“We should talk about birth control,” he said.
Her gaze jerked upward. “Birth control?” she asked, not quite registering the question. That line of hair was just so intriguing.
“Yeah,” he said. “Let’s do ‘the talk’ and get it out of the way.”
“The talk.” Laughter bubbled from her lips, with surprising ease, considering this was her first time to be naked with Ryan—well, sort of, there was the partial nudity in the stairwell. But normally she’d be nervous, thinking about what he was thinking. But the heat in his eyes, the stark hunger in his face, said more than words. Continuing, she said playfully, “Well, let’s see. I’m on the pill, but a good senator’s daughter would still demand a condom. Got one?”
He reached to a drawer behind him and tossed a row of condom packages to the bed. “Never had sex without one. The women in my life haven’t exactly stayed around long.”
She snatched the six-pack of condoms from the bed. “Glad you’re prepared.” Was she one of the here-today, gone-tomorrow women of his life? Another conquest. Another goodbye.
“Don’t go reading into that,” he said, as if he was the one reading her mind. “I’m not bed-hopping. I haven’t, not for a good long while. I was on a mission for six months right before I got out of the Army. You?”
The last man in her bed had been a corporate attorney she’d thought wanted her, wining and dining her, sending her flowers. But in bed, he’d been hard and fast, and insensitive to her needs. Satisfaction for him. None for her. She’d given him three tries, all of which had left her feeling used and abused. When she’d broken up with him, he’d told her she was boring in bed, and that he’d tolerated her for her father’s business.
“A year,” she said, a bit more somber now. Was she boring in bed? Had she been the problem?
“I bought them the night I met you,” Ryan said, drawing her into the moment, the look in his eyes, the understanding that seemed to reach beyond words. He made her feel sexy, made her feel confident.
She shoved away the past and reveled in the moment, in Ryan. “A bit presumptuous, don’t you think?” she asked, casting him in a haunting look.
“A soldier is both prepared and thorough,” he amended, hungrily inspecting her body, his gaze lingering on her nipples. “Damn, you’re beautiful, woman.” The words seemed to set off an urgency within him.
In one swift move, his jeans and boxers were gone. A wave of overwhelming, almost primal need washed over her as she found the answer to where that trail of hair ended. He was all sinewy muscle, defined, powerful. Aroused. His erection impressively long and hard.
Before she knew his intention, his knees hit the mattress, and he turned her to her stomach. He spread her legs and slipped between, his body warm over hers, his lips near her ear.
“Thorough, remember,” he whispered. “I want to know all of you, Sabrina. Every last inch.”
It was complete submission. It was handing him control. And it was having control. Because it was her decision. One so much more meaningful than that one moment at the edge of a plane when the decision to jump took place. It was intimate. It was personal. It was trust.
He brushed her hair from her neck and nibbled. Spread her arms out and covered them with his own, and pressed his lips between her shoulder blades. His cock settled between her legs, slid into the wet heat, taunting her with how easily it would be for him to slip inside her.
His hands caressed a path down her arms until they slipped around her, cupping her breasts. She moaned and bit her lip. He tugged gently on her nipples, pressed his hips more fully between her thighs. Her backside lifted, as desperation tore through her.
“Ryan,” she whispered. “Oh…” She lost the words as he moved, leaving her thighs aching. His mouth traveled down her spine, hands down her ribcage, over her hips, her backside. Kissing a path that was rapidly becoming more tempting, more intimate. Sabrina could feel herself losing touch with reality, her body quivering with every touch, every taste.
By the time his fingers slid between her legs, she cried out, gasping on a plea. “Ryan. Please.”
He slid up her body, hard muscle encasing her everywhere, the thick ridge of his shaft teasing her thighs. Yes. That’s what she wanted. “Please what?” he asked, his cheek next to hers.
“You know what I want,” she whispered. “You.”
“Me how?”
For only a flash of a second, she hesitated, not used to being uninhibited with a man. But it was a second and gone. “Inside me. I want to feel you inside me.”
