Nightfire (7 page)

“Nice room,” Mike said, strolling in, looking around.

“Yes, it is,” she agreed, delighted that it wasn’t going to have to console her. “It won’t take me but a minute to pack.”

“Take your time.” Those bright blue eyes fixed on her. “You weren’t planning on staying long.” It wasn’t a question.

“No. I, um. I booked for three nights, as I said. If—if it didn’t turn out well with Harry, at least I could look forward to doing some touristy things here in San Diego. When I left Boston, there was a foot of snow on the ground and subzero temperatures.”

“Well, you’re not going back to Boston for a while.” Mike watched as she pulled open the one drawer into which she’d put her underwear, nightgown, two sweaters and a pair of lightweight wool slacks. Not many things. “You’ll want to do some shopping. Harry’ll be good for it. Hell, I’ll be good for it.”

Chloe turned, nightgown in her hands, frowning. “I’m not too sure I under—Oh!” She blinked in surprise. “You mean Harry would pay for new clothes. Or you would.” She blushed. “I could never accept that. And anyway, my parents left me a lot of money.” A ton of it, in fact. The amount still astonished and, in a way, shamed her. She didn’t deserve all that money. “As a matter of fact, that was one of the reasons I came here to find Harry. I wanted to offer him half the value of the estate I inherited. It’s only right. We’re siblings, he should have half.”

Though nothing could ever compensate Harry for having been left behind, abandoned.

Mike walked over to her, smiling. “You want to give Harry money? Good luck with that. As a matter of fact, I’ll bet you dinner at the Crown Room, right here at the Del, that he won’t accept a dime from you. Won’t even entertain the thought.”

“And what would I bet?”

His eyes held hers. The light off the ocean outside her window lit up his blue eyes until they were the color of the ocean itself. He smiled. “Dinner at the Del.”

“So . . . no matter who wins, we have dinner here?”

He stepped closer. “Yeah, that’s about the size of it.”

Though he wasn’t as tall as his oversized “brothers,” Mike Keillor was still taller than she was. She had to tilt her head back a little to keep looking into his eyes.

He was so close she could feel the heat he emanated. So close he filled her field of vision, blocking everything out but him.

“Shake on it,” he ordered.

Her hand lifted without any volition on her part, as if it were the hand itself that wanted to be held by his. He gently grasped it in both hands, instead of the impersonal handshake she’d been expecting. His hands were as hot as a furnace. Slowly, watching her every second, he brought her hand to his mouth and—oh my God—kissed it.

Something inside her, something she’d never even suspected existed, pinged to life. Heat, excitement . . .
desire
. Her hand started shaking in his, utterly uncontrollable. She wasn’t in control of anything here—her hands, the expression on her face, her own desire.

It was like being on a raft without oars, tumbling down a raging river. All she could do was hang on. And she did.

Her fingers curled around his hand as he tugged, pulling her willingly closer to him.

Oh, everything about this was just so delicious. Chloe wanted to remember this exact moment for ever. The drapes opened onto a delightful balcony overlooking a stretch of white beach and beyond, the endless Pacific, the sun shining off the waves so brightly it was as if the ocean were filled with silent fireworks.

There was a vague, happy rhythmic sound that was the waves in the distance, overlaid by a little girl’s laughter and the dull thwacking of a tennis ball somewhere. She could smell lemon polish, brine, some flowering plant outside the window . . . and Mike.

Every sense she had was heightened, her entire body turning into one huge receptor. Absolutely every sensation her body was receiving was delectable, particularly the desire.

Oh my. She’d read about it, endlessly. Listened to friends talk about it, thought about it, but never understood it.

Now
she did. Now she could see why women dated and sometimes married completely inappropriate men, because if for even a fleeting moment it was possible to feel this, it was worth it.

Her entire body was warming up, fast. A wave of heat moving through her, warm and alive. She could barely breathe from the heat and excitement. She could feel every single muscle in her body, feel her heart thudding, all her extremities tingling.

Desire melted her insides, spread heat between her thighs. When Mike pulled her so close her breasts met his chest, her vagina contracted. A strong pulse, unmistakable. It had never happened to her before but she recognized it immediately. Without any input from her head at all, her body was readying itself for him.

But what astonished her, excited her, delighted her was that extraordinary feeling of being
alive,
the life force pulsing through her, and she recognized how dead she’d felt most of her life. Somehow always at a remove from the living.

But not now. Now she was alive in every cell, connected to the earth, as human as they come. This was frightening, exhilarating stuff. She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this didn’t come from her. She couldn’t make herself feel this way. She’d tried, but it had never worked.

It took Mike Keillor, watching her carefully out of those oh-so-blue eyes, potent and strong and so very very male. He was the reason she felt so incredibly alive.

The thought would have frightened her if she’d had even a minimal capacity for fright, but she didn’t. She felt alive, and strong, ready for anything. Able to move mountains. A force of nature.

Mike watched her carefully as he moved his head down, slowly, looking deeply into her eyes, trying to gauge her mood, whether she was going to object.

Was he kidding?
Object? When she craved this kiss so much?

Everything about this was brand-new. An excitement so intense her breath was caught in her lungs, all that male power concentrated on
her,
when she was so used to being utterly invisible to men.

And the showstopper. Her own desire. Something she’d never felt before, certainly not at this level of intensity. Everything in her was quivering with anticipation.

And then—it happened.

Mike lowered his head to her, his eyes watching hers, then dropping his eyes to her mouth, the gaze so powerful it was as if he touched her mouth with his fingers.

