Maid of Dishonor (7 page)

‘Damn straight you won't,' he replied, not looking cowed in the least. ‘That shirt cost me over two hundred dollars. So I figure you owe me.'

She allowed herself a moment to absorb the breath-taking display of tanned skin and bulging muscles—before making quick work of his belt buckle. And drawing down the zip to reveal the huge bulge straining against his boxers. Her eyes met his and she cupped the firm package. ‘Then it must be payback time.'

So what if he could seduce her into a coma? Didn't mean she couldn't seduce him right back.

‘Yeah, I guess it is,' he said, the challenge in his cobalt eyes unmistakeable. ‘Give it your best shot, sugar.' The low chuckle was as smug as ever as he kicked off the rest of his clothes, and stood before her gloriously naked.

She took a few extra moments to get her breath back.

Goodness.

His body had matured, the once lean, coltish physique gaining muscle bulk in all the right places—making his shoulders broader, the V of his hipbones more defined, his triceps and biceps a lot more prominent and the ridged six-pack quite simply awe-inspiring.

Someone had been working out. A lot.

She touched a nail to the new swirls of chest hair that now surrounded his flat brown nipples and then traced the happy trail down to the thicket where his erection jutted out.

Oh, my word.

Was it her imagination, or had that got even more magnificent too?

‘Carter, you're beautiful,' she said, running her tongue over her lips as she dropped to her knees. She smiled up at him, adrenaline surging through her veins like a heady drug as she circled his girth, felt it twitch against her palm—and saw the fierce flash of need cross his face. ‘Brace yourself, sugar,' she purred, mimicking his lazy, moonlit and magnolia tones. And then swept her tongue from the root to the tip and heard him moan.

* * *

Holy hell!

Carter ran his fingers into her hair, caressing her scalp, as his knees turned to Jell-O and the fire in his gut became an inferno.

Stay upright, damn it.

He dragged his gaze away from the sight of those soft, full lips surrounding him, and struggled to take the exquisite punishment like a man. But then he saw their reflection—and the decadent image of Gina on her knees, pleasuring him with her mouth, nearly had him collapsing in a heap.

She should have looked submissive as she knelt before him, but instead she looked bold and defiant, like an Amazon goddess, feeding into every schoolboy sex fantasy he'd ever had about her. And he'd had a heck of a lot of those over the years.

Hellfire and damnation.

That was where he was headed and he didn't care.

He tried to force his mind to engage in banalities to stem the tidal wave of his orgasm and keep from disgracing himself. Against shuttered lids, he conjured a picture of the Sunday service at Riverbend Church; the board of directors of the Mill discussing the end of year's report...but every single image crashed and burned to be replaced by the glorious sight he'd glimpsed in the dark glass as her tongue licked and swirled, her mouth suckled. An image he feared would now be lasered into his brain for ever more.

He groaned, the heat curling and twisting and then yanking hard in his groin as her hot, beautiful mouth feasted on the last few ounces of his self-control.

His fingers tightened in the mass of curls as he dragged himself away from her. ‘Enough.' Hooking his hands under her arms, he hoisted her off her knees.

Her cheeks pinkened as those bright green eyes flickered with challenge. ‘Why did you stop me? I was enjoying myself.' The pouting lips made the heat pulse and throb harder.

He grabbed her wrist as she reached for him. ‘Uh-uh. I said enough.'

She cocked one perfectly plucked eyebrow. ‘Why? From all that moaning you were doing, I got the definite impression you were enjoying it too.'

He grinned. Damned if she wasn't as wild and reckless and wanton as she'd ever been beneath that layer of chic sophistication—and didn't that make her perfect for him? In the only way that mattered now.

‘I didn't say I wasn't enjoying it,' he said, his gaze steady and his voice firm, or as firm as it could be while he was clinging onto control by his fingertips. ‘I just don't want to come that way. Not this time.'

‘Spoilsport.'

He laughed, but tightened his hold on her wrist and brought her fingers to his lips. ‘I want to be inside you, Gina. I want to watch you climax with me—you're even more gorgeous when you come.'

