Deadly Ties (19 page)

Amber darkened as passion danced in her eyes. They shifted together, the age-old movement as simple and beautiful as the ebb and flow of waves on a shore.

With each measured stroke he slowly built her back up until she was nearing the peak, only to change rhythms and prolong this joining. He didn’t want this to end too soon, the pleasure over too quickly. Slow and deep, fast and shallow, rotating, thrusting, until she thrashed her head

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to the side.

“Oh God.… Gavin….”

When they were both glistening with moisture, when Taylor was all but begging him, Gavin reached down between them and found her again. She crested, vising around him, yelling his name.

“Gavin!”

Pulling him over the edge with her.

Gavin poured himself into her, losing his mind, his thoughts, all reason and more of himself than he ever had before as her muscles squeezed everything from him.

They both lay gasping for breath. Gavin knew she was alive because her heart pounded beneath him, and her breath puffed against the side of his face. And he must be alive if he felt those things.

Gavin rolled to the side, and brought her with him so that she lay tucked up beside him.

Minutes passed in silence. His fingers trailed over her arm and hip. Hers skimmed over his chest.“I never knew…” she whispered, her head on his chest.

“Never knew what?” he asked her, tucking his chin in and looking down at her.

“I didn’t know it could be like that,” she admitted.

Gavin thought about that for a minute. “You mean you’ve never…?”

Her head shook back and forth, the hair sliding over his arm and chest. “Yes, I’ve had an orgasm, oh great one. Just not like.… I didn’t understand what the big deal was….”

Grabbing her against him, he pulled her atop him.

“Not that big a deal?” he asked her. “Poor Taylor, so deprived.”

Her dimples calmed him. “Deprived?”

It was stupid, juvenile even, but primitive, too. He had pleased her, opened this world of passion for her. He felt invincible.

Her back was as soft as the blooms scattered all around them and over them. Gavin picked several of them out of her hair. He loved those coppery strands in his hands, sliding like silky water through his fingers.

Her head turned to lie on his chest.

“What’s the champagne and cake for?” she asked.

“Oh.” He’d meant to drink some before, but had gotten side tracked.

Gavin sat up and Taylor moved away from him, tucking the sheet up beneath her arms, sitting cross-legged. One knee stuck out of the sheet. He opened the bottle of the hotel’s best champagne. The pop of the cork preceded the dry scent of the wine as a cloud swirled out of the mouth of the bottle. Bubbling gold sloshed into two flutes. He handed one to her.

“To us,” he said.

She tilted her head, studying him, and he thought she’d never looked more beautiful. Her pale cheeks were rosy from lovemaking. Fiery strands of hair tasseled down around her shoulders and breasts. Lips full and pouty from his kisses gently smiled. He wondered at the question he saw in her eyes. Finally, she clinked her glass to his. “To us.”

Instead of taking a drink like he, she looked down into the glass.

Gavin reached out and titled her face up. “What is it?”

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“I don’t know how to explain,” she said.

“Try.”

Her teeth scraped over her bottom lip. Taking a small sip, she shrugged, then said, “Thank you.” “For?” He didn’t want her damn gratitude. “For making love to you?”

She shook her head, a small smile playing at the edge of her mouth. “No, even though that was amazing too.”

She took a deep breath. “For everything. For listening to me, for wanting to listen, for the flowers.” Her hand waved out over the bed. “For wanting me. This will probably sound dumb, but it’s the little things that matter most to me. A phone call, a smile across the room, just when you reach for my hand.”

She looked over the bed then back to him. “How did you know this was my favorite flower?”

“You smell like honeysuckle.” He leaned over and pulled her towards him until they were sitting side by side. “Besides, roses are generic.”

Her laugh tinkled around him. “You make me laugh, Gavin. I like being with you. You make me feel foolish and stupid and special.”

He tilted his head. “You are special, Taylor.”

Her gaze went back to her glass and she took a drink. Gavin reached out and held her hand over her flute. “You are special.”

“I don’t know about that, but you believe it, and that’s enough to make me smile, to make me believe it too.”

