Once Upon a Rose (26 page)

“You know what I would like?” she whispered fiercely into that strong joining of his neck and shoulder. “To make love to you when you’ve just left the rose fields, when you smell of them all over and I can follow the scent all over your body.”

His eyes closed, his expression strained, as he moved inside her in one long thrust.

“And then you could leave the scent of them all over
my
body,” she breathed, enraptured with this vision.

“Oh,
bordel
,” he said. “You’re—you—be quiet. Let me concentrate.”

“On this?” she asked innocently, arching her body and squeezing. “Or this?” She slipped under her legs to cup him.

His breath hissed. His eyes opened, and he stared down at her, as he pulled slowly almost out and slid deep again. “On all of it. On every single second.”

That intense gaze speared her, held her, almost as deeply as his body did. She stared back up at him, caught—by that sensual lower lip, by the upper one that couldn’t get the lower one to behave, by those long lashes that so passionately defied the strong, stubborn bones of his face, by those dark eyebrows drawn together. By the hard, bronze body, by the gauze that showed that he could be hurt, too, by the dark hair on his chest and the way his stomach muscles flexed with each movement of his hips. The way that movement into her body rippled out all through her. “You are so gorgeous,” she breathed wonderingly.

“Bouclettes
.
” His eyes tightened closed again and he turned his head away, hips surging. “Please don’t—not now.”

“I can’t help it,” she whispered. “You really are.”

“Hell,” he muttered, cupping one hand under her butt to pull her in tighter to him as he braced with his wounded arm.

“And you feel so good inside me,” she confessed. “Can we do this again sometime?”

“Oh,
merde
.” His hand hardened on her butt, his movements growing stronger, faster. “Bouclettes
. Yes.
Now will you please shut up and let me get it right this time?”

“You already got it right.” She rubbed him, flexing her hand gently as she tightened all her inner muscles as hard as she could. “Now you should just focus on having fun.”

He opened his eyes again and gazed down at her, shaking his head wonderingly. “Fun?”

She flopped back on the bed, arms spread wide. “Fun. Yes. Here I am. I dare you. Have all the fun with me that you can.”

“Oh,
bon sang
.” His body shuddered. “You don’t know what that
does
to me. You look so—so—”

“Do it,” she whispered. She cupped her own breasts, pressing them together and up, an offering. “Do it.
Do it.
”

“
Merde.
” He bent and kissed her as his body began to move faster and harder.

“Yeah,” she breathed wickedly and bit his lip. “Oh, yeah. Like that.”

“
Merde
, Layla, please—”

“Yeah.” She squeezed. “Harder. Faster.”

“Shut
up
—” He was losing himself in his own movement, his eyes going blind.

“Oh, yeah.
I love the way you feel.
”

“Oh,
bordel
.” Big arms engulfed her, wrapped her in tight, tight, tight, into his body, into his strength and darkness, as he growled hard and low as he came.

Layla wrapped her arms tight around him and held on, so pleased with herself that the only thing she could do was grin like a cat in cream. She was still beaming later when he came back from the bathroom and slipped into bed beside her. He tried his best not to take over the narrow space, but the whole mattress dipped toward his weight, tumbling her body against him. He propped himself on his side to gaze down at her, his face oddly solemn, one hand framing her face, stroking back curls. She smiled and curled on top of his body to leave room for him on the mattress, draping her arm over his chest as he tucked her in close. Still smiling, she nuzzled her face into his chest, falling gently into a dream of roses.

Calm down.
Matt rubbed a grimy hand on his T-shirt, over the left side of his chest.
You’ll be all right.

In the quiet gray of early dawn, his hands sank again into dirt, digging up the old fountain’s pump. He might have to follow the old buried wood pipes up into the hills to solve this particular problem, but he was hoping the failure of the fountain really lay in the modern pump someone had installed in the fifties or sixties to add a decorative lion fountain here to the old system for bringing water to the houses above the valley.

The moist, old scent of fountain earth rose around him, and a little movement in the doorway onto the patio lifted his head.

