Tasting Fear (41 page)

Her eyes followed his hand. There were several pools, sunken into the huge, flat gray rocks of the riverbank. They were surrounded by the nodding yellow flowers and mint. The last rays of sun that still managed to slant into the river canyon lit up the water, the multicolored pebbles, and the glittering sand. Faint curls of steam rose from the water. The river rushed noisily by a few yards away.

He watched her face, intently. “Like it?”

She looked around, enchanted. “Oh, my God. It’s superb.”

Her delight was shattered when she realized that Jack had stripped off his shirt and was unbuckling his belt. Oh, God. Jack Kendrick fully clothed was already too much voltage for her circuits to handle. Jack Kendrick naked would blow her fuses to hell and gone.

“Hey, you! Just wait a damn second!” she said sharply.

His hands stopped on his waistband. “Yeah?”

“Are you wearing swimming trunks?” she demanded.

“No.” He waited patiently as she processed this.

“I’m not comfortable with that,” she said. “Things are already funny between us. I’d rather not, uh…”

“See me stark naked,” he finished.

She blew out a sharp, nervous sigh. “Right on, buddy.”

“Do you want me to leave? Can you find your way back alone?”

Ow. That would be so flat. So blah. She did not want him to leave.

Damn, she didn’t know what she wanted. She wanted the world to be different. She wanted him to be different. She wanted…aw, shit.

She just wanted him to want her. Her, Vivi D’Onofrio. The whole damn tattooed, itinerant, sexpot, complicated, prickly package.

That was too extravagant a thing to hope for. Besides being way too soon. For Pete’s sake, she’d just met the guy the day before. She just had so much intense, scary emotion about sex backed up in her system. After six years of celibacy anyone would be climbing the freaking walls. She had Brian Wilder to thank for that, too. The jerk.

“No, don’t leave,” she murmured, abashed. “Can’t you just, um, keep your underwear on?”

His lips twitched, making her feel foolish and prissy. “Yeah, whatever,” he said. “If it really bothers you.”

He pulled off his jeans. He was wearing white briefs. The muscles in his torso were finger-licking delicious. Luxurious curling dark hair tapered down to his belly and turned into a furry mat that disappeared into those briefs. Narrow hips, powerful thighs. She might not survive this visual sensory experience even if he did keep his briefs on.

He stepped into the water, descending until he sat in the pool cross-legged, clouds of glittering sand wafting up from the bottom to swirl and turn in the water, glinting in the sunlight. The water reached to his collarbone. He leaned against the rim of the pool and closed his eyes. A nice show of delicacy, while she undressed. He was in perfect gentleman mode now—but she knew his tricks. If she relaxed and let down her guard for one instant, he’d turn on her for sure.

She pulled off her jeans and T-shirt, wishing her bathing suit were less thin and worn, and stepped into the water. Deliciously hot. Like an enormous, full-body kiss. A sprig of mint dangled over her shoulder, brushing her cheek. She was blushing furiously.

“Why are you blushing?” His voice was silky, amused.

“The water is hot,” she snapped. “And how did you know that with your eyes closed, anyway? That’s sneaky.”

He smiled briefly and made no reply.

They sat there, listening to the river rushing by, for a very long time. He kept his eyes closed, until it felt as if he were hiding from her.

She wanted to make him reveal something about himself. She’d bared her soul in the restaurant the night before. He owed her some freaking personal history, too. “So. Nudity doesn’t embarrass you?”

“I grew up around people who weren’t embarrassed about it,” he said. “The sexual revolution. Let it all hang out.”

Interesting factoid, that. Vivi pinched off a mint leaf and chewed it, letting the fresh, clean flavor clear her head. Jack dunked his head under the water and smoothed his hair back from his square forehead, and she noticed once again the white streak of the scar that disappeared into his hairline. “How’d you get that scar?”

He didn’t open his eyes. “Long story.”

“I’m not in a hurry,” she said.

His forehead contracted, and then he wiped his face clean of expression once again. “Another time.”

She plucked another mint sprig. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to pry.”

“It’s okay. Talk all you want. Just don’t expect me to be scintillating when I respond. Or even coherent.”

“Why? Is something wrong?”

He opened his eyes, and looked at her, with that bright, clear timber wolf gaze that made shivers of delicious terror race through her.

