Awaken to Danger (17 page)

pale yellow Victoria's Secret. On sale. And holy cow she was rambling in her brain to ward off

embarrassment.

The cold kissed her skin a second before his mouth. Moist heat flowed from him through her veins until

she longed to shrug away the heavy blanket, but her languid body wouldn't obey commands from her

brain. Only instinct. Her frantic hands grappled over Carson, hungry to touch as much of him as possible

after yearning for so damn long. Much more and she would combust.

His hands slid lower to her bottom, drawing her nearer. They rolled along the truck bed in a tangle of

arms and legs that should have hurt but sensation suffused her to the exclusion of anything else.

Cocooned in the blanket, she kicked free of her jeans, needing to be rid of the confining clothes. Her

sweater hung from her shoulders as her bare breasts brushed along the rough fabric of his flight suit as

they lay side by side.

The flight suit unzipped from the bottom for easy access during flight, and she definitely intended for them

both to fly now, with the sky and stars, sound of the waves in her ears, the best of both worlds.

"Birth control?" she mumbled against his mouth.

"In my wallet." He combed his hands deeper through her hair, holding her with an intensity that rocked

her. "Nikki, I swear I'm going to be around after."

"Can we talk about that later?" She only wanted to focus on finally feeling all of him all over her.

"I'm just doing my damnedest to be honorable here."

One of the things she admired about him, but right now he'd turned her inside out until she couldn't have

run enough miles to burn off the frenetic energy zinging through her.

"It would be very dishonorable to leave me unsatisfied." Stretched beside him, she wrapped her fingers

around the thick length of him, learning the silken steel texture of him. His groan thrilled her as much as his

touch, knowing
she
brought him pleasure. She suspected the timeless tunes from the stereo would arouse

her mercilessly from now on.

He tugged out his wallet, pulled free a tiny packet and sheathed himself with a speed that spoke of an

urgency echoed inside her.

Hooking his hand behind her knee, he hitched her leg higher, over his hip until she realized what he

intended. No missionary position tonight. Fair enough. She liked the idea of taking this journey side by

side.

Then the thick blunt prodding stopped her thoughts altogether as she focused on this moment she knew

would change things between them forever. Deeper, deeper still, she took him inside her body and more,

slowly, carefully, staring into his eyes and soul in a way she never had months ago when she'd been too

wrapped up in her hero worship to see the man.

She winced at the uncomfortable pinch and stretch, settled, waited for her body to adjust around him.

"Okay?" he asked, his jaw flexing from a restraint he couldn't hide.

"Totally." She rocked against him once, twice, again, his grip on her hips helping her find a matching

rhythm of their bodies together. Moving. Rocking to increase the pleasure of his slick thrusts.

He shifted onto his back, holding her in place during the shuffle, the blanket slithering down around her

waist, her sweater flapping open while he laved attention over her breasts.

His hand slid between them, touching where their bodies met, circling in time with her writhing hips

against him. Her womb clenched tight, tighter, as tight as her legs clamping him to her as she chased the

release so close... closer...

Waves of pleasure sluiced over her, pulsing like the breakers gushing against the shore, then receding

slowly and stealing her muscles from her body until she slumped on top of him. Two deep thrusts later,

his arms convulsed around her in time with his hoarse growl of completion.

Slowly, her senses tuned back in on things other than the residual pleasure pulsing through her.

Waves surged and crashed while the stereo piped one of her favorite songs, "Don't Sit Under the Apple

Tree." Now she knew why.

Nikki grinned against his neck, tasting the sweat on his skin. "After all our talk about being old and

mature, here we are in the back of a truck."

His hands roved up and down her spine. "I've never made love in the back of a truck."

"Me, either." Nor had she made love anywhere else for that matter.

A fact she now knew for certain.

She'd been almost sure nothing happened with Gary. The doctor in the emergency room had reassured

her there were no signs of penetration, and she'd believed intellectually, but her mind had felt so violated

it had been difficult to look beyond that. Now at least she had physical reassurance that she had not slept

with Gary Owens—or any man for that matter. Because making love in the back of a truck had been a

first for her in more ways than one.

Nikki was a virgin.

Past tense now.

Carson still couldn't wrap his brain around the fact, even as they sprawled in bed—at her apartment, not

the garage place at her parents. After they'd untangled themselves from the sleeping bag in the back of his

truck, he'd hesitated to take her to his house because of the bad memories it might hold for her, so he'd

suggested her empty apartment. Since it was now common knowledge she'd moved out, there was no

reason to fear hanging out in the place for a few hours.

An arm tucked under his head, the other curved around Nikki while she slept curled against his side, he

stared up at her ceiling fan clicking overhead, circulating the heat. A tiny soccer ball dangled from the

chain, spinning lazy rings in the air. Her room surprised him. She was such a no frills and leanly honed

person he hadn't expected something so…froufrou. From her ruffly curtains to the poufy spread,

patterned with tiny pink flowers and little green leaves.

Then there was that soccer ball chain pull overhead.

The dichotomy was somehow so totally Nikki the image settled in his brain as he grew even closer to this

woman he'd fought hard to resist. How many other facets to her personality had he missed because of

preconceived notions?

And the biggest mistaken notion of all... Damn it, he should have figured out she'd never made love

before
he came up against the hint of a barrier. Which shocked the hell out of him.

Although she was a quick study.