He brought his mouth to hers, briefly, and she felt electricity crackle, was surprised lightning didn’t flash.

They both jerked a little, as if what had happened was unexpected. It was certainly completely new to Chloe, but then she wasn’t really an expert.

Mike lifted his mouth and looked down at her. His eyes narrowed, his face somber, as if he’d just received a shock, perhaps an unwelcome one.

Before she could say anything, pull back because it seemed clear he wasn’t happy with the kiss, he bent down again and there was nothing tentative about this kiss. He simply opened her mouth with his and explored it.

Another wave of heat went through her. She leaned against him to get as close as possible and it was like leaning against steel. The first time his tongue touched hers Chloe shuddered.

He must have felt something, too, because he tightened his strong arm around her back and, lifting her, walked two steps to the wall.

There was no discernible change in his breathing when he lifted a full-grown woman, one-armed. The change in breathing came a few seconds later, after her back thudded against the wall and he moved closer to her, as close as the wall was at her back, without ever lifting his mouth.

The kiss became heated, pure sex—sex with their mouths and not genitalia, but it was just as hot, just as exciting, and it had the same effect on her vagina. Each stroke of his tongue made her clench tightly between her legs, a reaction she was utterly unable to stop.

Not that she wanted to. She wanted him even closer, though that wasn’t possible. Her arms around his neck tightened and she lifted herself up to his mouth, craving the feel of him everywhere. She felt his every breath through her mouth, against her breasts as that incredibly wide chest started bellowing.

A foot stepped between hers, then two. His thighs somehow opened hers up and then his entire groin was plastered against hers and . . . oh God.

Right against her belly she could feel it. Feel
him
. Big and thick and hard. What was happening to her every time his tongue touched hers, was also happening to him. Where her vagina contracted, his penis moved, became impossibly longer, thicker. He was grinding against her, mouth to mouth, chest to breasts, groin to groin, setting off a friction that ignited her inside. Each move he made inflamed her more and more.

Her eyes were so heavy she couldn’t open them. Though she’d like to see his face, there was no question of opening her eyes. Her body didn’t want to see him, it wanted to
feel
him. Feel all that massive strength and heat, concentrated on her, feeding his heat into her.

The kiss went on and on and on, as she moved into a place without time, where there was just an endless now, glowing with heat.

Mike reached down to the hem of her skirt and placed his hand on the outside of her thigh. His hand was so huge it covered an amazing amount of skin. The skin of his palms was rough, she could feel the nylon catching as he slowly brought his big palm up and up.

His entire body jerked when he realized she wore thigh-highs. Chloe had always hated the tight restriction of panty hose and was glad of it now because when his hard palm moved up over the lace at the top of her stockings, he touched her bare flesh and she shivered, goose bumps breaking out all over her body, which was crazy because she was also steaming hot.

At the feel of bare flesh, he stilled, and lifted his mouth. Oh God, was she supposed to open her eyes? Because it was so hard to do. Almost impossible. Her head felt loose on her neck. She was upright simply because there was the wall at her back and Mike Keillor at her front, otherwise she’d fall down.

She opened her eyes when a second passed without Mike kissing her. It wasn’t easy. Her lids lifted slowly, as if lead weights were attached to them. All she could see was Mike’s face filling her entire field of vision.

He was watching her closely. Maybe to see if she’d object to him touching bare flesh?

Foolish, foolish man.

Chloe lifted herself up a little and placed her mouth on his. Mike drew a deep breath, the air coming from her own lungs, then plunged into her. It was the only possible word to describe the feeling that he possessed every inch of her.

He pulled back a second. She wondered why when cool air brushed her thighs. He’d pulled up her skirt so that when he leaned back heavily against her, she could feel every hard inch of him.

His hips pressed hard against her, thighs opening hers until somehow, as if by magic, as if by some heavenly alignment, his penis was right against her vagina, opening up her lips, rubbing against her . . .
there
.

She whimpered, the sound lost in Mike’s mouth. She was entirely his, completely without willpower or volition. His mouth ate at hers, his shoulders curved in to her like some powerful wall of flesh. He moved his hips against her in short, stabbing movements, hands lifting her hips against his.

He gasped, tilted his head, tongue moving deeply in her mouth. She could feel the heat of his penis through his briefs, his trousers and her own silk panties. It burned, his penis hot, moving fast, moving exactly where all her nerves were so raw it was as if he’d switched on an electrical current right . . .
there.

She was on some vast ocean of pleasure, warm and honeyed and filled with joy. And then the ocean rose, lifted, became a huge wave coming at her, closer and closer, faster and faster . . .

She gave a cry that was lost in his mouth as her body exploded in a burst of heat coming from her thighs, but spreading fast throughout her entire body, her vagina contracting sharply in uncontrollable pulses so strong and sharp they were almost, but not quite, painful and spread through her, down to her fingertips and toes.

She’d shot way out into outer space and came floating back down slowly, in swooping motions. Everything that had been a heated rush slowed and cooled. Gravity reasserted itself, she felt the floor under her feet again. Eyes closed, she sighed.

Amazing. Everything about that had been just amazing. The best experience of her life. As a matter of fact, nothing else had ever come even close.

Mike lifted his mouth from hers.

She sighed again and opened her eyes and received a shock.

Mike did not look happy. He looked as if he were in pain.

“I’m sorry,” he said tightly, and her happiness disappeared, just like that. Like flipping a switch.

“You are?” Chloe whispered, appalled.

He was
sorry
. Well, what was she supposed to do with that? He was sorry he kissed her, made her climax? It had been the happiest experience of her life and he was sorry?