Gavin took her flute, set it on the nightstand beside his. He started to roll them over and show her just how special she was to him.

Her slow smile and wiggling brows stayed him. Taylor’s small hand pushed against his chest. He obligingly laid back. “It’s my turn now.”

“Are you’re hands always cold?” he asked her, as she straddled him.

“Pretty much. Why?”

“Just wondered.”

“Hmmm…” Taylor leaned down and kissed him. And it was unlike any kiss they’d ever shared. This was no easy, gentle kiss. It was as if all her feelings, all her emotions, all her everything was in that single mating of tongues.

“I want to kiss all of you,” she said into his mouth. “Can I kiss all of you?”

Gavin smiled. “If you want.”

“Close your eyes.”

What was this? Gavin looked at her.

“Please?” she asked him. “I promise not to do anything you don’t like.” That she’d turned his words back on him was not lost.

With a sigh, Gavin closed his eyes. “Can I peek?”

“No.” He kept his hands on her waist, felt her shift her weight and reach over him, her breasts brushed his chest and his breath caught.

“Here you need some cake.” Her finger skimmed his mouth and he reached out, licked it.

The creamy icing sweet on his tongue. He pulled the digit into his mouth before he released it.

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“I like cake.” He wiggled under her. “Can I have some more?”

“In a minute.” He could hear the smile in her voice. The clink of flutes hinted only a moment that she had the champagne before he felt the chilled liquid drizzle over his chest, around and into his mouth. More clink and the tinkle of ice as she set them back apparently in the ice bucket.

Her mouth was warm against his as she kissed him. Her hot tongue licked the wine from the corner of his mouth, from his chest.

Taylor moved down him reveling in the fact that he was hers for the night. She kissed the hardened contours of his chest, twirled her tongue around his flat nipples, down his sculpted muscled stomach.

Cold hands? That gave her an idea… Reaching over again, she grabbed two cubes of ice.

Should she? What if he didn’t like it?

Taylor shook her head. He wasn’t Charles. Being with Gavin was not only wonderful, but fun. Fun. And if he didn’t like the ice cubes, she’d go back to the cake.

She laid her palms flat, the ice under them, on his stomach.

Gavin’s quick intake of breath had her chuckling. She swirled the ice over him, followed her hands with her mouth. She kissed him all over.

She kissed her way down his stomach, stopping for just a moment, looking at his tall, proud erection. Would he like that? What if he didn’t?

Gently, she took him in her hand. Smooth and hard. Contrasts just like the man. Leaning over she quickly kissed the tip of him.

He felt her warm tongue circle him. “God, Taylor.”

Then she closed her mouth over him. Hot tongue and cold ice. Swirling, circling.

“Christ.”

He felt the vibration of her chuckle. She loved him with her mouth, teased him with her hands, tormented him with the contrasting temperatures. She pulled him deep until he couldn’t stand another moment. He wanted to be in her now. Right now.

In one deft motion he flipped her off his chest. Holding her under him, he grabbed the ice bucket and the cake.

“I said I wanted more cake. Close your eyes…. It’s my turn.”

His eyes were that wild blue she’d seen earlier. Staring up at him, her belly fluttered with a good dose of passion and just a bit of apprehension of the unknown. Taylor licked her lips and closed her eyes.

She felt him shift, felt a finger, with the icing slide over her belly, twirl around her nipples, plop against each one.

His tongue slowly, torturously removed each and every trace until all she saw were warm lights behind her eye lids.

Gavin watched her, saw her pulse beating fast already.

He’d had to reach deep to keep from coming in her mouth, but this night was more about her than him. That’s the way he wanted it. He laved the icing off of her, then pressed his length against her for just a moment, kissing her.

Leaning up, she started to open her eyes, but he said, “No, keep them closed. Turn over.”

For a moment, he watched the slight frown between her eyebrows, but then she turned over

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on her stomach.

Gavin smiled at the line of her back, the vertebrate, the dip at the base of her spine before her flare of hips.

