Hot Spot (36 page)

She shook her head.

It was a start.

"I suppose it was Mar—" She drilled him with a look and he stopped.

"It's not her, it's all of them. Plural. And I know why the crowd's so large. Besides your obvious charms, and don't go getting a big head."

"Because you've seen charms like that before," he said, testily. "Like in your sketchbook."

"This isn't about me."

"Of course it's about you. It's always about you." He couldn't help it. When he thought about all those guys fucking her, he went crazy.

She sat up, her spine stiff as a rod. "I beg your pardon?"

"Don't give me a hard time about women when you've been notching your belt with all those guys. At least I don't keep a fucking record."

"Are you telling me there's a double standard?"

"Maybe sometimes there is," he muttered.

"There isn't. There better not be."

"Because you wouldn't want to give up your smorgasbord."

"You should talk. Women follow you around in droves."

He shut his eyes, counted to ten, and opened them again. "I'm jealous. Okay? I'd like to rip up your sketchbook and burn it— along with all those damned sex toys of yours. I know, I know— women have as much right to enjoy sex as men. So sue me. I don't want you to have sex with anyone but me. And that's the way I feel."

"Ditto here."

"I won't then. Your turn." His gaze was laser sharp.

"I don't want to, either."

He smiled. "So what's the problem?"

"It's your money, too."

"I give most of it to charity. You see how I live. It's not too out of the ordinary."

She snorted. "Fourteen cars?"

"They're yearly bonuses. They're a write-off for the company."

"You don't turn them down."

"Why should I?"

She didn't have an answer. Or at least a reasonable one. "I suppose," she said.

"And I suppose I could learn to live with your sketchbook."

"Compromise and negotiation, right?"

"Isn't that what love's all about? I do stuff for you and you do stuff for me?"

"What kind of stuff?"

Her voice had shifted an octave lower, turned soft. Things were looking up. "Any kind you want," he said with a smile.

"Pink rabbit stuff?"

He laughed. "After tonight, though, I'm buying you a new one."

She sighed.

"What?"

"I don't like to feel this way—caring so much. Worried." She'd never so much as given a man a second thought. Sex was sex. This was different.

"Marry me and stop worrying. We'll have a double wedding with the love birds who just left."

"You don't mean that."

"Jeez, you sound like Amy," he said.

"What do you know about the way Amy sounds?"

"She's distrustful, although she has reason."

"How do you know she has reason? See—this is what's going to happen. I'm going to be crazy jealous all the time and ruin my life and yours. Shit. If this is love, I don't like it."

"You'll change your mind."

"Don't sound so reasonable. I hardly know you anyway."

"Well, I know you, and I know what I want. As for die rest, we'll work it out." He rose from the chair and moved toward the bed, thinking if he could formulate three hundred thousand commands to design a game, he could figure out some way to make Stella see things his way.

"What are you doing?"

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm coming to bed."

"You sure?"

"Oh, yeah. I'm real sure."

"So it really wouldn't help if I were equivocal or not."

"Nope."

"You're coming to bed anyway."

"Yup."

She smiled for the first time the way she used to. "I was just thinking."

"I know."

"No you don't."

"You were thinking I should stop here and open this drawer and bring your pink rabbit to bed with me."

She grinned. "You're a mind reader."

He winked. "Fucking A." He held up the pink rabbit. "And he's a mind reader, too. Move over. We've got things to do."

She scooted over enough so there was room for him to sit down, her senses doing a little flutter of anticipation as he tossed the vibrator on the bed, pulled his T-shirt over his head, and began stripping down for action. He could have been on a
Play-girl
calendar with his hard, taut muscles and sleek power, with that damned near-zero-body-fat factor. He had to work out, although he didn't talk about it. Not that he talked about his fourteen cars much, either.

His clothes were on the floor in mere seconds. But then he'd been on the way here for the last couple days. It wasn't as though he had to think about his next move. "So you're playing the sultana?" he said as he turned back to her. She hadn't moved in her lounging pose.

