Along Came Trouble(52)

He grinned again and brought one hand to her thigh. “That’s a serious problem. But I can help.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yep. What you need is to make some new memories. I’ll assist you.” He lowered his mouth to the base of her throat and began kissing his way downward.

“What about my old memories?”

“They might not be recoverable. But if there were no good orgasms in there, I figure it’s not much of a loss.”

She ran her fingers through the short bristles of his hair. It was silky and thick, and she wondered what it would look like if he grew it out. If it would curl at the base of his neck. She could see Caleb as a wiry rascal of a kid, scraped knees and mischievous eyes, hair flopping over his forehead. Exasperating and lovable.

He returned, kissed behind her ear, and she sighed, lifting her foot to trail along his calf. Where her toes discovered he was still half-dressed. “Clark, if you don’t get these pants off right now, I swear I’ll kick you out of my house.”

“Maybe I should keep them on,” he said. “They’re doing amazing things for my self-control.”

“If I go on record as being terribly impressed with your self-control, will you take the damn pants off?”

He shook his head no. “You’re going to have to do it yourself.”

It wasn’t exactly a hardship. She sat up and shoved him onto his back, then reached for his fly as he interlaced his fingers behind his head. Caleb Clark smiling up from her pillow. Enough to give a girl the vapors.

When she worked open the button and lowered his zipper, her fingers moved inside and curled around their discovery in an automatic caress. There was nothing small or modest about Caleb, that was for sure. And nothing soft, either. No, he grew harder in her grip, straining eagerly toward her. Knowing she could do this to him gave her an embarrassing amount of pleasure.

Nobody had ever filled her with such lust before. No man had ever made her want to get down on her knees and beg. Or get down on her knees and suck, for that matter. Blow jobs had never been high on her list of favorite activities, but it was going to be downright fabulous to find out what happened to Caleb’s soldier face when she put her mouth on him.

He caught her eye and apparently got a pretty good idea of what she was thinking, because he groaned. Raising himself on one elbow, he brought his mouth to her ear and bit the lobe, sending a shiver skating along her spine. “Careful, babe. My self-control might not be as impressive as you think. Show me a little mercy, huh?”

But she wasn’t feeling merciful. She hooked her thumbs through both of his waistbands and tugged them down, down, down, sliding her fingers over his butt and the backs of his thighs until finally he was naked for her. The dusky head of his cock strained toward her, and when she stroked the softest, hardest part of him, he sucked in a gratifying breath.

She wanted him in her mouth.

She found herself on her back.

“I was going to—”

“Not now.” His eyes glittered with an animal heat that told her Caleb was done playing around.

“I had plans! You would’ve liked them.”

“Yeah. But I’m going to like this more.”

He kissed her and spread her thighs wide with his hand on her knee. “Have you got a condom?”

She looked toward the side table. “In the drawer over there.”

He followed her glance. “Is it three years old?”

“Just about.” She’d bought them within a week of kicking Richard out—not because she expected to have sex with another man anytime soon, but because preparing for the possibility was one more way to thumb her nose at him. “Expired, you think?”

Caleb chuckled. “Yes.” Moving off her, he fished around in his pants for his wallet and then returned with a prize. “I only have one. We’ll have to make it count.”

She expected him to get right down to business after that, but he took his sweet time heating her up, his hands on her breasts and stroking over the outside of her thighs, the inside of her thighs, fingers dipping between her legs, tongue tracing the shape of her collarbone and flicking her nipples and doing to her mouth what she very much wanted him to do to her body. She reached for him more than once, trying to speed him along, but he batted her hands away and counseled patience.

“What happened to fast and hard and rough?” Desperation made her edgy and possibly a little whiny.

“Mmm. We’ll do that next time. We have to get acquainted first.”