Bungalow Nights(64)
Her heart squeezed in her chest, the rhythm faltering there, too, and she swayed on her knees, dark spots swirling in her vision.
In a second, Vance had pulled her up, taking her into his lap. “You have to breathe, silly girl.” His fingers gripping her chin, he tilted her face toward his. “Breathe.”
The air she sucked in made the black spots disappear—and then she was struck by her vulnerability. She was trembling again, and naked, surrounded by a mostly clothed Vance. She made to climb off him—time to gain the upper hand!—but he tightened the arm about her waist. His other hand lifted to cage one swollen breast.
She moaned.
“Yeah,” he said, blowing aside her hair so he could press a kiss to the side of her neck. “My turn now.”
Pinching her nipple, he moved his mouth upward, ignoring her desperate wiggles. “Vance...”
“Hmm?” he asked, the sound humming against the hollow behind her ear.
“Please...”
He lifted his head and his fingers eased up on her breast. “Please harder, softer? Please more kisses? Please more touches?”
Her mind reeled, thoughts not coalescing. “Just please,” she finally said, aggravated.
His smile was almost sweet. “Of course.” Then he stood, lifting her in his arms.
The bedroom was dark, the sound of the ocean bouncing off the walls. He’d left the windows open, she thought, because the air was cool against her skin and smelled soft and wet. He placed her on the mattress, then came down over her a moment later, his elbows on either side of her head. His body was naked now, his skin delicious against hers.
“Oh, Layla,” he said, framing her face with his hands. “Shall I tell you what you do to me?”
“Don’t say anything,” she begged. “Don’t talk.” If he did that, he’d ratchet up her desire and she would lose herself in the heat and need, lose her control over her thoughts and her voice and then it would be she who was talking, telling him the truth she hadn’t yet eradicated from her heart. It was only loosely rooted, it had to be, but it was there now, and dangerous to her pride and to her future.
Instead of answering, Vance kissed her, long and deep and drugging. Yes, she thought, thankfully this wasn’t talking, and reveled in the sensation of his tongue sliding against hers. She sucked on it, open to his flavor, letting the heat and weight of his body sink into hers. Her arms went around his neck and her legs twined his hips.
More kisses. A thousand kisses. A night of kisses.
But then he lifted his head to move down her body. Layla panted in the ocean-scented darkness, arching her back as the flat of Vance’s tongue swiped across her nipple. “Look what I’ve found,” he murmured, and then he traveled to the other, greeting it with another wet velvet caress. “You’re hard for me, baby, just like I’m hard for you.”
Oh, God, yes, she felt it. She felt his length against her thigh, the tip of him wet and that made her wetter, too. One hand tried to find purchase in his short hair, but there was only the silky brush of it against the hollow of her palm. How could that be so sexy? But it was, and even sexier in contrast to the way his thick shoulder muscle bunched against the grip of her other hand.
His mouth sucked her nipple deep. Layla tightened her fingers on him, riding the exquisite bliss of the pull. Her mouth opened, and she moaned, the pitch of it turning higher as he paid attention to her other breast, too, kneading the soft flesh, rubbing his thumb against the tight tip.
“I’m thinking about making you come just like this,” he said, lifting his head to blow cool air on her damp flesh. “I’ll just kiss and lick and tug on your pretty breasts until you give it all up for me.”
No, no. She couldn’t give it all up for him. Alarmed, she thrashed under the weight of his body, but that only brought her more exquisite sensation, her hard nipples abraded by the hair on his chest. Her mouth opened on another cry.
“Shh, shh,” he said, trying to soothe her by trailing wet kisses back up to her mouth. He took her there once more, his possession slow and sure, sending her mind careening off again.
Her control spun away with it. Now it was only Vance’s touch that kept her body centered. He swiped his palms down her belly and along her flank. He reared back, lifting one of her legs so he could trail his tongue up her calf, along the inside of her knee, and on to the twitching flesh of her inner thigh.
He opened her, using his broad palms like blades and then he bent over her, his hot breath the only warning before he was taking her there with his mouth. She jerked at that first velvet stroke and he lifted his head. “You taste so good, Layla, why do you taste so good?”
