Wild Card (46 page)

There were nearly two dozen bottles of vintage wines. He'd started collecting them before he

was old enough to be legal. He'd traded for them, bargained for them, lucked into a few. And

each one had significance. Each one he'd planned the date or event to open.

He turned around and took another good look at the basement, watching as Sabella stepped into

the doorway and stared down at him.

Her face was in shadow, but he could feel the worry that seemed to wrap around her.

"I haven't cleaned it," she said softly as he moved back up the stairs. "The basement, that is."

He strode up the steps as she backed up into the kitchen, her expression thoughtful. "Perhaps I

should."

"It's a basement. Doesn't look like you use it much."

"No," she answered. "I don't use it much." She shook her head before turning away from him.

"I need to shower."

Sabella moved upstairs quickly, her hand pressed to her stomach as she fought back the tears

threatening to spill from her eyes.

She could do this, she told herself. She could handle this, and she could live through whatever

happened if he left her.

If
. She was holding on to the prayer that he wouldn't. It was the only thing keeping her sane at

this point.

The pizza was good, the half bottle of wine they consumed with it was ambrosia. Despite the

fact it was the middle of summer, Sabella lowered the air conditioner, and lit a small fire in the

fireplace.

They ate the pizza in front of the fire, the chill of the AC whispering around them while the

warmth of the fire heated them.

After eating, they dragged the heavy pillows from the back of the couch and stretched out on

the floor. It was quiet, easy. And she wasn't surprised that Noah's head ended up in her lap. It

was normal. This was how they had always ended up on cold winter nights. His head in her lap,

her fingers playing through his hair.

Did he remember? she wondered. As he stared into the fire, his hands folded on his stomach,

did he remember the nights they had shared, doing just this?

And other things.

She grinned at that thought. The fires they had built in that fireplace had seen a lot of loveplay.

Nights they had spent just touching, just holding. Nights they had spent consuming each other,

devouring sighs, kisses, and passion.

She stared down at him, watching his eyes, the flames reflecting in the wild blue, his lashes

lowered slumberously. Her gaze drifted down his body and felt the familiar flexing of her

womb at the sight of the heavy bulge beneath his jeans.

"Do you stay aroused?" Her voice was quiet, almost amused as she asked the question.

His head turned, his eyes staring into hers. "If you're around, I'm hard," he admitted ruefully. "I think you're a bad influence on me, Sabella. You encourage wild, wicked thoughts."

"Really? What kind of wild, wicked thoughts?"

He shifted, sat up, and turned to her.

"Thoughts of how sweet and wet you get for me." His hand cupped her cheek, his fingers

threading through the hair at the side of her face. "Thoughts of taking you, fucking you until

you're screaming my name, over and over again."

"Been there," she whispered, leaning back against the pillow behind her. "You've already done that."

"Hm, I have, haven't I?" He lowered his head, touched his lips to hers. "Maybe it bears

repeating."

His kiss. She moaned against his lips, felt him sinking into her with that kiss, making love to

her lips, her mouth, tasting her, drawing her inside him.

Sabella wrapped her arms around his shoulders, her nails digging into them as he came over

her.

It was another memory, another moment in time to hold on to. She felt his hand caress up her

thigh, beneath the light summer lounging dress she had worn.

The silky material slid up her thighs easily, pooling just below her hips as he drew back from

her.

Firelight flickered over his body as he rose to his feet. He'd showered earlier, dressed in clean

jeans and shirt. Those were disposed of quickly, leaving him naked, his bronzed flesh

shimmering with the soft light of the flames, his cock jutting out from his body, heavily veined,

the crown dark.

"Your turn." He knelt beside her, gripped the hem of her dress, and drew it off her body.

She wore panties, no bra. She wore her ankle bracelet and her wedding band.