She grinned. "Roxana, I think."

"Not in that cartoon T-shirt."

"Okay, Miss Piggy. It's all about
moi
."

He didn't care what it was all about; he was real adaptable. And focused. "Let's fire up the rabbit and get him in the rabbit patch."

"I just adore a man who takes charge."

"A man? Could we be a little less general?" But he was teasing as he unzipped her shorts. He knew where he stood.

"One by the name of Rees with a body that's turning me on."

"That's better." He stripped off her shorts and panties. "You'll get preferential treatment now."

"The full spa treatment?"

He grinned. "You betcha. One happy ending coming up." Nudging her thighs apart with a sweep of his palms, he nicked the switch on the rabbit vibrator and eased the glossy rotating head into her by slow degrees until the belt of pearls at the base of the shaft was solidly against her pussy. The rotating shaft was working on her G-spot at the same time as the clit-tickling rabbit ears were stroking what they were designed to stroke.

He glanced up to check out the effect of his handiwork and smiled.

She was breathing little shallow breaths, as though she didn't want to move too much and lose the magic.

It was almost too easy with her. Not that he was complaining. They were a good match. But he was guessing she wouldn't mind another few degrees of sensation. In fact, he knew she wouldn't.

"Don't move," he unnecessarily whispered, easing her T-shirt off so quickly she didn't have time to do more than moan as a rush of pleasure bombarded her brain. The slightest motion registered in the seething pool of frenzied nerve endings caressed by the rotating shaft and rabbit ears, the possibility of sensual overload imminent.

No bra. Handy. And dipping his head, he cupped one breast, drew the taut nipple into his mouth, and gently sucked.

She cried out—the softest of whimpering sounds.

He licked the taut crest, exerted slightly more pressure, tugged on her nipple, bit little nibbling bites—not too hard, but hard enough to elicit a little moan, a squirm of her hips. It was all about self-restraint, tempered with just enough forcefulness—he stretched the pliant flesh, suckled the tender bud as though he relied on it for sustenance. Gave the pink rabbit a little nudge with his palm.

Ravished by a dizzying, raw sensation that traveled downward and upward and met in her hot, strumming core, she quivered and arched her hips upward, reaching for that singular delight.

"You can't come yet," he said, flexing his arm, sliding the pink rabbit upward the merest fraction. "You have to wait."

She tensed—from pleasure, from the husky authority in his voice, from a kind of rarefied, stunning splendor and abruptly climaxed in a shuddering, almost noiseless, paroxysm.

He wondered for a moment if he'd done something wrong. She was always hair-trigger fast, but never so constrained. And then he saw the tears seeping from under her lashes and felt an inexpressible fear. He'd hurt her. Jesus. Flicking off the vibrator with lightening speed, he carefully removed it and swept her into his arms.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, cradling her in his lap. "Don't cry. God, don't cry."

Her lashes lifted, sparkling with tears. "It's okay. I'm happy."

"Like hell you are." He brushed away a trail of tears on her cheek.

She shook her head and offered a shaky smile. "You swept me off my feet, lover boy."

That wasn't exactly an intelligible phrase to a man with both feet on the ground. "What's that got to do with crying?"

"I'm feeling all dewy-eyed and mushy." She couldn't quite bring herself to say love, but it was on the tip of her tongue.

"Mushy?"

"Like quivering heartstrings, cooing doves, baby names."

His gaze narrowed. "You'd better not be pregnant, 'cuz I haven't known you that long."

"Excuse me. Have you heard of the pill? And unless you change that tone of voice, my mushy stuff is going to ride off into the sunset."

"Okay. I like mushy. I love mushy." He grinned. "It's my favorite word."

"Speaking of favorite things."

He blew out a breath of relief; talk of feelings made him nervous. "This I understand. Are we talking mechanical devices or the real thing?"

"You tell me."

"The real thing."

