A Delicious Mistake (13 page)

Even
as he’d made his way back to the Lodge, he had known he could not stay away
from her any longer. But he had reached the Hutton Game Lodge too late in the
night to visit with her right away. But she had come to him.

He
had been giving the crackling fire one last stroke of wood before finally going
to sleep when Sarah entered. She burst in, sudden and unannounced, like a
red-haired storm breaking over him. She stood there, eyes wide and bright, lips
parted, chest rising and falling as if she had perhaps run to him. She was the
most astounding vision he had ever witnessed. She was like something from his
hottest, wildest fantasy, and though her lips moved—perhaps to lash out at him
once again—he could hardly register the words, for he was caught up in how she
seemed a thing made of fire, as if she had sprung up from the flames he had
coaxed to life.

He
muttered something about patrols and poaching—he didn’t really know. He didn’t
want to lie to her. He merely said the first thing that sprung to his mind
because she could have been telling him to jump on a big pink elephant right
now and he would have thought that a reasonable thing to do and done it for
her.

All
he could really process was her scent, which permeated the air like the smell
of electricity before a thunderstorm. Like an aphrodisiac it drove him wild and
sank into the deepest recesses of his soul. He stood. The fire that blazed in
her emerald green eyes awoke the spark inside him he had thought buried so deep
he could forever ignore it. He could resist her no longer. He had been a fool
to think he ever could. Something of that must have shown in his stare. He saw
her hesitate, he saw her realize what he knew. She didn’t recoil from him.
Idly, he became aware of the distant strains of the yearning song of a night
bird. It was as if the Serengeti was singing for them, encouraging them to act
upon their desires.

In
two long strides, he was in front of her, close enough to touch her. To feel
her. Even underneath the shorts and tank top she wore, he could see the outline
of her delicate curves. The erotic fantasies of her that had come to visit him
underneath the velvety, endless star-filled sky came to mind. He had claimed
her a thousand times in his dreams. This was no dream. Sarah was very real, and
she was here within his reach. He knew at once they needed each other. This was
the answer he had been seeking—they needed to heal each other. This time they
would speak only with touch and passion.

Within
moments, he had her in his arms. He reached out and undid the bows that held
together the straps of her tank top. He watched the garment slide like a caress
down her body, leaving her topless, her glorious breasts exposed. A few moments
later, her shorts, socks, and shoes followed, until she stood breathtakingly
naked in front of him. Her curves were perfect. Her small but firm breasts fit
perfectly within his palms. He slipped a hand down into her fragrant sex,
touched the red curls between her legs, and the urgency to fill her, to plunge
into her almost undid his control. He wanted her—needed her. He was no stranger
to beauty, but Sarah’s beauty took his breath away. Her emerald green eyes, her
white skin, her exquisite silhouette chained him as if she had locked him to
her side.

He
had fought his inappropriate fantasies for her. It had been such a sweet taboo.
He should not think of her as anything but Luke’s sister. But now he knew she
was meant to be his woman.

He
swept her up and put her onto his bed. He touched her, kissed her, stroked her
skin. To his astonishment and delight, she unfolded gently underneath him like
a night flower blossoming for the first time. She put her arms around his neck
and kissed him back until she left his mouth dry with desire. He had to taste
more of her. The pink buds jutting out of her youthful breasts tempted him, and
he did not resist. He suckled her nipples, tugged on them, nibbled those hard
nubs until Sarah moaned and writhed under the hard weight of his body. The pink
lips between her thighs called to him as well. He could not ignore the damp
need between her legs. In awe, he ran his hands all over her petite, impossibly
perfect body—that very same body he had coveted for so many sleepless hours.
Carefully, he touched her wet sex. Sarah spread her legs and so he pushed a
finger into her, marveling at how dark his skin looked against her warm, pale
flesh.

