She rolled over him, pressed down to him, and her mouth went on a crazed journey over heated skin the light breeze from the open terrace doors couldn’t cool.
Rolling again, yet again, he dragged at her pants as she dragged at his until there were no barriers between them.
When she rose over him, she wore nothing but the flash of the diamond he’d given her. She took him in, held there one glorious, torturous moment, held him there until the eyes locked on his went blind.
When she moved, they shared a kind of madness, rising and falling in a storm, all drenched in pleasure. It went deep, deeper still until she cried out from the shock of sensation.
When she shuddered, he pulled her down to him, rolled once more.
“Take.” He covered her mouth in a desperate kiss. “Take again.”
Helpless to deny him, herself, she leaped back into the storm and rode it with him.
Spent, sated, saturated, she lay under him. She thought she might regain the use of her extremities in a few hours. Possibly a couple days.
She found she didn’t mind that considering he appeared to be in the same boat.
“We could sleep right here.”
“Aye.” He didn’t move a muscle. “I’m thinking about that option right at the moment.”
“You’re the one who didn’t want to go up to the bedroom.”
“True enough. It might be all that talk of old masters and the thievingof them started it. It’s always been a passion for me, after all. But no.” He managed to turn his head and brush his lips against the side of her throat. “I think it was you all along.”
He feathered on another kiss.
“Just give us another minute here.”
“I can give you until oh-six hundred.” Then she remembered. “No, damn it, oh-five-thirty. I’m going to get that christing paperwork done.”
“Then you need a bed under you.”
He rolled off her, shoved at his wonderfully tousled hair. “Come on then, Lieutenant.” He reached down for her hand. “Let’s get you up.”
When he pulled her to her feet, she looked at the scatter of clothes.
“We need to get all this. I’ve said it before, and I’m saying it now. We don’t leave evidence of sex all over the place.”
“Evidence of sex. Always the cop.” And delighted with her, he helped gather up clothes.
She hitched her weapon harness on one naked shoulder, and made him smile.
“Christ Jesus, how can you make me want you again when I’m barely breathing from the last?”
“I’m not picking all this up a second time.”
He laughed and walked over to shut the balcony doors. “To bed. You need some sleep.”
She glanced back as she walked to the elevator. “Looks like the cat beat us there.”
“Then he’ll need to make room.”
Not long after Eve opened operations, Jonathan Harper Ebersole went on the hunt.
He’d painted for hours that day. The music soaring, and his heart with it, as every stroke of his brush brought him joy. He knew the portrait washis best work, magnificent work, and no wonder. He’d taken her life with his hands, and her death brought life to the art.
He understood that as he never had before.
