Midnight Sins (25 page)

an agony of pure, burning rapture. She felt the hard,

fiery blast of his semen pulsing inside her. Felt his

fingers scissoring in her rear, extending the

sensations. His free arm held her close to him, and a

muted, broken male groan sounded at her ear.

Ecstasy exploded again, tearing through her and

pulling a desperate cry from her lips as she heard him

whisper her name. His free hand moved up, locked in

her hair, and turned her head to him, his lips catching

hers, kissing her, devouring her cries and her

pleasure as it tore through her.

Torturously intense shudders of rapture raced

through her flesh as she swore she could feel Rafer

not just inside her body but also under her skin. He

was invading parts of her she hadn’t realized he could

ever breach.

Lying against him, waves of heat sinking deeper

and deeper inside her, Cami fought and failed to

keep that inner part of her closed against him.

She could feel, hear, his heartbeat against her

breast as her throat tightened with tears. Tears she

couldn’t, wouldn’t, allow herself to shed.

Tears that didn’t make sense to her, because

she had known, even before he touched her that first

time seven years before, that between them there

could never be anything more.

* * *

Rafe lay silently, petting Cami’s body gently as the

shudders of her release began to slowly ease. The

incredibly tense, violent vibrations of her orgasm had

taken him by surprise. As though the pleasure had

been pulled straight from some inner part of her

feminine core and raced through her repeatedly

before releasing.

It took long minutes for her body to slowly relax,

for the tremors to ease and the heavy, satisfied

lassitude to move in and do its work.

To keep her in place. To hold her to him while he

tried to find a way to figure out exactly what had just

happened.

What had begun out of arrogant male pride and a

lust he had no idea how to combat had turned into

something more, into something he wasn’t certain he

knew how to control.

There was something about Cami that slid right

past his defenses and locked inside a part of him that

he simply wasn’t familiar with. A dark, dominant,

primal part of his psyche that only awakened when he

was with her.

And he had no idea what the hell he was

supposed to do about it or how to rid himself of it.

“What’s going on between us, Rafer?” Her voice

was quiet, wary, as she asked the question. “How do

you do this to me?”

In that soft, cautious tone she expressed the

same conflicting feelings he could feel roiling inside

himself.

“Hell if I know,” he breathed out roughly after

several long moments. “Whatever it is, it’s damned

good, though.”

It was a pleasure he would be loathe to lose after

the storm was over and Cami left. He couldn’t

imagine letting her go when the time came. Hell, he

couldn’t imagine her walking away from him. Surely

there was a way to convince her to stay, just for a little

while. Just long enough to explore the pleasure, the

dark, sensual need that drew them together.

“It’s snowing again,” she said rather than taking

the current conversation any further.

Cami made all those dark hungers swirling

inside him, so thick and heavy that it obliterated good

common sense.

He stroked his hand slowly down her back,

relishing the feel of her satiny flesh, the warmth of her

skin, the feel of her heartbeat against his own.

“How long do you think we can stay apart this

time without tearing into each other like love-starved

teenagers the first time we see each other again?”

That was what he was often reminded of since she

had shown up on his doorstop the night before. “Do

you really think you can escape this addiction another

three years?”

She tensed in his arms and for a moment, the

briefest weakening moment, he wished he had kept

his damned mouth shut.

But the more realistic, logical part of his brain

assured him it was a valid question and one she

needed to be prepared to answer when they saw

each other again. Reality sucked bad enough and

there were times he’d give almost anything to escape

it, but the truth was, there was no escaping. It. Better

he face it now, and deal with it, than to have it surprise

him later.

“This can’t happen again, Rafer,” she said softly,

pulling out of his arms to sit up in front of the fire. She

gazed into the flickering flames.

Her expression was somber, resigned, as she

wiped a hand over her face and breathed in roughly.

“We aren’t teenagers. And we’re going to have to

simply accept that it can’t go anywhere and let it die

as it should.”

With her legs bent, her arms wrapped around

them, as her chin rested at the top of her knees, she

looked like a little lost girl. Especially with that short

mop of hair framing her delicate face. She was a

woman, though, and she was talking about walking

away from something neither of them had been able

to deny each time they had been face-to-face with

each other.

Her ability to fool herself, to weave daydreams

and to believe them, simply amazed him.

“You don’t really think that’s going to happen

anytime soon, do you, Cami?” he said mockingly.