He
wanted their lovemaking to be wildly erotic, wonderfully strange, and
uninhibitedly intimate—he wanted everything for her. But he had not expected
Sarah to be a virgin. When he pushed into her, sheathed himself in her sweet
tightness, he felt the resistance of a woman who had never known a man. He held
himself still. The discovery that no man had ever taken her filled him with a
wave of affection and, yes, a hint of all-male pride that he would be the
first. He wanted her to know joy, but he had to warn her as well that there
would be pain at first. She stared up at him, panting, her skin sheened with
sweat. He saw in her eyes and well as heard from her that she wanted him to be
the one—the only one. He thrust into her and she cried out.

As
he broke through her barriers, he had caught his breath, wonder filling him all
the way to his very core.

Mine.

His.
For tonight at least, Sarah was his in the most complete way possible. He
ground into her welcoming heat. With her virgin barrier gone, he could thrust
deeper and deeper into her, bringing her pleasure now. He set a demanding pace
with his hips, gasping out his own breaths as he became one with her.
Mine
,
he thought again, the word going in circles in his mind over and over and over
again. It filled him with a mounting sense of wonder.

Mine.

Mine.

Mine.

With
each thrust, his chest grazed against her breasts. His skin rubbed over her
nipples. She moaned, pressing her head back into the pillow, her red hair
spread around her head like a fiery halo, her long neck exposed to him.

He
forced himself to hold onto his orgasm. He wanted her to know moments of pure
delight, moments that came close to nothing he had ever known or experienced
with any other woman. With Sarah, his passion wasn’t just arousal—it was
something more, something sublime that simply could not be put into words. She
danced wildly underneath him. He caught her legs and turned so she sat astride
him and could ride him now at her own pace. Eyes huge in her oval face, she
stared down and him and gave an experimental wiggle with her hips. He moaned
and closed his eyes and let her take control of him. Sitting on him, she danced
the soft, velvety night away.

At
last he could control himself no longer. Grabbing her hips, he turned her, put
her back underneath him. He caged her body with his hands and arms and rose up
over her so that they touched only at the hips where their sexes merged into
one. He pulled out of her hot, dripping wetness, held himself out while she
whimpered underneath him, begging without words for him. He thrust deep and
hard into her. Her hips bucked underneath him as if begging for him to go
deeper still. Again, he pulled out and held himself back from her. She wiggled
and moaned under him again. At last he gave her want she wanted—what he wanted.
He plunged into her, taking her hard and fast. She cried out and arched and he
plunged into her over and over, spending himself into her—spilling his seed.

He
collapsed onto her and when he tried to move off, she held him in place with
her arms and legs. They lay entwined, passion spent, and Benjamin knew the
world for him would never be the same. His little Sarah would never be the
same.

But
she lay with him until the dawn caught them.

* * *

               
When she opened her eyes to strange surroundings, a shard of panic pierced
Sarah. Frantic, she tried to get her brain to kick into motion and join her
body in the land of the awake and aware. It took several moments to finally
adjust her eyes to the dim light and realize she lay inside a hut. It took her
even longer to remember it was Benjamin’s hut.

               
And the heavy weight next to her was Benjamin.

               
She sat bolt upright.

The
fire, low and restful now, slumbered in sharp contrast to the mounting alarm
that hit Sarah. Recollection dawned on her in the same way the sun was dawning
and streaking into the room through the window. She had slept with Benjamin.
She had caved. She had given in to her unspeakable urges. The memories became
vivid and the events of the past several hours came crashing down on her—as if
the dull, delicious pain throbbing wonderfully within her sex wasn’t a clear
enough memento. A hot flush climbed from the base of her throat all the way up
to her cheeks.

She
turned to stare at the man who lay beside her. She thought he had been asleep,
but Benjamin was far from sleeping. He lay still, staring up at her with very
alert, very deep, dark eyes.

Oh, Christ,
Sarah thought in a
panic.
Shit.

Her
first instinct was to jump up and leave. The urge to run as far away and as
fast as possible almost swamped her. She had never,
ever
envisaged
herself as being capable of the wanton acts she had performed during the night.
She had ridden him as if he were a stallion to mount. She had allowed him to
touch her, to push his fingers inside of her. He had taken her virginity and
she had ached for him to do even more. She had never thought herself capable of
bringing her recent wild dreams and fantasies into reality—but she’d been
willing to let him do anything to her.