She was married. Fuck him. Screw whatever reasons he had for hiding who he was from her,

she was still his wife. For now. For now, she was Sabella Malone, and he, he was Nathan

Malone. A ghost. A vision from the past with another face, another name, but still the man she

loved.

"Kiss me." She stretched out against the thick, incredibly soft rug that covered the floor in front of the fireplace.

Pushing the pillows out of the way, she arched her back and saw the surprise that flickered in

his eyes.

"Where?" His lips tilted with wicked eroticism.

"Right here." She tapped her lips with a finger. "We'll discuss other areas as we go."

His brows arched, and the temerity she showed obviously pleased him. He came down beside

her, one hand gripping her hip, turning her to him.

"I won't break," she told him with a light laugh. "Kiss me, Noah. Kiss me right."

His eyes flared, darker, wilder.

"And what is right?'" His voice was rougher, more guttural.

"Have you ever dreamed of a kiss? Dreamed of it, and ached to live that dream?"

"Every time I've dreamed of kissing you." His thumb brushed over her lips.

"Kiss me like that. Like you dream."

His hand tightened on her hip. Some emotion raged in his eyes, and then he was kissing her as

he had never kissed her before. He braced himself over her, touching her with nothing but his

lips, his tongue. Deep kisses. His lips slanted over her, and he kissed her with a desperation and

a hunger that tore straight through her soul.

All the pent-up dreams, lonely nights aching for him, the nightmares that left her gasping,

screaming for him, all of it went into the kiss she returned to him.

She didn't touch him any other way. Her nails dug into the rug beneath her, she felt his body

tensing above her. They made love with their mouths. With their tongues. They licked and

stroked and desperate moans filled the air as the need rose, blazed inside them.

When they came up for air, it wasn't oxygen that drew them. Sabella's arms lifted, wrapped

around his back, and drew him to her. Her nipples brushed his chest as his lips scoured her

neck.

Hunger pounded inside them. It filled the air around them, brushed them with a sheen of

perspiration from the flames that licked inside them, over them.

"I need you," she breathed against his neck, nipping, licking, leaving small reddened marks

beneath his closely cropped beard as she fought to get closer. "I need all of you, Noah."

"God. You have me, Sabella." His lips moved down, down. His tongue licked over the upper

curves of her breasts, and a second later she was arching, crying out as he sucked the hard tip

of her nipple into his mouth.

Electric sensation shot through her. She arched. She moaned. She was dying inside with the

need to hold him, hold all of him within her forever. Or whatever small part he would allow her

to keep if he left her.

If. She couldn't allow herself to believe he would leave. She refused to. Love alone would hold

him, she promised herself. It had to.

"You taste like summer," he groaned as his lips moved from her breasts, down her stomach.

"Spread your legs, Sabella. Let me see if you need me."

She bent her knees, spread her thighs. She watched him as he sat back on his knees, his hands

pressing her legs farther apart, his eyes glowing as he stared at the swollen folds between her

thighs.

"Damn, you're wet," he whispered. "Always so wet for me. So sweet."

Her juices glistened on her flesh. In a bold, daring move, Sabella ran her fingers down her

stomach, dipped her fingers into the narrow slit, and let one caress gently around the straining

bud of her clit.

His cock jerked. She watched a droplet of creamy liquid pearl at the tiny slit at the crown as he

watched her.

"Is that how you like it?" he growled. "Slow and easy?"

She let her lips curl invitingly. "Is that how you like giving it?"

His tongue touched his lower lip as he glanced back at her. "I want to take you like an animal,"

he rasped. "So hard and deep you don't know anything but the fact that you're being taken."

She lowered her fingers as he watched, parted the wet lips, and let him watch. Watched her

hands as she dipped her finger into her pussy and drew it back. It glistened with her juices. And

then she lifted them to his lips.

A ragged moan filled the room as his lips parted and he sucked her fingers inside. At the same

time, his hand lowered and Sabella arched, a tortured cry falling from her lips, as two fingers

filled her.

