Knock Me for a Loop (21 page)

It took no more than that for his own body to go taut, for the pressure that had been building in his cock and balls all night—hell, for months now—to reach a boiling point that was forced to find release or consume him from the inside out.

His fingers flexed against her soft flesh, brought her down on his still-rigid erection, and then he spilled. Wave after wave of uncontrollable ecstasy rolled through him, battering him against the shore, pulling him back, crashing over him once again. Her name passed his lips in a strangled whisper, almost like a prayer.

And when she collapsed on top of him, falling to his chest so that he could feel her ragged breathing, feel the warm flush of her cheek against his skin, he folded his arms across her back and held her there.

Right now, at this very moment, his life was perfect. Reality would intrude soon enough, he knew. But for just a while longer, he had the one thing he wanted more than life itself. He had Grace.

Row 20

Grace couldn’t remember ever feeling so relaxed or content. She could lie here for a hundred years, she thought, and never want to move.

A scratching from the far side of the room, though, reminded her that that wasn’t an option.

Zack groaned. “At least he waited until we were relatively finished.”

She tried to chuckle, but it came out as more of a wheeze. Her head was on his shoulder, eyes closed, body limp and boneless with satisfied satiation.

One of the strong arms around her back tightened, and he rolled to his side—his right, her left. “My turn to deal with him,” he said. “You stay here.”

Like she was going to argue. She barely had the energy to draw oxygen into her lungs, let alone get up and do the doggie day-care thing.

He slipped out of her, slowly and carefully, leaving her feeling empty and bereft. He’d only been gone half a second—was still, in fact, occupying the king-size mattress right along with her—but already she wanted him back. Beside her, under her, inside her.

The mattress dipped as he moved to the edge and stood. She cracked open one eye, just a fraction, and watched as he hopped toward the bathroom on his good leg, keeping a hand to the wall for balance.

She heard a scrape and a creak as he turned the knob and opened the bathroom door. Bruiser gave a happy yelp, and she imagined Zack jumping out of the way to avoid getting run over as the giant Saint Bernard burst forward and loped into the bedroom. He gave another joyful bark and leaped onto the bed, sending her bouncing.

Grace knew exactly what was coming, but still she shrieked when paws the size of dinner plates pummeled her and Bruiser started licking her like a lollipop. Laughing and curling into a ball to protect herself from either massive bruising or melting from an excess of doggie saliva.

“I think he likes you,” Zack quipped with a chuckle, leaning against the far wall.

“I think he hates not being the center of attention and is going to make us pay for locking him up for twenty minutes.”

Zack glanced at the digital clock on the bedside table. “Forty-five, thank you very much.”

One corner of her mouth lifted. “Sorry, forty-five.” And then her brow creased. “He didn’t destroy anything in there, did he?”

The curl of Zack’s lips told her the big behemoth had, indeed, done some sort of damage.

“He kind of ate the shower curtain.”

Her eyes widened. “The whole thing?”

“Most of it. But he left the rings.”

“Oh, good,” she replied, as though that made all the difference in the world.

Bruiser continued to use her and the bed as a trampoline, and she started to get the feeling he was more than just glad to be out of the bathroom.

“I think he needs to tinkle.”

“I’ll take him,” Zack offered, pushing away from the wall and moving to find his pants.

“No,” she told him, bending and squirming until she’d extricated herself from the hundred-and-fifty-pound ball of fur. “It will be quicker if I do it.”

He didn’t respond, but she felt his gaze following her as she dug a T-shirt and jeans out of her suitcase and shrugged them on. She slipped the room’s key card into her back pocket, then found Bruiser’s leash and snapped it to his collar.

“You know,” she drawled, as Bruiser dragged her toward the door, “we do have a few condoms left over there.” She tipped her head in the direction of the nightstand. “When I get back, maybe we can put them to use.”

His expression didn’t change, but his eyes glittered with heat and intense sexual interest. That same heat skittered through her veins as she skipped out of the room and sneaked Bruiser down a rear stairway for a quick potty call so she could rush back
up
stairs for a nice, leisurely booty call.

Thankfully, when she got back to the room with an empty-bladdered Bruiser, he settled right down on the blanket that Zack had retrieved from the bathroom and arranged on the floor at the foot of the bed and fell asleep. And a snoozing Saint—provided he wasn’t snoozing smack-dab in the middle of the bed between them—allowed them to make love again. With any luck, more than once.

