When Lightning Strikes Twice (16 page)

And she was still too uncertain of him to offer much encouragement. “I might be a little curious,” she hedged.

“A little curious,” he echoed. It seemed safe enough to admit, though he was experienced enough to know that this
little game they were playing—if that’s what it was—was as far from safe as he’d ever been.

“One kiss?” he asked silkily. “Just one, to see what it might be like?”

She didn’t know what to say, if her answer should be yes or no. Her lips parted, but before she could speak she saw the way he was staring at her mouth, in utter fascination, and she couldn’t say a single word. Instead, she gave her head a brief half nod.

Finally, slowly, they closed the small gap between them and their lips touched lightly in a chaste, almost experimental gesture. Wade heard his heartbeat thundering in his ears as he pulled back a little and stared down at her.

She was so small. He wondered vaguely why he’d never noticed how petite she was, barely five-three to his own six-foot height. She was delicate and small-boned and exceedingly feminine, and the realization floored him. His eyes drifted compulsively over her.

Her legs were shapely from all the exercise she did, much of it with him. Running, biking, swimming, roller-blading, skiing—both water and snow. Dana didn’t wimp out like most women he knew; he expected no less from Tim’s sister. And though he’d certainly seen her bare legs before—too many times to count—the heat that frissoned through him now was powerful and new.

He saw the outlines of her little nipples against his old T-shirt and the sight struck him as highly erotic—his shirt covering her breasts yet revealing her arousal to him. He wanted to touch her there and wondered if he dared. He didn’t know what to do, how far to push whatever it was that was going on between them. Dana stood still in his hold, closer than they’d ever been, yet gave him no clues, neither pushing him away nor taking the lead.

Daringly, he leaned down and kissed her again exactly as before, but he felt the sensuality inherent in her response. A spasm of hot pleasure surged through him.

Dana felt the tremor that racked his body and quivered. Hot color burned her cheeks, and she lowered her face. But
when Wade used a single finger to tilt her head back, making her meet his gaze, she made no effort to stop him or to look or move away.

“What are we doing, Sheely?” Wade murmured huskily.

The sound of his raspy, sexy voice was an aphrodisiac in itself, which Dana did not need because she already was more aroused than she’d ever been in her life. That might have scared her, if either fear or caution had been able to filter through the thick cloud of desire engulfing her.

But nothing could; it was too strong, too vigorous and intense. “I don’t know. But whatever it is, we’re doing it,” she mumbled.

Her answer, such as it was, struck Wade as perfectly sound. “Yeah,” he agreed.

He put his arms around her, tentatively at first, and then, as the warmth of her curvy softness penetrated through to the very fiber of his being, his embrace tightened. He held her firmly against him, the feel of her going to his head like a shot of hundred-proof whiskey.

“Kiss me,” he whispered, brushing his lips against hers. He felt her mouth open to him, and her acquiescence sent him reeling. Clasping her neck with one hand, he deepened the kiss.

Dana’s arms closed tightly around him and she sank against him. A tiny moan escaped from her throat as she kissed him back with exhilarating fervor. The kiss went on and on, and a sensual storm gathered force within her. She throbbed, she ached, she wanted …

Suddenly, he moved away from her. Dana felt oddly disoriented, as if trapped between wakefulness and a dream. She opened her eyes, and then her stomach lurched when she saw Wade at her door. Locking it.

She shivered and goose bumps covered her skin. A microsecond later, Wade was back, reaching for her again.

“Wade, we can’t.” Never had she sounded so unconvincing, especially to herself. The words she spoke did not match her encouraging tone or the way she was clinging to him.

Wade noticed. He smoothed his palms over her arms. “Can’t we, Dana?”

“You called me Dana.” When he said it, she found herself actually liking her name and not envying Tricia and Sarah theirs.

“I had to get your attention somehow. I’m trying to make a very crucial point.” He borrowed her earlier statement, his hazel eyes warm. “And you called me Wade twice tonight,” he reminded her. “Believe me, you have
my
complete attention.” His breath was warm against her neck. “I want to kiss you again. Dana.”

