Ghost Talker (4 page)

The scent of him, the denim and leather he wore, the hint of soap from his last shower, his underlying smell of plains and prairie grass, had her wrapping her arms around him. Zach.

Best of all, the
feel
of him, the hardness of his wide chest flattening her breasts, his hips angling into her, proving he wanted her as much as she wanted him. Her core dampened and she lifted a leg to move her own needy sex against his and rub.

He gasped, taking some of her breath, and pulled away, shaking his head as if to clear his mind. “God, Clare. God, I need you.”

She swept her tongue over her lips, enjoying his lingering taste. “Yes, and right now.”

His cane had fallen to the floor. She picked it up, gave it to him, took his hand, and hauled him to the tiny elevator, making sure he had no time to think of being manly and taking slow steps up the wide stairs. For some reason, he didn't like the elevator.

She closed the gate, then the outer door, pushed the button, and turned to get busy—though he'd nibbled at the side of her neck and sent sizzles of lust down her nerves. As she turned, she swept her hands under his jacket and pushed it off him. The gun in his shoulder holster didn't give her a jolt anymore, it was simply a part of Zach. Her fingers worked fast on his shirt buttons, flicking them open, sliding her nails down his muscular chest to the next button. She liked his warm panting breaths that stirred the hair near her temples.

Liked it better when he undid the large buttons of her jacket and put his hands over her breasts, circling her nipples with his fingertips. Her turn to pant.

The elevator stopped and she whirled to open the doors. He crowded into her, making sure she felt his thick erection against her backside. Yes, yes, indeed her body readied for him. Her inner muscles clenched in anticipation, needing the man inside her. A wave of heat spread through her from her center out. She fumbled at the gate opening and he pushed it aside, then he stripped her jacket from her and tossed it down, but she still burned.

She opened the outer door and he moved even closer, his body radiating heat. His hands clamped around her upper arms and he lifted her, moved her across the small threshold of the elevator. “God, Clare, I wish I could carry you to bed!” His hands dropped away and she bolted from the elevator toward the bed and stopped after two strides so she wouldn't outpace him. Together, they had to do this together, a portion of her brain insisted.

“It doesn't matter.” She reached and grabbed his free hand.

“I want to hold you. All of you.”

“You will. Better, you'll be inside me.”

He groaned, took his hand from her fingers to curve it over her butt, nudge her. “Faster, woman.” She moved her
bottom back and his fingers almost touched where she wanted, but her jeans felt hot and tight and she yanked at the snap and zipper as she rushed to the bed, then stopped for a half step and dragged her thin cashmere sweater over her head, dropped it. Leaving a trail of clothes on the floor, even inside the elevator, because she was so hot to have sex. Incredible. And fabulous.

When her knees rammed into the pillow-top mattress, she halted and dragged off her bra, let it fall from her fingers. Her breasts felt swollen, her nipples had tightened into hard buds, ultra-sensitive and needing Zach's touch.

All of her needed Zach's touch. Her body yearned for his, her spirit for the joining to come, the pleasure and the ecstasy shared. Shimmying out of her jeans and panties, she stepped out of the folds of them and turned—only to be stopped by Zach's hands on her shoulders and faced front.

“You're lookin' good.” Zach's voice was thick and rough, with that trace of native Colorado accent.

His fingers trailed from her hairline at the nape of her neck down her back and between her bottom cheeks. She angled forward.

“That's it,” he said. “My woman, naked for me.”

The sensual jolt from his words raised her temperature.

So she lowered her torso to the bed. The raw, nubby silk of the bedspread chafed against her nipples, her feet slid back against the area rug, and Zach stepped between her legs, widening them. The rough denim of his jeans against her calves, then her inner thighs, made her gasp with excitement.

In the intense quiet, she heard the unsnapping of his jeans, the slow and careful lowering of his zipper.

Her heart beat faster in anticipation, waiting, waiting. She'd never played sex games like this before, and thrills ran along the surface of her skin.

Without another word, Zach's big hands went around her hips, lifted her. Angled her for penetration. She heard nothing but the blood pounding through her.