Still, if he'd known he would have.. .what? Turned away? Probably not, but at least he could have

offered her a gentler, more romantic first time. Being with her blew his mind beyond anything he'd ever

experienced. He knew now there wasn't a chance he could have been with her seven months ago and

forgotten.

However now he wondered what
had
happened between them. When he reexamined their

conversations about that night, never once did she say they had sex, only that they'd gone to his place.

Not that they'd discussed it much—his own damn fault.

He remembered waking up naked together, so they must have gotten mighty damn close before he

passed out. God. He owed her an even bigger apology than he'd thought.

Nikki stirred against his side and sighed over his chest before pressing a kiss to his shoulder, stirring a

good morning
down south even in the middle of the night. He willed away the erection—okay, it wasn't

going down any time soon, but at least he reined himself in and simply rolled toward her for a simple kiss.

Simple? Not for long.

Carson sailed his hand along her naked spine. "You're awake."

Her fingers skipped down his chest. Lower. Gliding one finger from tip to base. "So are you."

He clamped a hand around her wrist. "As much as I would really enjoy an encore, again, you need more

time to recover."

"Women don't have a recovery time like guys."

"That's not what I meant." He pressed a kiss to the palm of her hand and resisted the urge to taste more

instead of talking about what promised to be a sticky subject. "You were still a virgin."

She stilled for six clicks of the ceiling fan overhead before flipping to her back, sheet clutched to her

creamy chest. "I was wondering if you noticed that little fact."

Tough to miss. Just the memory of her tight heat had him throbbing all over again.

While he couldn't have all of her just yet, he allowed himself the pleasure of teasing her tangled hair along

the pillow and rubbing a dark lock between two fingers. "Twice tonight was probably already one more

time than was wise for your body. Tomorrow, though, I'll be more than happy to take you up on that

offer."

"So we're done for tonight?"

Her obvious disappointment stirred him as much as any touch. If she was game, he had a few ideas of

how they could spend the remaining hours before sunrise and a return to the real world. "Unless I can

interest you in a bath?"

"A bath?" She sat up, flowered sheet slithering down to pool around her waist while she studied him with

unabashed enthusiasm.

Forget oysters, this woman was a walking, talking, living, breathing aphrodisiac.

"A steaming bath would be good for all those new muscles you used tonight." He swung his feet from the

bed and held out a hand for her.

Linking their fingers, she followed him into the bathroom, leaning to twist on the water—and whoa what a

view. Passion fogged his vision.

Steady.

Stepping over her seashell-shaped bath mat, he lowered himself into the tub, then settled her in front of

him while the faucet sluiced steaming water over their feet, her sweet bottom pressing a soft torment

against him. Way to go, genius.

His skull was going to explode before he could get around to discussing the pink elephant looming in the

middle of her ocean-themed bathroom. "I thought we had sex seven months ago."

Arms draped along the sides of the tub, she tipped her head on his shoulder to look at him, surprise

sparkling in her crystal-gray eyes. "You don't remember what happened that night? I think you owe me a

new apology."

Ah hell. Not a pink elephant at all for her, since she didn't have a clue what he'd thought.

This really was screwed up and now he'd made it worse. He needed to unscramble his brain to get

through this, tough to do when his eyes were full of Nikki's legs...and more. "What did you think I was

apologizing for last week?"

"For passing out on top of me seconds before the act." Pink tinged her cheeks, but he suspected it had

nothing to do with the steam rising from the water around them. "And I figured you were apologizing

most of all for walking out the next morning and never calling."

"That last part, absolutely. The first part, God yes, I'm apologizing for that now, as well. I'm sorry for

being in no shape to ask you to stay the night with me and for being selfish enough to do it anyway."

"I can't believe that for all these months you thought we slept together." Confusion smoked through her

eyes. "At least you're off the hook for that."

"Not even close. Doesn't matter that my body shut down, the intent to make love to you remained even

though I knew I should stay away." He rested his chin on her head, remembering enough of that night to

know that nothing, nothing was more important to him then than being with Nikki. And that unsettled the

hell out of him because he still felt the same.

"Maybe you would have had second thoughts if you hadn't passed out."

"I doubt it. I'd wanted to be with you for so damn long." Which brought them back to the present. "And

here we are again."

"Except things went better this time." Her smile granted forgiveness he still wasn't sure he deserved.

"I want afterward to be better, too." He clasped her hands in his, linking them over her stomach.

"Although I can't image how the 'during' part could be any better."

His thumbs brushed along the soft undersides of her breasts, perspiration from the heated water dotting

her chest and begging him to taste her. "I would take that as a compliment, but you had twenty-three

years of buildup going."

"Who says I went totally without for twenty-three years?" Pure sensuality emanated from her smile. "I'm a

woman who can take care of herself."

He choked on a cough.
Take care of herself?
She couldn't mean... He searched deeper into her

narrowed eyes and holy crap, she most definitely meant exactly what he thought.

Carson linked their fingers tighter, holding hands as much touching as he could risk with his body on fire

from just her words. "Now there's an image I could enjoy for a damn long time."

Nikki's smile widened and she guided one of his hands down her belly, dipping deeper into the water.

"Or you could enjoy it along with me now for real."

His brain went on stun, then revved to life because no way was he missing out on a second of this fantasy

come to life.

Nikki reclined back against his chest, her knees parting in the move of an awesomely bold innocent. She

guided his hand lower, her hand over his cupping the core of her.

She brought their other fisted hands up over her breast, unfurling her fingers until she flatted his palm to