For the second time that night, Zack was naked and waiting for her—something that Grace decided she could easily get used to.

Stripping off her clothes, she let them fall where she stood, then slowly crawled her way across the mattress to join Zack beneath sheets warmed by his body heat. He wrapped his arms around her and drew her close for a long, leisurely kiss.

“Mmm,” he murmured when he finally lifted his lips from hers, brushing the corner of her mouth with the pad of his thumb. “You were gone too long.”

“Your dog has a bladder the size of the Goodyear blimp. Don’t blame me if it takes him a while to empty it.”

Zack chuckled. “Maybe we should stop giving him water until the end of our trip.”

“That would be cruel.”

“Well, then, maybe we should take advantage of every moment he
doesn’t
have to take a leak.”

At that, his hand smoothed down her arm, onto her bare hip, and along the outside of her thigh. She lifted the same leg, careful not to bump his injured knee as she draped herself over him. “I’m all for that.”

She pressed herself close, loving the feel of his hard, only slightly hairy chest against her bare, beaded nipples and the eager press of his erection at the apex of her thighs. Reaching between them, she eagerly stroked his rigid length, only to find it…smoother than usual.

With a brow winging upward, she leaned back slightly to regard him. “Somebody was feeling rather sure of himself.”

“Hey,” Zack said, his face a study in seriousness, “I’m a relatively hot guy, confined to a hotel room for the night with an equally hot babe who already let me into her pants once. I figured there was a fifty-fifty chance you’d come back raring for round two and thought I should be ready for action.”

“You’re a very arrogant man,” she told him, still stroking his latex-covered penis.

“Was I wrong?” he asked, the words cocky even when grated through clenched teeth.

She shook her head. “Not wrong, just arrogant. Luckily, I’m a fan of the Boy Scout motto.”

Slipping a hand between her legs, he found her curls damp and slid his fingers easily between her silken folds. “So am I.”

With a moan, she arched her hips in an attempt to get closer to his erotic ministrations.

“I wish I were a hundred percent,” Zack whispered near her ear while he nibbled her lobe and kissed a warm trail down the line of her throat. “If I didn’t have to baby this damn knee, I’d have you pinned to the wall right now. I’d be taking you on the table, in the shower, up against the door …”

The erotic images he created seared themselves into her brain, leaving her gray matter singed and smoldering…and every other part of her sizzling like a live electrical wire.

“Here is fine. This way is fine. Just…” She shifted on his fingers, driving them even deeper inside. “Stop talking and take me already.”

He started to chuckle, only to break off as she took his mouth, then released his cock and forcefully moved his hand so that she could drive herself down on his hard length. The bold action made them both groan, but it didn’t slow them down. They were too turned on, too ready…and all too aware of what awaited them at the end of the blinking neon rainbow.

Ever cautious of his knee, they remained on their sides, using their lower bodies to create a rhythm, a steadily increasing cadence of up and down, thrust and retreat. Friction built. Tender, swollen tissue rubbed along slick, velvety steel.

Her nails dug into his shoulders and she wanted like crazy to cry out, but refused to relinquish his mouth. She needed him
everywhere.
Wanted to feel him, taste him, absorb him into her system until there was no Zack, no Grace, only a single entity intent on pleasure and fulfillment.

His hands moved along her bare skin, raising both gooseflesh and flames everywhere they went. He knew just how to touch her; he always had, from the first time passion had overtaken them. And she knew how to touch him—light here, more firmly there.

He groaned against her lips and she felt it down to her toes. Her legs tightened around his hips, her hands on his shoulders and biceps. His clutched her buttocks, pulling her harder, faster into his forceful pounding.

And then, without warning, she broke. Her heart stuttered in her chest, her inner muscles clasping, seizing, grasping at him like a swimmer drowning in a raging sea while wave after wave of perfect, intense pleasure broke over her head. But if she were to die, to drown in the complete ecstasy only Zack could give her…wow, what a way to go.

Zack followed her over only a split second later, biting her lower lip, yanking her to him in an almost painful grip while he stiffened. He growled his completion into the taut flesh of her throat where her pulse beat erratically, taking advantage of a store of oxygen she apparently didn’t have access to. But she certainly shared the sentiment.

As he stilled beside her, her breathing slowed to a more normal pattern and she wrapped her arms around him, taking comfort in his nearness, his warm embrace.