“And you will,” he promised. “Soon.”
He lifted his body off hers, rolled to his side, and Sabrina took advantage, not giving him the chance to claim control again. She’d given it. Now she wanted to take it. It was her turn to drive him crazy.
Sabrina straddled Ryan, positioning the hard length of his erection behind her, pressing temptingly against her backside. “My turn,” she declared, driven by how much this man turned her on—everything about him, including the wicked gleam in his eye right now.
“And if I say no?” he challenged.
She leaned down, the crisp hair of his chest teasing her nipples. “Don’t you want to please me?”
His hands ran up her back, the air crackling with instant heat. “You know I do.”
She did; she knew. That was what made it so easy to be free with him. “Then do what I say.”
He nipped her bottom lip and smiled. “I thought you weren’t a control freak?”
“Sometimes control has its perks.”
His hand slid into her hair. “Sometimes giving away control has its perks.” He dragged her mouth to his, a bit rough, a lot wild. His tongue pressed into her mouth, a deep, drugging invasion that Sabrina felt in every nerve ending of her body. Her thighs hugged his waist, wet heat draped across his lower stomach. It would be so easy to lift her body and take him inside her. So good to take him inside her. She fought the urge. There was so much she wanted to do to him first. So much.
He broke the kiss long enough to nip and nibble her lip, his hand at the back of her neck, holding her captive until he claimed another drugging kiss, taking her further into an alternate reality where only pleasure existed. He reached between them, tugging at her nipples, tweaking with enough pressure that it hurt, but, oh, so good.
He turned his face to her hair and then nuzzled her cheek. “You smell gorgeous. Like honeysuckle.” His hands covered her breasts, held them, caressed them.
“My shampoo,” she whispered absently, the press of his shaft against her back reminding her of her agenda. How she wanted to slide down his body and take his cock in her mouth. To show him the kind of pleasure he had shown her.
Desperate to make it happen, she pressed away from him, sitting up. “And stop it. Control is not yours right now.”
“Sweetheart,” he said, his voice low, rough. “I couldn’t agree more. I am totally at your mercy, unable to stop touching you.” He reached for her.
She captured his hands with hers, twined her fingers with his. “Behave, Ryan Walker.”
His gaze brushed her nipples. “Let me lick one.”
“I said behave.”
“Let me lick one and I will.”
“Stop,” she ordered.
An evil smile touched those equally evil lips capable of amazing things. “You know you want me to.”
“No,” she lied. “I don’t.” Yes. She did. Her nipples were perhaps the most erogenous places on her body. Along with the back of her neck, which he’d effortlessly located quite effectively.
“Let me lick one and I’ll behave.”
Tempting. “You promise?”
“You have my word.”
His word. She believed him more the last time he’d offered it. He was in naughty mode. Wickedly naughty and she loved it. “Fine.” Holding on to his hands, she leaned forward, dangling her nipple excruciatingly close to his mouth before saying, “Remember your promise.”
Hunger flitted across his face. “I remember.”
She leaned into him, and he did more than lick. He suckled her nipple into his mouth. Sabrina moaned with the sensation, waves of it washing over her and into her. Her back arched into him, thrusting her breasts higher. Her grip on his hand weakened, forgotten. He licked and suckled and nipped. His teeth rough, his tongue gentle. Her hips were moving; she couldn’t help it. She needed him. She needed and needed.
“It’s time to let me inside, Sabrina,” he said, his hand twining into her hair and dragging her mouth to his. Masterfully, he both kissed her and lifted her hips, shifting her body until he pressed the head of his shaft past her swollen, aching flesh.
Sabrina held her breath as he slipped all the way inside her. “Oh,” she moaned as she felt him fill her, expand within her.
His fingers brushed through her hair. “Oh is right,” he breathed into her mouth, briefly tasting her.
“You’re very…hard,” she whispered. And big.
He laughed. “That’s the idea, isn’t it?”