He pushed inside her, strong and deep, a shock of penetration, of pleasure, as he reached deep

and with the tips of his fingers caressed that hidden spot of exquisite sensation inside her.

Sabella's hips arched, her gaze followed his. It was the most erotic sight she could have

imagined, seeing his fingers penetrating her, pulling back, then pushing inside her again as his

head lowered.

"I'm going to eat you like candy, baby," he told her, the sexual, erotic sound of his voice

spearing into her womb. "Like the sweetest candy."

His tongue licked around her clit and he watched her, held her eyes. The tip flickered over the

tight, straining bud before he went beneath it and lapped at it. Long, slow licks as his fingers

shifted and shafted inside her.

"You're going to tease me to death," she panted.

"Fuck us both to death," he growled before sucking the tender knot of nerves into his mouth

and creating the most exquisite sensation. He drew on her, let his tongue rub against the

ultrasensitive flesh as she cried out his name.

"Not fair," she cried out.

"Hmm. So sweet." He kissed the little bud gently.

"I want to touch you."

"You make me crazy when you touch me." He nipped her thigh. "You make me lose my mind

with hunger."

"Yes," she hissed, lifting until she rested on her elbows, staring back at him. "Like you make me. Lie back for me, Noah. Let me touch you. Let me ride you." She grinned back at him.

"Afraid you can't handle me?"

Hell, he knew he couldn't handle it. But it was a dare, a challenge, and Sabella had never

challenged him quite like this.

He pulled his fingers back from her tight grip, grinned, and sucked her juices from them. Her

face flushed, her eyes darkened, and it was the prettiest damned sight he had ever seen.

Then he pulled back and lay down for her. Watching her, his body tensing, tightening as she

moved between his thighs as he had hers.

"Oh, I think I like this." Her hands smoothed up the bunched muscles of his thighs, coming

close, so close but not touching the tortured sac of his balls.

"You're playing a dangerous game, baby," he told her, his voice rougher than normal, the blood

pumping harder, faster through his body.

He linked his hands beneath his head, otherwise he was going to jerk her over him and take

what he knew she would give him anyway.

"I like living dangerously." Her lips lowered, lowered.

"Ah fuck!"

Her lips were on his balls, open, drawing one side into her mouth, her tongue flickering

playfully, licking at the tight sac as his hips jerked, arched involuntarily.

The whisper of her moan filled his head as he watched her. He had to watch her. This was

another side of his wife that he had never known. Catlike, seductive. Licking and stroking until

she was licking up the ropy veined shaft of his cock and finally, teasingly, mouthing the head

of his cock.

He watched her lick the crest. Watched her suck him into her mouth. Watched her love every

inch of his massively hard erection.

He could feel the sweat beading on his forehead. Felt the arousal like an ecstatic, rapacious bite

tear through his system.

She moaned and sucked the crown deeper. Tongued it. Consumed it, until he thought he was

going to die from the need to fuck her. To have her. To pound into her until she was screaming

his name.

Finally, her lips lifted. She shifted, moved, stood. Noah stared up at the juices that had built on

her pretty, bare pussy. He licked his lips. Wanting to taste. Knowing he needed to fuck her

more.

He pulled his hands from beneath his head, gripped his cock with one hand, spearing it up to

her as his hand lightly circled her ankle.

"I want to watch," he growled. "Let me watch you take me, Sabella."

With her feet flat on the floor she bent her knees, keeping her thighs wide, and she lowered

herself to him. Noah let his hand caress up her leg, grip her hip. Watched, watching in

agonizing pleasure as the engorged crest parted the swollen folds.

He watched the lips of her pussy embrace the blunt tip of his erection, felt the fiery heat of her,

the slick, wet desire that rained from her. And he watched as she lowered herself, felt as he

began to impale her.

She took only the head, then lifted, let him see the juices coating the tip of his cock before she

lowered further. Took more, lifted.