“Meg…” Simon said, his tone a warning.
But she was past warnings now. Now the words seemed to fall from her lips even if she didn’t want them to. “It isn’t that I don’t like Graham, or that he isn’t a fine match. God knows he is a fine match—any woman would fight to be in my place. But that doesn’t change the facts. And the fact is that there isn’t a connection between us.”
“Meg,” Simon said again, this time with more urgency.
“Not the connection that there is when I’m with—”
Simon rolled unexpectedly, pushing her onto her back on the mattress, his hands coming to grip her upper arms as he loomed over her, his body covering half of hers as he stared down into her face with wild eyes. Her jovial, playful friend Simon was not there in this man’s face that was so close to her own. He had been replaced by a dark, hard, passionate Simon who held her down and made her body ache even more with a wanting that was wrong and right all at the same time.
“Stop,” he hissed. “Don’t say another word, Margaret, or I’ll—I’ll—”
What little breath she had left in her lungs caught in her throat. “What? What will you do?” she asked.
He groaned deep in the back of his throat and then his mouth crushed down on hers. Simon was kissing her. The shock of that was so powerful she didn’t think to fight it.
His grip loosened on her arms and she lifted them up, wrapping them around his neck and drawing him closer as relief flooded her. It was like a dam had been broken, one built from years and years of stolen glances and hidden longing. Now everything she’d ever felt or wanted from this man was cascading over her and she was lost to its power. Tohispower.
His mouth was rough on hers, opening so his tongue could push inside her. She allowed it, meeting the kiss with her own, unpracticed, yes, but just as passionate. He stroked her tongue, seeming to taste every inch of her as his weight pushed her into the pillows. She was beginning to understand and did the same to him, eliciting another soft groan from him.
His hands moved, too, sliding down her bare sides, gripping her hips in the darkness beneath the blankets and pushing himself against her. She lifted to his weight, gasping when the hard cock she’d seen earlier thrust against her lower belly, insistent and hot.
“Simon,” she gasped into his mouth, overwhelmed by pleasure and need all at once. It was all so heady and dangerous and wanton and wonderful.
He froze at the sound of his name, his hands stilling, his mouth stopping. Then he released her in an instant and jumped off of her as quickly as he could. He caught the blanket on top and wrapped it around himself as he paced away to the fire.
“No!” he shouted, loud enough that the room almost shook. She thought that the exclamation was as much to himself as to her, and she winced at the pain in that one little word.
“No,” he repeated, and there was even more pain in the softer admonishment.
He moved toward the door and she sat up, the blankets sliding from her breasts as she did so, but she didn’t care.
“Where are you going?” she asked. “Please, Simon.”
“I can’t, Meg,” he said, spinning to face her. He stared, and she blushed before she covered herself. “Ican’t, don’t you see? No matter how I want to, no matter how Ineedto. He is one of my closest friends. Practically a brother when I had no one else in the world. Theybothare. I’m sleeping on the floor. I should have done so to begin with.”
Her lips parted. “But the cold—”
“Then I’ll freeze,” he snapped, exiting the room and slamming the door behind himself.
She flopped back on the bed, covering her face with her forearm as the tears began to fall.
Chapter Six
Simon shifted and grunted as pain shot up his arm. Every part of his body felt stiff and bruised. He remained with his eyes closed, caught between restless sleep and wakefulness, and tried to remember exactly why everything felt so awful.
And then he heard the voices. Distant, through glass and wood, but there. He recognized those voices. James saying, “—one of the few people to know where this place is.”
Then Graham, his tone angry. “—at least it would protect her.”
Simon shot to his feet, all the memories of last night coming cascading down on him. He and Meg caught in the storm. He and Meg, lying in that bed together. Kissing Meg and having it be so much better than anything he’d ever dreamed.
And so much worse.
He’d had every intention of waking her early, of them being fully dressed before dawn. But thanks to that searing kiss, he’d hardly slept, probably less than an hour, and clearly most of that hour had been recent.
Now Graham and James and…there was another voice, one he didn’t recognize. Well,theywere here. And he was naked except for a blanket, and all his clothes were in a bedroom with Meg, equally naked.
“Shit!” he burst out, tucking the blanket around himself just as the door began to open.
