Night Forbidden (17 page)

But somehow . . . the memory of him crouching next to Tanya and promising her an awesomely crazy mushy apology rose in her mind. And the love and intensity in his face when he pointed out all of the sights on their journey from Glenway, his smooth, warm narrative telling her he loved his world as much as she loved her sea.

“Meeting up with you here?” she said, forcing her voice to sound cool. “How strange is that?”

“Stranger than a green alien,” he replied, deadpan. But his eyes smoldered and he drawled, “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were following me around, just to try and get another of those knee-shaking kisses.”

There was no doubt what was on his mind, and the realization had Ana’s belly filling with delicious fluttering.

Nevertheless, she put on a surprised expression. “Huh. I never thought of that.” And she smiled, wide but not quite nicely, and started to slip past him.

He lifted his arm to bar her way. “So, uh, I was wondering what you were planning to do now.”

“Now?” she said, and glanced around to make certain no one was within hearing range. “Now . . . after I’ve been interrogated and imprisoned and forced to jeopardize my safety?”

He opened his mouth to respond, then must have thought better of it, because he slipped into a warm smile instead.

That pretty much infuriated her, thinking he could charm his way into her good graces—and possibly something else—with a mere smile and hot look. But what made her even more annoyed was knowing that it was
freaking working.

What was it about him? He was so much more than a sexy smile and double entendres . . . why the heck did he have to hide behind them? Behind that superficial charm?

She forced herself to become silently indignant, and turned her expression into all innocence and wide eyes. “Actually . . . I was thinking about a swim,” she said casually. “Want to join me?”

A hitch in his smile was the only sign of her direct hit, but then he smoothed it out. “Hmmm . . . skinny dipping,” he said, his eyes now bold and warm. “I like it . . . but what say we do it without the dipping? Or maybe I should say, without the skinny . . . ’cause, ya know, there could be some dipping going on.”

Somewhere beneath the fluttering heat that she couldn’t seem to control, Ana realized that if any other guy said something like that to her, she’d be disgusted and annoyed and completely turned off.

But that was the thing about Fence, damn it. He
said
things like that, and he got the exact response he was obviously hoping for. Even though she wanted to snarl at him and then stalk away in disdain, he was like a magnet, keeping her there.

Right there. Tempting her.

And then all at once the thought struck her. He’d seen her crystals. He knew she was Atlantean.

She didn’t have to hide it from him anymore.
Hot. Damn.

Ana gave him a long, slow smile of her own. “Some dipping?” she said, watching his irises suddenly expand in those dark, hooded eyes. “Is that a promise?”

“Your wish is my command,” he said, and flashed straight white teeth as he moved that big bulk of an arm out of her way. And . . . suddenly, she saw the veneer, the charming veneer, slip away to show
reality
. Some real emotion there, deep in his eyes. Intense . . . uncertain . . . warm.

The look made her belly quiver even more.

“Your place or mine?” he asked.

Ana was aware of her heart suddenly beating faster, of her belly being filled with the warm fluttering of anticipation. “Whichever one is closer.”

“Yours,” he said, and edged toward her.

There was no one around, so she didn’t hesitate when he eased her against the wall and settled his mouth over hers. Lips, tongue, slick and warm, hungry and full of promise . . . and then he pulled back. “Got your knees shaking yet?” he murmured, brushing a lock of hair from her temple.

“Hardly a tremor,” Ana said, trying not to sound as breathless as she felt. “I think you’re going to have to do better than that.”

His eyelids drooped even lower. “Oh, I will, sugar,” he said with a thick drawl. “You can bet your sexy crystals on that.”

Five minutes later he was well on his way to proving his boast.

They’d found their way to her room, made it through the door and closed it, and now he’d somehow, between more long, strong kisses, positioned them next to the bed. The mattress bumped against the back of Ana’s legs, and she found herself grabbing his shoulders for balance.

It was then she realized this was the first time she’d gotten intimate with a man outside of the ocean. Normally, she had the water’s buoyancy to help her remain upright on her bad leg . . . and to add its gentle surge and salty taste to the mix.