She wished they could stay here forever. That they could stop the clock and lock themselves away in this cramped hotel room, forgetting about the rest of the world for a while.

Did she know where they were going from here? Other than to New York, no. She didn’t know if she truly trusted Zack, didn’t know if she could block out what she’d seen that day in Columbus and believe it hadn’t been an act of infidelity. But, oh, how she wanted to try.

To that end, with his gentle snores filling the room and echoing in her ears, she forced her brain to turn off and
not
overthink what was going on between them right now.

In the wee hours of the night, with the lights turned low, that was simple. She let herself close her eyes and enjoy the feel of his skin caressing hers, of his chest rising and falling against her own. And when he woke her in the wee hours of the night with soft kisses and the stroke of his fingers on her breasts like butterfly wings, she made love with him again—happily, willingly, exuberantly.

But the hours ticked by too quickly, and when the alarm went off at eight A.M., neither of them wanted to move. The sharp, incessant buzz filled the room for a good three minutes before Zack reached over and smacked the snooze button. Nine minutes later, the buzz started again, and once again Zack did the ol’ karate chop to make it stop.

Grace would have been happy to stay where she was, pressed like plastic wrap to Zack’s side from shoulder to ankle, and repeat the process for the next twelve to twenty-four hours. But then Bruiser started to stir, to whine, to climb up on the bed and “massage” them awake.

“We’d better get up before Bruiser decides to flood the place,” Zack said groggily.

Grace groaned and screwed her eyes shut even tighter. “Do we have to?” she asked, burying her face in the crook of his shoulder.

“‘Fraid so.”

He stretched, reaching his long arms up over his head and his toes toward the end of the bed, dislodging her from her warm and cozy cocoon of drowsiness.

“We should probably get on the road, anyway. Those Insides Out folks will start to wonder if we drift into town a couple days later than expected.”

She inhaled deeply, then exhaled on a sigh of resignation. “Fine, but don’t blame me if I fall asleep at the wheel.”

A large, warm palm spread across her left butt cheek and gave her a little morning goose. “Don’t worry, I’ll think of something to keep you awake.”

She cracked open her eyes to find him grinning down at her. Her mouth opened on a witty retort, but then Bruiser’s big, long-nailed paw goosed her on the other cheek and she gave a screech of shock instead.

Laughing, Zack climbed out of bed and began to dress. He took the bathroom first, giving her a few more precious moments of rest with a side order of panting, dancing dog.

When he returned, he collected his crutches, Bruiser’s leash, and Bruiser himself.

“Are you going to be okay with him?” she asked, holding the white top sheet to her breasts as she pushed herself into a sitting position against the headboard.

“Sure. We’ll take it slow and I’ll let him lead.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

He shot her a smile before hobbling out of the room, a prancing, tail-wagging Bruiser preceding him into the hotel hallway.

Although she desperately wanted to hunker back down under the covers and grab a few more minutes of much-desired snooze time, she knew Zack was right about getting on the road. Dragging herself out of bed, she shuffled to the bathroom, and made quick work of washing her face and brushing her teeth.

Zack hadn’t been kidding about the shower curtain. What was left of it hung from the hooks like the mast of a wrecked ship and looked as though a shark had gotten hold of it. Not that this was the first time she’d thought of Bruiser as a Great White of the canine world.

They would definitely have to pay for that when they checked out. The question was, how did they explain the curtain’s condition?

A slip and near-fall while climbing out of the tub?

Really
wild sex?

Multiple Personality Disorder, one of whom thought he was Norman Bates?

Oy.

Drifting into the other room, she dressed in the same jeans and mint-green Aéropostale tee she’d thrown on to walk Bruiser last night. By the time Zack returned with a much less wiggly pup in tow, she had her suitcase and Bruiser’s designer zebra-print tote packed and sitting by the door.

While Zack collected his own things, she moved about the room, cleaning up what little clutter they’d made during their short stay. Housekeeping would come in to
clean-clean
, she knew, but she’d always had an ingrained need to straighten her own area and not leave more of a mess than she absolutely had to for someone else to take care of.

When Zack was ready, and they’d done the usual under-the-bed-and-inside-the-drawers check to be sure they hadn’t left anything behind, she suggested he take Bruiser down to the Hummer and leave the heavy lifting to her. He grumbled about not being able to pull his own weight, but she merely smiled, stretched up on tiptoe to buss his cheek, and told him he could make it up to her later.