Layla leaned sleepily against the doorjamb, barefoot, in soft knit yoga pants and a gray hoodie, her hands in her pockets, her head resting against the doorjamb, too, as if those curls were too heavy at this hour for her to hold them up.

And his heart did ease, at the sight of her, as if something as soft as her bare footfalls had brushed across it. He sat back on his heels, rubbing his dirty hands against his jeans automatically. Maybe his hands wanted to make themselves a little more eligible to touch someone if the opportunity arose.

“It’s official,” she murmured. “Our sleep schedules are not compatible.”

“Is that a big deal?” Matt asked warily. His last girlfriend had made everything a big deal. Casual friendliness to another woman. Not noticing if she painted her toenails. Taking a deep breath. Of course, she’d been famous, and famous women obviously weren’t for him. He couldn’t handle the narcissism. Layla, in contrast, was so down-to-earth and human, his girl next door.

Layla gave a dreamy shrug, as if she was barely awake, and smiled at him. “Thanks for the rose.” Her voice was almost a whisper, this husky blend with the softness of dawn.

He flushed a little. Him and his stupid roses. Why he had to go leave one on the pillow beside her, he did not know.

“I put it in the vase,” she said.

Had she? Taken care of it just like the others? He bent his head, trying to focus on the pump while his mouth kept wanting to curve ridiculously.

“What are you doing?”

“I’ve been meaning to fix this fountain,” he said.

That smile she sometimes had for him made him feel so confusedly and vulnerably happy, as if he was a teddy-bear she was about to pick up and squeeze. He had never in his life felt very squeezable before.

“And that’s the only thing you could think to do at—what is it, five in the morning?” she said.

“I was afraid working on your showerhead or your car would wake you up.” He rubbed his hands on his jeans again, really wishing he could get more of that dirt off. “And I didn’t want to get too far away.”

Her sleepy smile made him feel as if she was stroking him everywhere—long, generous strokes. He looked down at the pump again, scared to take a deep breath in case it accidentally overfilled his body and all those emotions pressing up in him exploded. “And nothing other than fixing something occurred to you, at this hour of the morning?”

He shoved a dirty hand through his hair, confused about what she wanted from him. “It’s my valley,” he tried to explain.

Her smile broke into something radiant.

He stared at it. “And…I don’t really fit in your bed. I was making you uncomfortable.” He’d been afraid to fall asleep, in case he rolled over and knocked her out of bed. Or snored. Or sweated, with her hot body smashed up against his like that. Or did, really, anything a big male body in a tiny bed could come up with to do to make the woman in it crinkle her nose and wish he was elsewhere.

She rubbed her shoulder, still smiling. “I do have a crick in my neck.”

His gaze zeroed in on her rubbing. His palms itched. He could rub there better than she could. He rose, then remembered how dirty his hands were.

“I bet your bed is a lot bigger.”

It was, yes. And it was
his
bed. She’d fit perfectly in it.

She blinked heavy, smiling eyes up at him. “I don’t suppose that offer’s still open?”

He couldn’t remember what she was talking about, so he played it safe. “All my offers to you are still open.” To take care of her, to make sure she didn’t get lost, to fix her shower…oh, shit, as long as she didn’t mean that offer to buy this house back. Could they not talk about kicking her out of this valley this morning?

“To carry me,” she whispered, lifting her arms to him. “Through the roses to your house. I’d like that so much.”

Of all his offers, it seemed by far the least practical. But then again, she
was
a musician. He lifted her, and her weight felt just right in his arms—something he could carry, but heavy enough that he knew she was worth the effort.

“Sorry,” he muttered, as he saw his hands against her gray hoodie and yoga pants. “I’m getting you dirty.”

“They’ll wash.” She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Am I hurting your arm?”

He shook his head. Nobody ever worried about whether he could take a little pain. With the five wild cousins, all of their elders had assumed they would tough it up when they got hurt. Sometimes, he had vague, sweet memories of his own mother’s tenderness, but it was so long ago, and he’d been so young, that maybe he’d just dreamed those memories up.

“I’m pretty tough,” he mentioned. He didn’t usually have to point that out to people.

