Desire and Deception (23 page)

"I . . . didn't know if it would," she said honestly. When Jason's mouth twisted in contempt, Lauren added, "I needed the money, so when you suggested the bargain, I felt obliged to fulfill my part."

"Such a sense of honor," he mocked. "And now I bear the burden of guilt for having set your dainty little feet on the sinful path."

"That isn't true!" she cried. "I tell you I didn't have a choice."

With her answer, Jason's fury erupted. He slammed his glass down, shattering the crystal, and reached Lauren in three strides, making her head snap back as he seized her shoulders in a crushing grip. His eyes blazed with blue fire, his nostrils flaring as he snarled, "You had a choice, damn you! I would have taken you as my wife. I would have cherished you, protected you, given you everything I owned."

Lauren gasped with pain as his fingers bit into the soft flesh of her arms. His face was just inches from hers, his eyes alive and blazing with emotion, and for the first time she was afraid of him. She struggled, pushing against his alarmingly broad chest. "You wanted the Carlin ships!" she cried, trying to twist from his grasp. "You didn't want me!"

Her efforts left her panting for breath and no less a captive as Jason hauled her full against him, against his powerful, sinewy body. "Wrong, sweetheart!" he rasped, his eyes crystal slits of fury. "I wanted you. I still want you. And I mean to have you."

His lips came down on hers fiercely then, claiming with brutal possessiveness. The taste of brandy filled Lauren's senses as his tongue savagely assaulted her mouth, punishing her, robbing her of breath.

Lauren's attempts to free herself failed pitifully. Clamped as she was against the hard length of him, all she did was arouse Jason further. Arouse him in a different way. She realized his new intent almost at once, even before she felt his hard body tighten.

When he raised his head, she stared up at him, shaken, breathless, furious, into eyes that were hot and glittering, and she became truly frightened. What did she know about Jason Stuart, after all? She had dreamed of making love to him, of being in his arms again, but not like this. Not with anger and fear raging between them.

Desperately Lauren tried to avert her face, but his powerful hand cupped the back of her head, holding her still while he lowered his mouth again. He kissed her with a bruising, controlled passion that left her gasping. Her hands flailed helplessly around his shoulders as he filled her with the taste of him, the hot searching stab of his tongue.

His kiss was brutally lustful . . . yet somehow sensual. Lauren couldn't control the wild pulse of excitement that quivered through her at his rough handling. Even so, she fought him, pounding her fists ineffectively at his broad shoulders.

Jason easily subdued her, forcing her hands behind her back as he bent her back over his arm. Lauren whimpered, wildly aware of his muscular chest crushing her breasts, of the explicit pressure of his arousal pressing against her thighs. But her resistance only seemed to increase his determination.

He held her wrists in one hand while the other slid up her satin bodice to the yielding swell of her breasts, roaming freely, caressing boldly. Then, bending, Jason pressed his lips against her hair, nuzzling her ear. "Play the whore for me, Lauren. Show me how well you do it."

She was shocked by his husky
command,
and shocked further by the brutal rush of feeling that flooded her. The primitive leap of hunger assaulted her so sharply that she moaned.

"Is Duval a good lover?" Jason continued in that hoarse, relentless voice. "Does he make you moan like this? Can he make you cry out with passion?"

His hard fingers closed over her breast, relentlessly pressing and releasing the nipple beneath the satin. Lauren gritted her teeth as her flesh involuntarily contracted into a tight, aching bud. She was hardly aware of what Jason was saying.
Duval?
Felix had never done anything like this to her. And how did Jason even know about him anyway?"

"No . . . you're mistaken. . . ." she gasped, fighting her body's traitorous response.

Suddenly Jason was turning her and urging her backward. Caught off balance, Lauren clutched at his shoulders, having no choice but to move with him as he pushed her up against the desk.

There was nowhere to run. The edge of the desk bit into her buttocks while Jason's granite-hard thighs held her prisoner, molding against her softness. Feeling herself falling, Lauren threw her hands out behind her and found herself half sitting, half lying on the desktop, with Jason's arms staked on either side of her shoulders, his hard body pressing her down, holding her immobile.

"Perhaps," he rasped, "we should hold a contest. Who can satisfy you best? Who can make you moan the loudest?"

She heard the rough catch in his voice, saw the hooded anguish in his eyes, but still she didn't understand. "Why are you doing this?" she whispered, unable to bear his angry contempt.

"I told you why." His gaze dropped to her straining breasts. Very deliberately he ran a forefinger down the slender column of her throat to the bare white swells above her gown's low neckline. Lauren
quivered,
his touch feeling like a brand of fire against her skin. "Because I want you," Jason said, his low, sensuous tone stroking her.
"Because I've wanted you every night for four years, every waking moment.
And I intend to have you. I'll have you again and again, till you're so filled with me you can't even remember Duval's name."

"Please . . ."

"Please what?" his husky voice prodded her. "Please
you?
What do you like best, sweetheart? I expect I can be as inventive as Duval."

Lauren knew then. With the instinctive confidence of a woman, she knew he was jealous.
Fiercely jealous.
The knowledge gave her a heady feeling of power that she had no time to analyze. Jason desired her, Lauren thought dazedly, looking up at that hard, virile face with its noble, sculpted planes. He desired
her.

Something of her wonder must have shown on her face, for his eyes shut momentarily and his jaw went rigid, as if he were bracing himself against pain.
"Oh, God."
It was as if the groan was dragged out of him.

