Kiss and Tell (25 page)

Jake shifted closer, his hips nudging her thighs apart. His knee bumped the cabinet below. He didn't notice. Needing air, his mouth moved from her mouth to her cheek, to her eyes, to her cheek again. The soft fleshy part of her ear intrigued him. Her body shimmied with desire and her fingers tightened in his hair as he tested the taste and texture of her earlobe with an exploring tongue.

He traced the outer rim, and she moaned low in her throat. The low
hmmm
she made that drove him wild. Jake dampened deeper, letting his tongue imitate the love act until she arched and dug her nails into his scalp to pull his head up and away from her ear.

"Kiss me, dammit!" she demanded, then let out a little yelp when he did just that and crushed her mouth beneath his. She responded to his urgency with an instantaneous fierceness of her own. Sliding her hips to the very edge of the counter, she tightened her arms around his neck and gave him her tongue and teeth.

He felt the brush of her jean-clad legs as she encircled his waist. He sucked at the sweetness of her mouth. He'd never met a woman like her. Open, honest. Unafraid of her own sensuality. Unafraid to cry when her heart was full. Unafraid to show how she felt, even at the risk of being fatally wounded.

Mouth busy, Jake stroked his hands up along the elegant length of her thighs to the crease where her legs met her torso. Her breath came shallow and fast as he dipped his thumbs to explore her through her jeans.

He reached for her zipper, drawing it down slowly. She sucked in her breath as he brushed her soft curls.

She dragged her mouth from beneath his and looked straight at him with eyes heavy-lidded and filled with promise. By a trick of the light, he saw himself reflected in her dark pupils.

He looked invincible. Whole. Complete.

A trick of the light, all right. A chimera. An optical illusion.

He had to protect her. Even if it was from herself.

But not now. Judas. Not now.

"Make love to me, Jake."

"I am." Words, unspoken, unthinkable, eddied through his brain like ground fog on a summer's day.

He lifted her off the counter. Her legs automatically tightened around his waist and her arms about his neck.

"Your shoulder—"

"Is fine."

He carried her around the foot of the bed and set her down beside the shower stall.

Holding her gaze, he slowly unbuttoned the remaining buttons on her shirt. His knuckles brushed the eager peaks of her bare breasts. She'd been in too much of a hurry to save his ass to put on a bra.

He sank to his knees in front of her and buried his face against the soft vee of flesh exposed by her open zipper. He traced a lazy line down from her navel with his tongue, and she buried her fingers in his hair, holding his head against her.

He tsked. "No underwear?"

"I was in a hurry."

Jake palmed her jeans down her hips, over her legs. She stepped out of them, leaving a puddle of fabric on the floor at her feet.

"So," he breathed against the pale curls exposed, "am I."

She was sweetly wet, musky-scented, irresistible. His thumb lightly brushed the sensitive nub between her legs, and he pressed his mouth intimately against her.

"Um...Jake? Wait. I've never...I'm not sure..."

"Want me to stop?" He nudged her legs a little farther apart. She wobbled, holding on to his hair for balance. He cupped her ass cheeks and buried his face against her soft belly.

"No...yes...noooo..."

He found the spot.

She fisted her hands in his hair and hummed the sexy sound that he loved deep in her throat. He tasted her, savored her, slowly, carefully drawing out her pleasure with painstaking care and attention to detail until she was gasping and breathing hard. He held her still and felt her body vibrate with pleasure.

Knowing that what he was doing was sweet torture, he used his thumb to drive her over the edge. Her body shuddered in fierce response as she came.

He held on to her, reveling in her release, aching and hard, but wanting this for her. All for her. She trembled, damp and weak against him.

Finally he rose to his feet, drawing his body up hers, sliding his arms around her as she collapsed in his arms and buried her face in the crook of his neck.

"Yeah?" he asked softly, smoothing a hand down her back.

She nuzzled her face against his chest, limp, satiated. "Mmmm."

Her breasts brushed against him as she lifted her arms up around his neck and stood on tiptoe to reach his mouth. "More," she demanded, licking his lower lip, tasting herself there, then nipping it gently with sharp white teeth.