He wanted much more than that, he admitted to himself. Now that he knew how kissing her felt—wonderful, beyond any expectations—there were other questions that needed answering. He posed them in his mind. Did she like to be stroked and teased, deep and slow? Or did she like it hard and fast? Did she scream or sigh softly when she climaxed? Wade groaned with pleasure, contemplating the possibilities.

He slid his hands over her back to her waist. Over her hips. He kissed the fine line of her jaw while his hands slowly, inexorably glided beneath the hem of her T-shirt. He caressed her satiny skin and smiled as she exhaled sharply.

“Saxon, don’t,” she whispered, though her fingers were gripping his shoulders rather than putting a stop to his explorations.

“Don’t do this?” He pushed her shirt up as his hands continued their journey. They closed over her bare breasts and Dana whimpered.

Wade stared down into her wide eyes. She looked—scared? He frowned, not liking the idea that she could possibly fear him.

“I would never hurt you, Dana,” he said hoarsely. “Don’t be afraid.”

But she was, she was absolutely terrified. This was
Wade
, her fevered brain reminded her, one of her best friends, one of Tim’s best friends, who’d been a part of her life for so

long she could hardly remember a time when he wasn’t. Wade, who had made it unmistakably clear many times that he was years and years away from even minimal commitment. Wade, who ruled out dating one woman exclusively to ensure his freedom, who wouldn’t consider any relationship serious or long-term.

While she could not cope with physical intimacy in any other context. As a twenty-six-year-old virgin, a veritable throwback to another era, Dana knew very well that casual sex would never work for her. And if Wade were to find out she was a virgin …

She recoiled at the thought. He would either mock her mercilessly or pity her or be so shocked he might require therapy to deal with the revelation. Whatever, their friendship would be irrevocably ruined. Neither would be comfortable with each other again.

And she didn’t want to lose his friendship. She liked him too much, she would miss him too much.

While Dana’s muddled mind grappled with one worst-case scenario after another, Wade took it upon himself to alleviate her fears and doubt. His mouth closed over hers in a kiss that robbed her of breath and scattered every frantic thought in her head.

His hands tangled in her hair, which had slipped looose from the cloth scrunchie, and his tongue moved hotly in her mouth. He felt her body soften and weaken against his in elemental feminine submission, and the effect was powerfully erotic.

And though he had wanted this, had initiated it, the reality amazed him. All of a sudden, she wasn’t simply his good pal or his old friend’s cute, funny sister. She was Dana, a sexy, sultry woman whose kiss was affecting him as none before. It struck him that he’d never wanted anyone as much as he wanted her right here, right now, that the feelings raging through him were so much more potent than mere sexual desire. There was something else, something extra, that he didn’t understand but definitely felt. Something sublime that went beyond the lusty urge to mate….

When he finally, reluctantly, had to lift his lips from hers, and they both gulped in much-needed breaths of air, he stared down at her, studying her as if seeing her for the first time.

“You’re so beautiful,” he heard himself say through the ringing in his ears. He arched her against him. “Feel how much I want you.” His body was shaking uncontrollably with need, with anticipation. “Dana, I want you so much.”

He couldn’t wait another second. Impulsively, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her to her bed. He laid her down on it, settling himself heavily on top of her.

“Saxon,” she breathed.

She knew there was something else she meant to say but coherent thought eluded her once again. She felt helpless and fantastic at the same time, a paradox she would’ve found incomprehensible until this very moment.

His hard body pressed into hers and she twisted sinuously against him, wrapping her arms around him. Her knees flexed, enabling him to fit himself to her, their position intimate, only the barrier of their clothing separating them from physical union. The material of his trousers felt rough yet sensuously exciting against her bare thighs, and she clasped him firmly. He was hard and thick and full, exerting a constant subtle pressure on the most private vulnerable part of her. Tantalizing sensations roiled through her, driving her higher, making her feel wild, unleashing needs she’d never known she had.

He pushed up her T-shirt and his mouth fastened over one cherry red nipple. Dana groaned and clutched his head to her, threading her fingers through the springy thickness of his hair. His tongue flicked to graze the sensitive little tip as he suckled her, sending exquisite jolts of pleasure directly to her center. She squirmed against him, encouraging him, silently pleading for more.