And when he opened his eyes, she could see in the brilliant blue depths of his gaze that his anger had turned to smoldering passion.

Her lips parted in breathless anticipation as she waited helplessly for his next assault. She was startled when, with incredible gentleness, he tugged on the bodice of her gown, freeing her full breasts from their confining satin.

His gaze fixed hungrily on the silken crests as he drew in a sharp breath.
"Those magnificent breasts, just as beautiful as I remember them.
I remembered doing this . . ." He cupped her breast in his palm, his tenderness infinitely arousing after the violence that had preceded it. "And this
. .
His hard thumb circled the sensitive tip, sending a stab of quivering, almost painful delight through her body. "And this . . ." He lowered his mouth to claim the lush flesh, his tongue flicking out to taste, to tantalize, to torment.

Startled by the raw hunger that curled inside her, Lauren moaned, and with one hand clutched blindly at Jason's shoulder. Impossibly, his caresses became
more gentle
. His warm mouth pulled at the aching nipple, then pressed
featherlight
kisses on the tight bud, alternating with slow, sensuous licks of his rough, wet tongue, while his hand reached up to attend her other breast with a plucking motion of his fingers.

Lauren shuddered at the fierce pleasure he was arousing in her, a sensation like liquid heat gathering between her thighs. Jason's response was a low, hungry growl deep in his throat.

After a moment he lifted his head, letting his gaze rake Lauren's flushed face. "I want you, sweetheart," he whispered hoarsely. "I ache with wanting you."

He bent again, his mouth trailing hot, nibbling kisses along her throat as he reached down to slowly raise Lauren's gown to her hips, baring the secrets of her femininity. His warm fingers spread over her silken thigh, skimming upward, caressing the shivering flesh. "Yes, I want you. I want you hot and lusting . . . for me . . . only for me."

When he found his mark, the moist, yielding cleft, his sharp inhalation was audible. "I haven't even begun and already you're burning for me."

Lauren closed her eyes as his fingers began to move, desire running like fire in her veins. "Please . . ." she whimpered, not even knowing what she was pleading for.

"That's it," he urged, his slow, sensuous stroking driving her into a mindless frenzy. "Moan for me, sweetheart. Go wild for me."

She arched wantonly, straining against his hand as she tried to ease the throbbing, pulsing ache between her thighs. Her flesh was burning. Her skin was on fire. Her nostrils were filled with Jason's heat, with the musky, sensual scent of him.

She let her head fall back in surrender, her breath coming in soft pants as she gave herself over to the wild, heated dimness. Through a haze of desire, she could sense Jason watching her, could sense his hot gaze fixed on her face as he sent her flaring passion nearly out of control. Yet he seemed to know just when she could no longer stand his tender torment. His burning gaze remained on her face as he unbuttoned his breeches and freed his swollen, rigid hardness. He let his weight fall forward, pressing Lauren back, his aroused flesh burning her thigh, probing, seeking entrance.

She could have stopped him. In that brief moment when their eyes clashed, she read a question in the blazing azure of his gaze. But she didn't want to stop him. That was what terrified her; this feeling of being swept out of control. It was as if she had been craving this for years, as if desire had been building inside her for four years, stoked by her dreams and her memories. Every dream, every fantasy, every feeling of suppressed desire had been leading up to this moment.

She closed her eyes, reaching up to twine her fingers in his thick, sun-gilded hair. Jason instantly recognized her surrender. His hands slid under her hips as he lifted her, then pressed into her slowly, powerfully, entering her in continuing thrusts that filled her completely.

He held himself still then, poised above her, sheathed within her, as he gazed down at her beautiful, flushed face. Lauren's eyes were closed, her lips slightly parted as her breath came in ragged gasps. Jason's doubts about her innocence, his concerns for her vulnerability, were forgotten. "Look at me, Lauren," he ordered raggedly. "Damn it, look at me and know who
is loving
you."

She heard his voice through the flame-shot darkness, and her amber-flecked eyes flew open. She stared up at him, mesmerized by the intense, burning desire in his blue gaze. Slowly Jason began to move inside her, arousing her, making her body quiver in response. Her hips arched instinctively, her body welcoming his thrusts, his hard, pulsating fullness.

"God, four years . . ." she heard him rasp, and she wound her long legs about his waist. Abruptly, his movements became more urgent. His arms closed fiercely around her waist, his
taut body quivering with the effort of maintaining control as he groaned and buried his face and mouth in her shoulder.

Lauren clung to him, her fingers digging into the corded muscles of his arms as he took her with savage intensity. She was filled with his incredible hardness, sobbing with the sweet, sweet pain of it. Waves of pleasure washed over her again and again, lifting her up with their ever-increasing swells as Jason possessed her. The waves grew to gigantic proportions. She was drowning, drowning in a stormy sea, pitched and tossed by churning waves.

She sobbed, clutching him as his powerful body went rigid. He contracted, straining with hungry violence, and she plunged down, deep, deep, deep. . . . The sea erupted, sending violent surges crashing through her body as he poured himself into her.

The devastating shocks pummeled Jason as well. Shaken by one last, brutal shudder, he collapsed upon Lauren, his face buried in the damp hollows of her throat, his breathing harsh and ragged as the last vestiges of passion drained from his body.

Lauren lay beneath him, unmoving, vaguely aware that it was over. Jason's hard, muscular length was sprawled heavily on her, his weight only partially supported by his arms. Her breasts rose and fell slowly as she inhaled the sensual, sweat- dampened scent of him. The ragged sound of his breathing was loud in her ear.