No, she didn’t but she knew what was best for

her heart, and allowing herself to fall once more into

the emotional abyss that awaited her, if she allowed

this to continue, was not what was best for her heart.

Turning her head, she stared back at him. He

was so comfortable in his nudity, so confident in it that

she could only envy him.

“Is this because of your parents?” he asked as he

curled one arm behind his head and appeared as

relaxed and comfortable as any finely muscled, highly

sexual male animal.

God, the man made her breathless only seconds

after an orgasm so violent she’d nearly lost her mind.

As that thought hit her, so did his question. She stared

back at him with a frown. “What? Is what because of

my parents?” Genuine confusion filled her.

“Your refusal to admit there’s something between

us,” he growled, a disgruntled frown tightening his

brow.

“There’s nothing between us,” she agreed. God,

she didn’t want to do this right now.

His expression tightened. She could see the

male calculation that filled his gaze as well as the

determination, and she knew what she had done.

“I’m not a challenge or a dare, Rafer, so don’t

start attempting to see me as one. I have no intention

of falling into some kind of love-trap with you and

losing my soul.”

“Love-trap?” A black brow arched with deliberate

arrogance. “What exactly is a love-trap, Cami?”

Her lips thinned. Twisting around, she searched

for her clothes before gritting her teeth in frustration.

Hell, she had left them in the kitchen. Actually they

were scattered from the kitchen to where they were

now. She grabbed Rafer’s shirt instead and pushed

her arms into the sleeves before pulling the material

around her.

“I’m not getting into this with you, Rafer,” she

informed him as she moved to rise to her feet.

“The hell you’re not.”

Before she could avoid him, his fingers circled

her wrist and pulled her back to him. Caught off

balance, Cami found herself sprawled across his

chest, staring back at him in surprise.

“And what is this going to accomplish, Rafer?”

she questioned him, struggling to keep calm, to

refuse to allow the past between them to overwhelm

her.

“Tell me, Cami, do you know what everyone in

town says when they talk about you?”

He let her push away, but only far enough to sit up

again.Cami turned her gaze away from him to stare into

the flames flickering in the fireplace. “Do I want to

know?” Wrapping her arms around her knees, she

refused to stare back at him.

“Cambria Flannigan doesn’t give up,” he mocked

out. “She’s a hell of a friend. Honest as hell. She’s

even a cheap date. But she’s frigid as hell, no doubt a

virgin, and refuses to let a man get even as far as first

base.”

“Well, then, evidently ‘everyone’ is wrong.”

Turning back to him, she wished she had kept her

eyes averted.

“You’ve not been with another man other than me,

Cami.”

“Maybe my lovers just know how to keep their

mouths shut,” she retorted with a blatant lie. “And

maybe, Rafe, I simply don’t want the emotional ties

that go with a ‘relationship’,” she bit out sarcastically.

“There are those of us who aren’t all about that

commitment that goes with sleeping with certain

men.”She tried to rise to her feet again only to have

him pull her back.

“What the hell are you doing, Rafer?” she burst

out at the dominance in his refusal to allow her to

move away from him.

“I’m getting fucking answers,” he snapped, his

voice rising just marginally as his head lifted, his gaze

flashing in anger.

“Answers to what, Rafer? Why I refuse to fuck

around or fuck men who would just love to advertise

it? What business is it of yours?”

“Liar!” His lips drew back as the word rasped

from his lips. “You’ve been running from me for six

years now, Cami. Sneaking out of the bed like a

damned thief when the sun rises and avoiding me like

the plague for the past three years. And I want to know

why.”

“Well, it sucks to be you, Rafer,” she announced

archly as she fought the anger she could feel rising

more sharply inside her now.

“And what the hell do you mean by that?” he

growled back at her, the muscles of his jaw flexing

tightly.

“Exactly what I said.” Shrugging, her lips pursing

to hold back the anger, she jerked her arm out of his

grip before rolling quickly away from him and to her

feet. “I need a shower. Do me a favor and stop

listening to gossip. You should know yourself exactly

how destructive it can be.”

She stalked from the living room, all but running

from the living room and the questions she knew were

getting ready to come from him.

Why had she begun ignoring him?

Why had she stopped making the trips to Denver

that allowed him to waylay her for those few hours that

allowed her to slip away at dawn? And why did she