“These clothes,” she ground out an incoherent complaint. Their offending presence seemed devised to torture her, cruelly prohibiting the skin-to-skin contact her body craved.

With shaking hands, she yanked Wade’s shirt free from his slacks and thrust her hands underneath, to glide along the warm smooth skin of his back. Touching him this way was a potent stimulant, empowering her to do more. She felt his muscles flex under her fingers, inhaled his tangy male scent, and her head spun giddily. She was drowning in his masculinity, in his virility.

Incited, she made the boldest sexual move of her life and slid one hand around to his front to sample the fine wiry texture of the hair just beneath the waistband of his boxers. She extended her fingers farther, and the tips of her nails lightly grazed something pulsing and smooth. Instinctively, in a virginal reflex, she jerked her hand back.

A savage shudder went through him. He caught her wrist, intending to wrap her fingers around him, his actions guided by an overwhelming hunger. It was purely by accident that he happened to look at her face.

What he saw made him drop her hand and roll away from her. And denounce himself. She looked like a nervous little girl. And no wonder! After pressuring her into their first kiss—and promising just one kiss—he had practically jumped her right here in her room! God, Tim would kill him for treating Dana like an easy lay—after first condemning him as a sleazy, unprincipled user.

But it wasn’t like that!
Wade silently protested in his own defense, but to his dismay he couldn’t justify his actions to himself, couldn’t forgive himself for what he wanted to do with, for, and to Dana Sheely.

“This is crazy, Sheely.” Before he could talk himself out of it, Wade swung his legs off the bed and planted his feet firmly on the floor. He rested his elbows on his knees, gripping his head with his hands. “I can’t do it.”

He reviewed the situation again. And once again emerged in the unwanted role of louse. A treacherous, lecherous one. He’d been about to strip the clothes off his best friend’s sister—who also happened to be his own best friend—and have sex with her, right here in her own bed!
Under the very roof where the trusting Bob and Mary Jean Sheely sat watching TV.

He had betrayed them, just as he’d betrayed Dana and Tim and the entire Sheely family!

“I feel like a rat,” Wade gritted through his teeth. “No, lower than that. What’s lower than a rat?”

Dana lay flat on her back, desperately trying to process everything that had gone on between them. The wild desire, the irresistible impulses to kiss him, to touch him, the fiery passion that flared and still heated her body—and finally, awfully, his abrupt withdrawal.

She closed her eyes against the pain that gripped her. He’d had second thoughts, he’d decided that he didn’t want her, after all. And if she wanted to maintain even a semblance of their former friendship and salvage her pride, she was going to have to assure him that it was all right. That she really didn’t mind being rejected by him, that it was just fine for him to go on his way and leave her here like this.

“What’s a lower life form than a rat?” Her voice shook a little but she rallied. “Or what is more disgusting than a rat? Specify, please, because as Quint would say, ‘Specific is terrific’ ”

Growing up in a big family in a not-so-big house, one developed certain skills in order to maintain some personal privacy. Through the years, the ability to hide her feelings and hold back emotionally had saved her from being teased and challenged, lectured and interrogated. That talent held her in good stead now. She would never let Wade see how his rejection had devastated her.

“Hmm, let’s see,” Dana continued lightly, “since a rat is a mammal, a snake would be lower. A lamprey eel is even farther down the evolutionary chart and way more repulsive.”

“Sheely—”

“How low do you want to go—the insect world? If you want disgusting, a roach is definitely worse than a rat, at least in my estimation. But why stop there when we also
have the wonderful world of retroviruses? Is that what you are, Saxon? A disease-causing retrovirus?”

Wade laughed slightly. “I feel like I’m back in zoology class.”

“If memory serves, you didn’t do very well back in zoology class.” She sat up and moved off the bed, her movements deliberately slow and casual. “Tim said you barely passed it with a ‘D’ because you never studied for a single test. I think he secretly admired your nerve.”

“No, he didn’t. Tim thought I was nuts to blow off my grades, he was always trying to talk me into taking things more seriously.” Wade felt the force of his words like a physical blow, leaving him winded.