There was really something to be said for that mind-reading concept where one knows exactly what the other is thinking. Or at least Stella was hoping it was mind reading and not—you know—that professional skill that comes from using mechanical devices in hundreds of other bedrooms. In her superfine mood, she was going to go with mind reading.

As it turned out, he even knew how she didn't like a lot of questions. He even knew how she liked it slow and easy. He was a virtuoso of rhythm, depth, and timing. He even knew that there was that moment when the real thing did what real things did and met her exactly, precisely, to the nanosecond of perfection in a mutual orgasm.

She didn't have to say one single word.

Maybe she'd have to think about retiring the pink rabbit. On the other hand, there was no need to make overly hasty decisions.

Everyone knew that decisions made in the heat of passion didn't always stand up to the cold light of day.

But of one thing she was sure.

If this was love, it was sweet.

IN FACT, LOVING someone more or less changed everything— from the color inside your eyelids when your eyes were shut to the taste of kisses. She'd never known kisses tasted at all. They were sort of a cross between Jujubes and Gummy Bears. Really nice. And then there was your skin, which had suddenly become supersensitive and tingly and susceptible to a thousand degrees more sensation. She was probably glowing from within like a firefly.

If she could do haiku, this would definitely be the time to try it out. She'd have to put in a line about her old friend the pink rabbit.

"We should read poetry," she murmured.

"Umm…" His mouth was sliding down her throat, and when it came to rest in the curve of her collarbone, he whispered, "Beauty alone will not account for her. No single attribute her charm explains. Hafiz. I had to read him in freshman English."

Hafiz. One of her favorites. How sweet was that? She almost came right then.

And then he rolled on his back, carrying her with him as though she were weightless.

He was so gloriously strong; that would be another great line of haiku.

Swinging her up, he placed her on his thighs, facing him. "Now we're going to talk about this marriage thing, or you can't have anymore."

"That's not fair." She tried to rise to her knees enough to ease down his upthrust erection.

"I don't feel like being fair." He held her firmly in place. "So what do you say?"

She struggled against his hold. "Let's talk about it later." When she could actually think beyond her next orgasm.

"When later?"

"Five minutes." Really, it was shocking how concentrated one's thinking became when impelled by feverish desire—the need for orgasm swamping all else.

"After you climax again," he said.

She nodded. "I'll buy a wedding dress right after."

Whatever it took, he thought. This wasn't the time to have scruples. "Here we go, babe." He released his hold, guided himself into her silken warmth, and heard her breathy sigh as she sank down his rigid length. Some women wanted diamonds; others, trips to Club Med. His comic book girl wanted this. Was he lucky or what?

Short moments later—another orgasm later—Stella came up for air. She'd actually said wedding dress, hadn't she? Could she renege? Wasn't this all too hasty? Shouldn't two people know each other better before they made such a long-term commitment? Then again, he was lifting her upward again, slowly, leisurely, and her insatiable senses were anticipating the coming pleasure with tiny little quivers of excitement.

Maybe marriage wouldn't be so bad after all—look at Megan, going for it again.

Maybe what one lost in independence, one gained in sensational, starry-eyed, halcyon sex.

Maybe she could at least go
looking
at wedding dresses.

"Five minutes are up," he murmured, easing her downward again. "Say yes."

Her heated gaze met his. "Maybe."

He grinned. "Maybe,
I'll
have to keep this up until I change your mind."

Now that was the kind of persuasion she liked. "I gotta tell you," she said with a smile, "I can be real stubborn."

"And I gotta tell you"—he grinned—"ain't no mountain high enough."

It wasn't haiku, but it was really touching. "That sounds like dedication."

As a man, he would have called it something else, but he wasn't a fool. "Utter devotion, babe. That's me."

It was sort of looking like Marky B might keep her new hunky cohort after all, she found herself thinking. After all, one had to give credit where credit was due. Utter devotion was a concept that had real impact.

Like that—
ohmygod
… that was mind-blowing impact and a couple thousand inexplicable sensations more.

This definitely wasn't the time to parse the mysteries of love.

Plenty of time for that tomorrow…