“This feel okay?” he whispered gently. He’d let his fingers stray to the butterfly bandages on her forehead.
“Nothing hurts, Mason,” she murmured. “Please don’t stop.”
“Never,” he assured her, his blood pounding through his veins in a rhythm as old as time. And yet, he’d never felt this way before. Never experienced this level of awareness. “I’m gonna show you just how good it can be,” he swore. “I’m gonna take you to places you’ve never been before. And we’re gonna hit every stop along the way.”
He wasn’t one for words. But suddenly, he couldn’t stop speaking. Vowing. Making promises.
After tucking a wayward curl behind her ear, he kissed the side of her mouth, loving how her lips automatically sought more. “And when you’re ready, I’m gonna put myself inside you. Y’okay with that?”
A smile lit up her face and his whole body contracted. It was crazy what she could do to him with just one smile. “Yes, please.”
There were certain memories so warm and wonderful that they seated themselves into a man’s brain. This was one of those memories. Until his dying day, when he closed his eyes, he would conjure Alex in his mind. How she was right now, so utterly open and honest and beautiful.
Her bra was cotton-candy pink. Simple. Sweet. But it looked sexy as hell cupped around the soft, creamy swells of her breasts. He fingered one strap, arching an eyebrow. “Should we begin?”
“Yes, please.”
He bit the inside of his cheek. “For a woman who usually has ten thousand words perched on the tip of her tongue, you’re being awfully succinct.”
She rolled in her lips—those delicious Kewpie-doll lips. “I figured that was far more expedient than telling you you’re pushing on an open door and you’re welcome to come on in.”
“Well, then.” He bent to kiss her shoulder and slide down her bra strap. “Let’s get to it.”
There was laughter in her voice when she answered, “Yes, please.” But it ended in a gasp when he pulled down her bra cup and bared one delectable nipple to the sun dappling through the leaves of the palm overhead.
“You’re beautiful, Alex.” He brushed the callused pad of his fingertip over the tip of her breast and watched it pucker and pout. “So perfect. So soft.” When he pinched the hard little nub, her hips came off the blanket by a foot.
She was a firecracker. No doubt about it. And experience told him it wouldn’t take much to shoot her into the sky. But before she did, he wanted to watch her burn.
He wanted to make her beg.
He wanted the pleasure he pressed on her to be so exquisite that this memory, this moment, thisdaywould seat itself inhermind too.
In the years to come, when she closed her eyes, he wanted her to see him as he was now, feel him as he was now, hot and heavy with desire for her.
Holding her tightly so she couldn’t wiggle away, he closed his lips over her nipple and sucked until she squealed.
* * *
12:39 p.m.
Alex had never cared for the color of her nipples.
They were too light. Not berry brown or cherry red like the women she’d seen while doing research for this moment. Hers were a pale, baby pink. Sweet. Cute. A far cry from anything she’d consider erotic.
Boy, was I wrong!
Now her nipples were two of her favorite body parts. Because Mason seemed to enjoy them immensely, and in doing so, he’d proved they werehighlyerotic.
When he sucked on them, delicious aching sensations traveled down to her belly. Farther, to pool hot and heavy between her legs. And when he gently caught the ruched nubs between his teeth, flicking the tips with his insanely talented tongue? Well, she nearly came.
“Mason,” she moaned, her hips pumping. Twisting. Seeking. “Please, I need—”
“Shh, woman.” Her nipple popped free of his mouth, and it was pure torture. Or a reprieve. She couldn’t tell which. “I know what you need. You’ll get it when I’m ready. Whenyou’reready.”
“I’m readynow.” She tried to break free of his merciless grip. But it was useless. He was too strong.
“Good things come to those who wait,” he growled, and the sound swirled in her ears. Low. Warm. Shockingly seductive.