He ran his finger from her nape, all the way down to the top of her buttocks, his hands grazing over the flair of derriere.

She sucked in her breath. He grinned and grabbed an ice cube, ran it just as he had is fingers, watching the gooseflesh prickle over her skin, the shuddering sigh as he reached the base of her spine. Leaning over, he kissed her from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet, his hands working back up, slightly spreading her legs for him. Again he reached for another cube of ice… what the hell, with one hand, he slipped his fingers in her, worked them deep and slow until she was panting, wet and incredibly hot.

“Get on your hands and knees, curl over,” he said gruffly.

She shifted, doing as he asked, curling before him. He stopped, simply looked at her open, wet and waiting for him. Ice water dribbled from his hand. “Contrasts are interesting, aren’t they?”He worked his fingers deep inside her, even as he grazed the ice cube down bottom, dipped over her center, watched her shiver and pulse, his own passion at the breaking point.

He rose between her spread thighs and entered her, riding her hard and fast, her moans driving him over the edge as she screamed her climax.

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Warm water lapped around them, lost under the mountain of bubbles frothed high from the jets of the Jacuzzi tub. Taylor settled back against Gavin’s chest, squishing foam between them as her skin met his. The contact sent tingles along her nerve endings.

His arms wrapped around her from behind and his chin settled on her shoulder. Taylor turned her head and kissed his cheek. Their gazes locked.

“I like you wet.” Hands ran up her arms and back down to lace his fingers with hers.

Taylor grinned, “Yeah, I think I’ve already figured that out.”

Gavin laughed and the rumble vibrated against her back. That devastating smile played havoc on her heart. “Sass. You are full of sass tonight.”

“Want to see what else?”

His mouth settled over hers and he kissed her so slowly, so achingly sweet that Taylor’s breath caught. Gavin’s tongue teased hers to play before he pulled her bottom lip between his.

Her breath sighed out.

She pulled back, and saw his eyes, framed by wet spiked lashes, studied her.

“What?” she asked.

Gavin didn’t answer. Instead, he settled back into the tub, untangling one of his hands to pluck a strawberry off the chilled plate set on deep ledge of the tub. He dunked it in whipped cream and offered it to her. It was hardly the first he’d fed her since they’d climbed into this monstrous bathtub. The firm fruit gave way with a soft crush beneath her teeth. Reaching out, she deftly licked the cream from his forefinger, pulling the digit into her mouth. Those eyes of his crinkled at the edges as they narrowed on her.

“None of that,” he chided, and pulled his hand back. “I want to talk.”

A guy wanted to talk? “I thought that was women generally, something that--rumor has it--

drives men nuts. Isn’t that my line?”

“Hush.” He reached for a chunk of kiwi, her favorite fruit. But, instead he popped it into his own mouth.

“Hey,” Taylor said, splashing him lightly, leaning to the side. “I wanted that.”

“Too bad.”

This time he offered her the green seeded fruit.

“So, Taylor, tell me about yourself.”

She almost turned around to look at him. “What? You already know all about me.”

His head moved closed to hers and she could tell it was in a negative shake. “No, I know what you do, what you want out of life, and that you were married to a completely, utterly incompetent fool.”

“Ass.”

“What? Oh. Fine then, an ass. Anyway, I know nothing about your family and you know all

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of mine.”

“You know Ryan.” Taylor shrugged her shoulder, and started to lean up to get another piece of something off the plate. Not that she really wanted it, but it would give her something to do with her hands. But Gavin was having none of that. He pulled her back against him and water sloshed around them and out the edge of the tub with the force of the movement.

His breath was warm against her ear. “Don’t run away. Talk to me. I want to know you.

Everything about you.”

“Why?” she asked, resettling against him. And what was the big deal? Why couldn’t she just tell him? Fear. She was scared he would think the same of her that Charles had in the end and then that would hurt.
That
realization made her angry. Gavin was not Charles.

“Because, I want to know you,” he answered her after a while. Something about the answer said there was more to it, but that was all he was going to share with her.

“Fine. What do you want to know?”

“Your parents?”

