Kindred (The Watcher Chronicles #2) (10 page)

I almost choke on the piece of ham in my mouth.

"Well, if you didn't cook such delicious food, I wouldn't eat it so quickly," I say, thinking this is a completely logical defense.

"Oh, I'm not complaining.  If a girl has a healthy appetite for food, it usually means she has a healthy appetite for other things too."

The light of amusement and secret promises in Mason's eyes makes me look away.  I may not be very experienced in dealing with men, but I know a come on line when I hear one.

"So what's the main course?" I ask, deciding to completely ignore Mason's double entendre.

Mason stands.  "Be right back."

I take a deep breath waiting for his return.  When he reappears, he's holding two plates.  Each plate holds two slices of rack of lamb over various herbs, roasted tomatoes and risotto.

Since Mason didn't have time to eat his appetizer while he was making his gentle insinuations about my appetites, he ends up not having much time to talk during the main course which gives me ample opportunity to enjoy the tender lamb he cooked to perfection.

"Is there a desert?" I ask after finishing my entrée.

Mason smiles, phases and returns immediately with a white bowl filled with two scoops of what looks to me like ice cream sherbet.

"Mango gelato," he informs me.

The bowl only has one spoon.

He picks up the spoon and scoops up some of the gelato.

"Here, try some," he says, positioning the spoon in front of my face.

I part my lips and let him slide the spoon in and out of my mouth.

I nod.  "It's good," I say, wondering if he just wanted me to taste it before he brought me a bowl of my own to eat from.

I watch as he scoops some more out of the bowl and eats some himself.  It's only then I realize he intends for us to share the desert with the same spoon.  The act seems rather intimate, and I find myself feeling slightly flustered.  My body feels like its on fire, and I desperately want to get out of my coat to cool off.

"Are you all right?" Mason asks, setting the bowl on the table.  "You look hot.  Why don't you take the coat off?"

"I can't," I say, shaking my head determinedly.

"Why not?" He asks, confused by my refusal.

"Because I'm completely mortified by what I let them dress me up in," I admit.

A slow smile spreads Mason's lips.

"It can't be that bad," he says, obviously thinking I'm over exaggerating.

"Yes, it can."

"JoJo wouldn't dress you in something she didn't think looked good on you."

"Yes, she did."

Mason stands and holds one of his hands out to me.  "Do you trust my judgment?"

I nod.

"Then let me see the dress, Jess.  I won't lie to you.  If I think it's hideous, you can put your coat back on."

  I place one of my hands into his outstretched one and let him pull me up out of my chair.  He begins to undo the buttons of my coat for me and slowly turns me around to pull it off my shoulders.  When I turn back around to look at him, he's staring at me with eyes filled with a burning need.  I instantly snatch my coat out of his hands and slip it back on.

"Jess," he says, his voice hoarse.  "Why are you hiding yourself from me?"

"Because I know what she did," I say, feeling my temper flare.  "JoJo made this dress to make sure you would feel the way you do now."

How could I have been so stupid not to have thought about that before?  JoJo wanted to insure Mason would have no will of his own and want to do nothing more than kiss me.  The dress had to be the reason Mason was looking at me the way he was, full of lust and longing.

"Jess, it's not the dress that makes me feel this way," Mason says.  "It's you."

"No, it has to be the dress making you look at me like you want to eat me," I say, completely confident I'm right.

Mason places his hands on my shoulders and slides them down my arms until he's holding both my hands in his.

"What makes you think I would need her power to influence how much I want you?"

I look down at our hands and shake my head.

"I don't know," I say in a small voice.

Mason lets go of one of my hands to gently place his index finger underneath my chin and make me look up into his eyes.

"I want you to listen to me very carefully," he says, dead serious.  "Even when you were sick and dressed in those god awful Santa Claus pajamas, I wanted you.  It's not the dress.  It's you, Jess.  How can you not see how desirable you are?"

"Lack of self-esteem?" I try to joke, finding my attempt not a joke but something I realize is actually true.

"Come with me," Mason says, "I want to show you something."