Smiling, she said, “Yeah, but you are exceptionally—” He thrust into her, pressing her hips against his.
“Hard,” he said, finishing her sentence.
“Yes.”
“That’s because you really turn me on, Sabrina,” he said, his hands going to her face, bringing her gaze to his. “You…like no other woman.”
It was a confession that took her by surprise. Shook her to the core. Excited her. Frightened her. This man was inside her in more ways than the physical. She opened her mouth to confess as much, but her throat constricted. He was so much more than sex. He could hurt her. What if he hurt her?
“Prove it,” she finally said. “Prove it now.”
For just an instant a shadow flickered across his face. Disappointment perhaps. Or not. Perhaps she’d imagined it because almost instantly a primal look full of pure male intent filled his expression.
He took her mouth then, took it with a savageness she’d not felt from him until now. His shaft seemed to thicken further, pulsing inside her. She’d called him wild, but now she, too, was wild. They began to move together, hips pumping and grinding. Bodies pressed close, as if that would take him deeper. As if that would tear down what little separated them. Until the rage of need slowed to a sultry, sensual dance. Until the wild tasting of tongues became a soft musical caress. Until their eyes met and spoke for them.
There was something happening between them, something neither controlled any more than they did their burn to get closer. One last wild rush overcame them, a frenzied thrusting and pumping, that took Sabrina to the edge of shattering where she clung for dear life, wanting this to last, wanting…wanting. Until she shattered, burying her head in his neck, and gasping a moment before the spasms clamped down on his shaft, her body taking what it had wanted from the moment she first met him. He tumbled right after her, shuddered with a hard lift of his hips as he cupped her backside and buried himself far and deep.
SABRINA LAY ON TOP of Ryan, a limp noodle of satisfaction, when suddenly it hit her. “The bank!” she yelped, scrambling to the edge of the bed. “I have to get to the bank.” She eyed the clock. “Thirty minutes. I’m never going to make it! I have no ID, no money, no way to pay for my car keys.” She scrambled for her bag and clothes.
“I thought you went earlier,” Ryan said, already standing and putting on his pants.
“No, I—” Something scraped her back, and she reached over her shoulder. “Ouch! What is that.”
Ryan snatched whatever it was off her back and held it up. The condoms. “I think I’m the one who is supposed to wear them, not you.”
The condoms they hadn’t used were not her biggest problem right now. It was money. “Hurry,” she ordered. “Get dressed.”
His gaze caught on the jeans she pulled from her bag. “Where did that come from? Wait. Your shampoo. Your hair smelled like honeysuckle. You went to your apartment. Sabrina, damn it, what were you thinking?”
“That I had to have my passport to prove to the bank I’m me.” Damn. Her shirt must be in the bathroom. She turned toward it.
Ryan shackled her arm, halting her movement. “Are you nuts? What if someone was watching you at the club? What if they had targeted you?”
“The property manager came with me,” she said. “Or rather she waited in the hall ready to call for help.”
“Oh, that was safe,” he chided shortly. “Damn it. You should have called me.”
“Don’t curse at me, Ryan Walker.”
“Don’t put yourself in danger, and I won’t.”
“You aren’t my protector.”
“Yeah, well, maybe I should be.”
She gaped. “What the heck does that mean?”
“It means I care about you. And if you stand there naked much longer, yelling at me, I’m going to throw you on the bed and show you how much.”
Sabrina snatched the towel from the floor and wrapped it around herself. Though the idea that he couldn’t resist her wore away at her frustration.
Ryan sat down on the edge of the bed. “Look. Sabrina. I’m sorry. Whatever this is that’s going on between us, it makes me protective. I’ve seen some nasty things. Imagining the motives behind stealing your purse isn’t hard for me.”
Sabrina blinked at both the content of his confession and the delivery, glimpsing the tiniest bit of vulnerability and uncertainty behind his words. As if he wasn’t sure how she would respond. He touched her, this big, confident, sexy man with a softer side that even an argument couldn’t hide.