"You're insatiable," he told her, backing her into the shower stall and reaching for the knob.

She yelped as temperature-controlled water sprayed her back. "You started it."

"Yes." He nudged her under the spray "I did."

Her eyes glazed as he trailed a finger down her cleft. "What abo...ah...the bandage?" Her lids fluttered as he inserted a finger deep inside her.

Jake didn't bother with an answer.

"You're still dressed. Let me...help...you."

Her palms slid down his chest. Using both hands, she tugged at the waistband of his pants. The fabric was tightly molded to his hips and thighs, and the bulge of his erection made her efforts harder. Her fingers slid between fabric and skin. Despite the tight fit, she wedged her hand down until she could curl her fingers around the hard jut of his penis.

Heaven. Hell.

He leaned against the cool tiled wall and bucked as she tormented him. Blue eyes wicked, she alternated feather-light caresses with firmer strokes until Jake had to squeeze his eyes shut with ecstasy and force himself to remain still before he came too soon.

"Open your eyes. Look at me," she demanded, voice husky as she cupped him with soft, clever fingers. "Know who I am."

How could he
not
look at her? Her pale skin gleamed with water. Rivulets trailed down the gentle slopes of her breasts, then quivered on the very tip of each nipple. A shimmering gleam as the water beaded, then slid around the plump underside, and trickled down her midriff sheening her skin.

Nimble fingers found the most sensitive, intimate nerves on his body and played them like a virtuoso. Her blue eyes were hazy with arousal and wickedly playful. Jake groaned as she intensified the pressure.

Afraid he'd lose control, he grasped her wrist, stilling the motion of her hand. "Trust me. I know who you are."

Even to his own ears his voice sounded rough enough to be unrecognizable. Unfamiliar words bubbled like the brew in a witches cauldron from deep in his soul. Hell, yes, he knew who she was.

His hope.

His salvation.

His every frigging wish and dream.

But she deserved better than a potential alcoholic. A man to whom violence was second nature. A man who had a long and ugly past and the promise of a short and futile future.

Hell, he had no business putting his hands anywhere near her soft white skin.

People he lo...cared about died.

"Jake?" Eyes suddenly shadowed, she searched his features.

Jake pushed aside reality and concentrated on the now.

His lips twitched. Her hand was still firmly down the front of his pants.

"You have my attention," he assured her, his smile widening even as he bent the scant few inches needed to crush her mouth beneath his again. The spray poured over them.

He wasn't going to waste one precious moment with her. He wasn't a fool.

Kissing Marnie was like setting a match to TNT. Fire surged through him. Her fingers tightened around him, her hand pressed tightly against his body by the elasticized pants.

He bent his head to settle his mouth against the hard point of her nipple. Her skin was slick and wet, and he wanted to absorb her until she was a part of him. He squeezed his eyes closed as a tremor speared through him.

Her fingers threaded in his hair, holding his head close as he laved the peak with his tongue, then raked it with his teeth. Moaning, she kissed his shoulder, his neck, anyplace she could reach, her short nails biting into his skin.

"Jake, please, oh, please, I'm going to explode. I want you inside me when I do." Her face was flushed and dewy, her mouth ripe and red from his. Her eyes glittered feverishly.

Her internal muscles clamped tight around his fingers as her juices sluiced his hand.

He'd wanted to make her wait. He'd wanted them
both
to wait. To draw it out. To savor every stroke, every touch. But it wasn't to be. Not this time.

Like hers, his breath came ragged and fast. In an ungainly move, Jake wrenched his pants down one-handed. He lifted her against the wall and, with her help, guided himself inside her.

In one thrust he buried deep, taking her strangled cry into his mouth as her nails gouged his back. Hot water sluiced down against his back as he kissed her mouth with a savage, primal passion.

He was starving for the taste of her. He could never get enough. He wanted to imprint her onto his cells, to sear the memory of himself into her brain so she'd never forget him.

It felt incredible to be buried deep inside her. Teeth gritted, attuned now to her body, Jake kept the rhythm steady, wanting to drive her wild. Her head dropped back, the muscles in her throat taut; her breasts rose and fell with her rapid breathing.