“So convenient,” Fence was murmuring as he unfastened the row of buttons down the front of her shirt. “Easy access.” He slipped warm, dry hands beneath her open shirt, covering her breasts with large palms. “And no bra,” he added with a groan of appreciation.

Ana shivered as he found her hard, sensitive nipples with his thumbs. Heat swamped her as he circled over them, around and around with a feather light touch as he bent to kiss the soft skin at the side of her neck. Her knees were definitely weak, but that didn’t stop her from pulling his shirt up and out of the low-slung jeans he wore and flattening her hands under the cotton, over his broad, warm chest.

Then he shifted away and with a faint smile stripped the shirt from his dark, massive shoulders. “That better?” he asked, looking at her, then down at her hands settled over his chest.

The breadth of his chest was impossibly wide, and being faced with such power and beauty made Ana’s mouth go dry. When spread wide, the fingers of one hand hardly spanned the bulk of one pectoral.

“Ah . . . it needs some work,” she replied, and bent closer to press a kiss onto the little rise of muscle and bone near the hollow of his throat. He tasted warm and fresh, a little salty, and smooth. His heart was pounding beneath her lips, and she couldn’t help an extra little nibble. It was different . . . and erotic . . . tasting a man’s skin that wasn’t bathed in saltwater, cool and slick.

Fence chuckled, and she felt the deep, bass rumble in his chest. “I’ll get right to it. But first . . .” His voice was so low as to be nearly inaudible. “I want to show you something that doesn’t need a bit of work at all.”

He had his hands on her shoulders, and Ana allowed him to turn her to the right, so she was facing toward the other side of the room, then to slip off her unbuttoned shirt. As he tossed it to the floor, Fence came to stand behind her and said, “Look.”

Ana looked up and found herself facing a mirror, just across from them. She was bare from the waist up of her suspiciously sagging jeans, which were somehow unbuttoned and showed a triangle of panty and a hint of hip bone. Her torso was nearly as long as Fence’s, but much narrower and with different curves. Her crystals glinted dully in the low light, and her breasts looked like two dark-tipped teardrops.

“Now, isn’t that just beautiful?” he murmured in her ear as his large hands came around from behind to curve under her breasts, holding them in two gentle handfuls.

As he stroked his thumbs over each nipple in turn, Ana found herself mesmerized by the erotic image reflected back at her, and the little prickles of arousal tingling down to her core. The light in the room was limited to a small table lamp she’d left on near the door, and it spilled a warm glow into the space that made her skin look like burnished gold. His dark hands, and the breadth of his shoulders and the bulk of his arms, burned like rich bronze around her, and her hair spilled in more golden-bronzy waves over his biceps.

She raised her arms and brought them up behind Fence’s head, and her breasts lifted enticingly. She felt his cheek move and saw the smile flash in the mirror as he slid both hands along her midriff to settle over her hips.

“ ’S no lie . . . this is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” he said low in her ear as his fingers brushed the crystals on her right side.

His light fingertips brushed over her skin in small enticing circles over and over, down and wider, raising little, skittering bumps of pleasure. She could feel the heat of bare skin pressing along her shoulders and the rock-hard bulge from behind the fly of his jeans, and the deep, tingling response growing in her center. She felt damp and hot everywhere, and as he skated his hands up and down along the length of her torso, holding her breasts close and then releasing them to tease her nipples, she sagged back against him even more heavily. Her hands cupped the back of his skull, feeling the pleasure of warm, smooth skin, sliding forward to brush his jaw and temples.

He bent his face to her shoulder, still looking up at her as he sucked and nibbled gently on the slender ridge of tendon and skin. Using his tongue, he slicked along the curve, his lips moist and warm, so different from Darian’s, and she couldn’t control the delicious shivers radiating from his mouth.

When he went back down to the waist of her jeans and flipped a few more buttons open, she had a moment of panic and tried to turn in his arms, back to face him.

“We’ll have none of that, sugar,” he said firmly, keeping her in place. Facing the mirror.

His big fingers slid beneath the loosened band of her jeans, beneath her panties and down over each hip, and, as she watched, he shoved them down in a long, smooth movement.