“I can’t concentrate,” he said. “I can barely hear you talk. All I can hear is my own heart pounding.”

The flat statement hung between them. The force of his gaze burned against her face. She closed her eyes, counted to ten.

She opened them, and gazed at him. A lock of hair was clinging to his forehead. A drop of water rolled down his cheek. Vivi leaned forward and touched it with her fingertip. His face was so hot, his skin so resiliant, velvety.

He caught her wrist in his hand and pulled. She floated effortlessly, inevitably closer to him. For a few breathless moments, they were face-to-face, staring at each other. Her breasts brushed his chest. He touched her lips. Slid his finger into her hair. Kissed her, hungrily.

She went nuts in his arms. An explosion of emotions, sensations, bursting into being from deep inside. Achingly sweet, and tinged with desperation, and something fierce, like anger, but brighter, hungrier. Twisting, twining, growing. She wound her arms around his neck and hung on, digging her fingers into those thick muscles.

He drew back for a moment, his eyes dilated and full of wonder. “You taste like mint,” he said huskily, and then that huge vortex sucked them right back into another desperate, twining kiss.

Oh, wow. He was outrageously beautiful close up. His eyes, the incredible length of his wet black eyelashes. Water drops trickling along the crest of the graceful, angled sweep of his eyebrows.

His lips were hot and soft, as wonderful and kissable as she had imagined, and his breath tasted so sweet. His skin was so supple and beautiful, with that delicate rasp of new beard shadow over strong, graceful bones, over chiseled manly angles. God. So fine.

She was charged with emotion. She explored his muscular back with her fingers, wound her arms around his neck, and opened to his kiss. An opening from somewhere deep inside her, someplace vast and beautiful. A universe of bright, open space.

She barely noticed the shoulder straps of her bathing suit being peeled down. She arched back, abandoning herself to his strong grasp, letting her head fall back and her hair float out in the water like a lily pad. She cried out with pleasure as he hungrily suckled her breasts.

So sweet, so shivering melting hot for him. Her nipples felt like points of glowing light. Her breasts had always felt so deplorably small, insignificant even, but under his hot mouth, they felt plumper, bigger. Swollen with eagerness, alive to pleasure. Her whole chest was melting and soft, as if he drank some magic elixir from her body as he licked her, and the more he took, the more she had to give.

And the breathless aching pull of want between her legs grew keener every moment.

Jack pulled her down onto his lap and slipped his finger under her bottom and into the stretchy fabric of her bathing suit, dragging in a sharp breath to find her slick and hot. He slid the tip of his finger slowly inside her. She squirmed, clenched around him, making a keening sound almost too high for herself to hear.

“Oh, wow,” he muttered. “You’re…”

“Yes,” she said. “No hair. I do a Brazilian wax whenever I get the chance. I like the way it feels.”

“Me, too,” he rasped.

She hid her face against his neck, her breath jerking in and out in short, hard sobs. Her bathing suit was floating away, forgotten. She had to slow this down. “Um, Jack? Wait.”

“Why? You’re ready. I’ve never seen anyone so ready in my life.” He bent his head to her chest again, pulling her nipple into a wet, silken vortex of sensation, his hot tongue rasping, swirling.

“But I…b-b-but I can’t—”

“Shhhh.” He thrust a finger inside her slick pussy, penetrating, pressing and swirling deep inside as he licked and lapped, and
ah…

She cried out, arching back in his grasp as a totally unexpected climax pumped violently through her.

When she opened her eyes, she was floating in his arms, staring up into the bright blue sky. Her eyes were awash with tears.

Jack rose to his feet. Water sloshed and slopped as he hoisted her up and set her on the edge of the pool. The cool air felt delicious on her pink, overheated flesh. Heat steamed off her wet body. She felt poppy red, feverish, weak in the knees. Terribly exposed.

He pressed her legs apart, and stared down at her. “Oh, yeah,” he whispered. “I knew it.”

“Knew what?”

He pushed her gently back, until her back was pressed to the flat rock, her legs wide. Laid out like a sacrifice on the altar of sexual misbehavior. Open to the sky. A warning to foolish, unwary girls.

But she wasn’t choking up, she wasn’t panicking, like usual. It was magic. She couldn’t stop. At least not yet. It was too wonderful.

“I knew that your pussy would be like this.” He knelt down in the pool to get closer, and kissed the inside of her thigh. “Those dark red folds, bursting out of your slit like some hothouse flower. Exotic.”

