CUL-DE-SAC (On The Edge Book 1) (32 page)

CHAPTER 39

It was logical, not to mention practical,
to head straight to Xan’s apartment since they were in close vicinity to it.
Yet Catalina wanted to go back to her place, convinced she would feel at a smaller
disadvantage on her own territory.

She was proven wrong as soon as they
stepped inside the house and the door closed behind them with a quiet but firm
finality.

She could feel Xan’s eyes boring into her
back but she donned her cool mask, the same one that always helped her to get
through even the hardest times. Trying to pretend it was possible to act
unaffected in his presence.

But he was a guest in her home and if she
knew one thing, it was how to make people feel comfortable even if she was on the
edge herself.

There were not many words between them which
only magnified her unease; she knew he wasn’t silent on purpose, it just seemed
that neither one of them knew what to say or how to behave.

Thank you, Chloé
, she thought
sarcastically.

She offered to run a hot bath for him and
was relieved when he didn’t try to talk her into having one with him. It wasn’t
that she didn’t want to be with Xan; she did, but the incident with Chloé made
her very much aware about the differences between them and this time she didn’t
mean their social background.

They were worlds apart from a sexual point
of view as well, and she would bet tonight wasn’t the first time a woman
offered herself to him just because of who he was. Catalina felt like she had lost
her self-confidence and needed a little time to win it back.

Her hand clenched around the ointment
bottle she had been searching for when she heard the door connecting her
bathroom with bedroom opening. She turned to Xan with a smile that fell off her
face in an instant, and she was forced to swallow hard no matter how
humiliating it was.

He was simply magnificent standing there
with droplets of water still clinging to his naked skin and shining in his hair,
making it seem even darker. He had a white towel hitched around his waist but
it looked precarious at best.

Cat had the strongest urge to place her
hands on him and take the same path the water drops created, sliding down his
body. To trace his tattoos with her tongue.

He didn’t miss her reaction.
“Kitten…”

He had told himself he would respect her
wishes tonight and wouldn’t force her to talk about all that went down. Because
even though she might have believed him that nothing happened between him and
Chloé, she was still hurt by the whole situation.

He had told himself he wouldn’t push her
for anything, no matter how much he wanted her. But the look in her eyes
couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than hunger and need, and he was more than
willing to oblige it.
“I hope the hot bath helped to ease your muscles. I found something that might
aid as well. Lie down, please,” she said quickly, not letting him voice
whatever he wanted to.

Xan gritted his teeth, but decided to give
in for the last time. If she provoked him once more, all bets were off and he
was done with playing nice. Those who did usually found themselves on the
receiving end of losing.

He walked toward the bed and obediently lay
down, not because he cared much for whatever she wanted to rub into his skin.
He just wanted to have her hands on his body and since it seemed like the only
available circumstances under which it was going to happen, he was down with
the plan.

He stifled a groan when Cat straddled him
and he instantly regretted he was facing the bed instead of her.
“Am I too heavy?” She asked and he wondered if she was serious.
“No.”

Yet he was unable to stop a moan from
escaping him when she started to massage the tense lines of his shoulders.
“Too hard?” Her hands froze and he closed his eyes, because what started as a
great idea was on the fast track to turning into a nightmare.
“I don’t know the meaning of the word.” He smirked and she just rolled her
eyes.

His body was tense, but the most important
part was that she didn’t see any ugly bruises marring his skin. She thought the
massage to be such a great idea, but what she hadn’t taken into consideration
was the kind of effect it was going to have on her, Catalina admitted.

Kneading his muscles and gliding her hands
over his hot skin was making her feel flush, and before she knew it, she leaned
in to place a kiss on his shoulder blade.

Xan’s body shot with even more tension than
before and she regretted listening to the silly impulse in the first place.
“Are you going to take as much care with my front?” He wanted to know.
“I think you are enjoying it a little bit too much,” Cat teased and bit down
lightly on his arm.

Just like that, her whole world spun, and
she found herself trapped under his body for a change.

Under his nearly naked and aroused body,
she noticed.
“Somebody
is not playing fair and nice again,” she said, straining against him, jerking
at the manacled hold he had her wrists in above her head.

All she managed was to arch her breasts
into his chest and she thought that would have been much better idea if she
didn’t have her bra and T-shirt on.
“You know full body contact is my kind of sport, but since you are wearing too
many clothes I would say that you are the one who is making it
unfair,
Kitten,” he murmured.
“Good thing you don’t care much about fair, then,” she pointed out and he
chuckled.
“Let me help you with that.” One of his hands held hers still above her head
while fingers of the other gave her T-shirt a tug.
“Your body is hurting after the fight,” she reminded him.
“I am never hurting
that
much,” he stated arrogantly.
“Xan…”
“What is it, Cat? Tell me why you keep shying away from my touch today. I told
you I didn’t…”
“You saw her naked!” She threw the words at him, forgetting she had no
intentions of admitting her weakness to him.
“Not by my choice.” He blinked at her, surprised by the direction in which her
thoughts ran.
“Not the point,” she muttered.
“Explain it to me then,” he demanded, losing patience.

He let go of her hands and moved away from the
tempting heat of her body, because being so close to her and not touching her
felt like a new brand of torture. If she only knew the power she had over him,
he thought, and his ire spiked.

She slid off the bed feeling utterly stupid,
but how could she explain to him that tonight’s scene had stripped her bare and
left her feeling self-conscious?
“You are the only woman I want to be with,” he said when she kept to her
silence.

There were no other words he could give her
and they should be enough from his point of view, but she didn’t seem
convinced.
“She is a model, Xan,” Cat sighed because it sounded ridiculous even to her own
ears, but she couldn’t help how she felt about it.