Before I know it, Mason has phased us to one of the exterior terraces overlooking a neighboring vineyard in the distance.  It's dark outside with the only light coming from the full moon in the sky casting a silvery glow on the world below it.

"It's beautiful," I say of the view.

"No, you're the only beauty here, Jess."

Mason brings up the hand he still holds to his lips and gently brushes them against my knuckles making me gasp.  The warm feel of his breath against my skin sends pleasant shivers, like tiny bolts of lightning dancing across every nerve ending in my body.  I feel his lips stretch into a pleased smile against my fingers at my instant reaction to him.

"You are the most beautiful woman I know," he tells me, placing his free hand on my lower back, taking a step closer to me until our bodies are only inches apart.  He rests his forehead against mine and the tips of our noses touch.  I take in a deep breath because I can't seem to get enough of the way he smells.

"I've imagined us standing here like this a thousand times since we first met," he confesses, making my heart melt into a puddle of bliss.

He lifts his head from mine and plants a small kiss on the tip of my nose.  I close my eyes and feel him trail small, tender kisses across my left cheekbone and down the side of my neck to my shoulder.  All I can hear is my own ragged breathing.  When he begins his assault back up my neck, he makes a maddening detour to a spot just behind my ear that I never even knew existed.  My sharp intake of breath makes him smile against my neck.

Unable to take his torturous kisses anymore, I pull away and take two steps back.

Mason watches my retreat with a puzzled frown.

"You're driving me crazy," I tell him, trying to catch my breath.

"That was the general idea," he says, with a roguish grin, completely pleased with his accomplishment.

"I don't want crazy," I tell him, shaking my head slowly.  "I want you to kiss me.  I want you to be my first real kiss, Mason.  And when we kiss, please, don't hold anything back because I want the moment scorched into my memory.  When I'm eighty years old, I want to be able to look back on this moment and remember it so clearly I can feel your lips against mine.  I want you to kiss me like it might be the one and only kiss we ever get to share."

Mason bridges the distance between us before I can take another shuddering breath.  Cupping my face between his hands, he looks into to my eyes and says, "I love you."

His lips descend on mine, finally given permission to release the floodgates of his pent up passion, forever branding the feel of his lips against mine into my memory.  He crushes his body against me, enveloping me in his arms and lighting every one of my senses on fire.  I feel his tongue slip between my lips and can't prevent a moan from escaping my throat at the pleasure that small part of him coaxes from my soul.  I wrap my arms around his neck, desperately needing him closer, deepening the kiss and matching the movements of his tongue with my own.

I'm not sure how long we stand there drinking each other in, but finally I feel like I need to breathe and reluctantly pull away.  My lips feel bruised from our kissing, but I wouldn't want them to feel any other way.  It's proof of Mason's desire for me and if I could live feeling this way for the rest of my life I would die happy.

Mason continues to hold me close and I'm glad to discover I'm not the only one having difficulty breathing.

"My god that was a kiss," he says in amazement, making me smile.

"Yes," I whole heartedly agree, "it certainly was, Mr. Collier."

"I've never been kissed like that, ever," he declares sincerely.

I pull back and see the earnest expression on Mason's face.

"Have you been kissed a lot?" I ask, remembering what Angela told me about Mason's other women.  I would be lying if I said I didn't feel some jealousy towards those faceless women.  I'm selfish.  I admit that freely.

"Enough to know a kiss like that only happens once in a lifetime," he says to me.

"Just once?" I ask, leaning into him, brushing my lips lightly against his but not kissing him.  "Can we try for twice?"

I press my lips against his tentatively, darting the tip of my tongue against his lips which elicits a groan originating from deep inside his chest.  Before I know it he has his hands on my back and phases us to the living room.  A fire blazes in the hearth.  Between kissing Mason and the fire, I feel as though I might spontaneously combust if I keep my coat on for much longer.

Reluctantly, I pull away.

"I'm getting hot," I explain, undoing the buttons of my coat quickly and letting it fall to the floor behind me.