He kissed her knuckles and a wary look crossed her face, giving him another disarming glimpse of the girl he remembered, who had been so bold sexually, and yet so unsure at the slightest sign of tenderness.

She draped her arms over his shoulders, threaded her fingers into his hair to drag him close, the siren returning full force—and he dismissed the sentimental thought. After all, there was nothing tender about tonight, and what he planned to do to her.

‘Well, all you had to do was say so, Rhett,' she purred.

Brushing the riotous hair back from her face, he kissed her long and hard, thrusting his tongue into her mouth and forcing her to submit this time.

Cupping her generous butt in his hands, he boosted her into his arms, dumped her onto the room's kingsize bed. ‘Consider yourself told.'

* * *

Gina laughed, the desire coursing through her veins and the electric connection that snapped to life between them making her feel free and unencumbered for the first time in a long time. It felt so good to relinquish control, to be able to take what she wanted without fearing the consequences.

Carter wouldn't judge her, because he knew who and what she really was. When it came to sex—hot, hard, explosive sex—they had always been kindred spirits.

He bracketed her hips and pressed his lips to her pulse point, drawing her knees up and positioning himself above her—but as she took in a deep lungful of that tangy masculine scent the press of his erection registered. The intoxicating desire ripped away to be replaced by a jolt of panic. Slapping her hands against his shoulders, she forced him back.

‘Wait, Carter. You have to use protection.'

He lifted his head, his eyes a little unfocused, a little dazed.

‘Please tell me you have something with you, because I don't,' she continued, the panic making her voice hitch. She should have said something sooner, much sooner. Why hadn't she?

‘Yeah, sure. Sorry.' He raked a hand through his hair. ‘Wait right there.' He jumped off the bed and padded to the suite's bathroom, his naked butt gilded by the moonlight.

She stared at the ceiling, the sudden realisation of what they'd almost done—a second time—dousing the flames.

He reappeared in the doorway of the bathroom. Her pulse hammered at the imposing sight silhouetted in the doorway. But as he returned to her she was hurled back to a time in her life that had left her hollow and empty and devastated. A time she had forced herself never to acknowledge. She sat up, threw her legs over the bed.

‘I have to go,' she said, struggling to keep her voice steady as the brutal memory hovered too close, threatening to engulf her.

‘Why?' He caught her wrist, preventing her from moving as he sat beside her. ‘I found what we needed.'

He threw a handful of foil packets on the bedside table.

‘That's great. But we don't need them now. This was a mistake.'

She braced herself, ready for him to object, to call her names—it wouldn't be the first time she'd been branded a tease or worse. And given how his arousal didn't seem to have abated one bit he would probably have a point. But right now she was too busy protecting herself to worry about any injuries she might have caused him.

But to her surprise, instead of getting angry or annoyed, he lifted a palm and cupped her cheek. ‘Why is it a mistake all of a sudden?'

She shook her head to dislodge the possessive touch—this was fine when it was just sex, but she didn't want to risk getting her emotions involved. ‘No reason.'

She tried to rise again, but he simply held her waist, making it impossible for her to move without getting into a wrestling match—something she definitely didn't intend to do, because, while her head was telling her clearly making love with Carter Price would be a very bad idea now, she couldn't rely on her body to play ball.

‘There is a reason,' he replied in that CEO tone he'd been using all evening. She'd found it a major turn on during foreplay; she was finding it somewhat less so now. ‘And you need to tell me what it is.'

‘No, actually, I don't. I'm under no obligation to—'

‘Think again, Gina,' he interrupted. ‘Because you're not going anywhere until you do.'

She sucked in a breath, trying to remain patient and sensible, and stave off a hissy fit.

‘I'm sorry,' she said, her voice tight with the effort to sound conciliatory. ‘I realise you're still extremely aroused...' She flicked her gaze to his crotch and heat crept up her neck at the sight of the magnificent erection. ‘And that's obviously partly my fault...'

‘Partly?'
he interrupted, giving an incredulous laugh.

