Sweet Revenge (36 page)

“It doesn’t take much, when it’s true. You have a way of looking at a man, Addy, that turns the hottest blood to ice. You aren’t looking at me that way now” He cupped the back of her neck. Even as she went rigid he watched her mouth, ripe, full, soft, tremble open. If a man were sated, he’d still hunger for it.

She felt her heart spring up to her throat to beat wildly when his lips whispered over hers. She started to lift a hand
to push him away. That was self-preservation. But she curled her fingers into his shirt and held on. That was need.

Then with need, surprisingly, came regret.

“I can’t give you what you want. I’m not like other women.”

“No, you’re not.” Instinctively, he rah his fingers along her neck, soothing, reassuring even while his lips played havoc with her nerves. “And I don’t want any more than you’re able to give.”

When he deepened the kiss, she moaned. There was something both of despair and of wonder in the sound. For an instant, only an instant, she gave in to it. Her body pressed against his, her lips parted, her heart opened. He had a glimpse of beauty, of generosity so overwhelming it left him shaken.

Then she was drawing back, turning away. “Philip, I know what my image is, but it’s only an image. This kind of thing isn’t for me.” She clasped her hands together to hold them steady.

“Maybe it hasn’t been.” Again, he put his hands on her shoulders. “Until now.”

She had pride. It had gotten her through the unstable and confusing years. Because it was strong, she was able to speak without shame. “I’ve never been with a man. Never wanted to.”

“I know.” She turned back, as he’d hoped she would. “I understood that this morning when you told me about your father, what you’d seen happen between him and your mother. There’s nothing I can say to erase that or ease your feelings about it—except that it doesn’t have to be that way, should never be that way.”

He touched her again, a hand to her cheek. It was as much a test for himself as for her. She closed her eyes, allowing herself to absorb the feel of his fingers on her skin and the jangle of nerves and needs it brought to her. She’d always been a woman who’d known her own mind, and her own destiny. Tonight, it seemed, he would become a part of both.

“I’m afraid.”

He slipped the twin ivory combs out of her hair. “So am I.”

She opened her eyes at that. “I don’t believe you. Why should you be?”

“Because you’re important.” He set the combs aside to let his fingers tunnel through her hair. “Because this is important.” He drew her close again, struggling to remain gentle, to remember her fragility rather than her strength. Both were there, both had snagged him from the first instant. “We can analyze this all night, Addy. Or you can let me love you.”

There wasn’t a choice, nor had there ever been. Adrianne believed in fate. She’d been destined to leave Jaquir, as she was destined to return. And she was destined to spend this night, if only this one night, with Philip, and learn what it was that made women give their hearts, and their freedom, to men.

She expected passion. She understood it. That was the wild frenzy that made men search for a form of release. She knew of sex from the frank talk of the harem to the wistful romantic chatter at tea parties. Women were as hungry as men, if not always as able to sate the hunger. The impression of sex that had remained with her since childhood was a tangle of limbs, a torrent of sound and movement best done in the dark.

When his lips came to hers again, she was prepared to give herself over to it.

But it was only a whisper of a kiss, the brush, retreat, brush of mouth against mouth. Her eyes blinked open in surprise to find him watching her.

He saw the confusion, and the desire growing moment by moment as he toyed with her mouth. There was no urge to devour or possess. Not this time. Not with her. Whatever skill he had, whatever patience he’d developed, he would use tonight. He let his hands lose themselves in her hair, giving them both time to adjust to the unexpected.

So when he touched her, she didn’t stiffen. Her body seemed ready to be stroked and discovered. He shrugged out of his jacket and she no longer hesitated to run her hands over his shoulders, down his back. Impatient to know the same freedom he was experiencing, she tugged at his shirt until it was free and she could feel the flesh beneath.

She heard him suck in his breath at her touch. His mouth
became more urgent on hers, his heartbeat less steady. She heard him murmur, but didn’t understand his request to go slowly. She couldn’t know how much it cost him to undress her carefully, to keep his hands easy when he wanted to grasp greedily. Naked, she shivered once. The sound of her dress falling to a pool at her feet echoed like thunder in his head.