Mason's eyes rake my body with undisguised want.  "Hot doesn't come close to describing how you look in that dress," he says, his voice hoarse, not bothering to hide his desire for me.

Suddenly, I don't feel self-conscience at all about what I'm wearing.  Not if it makes Mason look at me like I'm all he'll ever want in life.

"Can I put your hair down?" He asks unexpectedly.

I nod, not quite understanding why he wants to do such a thing, and turn my back to him so he can pull the myriad of bobby pins from the bun JoJo styled my hair into.

I hear Mason curse a few times, trying to dig the pins out.

"Could I make a request?" He asks, finally pulling out the last of the pins and running his fingers through my hair to undo the braid.

"You can ask me for anything," I say, remembering that word could hold a myriad of meanings in this situation.

"Please don't do that to you hair again," he begs.  "I like it down around your shoulders."

I turn to face him.  "I can do that for you, if you do something for me."

Mason pulls me in closer to him and I drape my arms over his shoulders.

"And what can I do for you?" He asks.

"Kiss me."

Mason smiles and before I know it he's pulling me down on top of him as he lies back on the couch.  My hair makes a natural curtain, hiding us from the world as we kiss again.  This time it's a slow kiss, each of us testing the other's limits and likes.

I begin to feel Mason's phone press into my belly and instinctively swat it to the side with the back of my hand so it's not poking me.  I have a fleeting thought that the phone seems larger than I remember.

Mason gasps like I've hurt him.

I pull away from him and look at his face.  He has his eyes closed and his jaw clenched.

"Did I hurt you when I moved your phone?" I ask, worried by the expression he's wearing.

"That wasn't my phone, Jess," he says, slowly taking in a deep breath.

It doesn't take me long to figure out what it was I actually moved.  Now I understand why it seemed larger than his phone should have been.

"Oh," I say quietly, pulling away from Mason to sit on the other end of the couch.

I have no idea what to do in this situation.  I feel flush because I've just touched a very personal spot on Mason completely by accident.  I look back over at him and see him lying there with his eyes closed, pinching the bridge of his nose with the thumb and index finger of one hand.

"Did I hurt you?" I ask again, not really knowing if what I did actually did hurt him.

"No," he finally says, opening his eyes and sitting up.  "You didn't hurt me, the complete opposite in fact."

I feel my heart race at the implication of his statement, but can't seem to make myself look up at him and meet his gaze.  I feel him staring at me, but don't know how to handle the situation we find ourselves in.  What does he expect to happen next?  I feel sure he's been in similar situations before and the natural progression of things would lead us to the bedroom, but I know in my heart I'm not ready for that yet.

I see Mason's hand lying between us palm up.

"I think it's time I took you back home," he says gently.

I look up at him.  "You want me to leave?"

He shakes his head.  "No, I don't want you to leave.  But I should get you back home before it gets much later.  You still need your rest."

"Are you making me leave because I won't…." I can't even say the words ‘make love to you' out loud so I say instead, "because I'm not like the other women you've brought here?"

Mason moves in closer to me, trapping me with his gaze.

"Now you listen to me very carefully," he says in a voice with a hard edge.  "Other than Jonathan's wife, you are the only woman I have ever brought to this house."

"But Angela told me…she told me about the other women you’ve been with."

Mason's jaw clenches.  "She shouldn't have said anything about that.  It’s none of her business.  I never brought any of those women into my home, Jess.  They meant nothing to me.  You mean everything to me."

"Then why are you making me leave?"

Mason sighs heavily.  "Because I want you so badly right now, I'm not sure I would be able to control myself.  I don't want you to leave.  I want to take you to my bed and show you how much I love you.  But you're not ready for that.  I know that.  I can see it in the way you're looking at me right now.  And I couldn't live with myself if your first time was rushed.  You deserve more and I want to be the one who gives you a beautiful experience.  When we finally do make love for the first time, I want it to be just like our first kiss, scorched into both our memories forever.  So please.  Don't even think for one second that I want you to leave, but I need to take you home now for both our sakes."