“That’s just my point.”
Once more he had cornered her, caught her in a trap of her own making. The fox lay in wait beside her. How could she escape? “Please, don’t, Sloane,” she begged softly. “Please let me sleep.”
“Is that what you really want? You’ve always been true to your own feelings, Justine. Don’t stop now. Is sleep what you really want?”
His question only added to her torment, embodying it, putting it into poignant words. Whatdidshe want? The night hung heavy, dark and still, as she wrestled with the dilemma. Her mind said one thing, her body another. Tears gathered behind her closed lids as she held off, held off, fighting what must surely be the inevitable. For she wanted Sloane. It was as simple as that.
With a low sob, she turned and covered the inches that separated them, drawn into Sloane’s body, against his manly warmth, with an intermingling of arms that locked the union. She was home. At last. It mattered not for how long. All she knew was that she had come home.
Her tears dampened the firm skin of his shoulder as his arms caressed her shuddering form. “Shhh. It’s all right, sweetheart. I love you.”
“I—I know. I know,” she wept softly, clinging to, him with every ounce of strength she possessed.
He held her until her crying ceased, offering himself as a willing pillow for her pale-copper head, as welcome support for her quaking limbs. “Love me, Sloane,” she murmured, as the tears dried and her fingers relaxed their grip to travel over the planes of his bare flesh.
Moaning, he gently slid the thermal jersey over her head, crushing her against him, then worshipping her curves, one by one, with his hands, his lips, his tongue. If he noted a greater fullness in her breasts than that attributable to the heat of passion, he made no mention of it. Her body arched against him, warm and demanding, growing more and more aroused as he coaxed her to peaks unimagined.
“I need you, Justine,” he groaned thickly, his hands helping her peel the covering from her slender legs. “You can’t imagine—”
“I know,” she interrupted in a whisper, seizing the opportunity to lead his body to the height of awareness at which she waited. The leanness of his muscles trembled beneath her questing fingers, making his breathing more ragged than before. His arousal was warm and strong, a pulsing requisite to their mutual satisfaction.
At the apex of desire, she welcomed him, receiving him with warmth, enveloping him with warmth, as his own warmth filled her. Together they scaled that peak, groping ever higher toward that star-filled summit, loving onward and upward, locked in the embrace that brought them finally to the pinnacle for a joyous moment of delirium which hung high and free in mindless suspension, before slowly beginning the downward cascade.
His flesh melded with hers as the wonder of it all held them in breathless ecstasy. Then, as their tremors eased, he shifted to lie beside her, holding her firmly against him. “McKinley pales in comparison, doesn’t it?” he gasped, his lips warm against her closed eyes.
“Ummmm.” Words could not express the pleasure he had given her, any more than could the life’s-beat of her heart so close to his. As they had shared the height of rapture, so they shared the haven of sleep which stole over them. Only the lonely hoot of the horned owl and the anguished howl of the lone wolf broke through the stillness of the night—but they were oblivious to it all. Their only reality was the warmth of each other, and they slept.
Morning brought the feather-softness of warm lips against Justine’s eyes. Slowly, she opened them, startled, then eased as the events of yesterday surged back in divine detail. A lazy smile curved the corners of her lips. “Good morning,” she whispered. “What time is it?”
“Somewhere in the vicinity of ten. How did you sleep?” His voice was soft and low by her ear. Instinctively, she turned her head toward it.
“Ten? It’s late! Shouldn’t we—”
A strong finger against her lips stilled her voice. “No, we shouldn’t. There’s no reason to get up, nothing at all to do. Isn’t it lovely?”
Her grin was a mirror of his own. “It is.” What was even more lovely was the length of hair-roughened leg that wound between her own smoother limbs. Her curls fell across his chest as she rested her cheek next to his heart. “You lied to me, Sloane.”
“Oh? When have I ever lied?”
“You told me, that first day I met you, that you talked in your sleep. I’ve spent three nights with you now, and I haven’t once heard you talk.”
“You wear me out. What strength have I got to talk, much less dream. Or”—he paused, a trace of mischief in his voice—“perhaps it’s you who is worn out. Perhaps I do talk, but you sleep through it all.”
“No way! I’m not that used to sleeping with someone that I’d miss something like that. So I’m not to learn the business secrets?”
“You already know most of them, sweetheart.” His arms settled around her, drawing her more comfortably against his body. “And I doubt that there’s much that that sharp legal mind of yours misses, anyway.”
“You’d be surprised,” she murmured, half to herself, thinking of how fully she’d missed the cunning approach he’d taken to her seduction. Not that she’d minded it in the end; last night had been worth every second. Even now, in hindsight, the stirring of desire was not far away. “So”—she cleared her throat of its thickness—“what do we do today?” Angling her head up, she propped her chin on his chest, resting her forearms across its sinewed breadth.
Sloane regarded the low-slung rafters as he listed off the possibilities. “We could walk in the woods, paddle around the lake in the canoe that’s out back, hunt for berries …”
His voice fell victim to a lazy amusement as he looked down at her, then shifted her onto her side and turned to face her. “What will it be?” he crooned, gently brushing a wispy red curl from her brow, then letting his hands fall lower onto her body.
“I’d like to go berry picking,” she began, then sharply sucked in her breath at the riot caused by his wandering touch. “It’s an idyllic thought … romantic. We could … walk through the woods … in … the bright sunlight …”—she draped her leg over his, her breath coming in ever shorter gasps—“hand in hand … Adam … and Eve …”
“It’s cold out there,” he rasped, needing her.
“We could … get … dressed … aaahh … very … warmly”—she gasped again as he filled her—“and … then … bake a … pie … with … the … ooooh, Sloane …” He moved inside her, warm and throbbing, driving the train of thought from her mind. “You feel so good …”