She laughed, shakily. “You’ve got flowers on the brain, Jack.”

“No.” His teeth flashed, in one of his rare, gorgeous grins. “I’ve got your pussy on the brain.” He nuzzled her labia, light kisses that promised and teased. “I was half expecting your clit to be pierced.”

She jerked up onto her elbows. “Hah! You won’t catch me sticking a metal pin through the most nerve-dense part of my entire body!” She peered at him, eyes narrowed. “I bet you’re disappointed, right? I’m not quite as wild as you’d fantasized?”

He played with her inner pussy lips, spreading them tenderly wide like butterfly wings, and the tickling caresses were driving her mad.

“Actually, no,” he said. “I’m relieved, to tell the truth. We’re on the same page about how we like to treat those nerve-dense parts of our bodies. That bodes well.”

“Yeah? For what?”

“Orgasms,” he said, and leaned down, pressed his lips against her clit. Swirled his tongue. Oh, God. He was so…
good.

She jerked helplessly against his face. She wasn’t ready. It was too intense. She was scared to death. She pushed his face away.

He rose up, kissing his way up over her mons, the tiny swatch of decorative red pubic hair, over her clit hood. Then over her belly, her rib cage, her breasts.

“Get comfortable with it,” he said, resolutely. “I’m going to lick your pussy until you’re a lake of lube.”

“Jack.” She grabbed his hair to hold him there, licked her lips, and dragged in a jerky breath. “I don’t know if this is such a good—”

“I have to.” He unwound her hands, sank down. “It’s going to be a really tight fit.” He slid his tongue boldly between her pussy lips.

The rasp of his plunging tongue, his matter-of-fact words, the thought of him inside her, it kicked her over the top and into a powerful orgasm. Her pussy pulsed around his thrusting fingers, throbbed against his swirling tongue. Long, sweet, echoing ripples went on and on.

He pulled her back down into the pool after the spasms had moved through her, and she sank into his arms as if she had no bones. He held her so she floated right over the thick, prominent jut of his erect cock against her thigh. In silent pleading.

She draped herself over his shoulder. Trying to catch her breath.

“Jack. Um, I hate to say it, but we can’t have sex,” she whispered.

He stiffened, nuzzling her shoulder. “No?”

“We have no latex,” she pointed out. “I certainly didn’t bring any.”

Breath hissed in sharply, between his teeth. “Ah, yes. That.”

“A small detail, but an important one. I don’t have contraception, either. And we haven’t even discussed our sexual histories yet. I’m sorry. I don’t know how I let things go so far.” She couldn’t stop herself from apologizing, even though the situation was only half her fault. “Just for the record. I’m, ah, fine,” she offered. “No STDs of any kind.”

“Me neither,” he said.

“No lovers, either. For a really long time,” she added.

“I noticed that,” he replied. “You’re tiny. Like a virgin.”

“But I’m not, ah…I’m not babyproof,” she said.

He stared at the river. Wiped water off his face, expressionless. “Forget it.” His voice was remote. “I’m disappointed, but I’ll live.”

His cool tone made her feel punished, and frustrated. “Besides, it’s just too soon for going all the way,” she rattled on. “Call me silly and old-fashioned if you want, but I barely know you, and things are really weird between us anyway, and I just don’t want to give it all up to you if you just want to…ah, I mean, if the relationship has no future.”

His eyes narrowed. “I should think you would be good at those.”

She stiffened, suspicious. “At what?”

“Relationships with no future. What other kind could your type possibly have?”

She shoved away from him, her boneless languor gone. A wave of hot water splashed up into Jack’s chest and face.

“Screw you, Kendrick,” she said savagely, leaping up.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to insult you.”

“Oh? You want to know a secret? A couple of minutes ago, I truly, sincerely wanted to suck your dick. You want to know something else? I don’t want to suck your dick anymore.” She yanked her jeans up over her bare ass. She couldn’t seem to make her trembling fingers work. He got out of the pool and moved toward her. She kept her face averted. “Don’t touch me,” she snarled.

“Aw, shit,” he muttered. “What a mess.”

“Yes. My feelings, exactly. I’ve known you for about one day, and every time you see me, you insult me. Big, nasty, mortal insults. And it’s ten times worse when you seduce me first. Freaking sadist.”