Her arms tightened around his neck as she tried to lift her weight off his arms. “Oh, no, I am?”

He tightened his hold. “The cut’s on the outside, Bouclettes
.
I told you. I’m fine.”

She searched his face, her arms still holding her weight off his.

He jostled her body gently. “I’m fine.”

She relaxed slowly, watching his face, and as he failed to flinch, she slowly curled back into his chest, easing back toward that dreamy, sleepy state.

So he carried her between those last two rows of roses, from the house she’d stolen from him to his, in the soft dawn. She mostly snuggled into him, but once she stretched out an arm and let it trail over the rose petals, still wet with dew. When she brought her hand back, she drew the dew droplets down his cheek, a cool freshness against his morning stubble.

And she did fit absolutely perfectly in his bed. By the time he came back from washing his hands, she was already nearly asleep again, all the honey shades of her nestled into his white sheets. He sat on the edge of the bed, sneaking a caress of her hair and shoulder. Her eyes blinked open, and she reached for him, pulling him down with her and kissing his chest, her hands running with this dreamy softness over his arms, down to his wrists.

“I think you’re in my dreams,” she whispered.

He leaned over her, on a surge of hungry pleasure at the way his body now caged hers in his big bed. “What do you want me to do in your dreams?”

A sleepy, sleepy smile, as her lashes fell against her cheeks and her face lifted to him. “Growl like that,” she murmured. “And do whatever you want.”

So…he did.

***

It was going to be a tough day. Having to deal with rough men, and machines, and his grandfather, and probably his cousins, with all his shields torn wide open like that, so that anyone could see all his vulnerable spots at the slightest glance. Matt had to dig his hands into his back pockets to keep from folding his arms over those vulnerable spots so that he could at least cover them with
something.

“I’ve got to go,” he told Layla. “I need to get the crews started.”

She nodded, dipping her Nutella-spread baguette in her milk and nibbling on it, a little chocolate smear on her upper lip.

“Are you coming down later?”

“I think I’ll go see Tante Colette,” she said, maybe adopting the use of “aunt” because she didn’t know quite what else she should be calling her adoptive great-grandmother. “I’d like to get to know her better.”

A smile eased his mouth involuntarily, and all his exposed insides felt just a little safer to be revealed like that. She really was just a profoundly nice, decent person, wasn’t she? Interested in and respectful of her elders and kind to rough men who growled at her.

“Don’t lock up,” he said. And, in case that needed further explanation: “It’s, ah, my valley.”

Her smile lit her eyes and the whole kitchen, making those slate counters shine. “Nobody would dare steal from you?”

His fingers flexed against his back pockets. “Well. Except for you.”

Her eyes laughed at him. It wasn’t so bad having your heart all exposed with that kind of shimmering laughter falling down over it. That laughter felt so soft and sparkly it was like it belonged in some other life, some magic fairy tale life. It felt soft as rose petals. “You did manage to get me out of that house, didn’t you? First step toward getting it back?”

Oh. She’d misunderstood what he thought she’d stolen. “You’re, ah…welcome to stay here.”
I…I might not mind so much letting you have a piece of my heart, if you’ll take care of it.

She gave him a searching look and then looked back at her baguette and Nutella, and…was she blushing a little bit?

God, it would help so much to fold his arms across his chest right now. But it would shut her out. He dug into his back pockets hard and offered her solid reasons. The things he was good at. “Here, I mean. In this house. My place is a lot more comfortable than Tante Colette’s old house. Fully equipped. Everything works well.”

A little smile on her face and a mischievous sideways glance that skimmed over his torso and lingered on his—crotch?—as if she almost made a joke, but she bit it back, whatever it was, and took a sip of milk.

His arms were going to break in two if he couldn’t fold them across his chest soon.
No,
he snapped at himself.
I’m not going to do it. I’m not growling her away.

Is this all a joke to her? All a game? Did she not understand what I just offered? Or did it just not have that much value to her?
She wouldn’t be the first woman who hadn’t valued who he actually was. “Okay, I’ve got to go.”

She got up suddenly from the stool and crossed to wrap her arms around his middle and press her face against his chest.