Catalina had never been the one to inspire
wild and insatiable desire in men, and she was fine with that because she
honestly never cared about any of those men enough.

But now she did; she was in love with Xan
and she couldn’t silence Chloé’s vicious words about not having what it takes
to keep the interest of someone like him.
“You know, I’ve always admired the fact that you were not like other women, but
damn, Cat, you are not making any sense right now,” he snapped.

“Offending me won’t win you any favors,” she
bristled and turned away, ready to leave the room, but Xan jumped out of the
bed and stopped her from it.

She was one of the most beautiful women he
had ever seen and definitely the most unconscious of it, he thought. One of
those mysterious puzzles that were not supposed to be understood but simply
accepted, he decided shrugging inwardly.
“Cat… just stop. Come here.” He urged her to stand in front of the big mirror
with him at her back.

It embraced both their forms, emphasizing the
rigid line of her spine and the pouty expression on her face. Yet he had never
wanted her more than at this moment, Xan decided.

It was obvious she was unhappy with what
she perceived as display of a weakness, but to him it was a new and alluring
façade of this complicated woman that most saw as cool and untouchable.

But he saw all the tenderness hidden
inside, all the vulnerability she was so skillfully keeping tucked within. He
should have wanted to exploit it, he thought, but all he wanted was to protect
it, protect
her
instead
.
If he hadn’t realized earlier he was
losing his goddamned heart to her, this would have been the moment of dawning
comprehension for him.
“You are the only woman I can’t stop thinking about, can’t keep my hands off.
Why do you think that is?” He asked quietly, placing said hands on her hips,
and saw her gaze dropping down to rest on the quite possessive and oh-so-telling
gesture.
“Maybe for the same reason I am thinking of you?” She didn’t want the sensual
note in his tone to sweep her under the surface, but she knew she was fighting
a lost battle where he was concerned.

Her body was attuned to his, greedily
soaking the heat coming off of his presence behind her. And she was chilled to
the bone.
“It doesn’t really answer the question, does it?” His head bent and he kissed
her earlobe.
“Maybe it doesn’t have to,” she whispered, tilting her head to one side as his
lips slid to her neck, leaving a wet trail in their wake.
“I want you, Kitten, not any other woman, no matter if she is a model or not.
It is your body that I crave.” He dragged her even closer until her lower back
was cushioning his arousal. “It’s your touch I want to feel on mine,” he added,
and she gasped when he brought her hand to his throbbing erection.

Her reaction wasn’t caused by the action or
by the fact his towel was gone all of a sudden and her fingers tried to close
around his rigid flesh. No, she gasped because the woman in the mirror was
reflecting every motion back at her and the flush creeping high on her cheeks said
she was enjoying the play.

“Raise your arms.” Xan’s hands tugged at
the hem of her T-shirt and she obeyed him, feeling a little bit like in a
dream.

Her heart was pounding, but she wasn’t afraid
of him; she was afraid of her own needs emphasized and mercilessly bared by the
mirror’s cool surface. She was afraid he was taking over her and of what might
remain of her, if anything at all, once he was done.

His fingers skimmed lightly over her
breasts, covered by her pink lacy bra, and her breath locked in her throat when
they slid lower to the button of her jeans, leaving her bosom aching and needy.

He pressed his lips to the nape of her neck,
and Catalina shuddered because she had never known her skin was so sensitive in
that place. He unhooked her bra and slipped his fingers under the
shoulder-straps, slowly dragging them down. Her hands rose of their own
volition to stop the undergarment from plummeting down as her heart did,
landing at his feet.

He didn’t say anything, just stroked one
hand down her arm to close his fingers over hers that were clenched around the
flimsy pink. Xan had no intention of forcing anything on her, not tonight, not
in this. All he did was lightly stroke her knuckles, gone white, with the tips
of his fingers. He felt her tremble but she uncurled her fingers, allowing the
material drop to the floor.
“Good girl,” he praised. “No, Catalina, look in the mirror,” he protested when
her gaze dropped down. “See how beautiful you are to me, see what I see when
you are like that.” He swept her hair back in case she wanted to use the silky
veil to cover herself, barring him from admiring her.

His need was painful now and the ache
seemed to seize his whole body, but for the first time in his life, impatience
wasn’t riding him hard. The ever-burning fever in him transformed his desire
into a fine but stable flame instead.

Catalina’s breathing turned choppy and
shallow when his hands guided her arms up and wrapped them around his neck,
exposing her breasts even more. One of his big hands returned to cup her breast,
to tease her pebbled nipple with his thumb, to torture her with his wicked murmur
when he bent his head to her ear, whispering rough words of his appreciation.

The woman in the mirror swallowed hard and
closed her eyes under the onslaught of sensations, but she remembered his order
to watch and her eyelids flipped open again, making her lock her gaze with his
burning one.

Her skin was lighter in tone than his, which
she knew already, of course, but had never spared a moment to actually see the
difference in shades.

The mirror was emphasizing all she let go
unnoticed so far.

She felt utterly feminine watching his hand
stroking down her abdomen to unzip her jeans. Cat held her breath, expecting
him to pull them down her legs, along with her panties, and wanted to protest,
not feeling ready for the ultimate vulnerability.

But he left them on, not taking them down…
yet, as if sensing her unease.
“Step out of them,” he said roughly, and she did again as asked, watching him
kick the material of her jeans away. “I like unwrapping you slowly like my
personal gift, each time wondering if your panties match your bra.” His voice
dropped an octave, changed by the need pulsating in him, the echo of which she
could feel in his throbbing arousal.