The satin of her thighs gripped his waist, and her fingers dug into his shoulders. She shuddered as he caressed her bare breasts with his chest hair, then cupped her breast firmly while flicking her distended nipple with his thumb.

"Beast," she gasped as he squeezed harder, maintaining his control, pushing her beyond pleasure. "I can't stand this." Her muscles tightened around him. Her skin glowed, rosy and damp, as she met him thrust for thrust. His fierce little warrior.

He wanted her stretched taut on the rack of passion. Wanted her mad with lust. Wanted her crying his name as she came. Judas, He wanted—

This. Only this.

Once, twice, again. Over and over, he drove deep and true, each thrust more powerful, a little faster than the last.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Her orgasms came, one after the other, with such force she cried out his name and held on to him tightly, her body shaking with aftershocks, her damp face buried against his throat.

With a guttural groan, Jake followed suit, spasming as her internal muscles clenched to keep him inside her.

They remained as they were, water cascading over them, while their breath eased to normal.

"Hmmm." Marnie nibbled his shoulder, then looked up and gave him a sleepy smile. "You taste salty."

He handed her the soap with a wicked smile.

Her heels dug into his butt as she tightened her legs around his waist. "Can't we stay like this forever?"

Jake chuckled. "With you attached to me and beautifully naked, and me with my pants around my ankles?"

"You could always take your pants off," Marnie suggested, nibbling at his neck. "Hmmm. I love the feel of you growing inside me like this."

He thought of something else that could be growing inside her.

"I couldn't pull out in time." His voice sounded one hell of a lot calmer than he felt. God. The thought of her round with his child—

Then a knee-jerk reaction.

No.

Not just no, but
hell, no
.

His skin felt clammy as he looked at her. "What will you do if you're pregnant when this is over?"

She lifted her mouth from his throat to look at him. "I'll have a baby," she said calmly.

"Just like that?"

"Just like that." She smiled. "A baby who looks just like my spy king of the universe. I'd consider myself lucky."

"Judas, woman." Jake rested his forehead against hers. "You're a menace, you know that?"

Reluctantly he disengaged from her slick warmth. She clung to his arms for balance as her feet found purchase on the tile floor. She gave him a hot, sultry look. "Hand me that soap, Spy King, and let an artist show you a little finger painting."

He was going to have to protect her from himself.

But who the hell was going to protect him from her?

*

Too tired to move, Marnie rested her chin on her hand which lay flat on his still damp chest. "Lights off. Eighty percent." The lights immediately dimmed.

"You're getting good at this," Jake said lazily, stroking her back.

She smiled. "Having my wicked way with you?"

"That too." His lips quirked. Almost a smile.

She loved the steady thud of his heart beneath her fingertips and the way his long dark hair fell across his cheek.

His eyes appeared fathomless as he watched her. But they also looked achingly haunted. Jake never quite relaxed. Even after making love, despite lying absolutely still, she felt unleashed energy surging through him.

It was as if, even while in repose, his mind leapt from scenario to scenario. Problem to solution. Question to answer. Although his body lay beside her, his mind was up there, searching for the answers he needed so he could once again find the man responsible for his friend's death.

And even while her body felt limp and sated from their lovemaking, her soul yearned to heal his unseen wounds. The wounds and scars he carried on the inside like badges of honor.

She couldn't imagine living as he did. Never knowing who was friend or foe. Always having to be prepared to fight or die. Not trusting anyone. Not allowing people to get close to him after the deaths of his friends.

And his lover, Marnie thought bitterly.

The woman he'd taken a chance on loving. The woman who'd thrown that love back in his face and added another layer of mistrust to his wounded heart.

She pressed her cheek against his shoulder and tightened her arm across his taut belly, wishing to comfort him for things way out of her realm of understanding, but needing,
wanting
to heal him. She lightly ran her hand up his chest, to his neck.

He caught her hand and splayed his own beneath it. Dark to light. Large to small. Rough to smooth. He inspected her fingers and short nails and ran his thumb along a long faint scar on her wrist. "How'd you get this?" he asked lazily.