She
would have liked to fool herself into believing that she had at least made a
couple of attempts to stop him, but she hadn’t. This hadn’t been rape. He
hadn’t held her down and forced her—but even that idea brought shameful warmth
to her sex. If he had tied her up and taken her, she would have loved it all
the same. But she hadn’t offered so much as one protest, half-hearted or
otherwise. At no point had she even made any real struggle. She hadn’t said no
to Benjamin—in fact she seemed to remember wanting more of him. In fact, it
felt as if she had been looking for the experience. On some deep level she had
come to Benjamin’s hut for that sole purpose. Her urge to confront him was in
truth an entirely different kind of urge. On some level she had known exactly
what would happen if she pushed open the door to his hut—she had even been
hoping for him to take her and make love to her. A part of her, deep down, knew
the truth.

Sarah
barely suppressed a groan. She couldn’t remember a time when she had felt more
ashamed. It felt as if she was incapable of getting any redder.

Yet,
one more glance at the warmth shining in Benjamin’s dark eyes was enough to
have her fall prey to that same, potent magic that had made it so impossible to
say no to him before. She wasn’t going to say no this time, either.

As
he ran a hand up her spine and gently guided her back down to the sheets and
his warm, powerful body, Sarah felt herself already beginning to relax. Her
body had a will of its own. The smoldering heat she could see in his deep brown
eyes weakened her every defense.  When he looked at her like that, she
knew she would surrender anything and everything to him, including and
especially herself.

Stupid little girl,
she
thought with a smile.
You should have known that escaping him wouldn’t be an
option.

It
had not been an option before, and it was not one now. Had she learned nothing
from last night?

In
fact, as it turned out, she had learned plenty. Some well-placed touches of her
hand to his taut nipples, some tantalizing strokes of her palm along his thigh and
to the silken hard length that jutted up from between his legs—she had learned
both those things last night. She traced a path of burning kisses along his
chest and then leaned down to place a kiss on his powerful manhood, which stood
erect and ready and already leaking a bead of moisture that tasted salty on her
tongue.

Benjamin
also seemed intent on giving her a few reminders of what they had both learned
of each other the previous night. Just like last night, he pushed her back and
rolled over so that he lay on top of her. He covered her mouth with his, taking
her into a long, sensual, passionate kiss. He pushed his tongue into her mouth,
demanding a return of his passion. She opened her lips to him and spread her
legs, helpless to do anything else under the onslaught of his burning demands.
Sarah curled her fists around the sheets on each side of her, moaning into
Benjamin’s mouth. Her own arousal climbed and mounted within her. Her hips
bucked up underneath him—and the only thought she had was that she ached to
have his hard length within her again.  Whatever she might have wanted to
say to him was lost as her body dissolved into his. She was entirely pliable to
whatever he chose to do with and to her. He didn’t need to tie her with ropes.
She stretched her hands overhead and knew herself to be tied with her dark
desire.

If
what he had chosen to do was make love to her over and over and over again
until they both reached a point of exhaustion, Sarah was only too happy to
comply. She didn’t even dream about resisting.

It
did indeed go on for hours, long, wonderful, maddening hours. Sarah lost count
of how many times Benjamin took her to the height of near insanity only to
bring her back again, much to her delighted frustration. It became a dance, a
rhythm, a passionate, wild, maddening cadence. Just before the point of no
return, Benjamin would slow his touch and his kisses. He would tease her
opening with his hard erection, plunge into her once and pull out. At first,
Sarah would only utter a few moans of protest, but eventually she threw all her
remaining inhibitions to the wind and began to cry out for more. She was
begging, and she didn’t care. This was the sweetest prayer she had ever
uttered. From the deep growls of pleasure escaping Benjamin, she could tell
that he had her exactly where he had wanted her—begging for him to take her and
claim her.