Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)(145)

“It’s better than being abandoned!” She lashed out at him, flailing.

He blocked her slap, and the flurry of frenzied blows that followed it, then pinned her hands to the wall. “I never stopped loving you,” he said roughly. “It’s been tearing me to pieces.”

She shook her head. “Let go of my damn hands. I need a tissue.”

He gave her one. She blew her nose, hid her face. “Just go, Sean.”

“No,” he said. “I just can’t do that.”

She dropped her hand, and glared at him. Her curling lashes glittered with tears. He could practically hear her spine stacking up. The look of fury in her beautiful eyes rang all his bells.

“Forget it. You can’t bully me into trusting you again,” she announced. “Let go of me!”

“No.” He scooped her up before she could wiggle away and lifted her, pressing her body against the wall so that she straddled his hips. He dug his fingers into the wind whipped hair, and kissed her, hard.

It was like lightning through a wire, the need that roared through him. The emotion, the sensations. Her soft female heat pressed against his crotch, her shabby skirt twined around his legs. She shivered, fighting him even as her thighs tightened and pulsed around his.

She kissed him back, angrily, hungrily. His heart revved up.

He tilted her face up. “You love me,” he said roughly. “I can make you want me. That’s enough for now. We’ll work on trust later.”

“No way, you arrogant jerk,” she hissed. “You got it backwards.”

“No, I don’t. I understand you perfectly.” He scooped her up, hands under her ass, and carried her to the couch. He sank down, depositing her on the cushions. “But if it’s the only card I have to play, I’m goddamn well going to play it.”

She pushed his face away with shaking hands when he tried to kiss her again. “OK,” she said. “Granted, you can muscle me around. You’re very strong. And yes, you’re good at making me come. But that’s all. It ends there. When you’re done, I’ll still tell you to leave. So leave now. Spare us. It’ll just hurt that much more.”

“No.” He put his hand over hers, rubbing his cheek against it. Kissing her palm, her fingers, that delicate knob of bone on her wrist. “If I make you come once, why not again? And again, and again, and damn, before you know it, sixty-five years have gone by.” He slid his hands beneath the skirt, over the thick wool socks until they gave way to bare, smooth female skin halfway up her thighs.

She swatted at him. “Stop it, you lust-crazed pig. So that’s your plan? Just enslave me sexually for all eternity?”

“Ah, man,” he said thickly. “Sounds like heaven.”

She wiggled furiously. “Smart-ass dog,” she muttered.

“Yeah.” The dress was so loose, there was no impediment to sliding his hand still farther, feeling her cotton panties, the humid female warmth between her thighs, the deep, sexy dip of her waist.

Her murmurs sounded like protest, but her breath was jerky, her cheeks hot pink. His hand insinuated itself under a thermal weave undershirt, and found the tender, jiggling heft of her tits, propped in the scaffolding of a cotton bra. Her nipples were tight.

Her heart thudded, quick and fast, against his hand.

Tears flooded his eyes. He hid his face against her chest, let her paint-spattered sweater absorb them. It moved him to tears. How f*cking beautiful she was. How fragile. Her body was a treasure box that held the priceless jewel of Liv Endicott’s soul.

His princess, his queen, empress. His goddess.

A sharp tug, and the cotton of her panties gave way, leaving her hot nest of curls naked to his caressing fingers. He tossed her skirt up over her waist. Oh, man. That soft skin, torn panties clinging to one white thigh, that lovely, hot pink slit in her dark curls. Beckoning him.

Her eyes were closed, tangled hair spread out across the couch cushions, the smudgy, sooty shadows of her lashes dark against her tear-streaked face. That stain of sunrise pink in her pale cheek, the soft lower lip caught between her white teeth, every detail devastated him.

The contrast between her delicate female body and the thick wool socks, the shabby skirt, the battered boots, was unspeakably erotic.

She moved against him, gripping his shirt, shoving his heavy jacket off his shoulders as if it pissed her off that he was still wearing it.

He let go of her just long enough to wrestle the sleeves off his arms. His hands were starving for contact with her hot skin. His dick felt like a ravening beast lunging at the chain, but he had to redeem himself first, as best he could. Making her come was his favorite way, cheap, short-term solution though it might be.

He didn’t care.

He slid his finger reverently into the tight, suckling heat of her *, mouth watering. He’d been aching for a taste of her sweet girl juice for months. He sagged down to pay passionate homage to her tender female flesh with his tongue.

Ah, God. Like always. Silken salty sweet. Delicious. Every sobbing breath, every lapping sliding stroke. He loved the way she struggled and writhed, bucking and heaving against his face, though he could feel her anger in the sharp, nervous bite of her nails through his shirt.

She was wound so tight, vibrating with furious excitement, but he was instinctively wary of making her come too soon.

Better to drag it out, make her wait. Keep her in this drawn up state of shivering need, for as long as he possibly could.