Closing the distance between them, she stopped in front of him, and gently touched his cheek. “No one has ever protected me before. Not me. Just my reputation. I like it.”
Surprise flickered in his face. “You do?”
She nodded. “Yes. Very much.” A slow smile slid to her lips. “But you think you can tame just a little bit of the tough-guy, demanding thing?”
He drew her hand to his mouth. “Depends. Can I still be tough-guy and demanding in bed?”
Instant sexual energy charged the room. “Sometimes,” she negotiated.
“Now?”
She glanced at the clock. No way was she making it to the bank. And she wasn’t sure she’d care if she could. “Now,” she agreed and dropped her towel in the name of seduction for the second time in one day.
16
DESPITE A WHIRLWIND of errands, and more than their share of challenges along the way, Ryan had enjoyed the hell out of spending the rest of Saturday with Sabrina. It was near eight that night when they finally stepped into the elevator of her building, several bags in hand, including a lock kit, a gourmet heat-and-eat pizza—since they hadn’t had time to eat—and her new cell phone in need of charging.
“I still can’t believe my car was impounded,” Sabrina murmured, shaking her head. Her car had been one of their more complicated challenges. “The manager at the bar promised us that wouldn’t happen when my purse was stolen. I even called this morning, and they said it was there.” Animated, she turned to him. “And after you paid for my key. I feel horrible about that.”
“You still need the key,” he reminded her. “And I can drive you out to the lot to get your car Monday morning when the tow company reopens,” he offered.
“I don’t want you to miss more work than you have,” she argued. “You missed today.”
“Business was slow,” Ryan said. “Besides, I worked seven days a week for over a month getting ready for the Hotzones first Army training camp. I’m due a few hours here or there.”
The elevator dinged and opened on her floor. “You’re sure?”
“Positive,” he said as they exited into her hallway. “And for selfish reasons. I’d like to take you out dancing again sometime. That means erasing the bad memories as soon as possible.”
“I don’t even want to think about how I was carrying on at that bar,” she grimaced. “If I’d been in New York, someone would have snapped a picture a
nd held it for ransom for sure.”
He snagged her hand and pulled her close. “But you’re not in New York. You’re in Texas. With me.”
She smiled. “And I’m liking being in Texas.” She kissed him. “With you. But please. Stop me at one margarita next time.”
“You have my word.”
Her smile widened to a grin. “Yes. I have your word.” She started to turn.
He didn’t let her get away, tugging on her hand. “And that makes you smile, why?”
She glanced over her shoulder, pulling him forward. “Because you always say that, and I know you mean it. I like it.” She stopped abruptly, and Ryan almost ran into her.
“Easy there, sweetheart,” he warned and then frowned, noting the box in front of her door.
“Your father again?” he asked, feeling his gut tighten.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t been taking his calls. Or my mother’s, for that matter. So maybe. Every time I talk to them they tell me all the reasons why I should go back to New York. Our conversations always end badly.” She approached the door and Ryan followed, taking the bag she had in her hand and shuffling it to the hand where he held the other two.
He watched her bend down and study the package, his nerves prickling with discomfort. Today, he’d actually begun to think Sabrina might really want to stay here, to make a life here. Maybe with him. But there was one man Ryan knew he couldn’t compete with—her father.
“Weird,” she said. “There isn’t a return address or any postage.”
“Put it down,” Ryan ordered with such force that Sabrina dropped the box immediately.
“Why? What?” She held her hand to her chest. “You scared the heck out of me.”
Ryan set the bags down. “Back away and let me check it out.” He waited for her compliance and then squatted by the box. Bent his head and listened for any odd sound and then did a visual inspection.
Standing up, he turned to Sabrina. “Hand me your keys.”
“Ryan, what is going on?” she asked.
His fingers brushed her jaw. “I’m having one of those protective moments that you both love and hate. Your purse was stolen. We have to be cautious. Stay out here. I’ll open the package.”