One of his hands laced with hers. The other scrolled shapes on her chest and arms.

Taylor took a deep breath. “They died when I was in high school.”

The finger on her shoulder stilled, then continued its meandering. “What happened?”

“I had one-act play practice that morning, so I was up and about early. Buddy Bishop and I were going over this scene that we never could seem to get right for our director and that was the only time we could all work on it. I got ready and went to school. I was running late, so I didn’t eat breakfast. Never even went to the kitchen.” Taylor patted one hill of bubbles down. “The sheriff and one of my dad’s friends came and got me before we had even finished our first run through. There was a gas leak and when they got up and turned on the kitchen light, or whatever it just.…” Taylor shrugged. “Just exploded.” As though it was the most important task in the world, she scooped up bubbles, intent on making some sort of wavy sculpture.

His arm around her tightened and the hand that had been circling her shoulder now cupped it. “I’m sorry. That must have been really rough.” He leaned over and kissed her jaw.

She’d never talked to anyone about it. Charles had always told her to get over it--that was life. But Gavin was not Charles. He proved that time and time again without even realizing it.

Nodding, Taylor relaxed back into Gavin’s embrace, her bubble sculpture forgotten.

“Yeah, it was. My entire life turned upside down and nothing was ever the same. But then, a couple of years later graduation came, and I was free to pursue life as I wanted to.” She wasn’t going to tell him about the foster homes, the endless round of workers that were too busy to really care. Except for one.

“Then, while working on an associates degree in human resources, I married Charles. The rest as they say, is history.”

“Hmm.…” He rubbed his chin against her hair, which she’d piled high up on her head.

“Can I ask you another question?”

“Sure.”

“How did you ever get hooked up with him? What’s the story there?” He shifted behind her, straightening a little. “Not that I want every little detail, but I’m just having such a hard time picturing you with a guy that didn’t care for you.”

Taylor chuckled, turned a bit and cupped his cheek with her palm. “I.…” Before the words

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were out of her mouth, she stopped them. Just like that?
I love you.
She was going to say those words to him?

Averting her gaze she looked to the right of his shoulder. Where had that come from?

Taylor shook her head at herself and smiled back up at him. “I’m glad I have you in my life. You make me feel good.”

“Hmm….”

Taylor wasn’t about to ask what that had meant. Instead, to fill the awkward gap she could feel growing between them, or maybe just around her, she complied with his earlier question, turning back to her bubbles.

“Charles was and is Charles. He’s a stockbroker and stuck on himself. It took me a long time to see that.” Where to begin? With the truth? “After my parents died, I was sent to a state home.”“You had no other family?” His voice reflected his surprise.

Taylor shook her head. “No, I was adopted. Mom and Dad were older and had tried to have kids for years. They always told me I was the miracle they’d prayed for. There was a distant aunt, my father’s older sister, but she was much older and wasn’t able to take me in.” Taylor smiled and pulled Gavin’s hand holding hers out of the water.

Suds slithered down their joined fingers, palms, and wrists. “Daddy’s hands were like yours.”“How so?” Both of his hands picked up water and trickled it over her. Then, putting his palms flat, he ran them from her upper arm, over the sensitive skin of her inner elbow, to her fingers, sandwiching her hand between both of his.

“You’ve got big strong hands. Hands that would work hard for a family, hands that are caring and gentle, but would do whatever necessary to keep those you love safe.”

He was quiet for so long that Taylor started to worry. Instead of waiting longer for him to say anything she continued. “Anyway, I joined the ranks as a number and name and got shuffled and reshuffled until I was finally put with this family that dealt with kids like me. That’s where I met Charles. It was at Christmas time and he came home for some sort of alumni thing this family held every year. They’re really nice people, but I didn’t care. I was too lost to care how nice they were.”

Taylor thought back to the first time they’d met. Funny, Charles didn’t seem like such a handsome man now.

“That was our first meeting. We kept in touch. After graduation he helped to a part time job with the firm he worked for. When I was twenty we got married. The years went by, we grew apart and then we divorced.”