Ana wanted to close her eyes, but she knew she needed to know what he saw when her mangled leg was revealed. She had to gauge his reaction, to notice when his eyes went there and stayed, unable to help themselves. It hadn’t mattered with Darian, because in the water she moved with grace and speed . . . but here and now things were so different. She was crippled . . . and next to such a perfect body.

“Ahh,” he murmured with great emotion in her ear as the jeans slid down and bunched at her knees. “Ana.” He let out a long breath, warm against her cheek, and just held her there for a moment.

The full curve of her hips and the juncture of her thighs with its dark triangle of hair was now revealed, but Ana was looking at her left thigh where it joined her torso. Her soft swell of pleasure had ebbed, and all she could see was the texture of swirling scars, jagged marks, and the lumpy outline of damaged muscle that had never quite healed.

Horror washed through her at the sight of such unpleasant imperfection, but before she could react, Fence’s dark hands moved all along the sweep of her hips, down over her thighs and back up again—all the while holding her in place.

“Now that’s some crazy sweetness there, sugar,” he said, and holding her gaze in the mirror, eased his hand between her legs. “Right here, baby. And I’m gonna sample it all.”

Ana shivered as he slid his fingers down around her, slipping into the heat and damp there. A surge of pleasure surprised her, and she wanted to open wider and give him more access, but she was trapped at the knees by her jeans.

Fence’s dark chuckle rumbled in her ear, and again that white smile flashed in the dim light. “Allow me,” he said, and without moving his hands, lifted his foot and dragged her jeans down into a wad at her ankles.

Ana was able to kick them off now, at least from one foot, and he used that opportunity of her hopping on her good leg to cop a full-blown feel between her legs.

“Oh!” she gasped in surprise as he found her . . . oh, yes, he
found
her. And his fingers slid so easily into her hot, swollen core . . . she could feel the slickness, and every little movement, every little tease, was exaggerated by it. Ana stopped, trying to catch her breath as the little shudders caught her off guard.

“I promised you a bit of dipping,” he said . . . but his voice was less steady than before, a little rougher and filled with breathiness. “Didn’t I?”

He held her gaze, watching her in the mirror. She couldn’t look away as he stroked and slipped in and around, his fingers sure and gentle and magical. He seemed to know just how to lure and coax, and Ana felt her body tightening, turning liquid with heat and pleasure, gathering up to explode. She watched his dark arms, one curved up to cover a breast and the other buried between her legs like some erotic bonds, holding her back up against him.

“Come on sugar . . . I want to feel you shiver and shake against me,” he whispered. Her eyes met his, saw the heat burning there, and she felt the rasp of his breath against her hair, the unfurling in her belly suddenly, sharply, swelling to encompass her whole body.

And then she didn’t think about anything more as he slipped into
just
the right place, and found the
very
spot and the rhythm . . . and then all at once she was gusting a long, happy moan, shivering and shaking and exploding against him.

He held her, murmuring into her ear, making the rippling pleasure last and last, teasing and slipping and coaxing, until she cried out in lovely, elated defeat.

When she opened her eyes, they were still facing the mirror. He was still behind her, his eyes still avid and hot, his mouth quirked in a tight, satisfied smile, one hand smoothing over her crystals again, the other brushing a thick lock of hair back over her shoulder.

“Now that,” he murmured, “is some sweetness.”

She would have turned in his arms, but again he held her firmly in place, chuckling in that low, sensual way of his. And then, the next thing she knew, he was tipping her gently, sideways, onto the bed.

As she collapsed backward in a tangle of her long hair, she flipped the second leg of her jeans free and worked herself fully onto the bed as he unbuttoned the fly of his own pants.

He watched her as he slid his hands down past the waistband of his jeans and briefs, and shoved them down with the same practiced motion he’d managed hers. His erection, full and more than ready, sprang free.

Whoa.

Her breath caught as he finished undressing, his flat, ridged belly and the curve of his rear gleaming with the rich bronze glow, all lean and muscled and
big
. Big and powerful and broad.