Slowly, slowly enough that her fingers clenched around fabric and a whimper of sexual longing escaped her, he set himself at the entrance of her body, pressed.

“Zach.” This whimper, his name.

“Yeah, I like hearing your need,” he said, his voice low and guttural.

He entered her. Not much, but sending incredible shocks of sensation through her, she was so concentrated on him and what he was doing.

“You're wet, good,” he said, then slid all the way in. “So good.”

She thought so, too. Or didn't think, only felt. His shaft seated in her, his hands around her hips, the denim of his jeans against her tender thighs, her nipples pressed to the silk, all combined to send igniting sparks of sheer pleasure through her.

“And now . . .” he muttered and began to move, gradually pulling himself from her until she cried out with the loss of him, then another far-too-deliberate thrust into her. Only his hands and his sex touched her, and she'd never been so aroused in her life.

He slid inch-by-inch into her. She gasped. Then he withdrew. Smoothly gliding.

Only three times before the orgasm hit hard, flung her into darkness and diamond-bright shooting stars.

“Wait,” Zach gasped. “Wait.”

She barely heard him as she floated down from her orgasm, soft and drifting like a feather.

“I can't see your face well. Gotta see your face when you come. Must.” He drew back and out of her and left with all his hot tenderness, and a soft cry of loss escaped her. Then his hands were at her hips again, and he rolled her over.

Her gaze latched on to his strained face and glittering eyes. His nostrils widened as he stared at her. She glanced down to see upthrust nipples. Her legs had fallen apart and she knew her sex glistened with her own moisture.

Then she stared at him, his shirt open and hanging—she'd done that, right? She could barely remember, but what she saw of his chest, taut and lightly haired, was prime. So were his tight abs, and . . . his sex . . . proudly jutting, thick, fascinating . . . throbbing. Her mouth dried, and the walls of her own sex clenched with anticipation, again and again.

“Gotta be in you. Right now.” He moved and the shadow of him—so dark and substantial, so solid and
human
moved toward her, loomed over her. Then he plunged inside her again and warm pulsing enveloped her, expanded from her heart and blood and breath, and mingled with the lunge, thrust, pant of him so the thick dark around them vibrated like a struck drum.

Shot her into another orgasm. Glorious pleasure.

She
screamed
her ecstasy as she clamped around Zach, arms, legs . . . cock. Only he existed as she fell through a universe of fireworks, all bursting inside of her, sinking into skin and muscle and down to marrow.

Zach's groan came strangled as he powered into her with one last thrust. They rocked together, then he relaxed atop her.

When her mind settled, she realized that she'd completely lost control during sex for the first time ever.

Zach had overcome her thinking with bodily sensations before, but she hadn't given her entire being up to sex . . . to loving . . . This time she had. This time she'd reveled in her physicality.

Because she felt safe and secure with him, and trusted him more than any other lover, probably more than any other person in her life.

She brushed away the sense of vulnerability. Zach wouldn't let her down, just as she would never let him down. She loved him.

But she didn't say the words.

Neither of them had repeated those words to each other since that crystal moment in the clear and cleansed mountain morning two days ago. That didn't matter. Yet.

Zach groaned, and she blinked since it didn't seem like his regular after-orgasm groan. Deeper, like it emanated from his innermost being. She liked the idea, and when she could move her limp arms, she lifted them to slide her hands under his shirt and stroke his back.

A chuckle got caught in her throat. She was completely naked and he partially clothed. She liked the contrast.
Concentrating, she felt the smooth linen of his shirt, though his jeans, farther down his body, were no longer in reach of her hands.

She wondered idly if she'd damaged the bedspread when she'd clenched it with her fists. She hoped she hadn't poked holes through the expensive fabric with her fingernails. She liked the looks of the antique spread on her bed, but perhaps she could find something nearly as nice and tougher at a lower cost.

“Clare,” Zach said thickly, and moved within her, and her mind misted again.