Her skin glowed in the vague moonlight that silvered the ends of her hair as it fell over her breasts. He’d known what it was to want, but he hadn’t known that the edge of desire could be so jagged—so jagged his hands shook as he tugged off his shirt, so jagged his throat ached as he lay her on the bed.

She, too, had known want. But her desires had always had a clear route and a definite end. Security, reputation, restitution. Now she learned that some desires had a morass of paths leading to many destinations. She was still afraid, but no longer of him. She feared herself now, and what price she might be willing to pay to go on feeling as she felt tonight.

He showed her what it was to burn, slowly, while still craving the heat. She heard her own shuddering sigh as her body, so long restricted from this one pleasure, strained, shivered, and accepted. Here was passion that liquefied, tenderness that excited, and knowledge that broke down long-held beliefs.

He took, as she had known he would, but there was giving as well. And no pain. She’d been so certain there would be pain. Yet his hands moved over her like water. Even when his mouth fit over her breast and her body arched in reaction, there was only pleasure. Waves of it.

She smelled of smoke and silk and secrets. Enough to drive a man mad. She touched, but cautiously. Though her response was everything a man could wish for, he sensed a knot of tension remaining. She was building to a peak he knew she couldn’t understand. Part of her mind was holding back, perhaps wary of the price. Where there was intense pleasure, there was intense vulnerability. Murmuring, he covered her mouth with his. Hers opened, so that her tongue moved in an experimental dance with his.

The tastes were new to her, and yet … familiar. The feel of his body moving against, fitting itself to, sliding over hers
wasn’t foreign or frightening as she’d expected. She didn’t experience the violation she’d been prepared for when he touched what no man had touched.

Then there was more, more than pleasant sensations, more than easy discovery. Her breath grew shallow and she struggled for air. Her skin, so sensitized by each stroke, heated until even the breeze flitting through the open windows couldn’t relieve it. Helplessness. It was something she’d sworn never to feel, not at the hands of a man. She struggled against it, against him, as the heat gathered, knotted, then expanded in her center.

Here was the pain, but nothing like any pain she’d known. She fought against it while she fought for it. She clawed at the sheets in a desperate attempt to find her balance.

Slowly, he skimmed his hand up her thigh, feeling the tremor of each separate muscle. And he found her, hot and moist. There was an instant of resistance, a strangle of breath as sensation intensified. Her body contracted, then on a moan of astonished release went lax.

From that moment she was trapped, greedy for whatever she could feel, desperate for all he could teach. Her blood pumped hot, fast, and close to the surface as she wrapped herself around him. There was a freedom here she embraced, as she embraced him. There was trust. She opened herself to it as she opened to him.

When he slid into her there was shock, there was pleasure, one for the other. He couldn’t have told her that at that moment, with her body cupped around him, he was more vulnerable than he’d ever been and more willing to risk.

Later, she lay quiet beside him. It shouldn’t have meant so much. It couldn’t change anything. She knew it was foolish to feel differently. In her country a woman of her age would have been long married, and if God were kind, would have borne children. What had happened tonight was simply a natural function. A woman was born to give a man pleasure and sons.

She was thinking like a woman of Jaquir! The shock of realization left a bitter taste in her mouth, one that overpowered
the lingering flavor of the man beside her. She started to shift away, perhaps to run. Then his arm draped over her.

Braced on his elbow, he studied her face. There were still secrets there, and, beneath the glow of quenched passions, reservations he couldn’t guess at.

“Did I hurt you?” It wasn’t his first thought, but he was no more ready to share his secrets than she.

“No, of course not.”

He touched her face. Though she didn’t shift away, neither did she return the touch. Because her skin had cooled, he drew the sheet up, waiting for her to say something, to give him any sign of how she felt, or what she needed. The silence stretched out and drew into knots.

“You won’t forget me, you know,” he murmured. “One never forgets the first lover.”

There was just enough bite in the words to let her see he was holding his temper, but not enough for her to recognize hurt. “No, I won’t forget you.”