“No kids? I mean I know Ryan is your son, but you and Charles never had children?”

He would ask that question wouldn’t he? Taylor shrugged. “I told you, you didn’t have to worry about me getting pregnant.”

Silence settled between them again. Then he sighed and asked, “What was the diagnosis?”

All doctor now.

Though the subject still squeezed her heart, she no longer cried because she’d never conceived. Instead she laughed.

“You are the professional. Actually, they never knew. It just never worked. I never even got

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pregnant.”

“He was tested?”

Taylor squiggled against him. “Yes, honey, he was. That was probably a lot of the strain.

But in retrospect, as with most things, it all turned out for the best.”

His hands cupped her knees beneath the water and the foam. Gently squeezing, he nuzzled the side of her neck. “I would have to agree there.”

His hands on her knees tickled and she wiggled against him.

Warm breath heated her ear. “You know, I always knew I liked you, but the more I know you, the more I admire you.”

“That’s sad,” she quipped.

His movements stopped, straightening, he turned her to face him, until her ankles rested on either side of his hips and her knees were tucked beneath his arms. She tried to wiggle out, this trapped feeling warming inside her, but he only clamped his arms tighter, his hands immovable at her waist. His eyes held no humor now, an intense blue, their depths unfathomable.

“You need to work on your self esteem. Taylor, you are an amazing woman. Why can’t you see that?”

“That’s what you see?” It truly shocked her. It was not as if she thought badly of herself, no. It was more she didn’t see herself as amazing or wonderful--just normal. How did Gavin see all this other in her?

Both his hands came up to cup her face, his thumbs circling her chin. “I see this beautiful woman, who has the most heart stopping smile, a great mom, who wants the best for her son, a caring gentle soul, who cries at the pain of children. How can I not see you as an amazing woman? To know what all you’ve been through and that you’re still.…” A muscle flexed in his jaw. If he said anymore, she’d cry. No one but her parents had ever told her anything like this.

Taylor leaned forward and kissed him. Her hands cupped the back of his head, fingers spearing through his wet, black locks. His mouth opened under hers and she poured all her heart into the mating of their tongues, of their breath. She wasn’t ready to say the words to him yet.

Not yet, but maybe, just maybe some part of him would know what he did to her, what he made her feel, how easily he could break her heart. Taylor knew she was heart over head in love with Mr. Gavin Kinncaid, but there was no way she was going to tell him that.

His hands--magical as they were--started their spells on her again. And wet with water and suds, there seemed to be no barriers between them. Hands slid and caressed on skin, shocking nerve endings. He touched her breasts, kneaded her stomach, her hipbones. Moving between them, his fingers found her, spread her, pierced her. Soon she was too lost in the onslaught of feelings, of emotions to think of anything but Gavin. Gavin. Gavin.

She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. One hand, splayed on her back, held her up for him to see. Water and suds slid off her long body, over her breasts, down into the water.

He leaned forward, pressing his hand deeper, and kissed her arched white neck. Her moan vibrated in her throat, against his mouth.

“Beautiful.”

When her moans and whimpers bounced off the tiled walls, he held his hand still, waited until she looked at him. Then he slowly started to work her again. He wanted more. He wanted

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all. Her lips trembled, her legs shivered. Gavin shifted and in one fluid motion, filled her.

Her eyes opened and looked at him. Deep in the amber depths he sensed a change in her.

One his mind didn’t recognize, but some part of him did, because he felt the same way. She tried to wiggle, moved her legs, but he shook his head, keeping her legs tucked against him, keeping her open to him, vulnerable to what he wanted her to feel.

“Wonderful.” He moved her up and down, keeping control of the rhythm. Water lapped between them, sloshed over the edge of the tub.

“Amazing.” He pushed deeper.

Taylor never said a word, but the sounds she made in the back of her throat drove him on.

Her hands slid over him like the soft wings of butterflies.

He made certain this joining was more than before, slower, fuller, complete.

Her teeth nipped his lips, before Taylor’s tongue darted into his mouth, demanding more.