She looked away as the heat hit her cheeks. For Pete's sake, was she actually blushing? She never blushed.

‘Okay, fine,
mostly
my fault,' she added, in the interests of complete disclosure. Because she'd never been coy either. ‘But that doesn't mean I have to sleep with you if I don't want to.'

He cursed. ‘Give me some credit here. I'm not a kid, any more. I do have some control. And I would never expect any woman to sleep with me if she didn't want to—no matter how aroused she's gotten me. I may not be the gentleman my mama raised me to be, but I'm not that much of jerk.'

‘Okay, good,' she said, relief flowing through her. He sounded more affronted than angry. Not that she cared if he was angry, she told herself staunchly; she'd never had a problem dealing with male tantrums. But right now she felt too exposed to relish dealing with one from him. ‘Then I'd like to leave.'

She waited, but, instead of releasing her, he began to stroke his thumbs back and forth over the skin beneath her ribs, in a light caress that sent darts of sensation places she really didn't want them.

‘Carter, let go of my waist,' she said, breathlessly.

‘Not until I get an explanation. What made you change your mind?'

She couldn't tell him that. Would never tell him that. Because it would mean revealing something she had decided a long time ago he had never really been a part of. The pregnancy had been an accident, a biological blip, that had ended almost as soon as it had begun—and forced her to re-evaluate who she was and what she was. But she'd come out the other side. She hadn't thought about it in years. And if she could get away from him, she wouldn't have to think about it now.

She sent him what she hoped was a bored look. ‘It doesn't seem spontaneous any more. And I'm really not that turned on now.'

‘You're really not, huh?' His mouth curled on one side and she saw the sceptical gleam in his eye. ‘Why are you lying?'

‘I'm not.'

She'd always been an exceptionally convincing liar—after all, she'd had a lot of practice in her teens—but unfortunately as she said the words her lungs seized as if all the oxygen had been sucked out of them at once—and the denial came out on an unconvincing hum.

‘How about we test that theory?' His voice deepened as his hands stroked down her naked thighs and gripped her knees.

‘If you were any kind of a gentleman, you'd take my word for it,' she murmured, pushing the words out past the constriction in her throat as he parted her legs. A move she appeared powerless to resist as her centre throbbed in anticipation.

‘That's true enough.' His thumbs blazed a trail of goosebumps, caressing the sensitive skin of her inner thigh as his hands headed back towards heaven. ‘And if you were any kind of a lady, you wouldn't lie about it.'

‘I'm not lying.' Those damn thumbs angled across the juncture of her legs, and caressed—back and forth, back and forth—making the protest compete with the telltale hitch in her breathing.

Kneeling in front of her, he pushed her thighs wider and let his thumbs touch the slick swollen folds. She braced her hands on the bed, let her head fall back and struggled to breathe as all thought, all feeling, all memory burned away in a blaze of lust.

‘There now. You seem to like that well enough, sugar.'

She could hear the arrogance and the amusement and she would have objected, but all she cared about now was concentrating on the heat, and forgetting the rest. The orgasm fluttered towards her on soaring wings as he used his thumbs to hold her open and then licked at the heart of her.

She sobbed, the sound echoing back at her off the room's hard, designer surfaces. Then he fastened his lips on her swollen clitoris and sucked. She screamed. Soaring straight into the cosmos.

The orgasm slammed into her, radiating out through her belly, her breasts, her fingers and toes. She collapsed back on the bed as he stood above her. He grabbed the foil packet, ripped it with his teeth, rolled on the condom, then sat on the bed and hauled her up, to straddle his lap.

She held onto his shoulders as his hands cupped her buttocks and positioned her over the huge erection.

‘I want to be inside you, Gina.' The naked need in his eyes matched the strain in his voice, the tendons standing out on his neck, and sweat slicking his brow. But still he held her poised above him, and made no move to take her. ‘Don't make us wait any longer.'

She impaled herself in one smooth stroke—the staggering fullness making her head snap back, her fingers clutch at his shoulders. And then she began to move. Rising up, sinking back, the intimate stroking touching that place deep inside that only he had ever reached.