed, smiling indulgently down at my mother.

I tossed back the rest of my champagne and gratefully exchanged the empty glass for the fresh one Cary handed me. There was a slight warmth growing in my belly from the alcohol and it loosened the knot that had formed there.

Gideon leaned over and whispered harshly, “Don’t forget you’re here with me.”

He was
mad
? What the hell? My gaze narrowed. “You’re one to talk.”

“Not here, Eva.” He nodded at everyone and led me away. “Not now.”

“Not ever,” I muttered, going along with him just to spare my mother a scene.

Sipping my champagne, I slid into an autopilot mode of self-preservation I hadn’t had to use in many years. Gideon introduced me to people and I supposed I performed well enough—spoke at the appropriate moments and smiled when necessary—but I wasn’t really paying attention. I was too conscious of the icy wall between us and my own hurt anger. If I’d needed any proof that Gideon was rigid about not socializing with women he slept with, I had it.

When dinner was announced, I went with him into the dining room and poked at my food. I drank a few glasses of the red wine they served with the meal and heard Gideon talking to our tablemates, although I didn’t pay attention to the words, only to the cadence and the seductively deep, even tone. He made no attempt to draw me into the conversation and I was glad. I didn’t think I could say anything nice.

I didn’t become engaged until he stood to a round of applause and took the stage. Then I turned in my seat and watched him cross to the podium, unable to help admiring his animal grace and stunning good looks. Every step he took commanded attention and respect, which was a feat, considering his easy and unhurried stride.

He looked none the worse for wear after our abandoned fucking in his limo. In fact, he seemed like a totally different person. He was once again the man I’d met in the Crossfire lobby, supremely contained and quietly powerful.

“In North America,” he began, “childhood sexual abuse is experienced by one in every four women and one in every six men. Take a good look around you. Someone at your table is either a survivor or knows someone who is. That’s the unacceptable truth.”

I was riveted. Gideon was a consummate orator, his vibrant baritone mesmerizing. But it was the topic, which hit so close to home, and his passionate and sometimes shocking way of discussing it, that moved me. I began to thaw, my bewildered fury and damaged self-confidence subverted by wonder. My view of him shifted, altering as I became simply another individual in a rapt audience. He wasn’t the man who’d so recently hurt my feelings; he was just a skilled speaker discussing a subject that was deeply important to me.