He rolled over, but took her with him so she lay atop him. She set her head just under his chin, smelled the sweat of him, felt the thin dampness of his perspiration that held his essential fragrance that continued to arouse her.

“Zach,” she whispered back, and rubbed her body against him just once for the supreme pleasure of it and a few tingly aftershocks. Nice.

His arms tightened around her, then fell away. “Never like this before. Not with any woman.”

Her heart clutched in her chest and huge emotion wrapped around it. “Not . . . not for me either,” she stuttered. He made not only her words stutter but her thoughts. No, she'd never had a better lover, in all senses of the term.

In fact, that was an understatement. She'd usually stayed in her own mind and thinking, with a brief cessation during the instants of orgasm, then gone right back to her rational self.

So she petted him, and kept her mind blank—or occupied only with the thoughts of her lover, the shape of his body, the tickle of his hair, the completeness she experienced with him.

They held each other. Cherishing each other—at least that's how Clare felt. They'd nearly died a couple of days ago. And they'd spoken of love in Creede. But not on the plane back, or the two nights since. That situation had been so intense and fraught, she had pulled back a little from the sharp edge of needy emotion.

In the moments of drowsiness as sleep crept over her, as he wrapped his arms around her and brought her closer, she hoped his actions spoke louder than the words he didn't say either.

*   *   *

Zach could almost feel Clare's busy mind quiet as her body, already relaxed from sex, slid close to sleep. Tucked around her from the back, he smiled. Always a challenge to turn her mind off during sex.

The antique mantel clock on her equally old and expensive dresser chimed the quarter hour. It had taken him a while to adjust to those damn quarterly chimes and the strokes on the hour, but now he only noticed them if silence filled the room.

Early for them to fall asleep, but Zach figured every time a new project—and ghost—arrived for Clare to handle, it stressed his lover out. Texas Jack Omohundro seemed like a nice, easygoing guy, as phantoms went, not like that evil spook they'd just put down—but that poltergeist was another matter.

And Zach let his smile widen. Yeah, he'd liked the mental and physical stimulation of the last dangerous case, the adrenaline rush, didn't even mind his life being on the line, though he sure hadn't liked Clare being endangered. An easy ghost would be good for her, though the way the modern phantom threw around rocks that could bean a person in the head and kill them concerned Zach. He'd always want to minimize the risk to Clare. The gut twisting he'd gone through when
she'd fought that nasty spook sure hadn't been pleasant.

Clare snuffled and Zach closed his eyes, loosened his arms that had tightened around her at the thought of losing her. No, he
wouldn't
think of losing her. Couldn't think of that and remain sane.

He let out a long breath. Clare. He wasn't going to say “I love you” first again. Let her do that. It bothered him a little, that those particular words didn't flow back and forth easily between them. Even with his parents' wretched marriage, he'd heard his father tell his mother that he loved her every day . . . while Zach's brother Jim had been alive. It had been a boon and a support for her as a military wife.

But those words, when Jim died, had crumbled like the rest of their family life.

God knew the general never told his wife he loved her anymore. Never visited the outpatient mental health facility in Boulder where Geneva Slade lived. Never even sent a bouquet of flowers or a candy sampler box for her birthday. And now stupid irritation seethed inside Zach and he had to loosen his jaw because he'd gritted his teeth. Love, death, family. Basic experiences that could screw you up.

Enough angst about his mother and his parents. Their love had turned to ashes, their marriage fallen apart. He needed to focus on his relationship with Clare, all the passion and promise of it.

So neither he nor Clare had repeated the love words. So what? They had plenty of time. He
wouldn't
let the lack annoy him. Besides, showing their love meant more than her saying words telling him.

Here in bed—well, also in the shower and on the couch, though God save him from the elevator—she responded to his lovemaking. And out of bed, she showed tenderness. Like he did. Clare
did
love him.

A chime for the half hour, and the house remained quiet, no cars on the street outside the French doors leading to the balcony. The air in the room smelled a little floral, a bit musky, like both perfumes Clare used. He bent his head to sniff the floral shampoo of her hair, got a whiff of sex that put the smile back on his face.