But this was different.He wasn’t in her head tonight, he was in her house.
So she shifted where she sat, and slid herself over his lap, so she was straddling him.
No matter what happened next, she thought it was worth it already for that look of shock on his beautiful face, and the way his mouth opened slightly.
And that white-hot blaze of heat in his blue eyes that scorched her straight through.
His hands went to grip her hips, and she liked that.
She also knew a whole lot more things about him, immediately, simply because she’d climbed up on him like this.Because now she knew how hefelt.His rock-hard thighs beneath hers.His hard, sculpted arms and the big, strong hands on her hips.He smelled even better up close, and she’d already thought he smelled delicious.And she could feel the heat he gave off, like he was his own furnace.
It made her hot in return, like her body wanted to match.
He blew out a breath, a sound that wasn’t quite a word.
But that wasn’t him ordering her to get off him.
Matilda indulged herself instead.She shifted closer, pressing herself against him, and that felt even better.Especially when she could feel the hardest part of him between them—very evidently as enthusiastic as she felt.
And that was like a lightning bolt.
So, still smiling so wide she was surprised it didn’t hurt, Matilda closed the remaining distance between them, slid her arms around his neck, and kissed him.
At long last.
Chapter Eight
For a moment,Tennessee thought his heart might explode inside his chest.
Matilda’s mouth was sliding over his, and then she licked her way between his lips, and he no longer cared at all if his heart did explode.Because if he died right now, he thought he would count himself perfectly happy.
He was a big man and tiny, delicate women had never done it for him.Matilda wasn’t breakable.He could feel the muscles in her thighs, the strength in her arms.She was built tough and so damned pretty and she tasted like heaven.
Perfect, in other words, because he wasn’t the least bit afraid that he might hurt her.
Not that hewantedto hurt her, but when he sank his hands into that cloud of strawberry-blonde hair—at last—and angled her head so he could find his way deeper into this kiss, he liked very much not second-guessing himself that he might be too rough.
Then he knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that he wasn’t when she moved against him, rocking herself on his lap in a way that was clearly designed to drive them both wild.
It worked, too.
It worked like a charm.After all, he’d called her the Pied Piper, and it fit—she seemed to know exactly how to use that magic on him.
Because the taste of her was almost too much to bear.She tasted like sugar.Her mouth was hot, and fit his perfectly.The way she kissed him seemed hotwired to something deep inside of him, like he’d been waiting his whole life for her to flip this exact switch.
He moved, tipping her over so he could stretch them both out on the couch, and that was even better.
The kiss deepened, then got wilder.Much wilder.He found his hands moving of their own accord, finding their way beneath her clothes so he could touch her skin.He felt her hands on him, tracing fire along his spine, her fingers digging into him as she kissed him in a way that made him think that maybe he’d never been kissed before.
She felt flushed, her lips were soft and sweet, and he wanted to put his mouth on every last part of her.
He kissed her again and again, and they rolled over once more, and then she was laughing and he was surprised to find that he was laughing too as they tumbled their way onto the floor.
But she didn’t stop kissing him.And he couldn’t stop kissing her.
He wasn’t sure he would have stopped—ever—if one of her dogs hadn’t come over then and insinuated his great, big, shaggy head between them.
Matilda laughed as she fended the big shepherd off.She sat up and rubbed the dog on his furry face.“Silly boy,” she crooned at him.“So protective.”