He rolled her until she lay across him, her hair curtaining both of them. Their eyes met. There was a challenge, acknowledged and accepted. “Let’s make sure of it,” he told her before he brought her mouth to his.

The sun was high and white when she woke. There was an ache, dull and somehow sweet, through her body to remind her of the night. She wanted to smile, to snuggle back in bed and hug it to herself like an accomplishment, like a bag full of the finest diamonds. But there was still a part of her, a part dug deep, that believed a woman’s submission in bed meant submission everywhere.

He was sleeping beside her. She hadn’t thought he would stay the night, or hold her throughout it. Nor had she known how comforting it could be to lie awake in the dark and listen to his steady breathing. She knew now how good it felt to study his face in the morning sunlight.

Tenderness. She felt it, fought against it. Her fingers itched to run along his cheek, to comb through his hair. It would be so satisfying to touch him now, as if what had happened in the night had been real and important.

Cautious, she uncurled her fingers from her palm and started to reach out. Her fingertips just brushed his skin
when his eyes blinked open. Adrianne snatched her hand away.

Even in sleep his reflexes were quick. Philip wrapped his fingers around her wrist and brought her hand to his lips. “Morning.”

“Good morning.” Awkward. She felt foolishly, miserably awkward. “We slept later than I intended.”

“That’s what vacations are for.” In one smooth move he rolled on top of her to nuzzle at her neck. “And other things.”

She closed her eyes. It was harder, much harder than she ever had believed to fight the need to give. If possible, she wanted him more now than she had during the night. Love, like any indulgence, was craved more after the first taste.

“Like breakfast?” she said, willing her voice to be light.

After nibbling on her lips, he drew back. “Hungry?”

“Starved.”

“Shall I ring up room service?”

“Yes—no,” she said, and already hated herself for the deception. “I’d really like to shower and change, then I’d been toying with the idea of diving, going out to Palancar.”

“Have you hired a boat?”

“Not yet.”

When he sat up she shifted, just slightly, so their bodies no longer touched. “Why don’t I see to it? I’ll go have a shower myself, then meet you in the dining room in an hour. We can take off after we eat.”

“Perfect.” She managed a smile. “I might be a bit longer than that; I need to call Celeste.”

“Not too much longer.” He kissed her, and because she was already regretting, she poured herself into it. With a murmur of approval he drew her closer. “A person can go for days without food.”

Her laugh was only a little strained. “Not this person.”

She waited until she was alone to bring her knees up and drop her head on them. It shouldn’t hurt. Doing what was necessary shouldn’t hurt. Oh, but it did. Tossing the sheets aside, she rose quickly and began to move.

He gave her an extra quarter of an hour as he sat by the window in the dining room and watched the sun worshipers oil up. He knew there were women who did not value time.
But, finally, he reminded himself that Adrianne wasn’t one of them. Holding back impatience, he lingered over a second cup of coffee. A man was in bad shape when he started counting the minutes. Philip picked up the rose he’d set beside her plate. He was in very bad shape.

More had happened to him the night before than passion and release. Things had clicked inside him, and settled unalterably into place. He hadn’t been looking, hadn’t even wanted to look for someone who fit him so perfectly. But there was no going back. For her either, he thought as he lit a cigarette. She might think she could pick up her life where she’d left it off before him, but he was going to prove her wrong.

He’d made his decision, perhaps the first in his life that hadn’t been self-serving or with an eye to profit, but he’d made it. And dammit, he wasn’t going to waste the rest of the morning waiting to start convincing her it was the right one.

He crushed his cigarette, leaving it smoldering and his coffee cooling as he strode out of the dining room. He was feeling uneasy by the time he got to her door. Lovesick fool, he called himself, with not a little disgust. He rapped, harder than was necessary, then tried the door when she didn’t answer. It was locked, but he had his door key in his pocket, along with a credit card and a thin coin. He didn’t bother to glance around as he went to work.

When he opened the door, he knew He was already swearing when he went to the closet to pull it open. It was empty, but for her scent. There was a trace of powder on the vanity counter, but the bottles and tubes were gone.