But he didn’t wait for an answer before he dove low once more and applied himself to savoring her flesh, to exploring every pleated layer and slick surface. She was thrashing again, but he had her hips in his grasp and it was even better to struggle against his strength, his masculine power an aphrodisiac as potent as the gentle stroke of his tongue.
The scent of sex mixed with the scent of ocean. The sound of the waves was louder in the room and as Vance took her up and up, she felt herself tumbling in another direction, slipping against sleek surfaces, twisting and turning toward some elemental center.
Like sliding into a seashell, she thought. The conch, the Buddhist symbol representing the awakening of disciples from ignorance. Because she would never be the same, not with the way Vance was turning her inside out. He flicked his tongue against that most sensitive spot at the apex of her cleft and her skin rippled, every nerve ending responding to the touch. Then he slid two fingers inside her, and they both shuddered. “So hot,” he murmured against her wet flesh. “So soft.”
He turned his hand, penetrating her with a twisting motion that had her arching again. “Vance,” she cried out, protesting, because it was too much or not enough or just wonderful, and she was sliding faster now, into the heart of the spiraled shell.
His touch destroyed her, tearing down all her defenses, until she was just flesh and bone and tissue that yearned for his touch, his lips, his penetration. His mouth was greedy on her hot center, eating at her, the edge of his teeth scraping the sensitized flesh, his tongue piercing the wet channel, making her writhe and shake and beg him for more.
His tongue turned gentle then, soft and adoring on the delicate tissue, licking upward until he could lap at the little bud. She moaned and he lashed it now, holding her still while her voice went hoarse with need. And then...then, he sucked, taking it between his lips and relishing it with a thoroughness that drew all the pleasure from each cell in her body toward that small point. She felt herself sliding again, spiraling, until she was surrounded by soft light and the ocean’s pulsing breath and—bliss...bliss...bliss.
It was as if her climax unleashed something in him. He went almost ferocious, his teeth grazing her hipbones, his mouth burning her belly. His hands were hot, too, cupping her breasts and squeezing her nipples until she was writhing on the sheets again, his wildness contagious. His mouth fell onto hers and the kiss was wet and desperate and she sucked on his tongue again, tasting herself and him, a heady combination.
Her hand slid down his chest to find his erection but his hips reared back. “God, too close,” he muttered.
So she let him put on the condom and guide himself into her body, her sex open and welcome. They both groaned as he infiltrated, a sensual assault by degrees, until he was fully inside her. One arm came under her hips, tilting them up so he gained another searing degree. Then he began moving, in powerful and deep strokes from which she had no defense.
“Layla,” he whispered, his breath hot against her ear.
She wound her legs around his hips, allowing him everything, her body his, her heart the same. It terrified her, this feeling that she’d unlocked her own doors and thrown them wide for him to ransack. Yet she felt herself rising to meet him again, another climax building.
Still thrusting, Vance slid a hand between them and stroked her, playing over the sensitized knot of nerves. She gasped, and then the orgasm crashed upon her like love had—without permission. Her cry was echoed by Vance’s groan, and he shuddered in her arms, his own crisis shaking the entire bed.
In the aftermath, his arms gathered her against his chest. Layla’s heart still pumped in an unsteady rhythm, and then, oh, God, and then what she’d been dreading happened. The words whispered into the room. “I love you.”
Appalled, her mind froze. How could she have let that go? She hadn’t even felt the phrase on her tongue.
But it was out now, and there was only one thing to be done.
She’d already known it was past time for goodbye.
* * *
THE KARMA CUPCAKES truck was back in its usual spot in Layla’s duplex driveway. The familiarity should soothe her, she thought, but she’d lost all hope for serenity somewhere between Crescent Cove and home two days before. Trying to ignore a churning stomach and a throbbing head, she settled onto a stool and contemplated the bottle of champagne on the countertop beside the mixer. Lost in misery, she almost fell over when Uncle Phil suddenly pulled open the door and stepped inside. He was in his usual counterculture garb: cargo shorts, natural-fiber shirt, braided bracelets, but the expression on his face didn’t look the least laid-back.