Hello Stranger (The Ravenels #4)(33)

There had always been a cold streak in him, but he couldn’t seem to find it now, when he needed it most. He was breaking apart inside. He would never be the same after this.

“Christ, you’ve ruined me,” he whispered.

His arms went around her, one hand gripping the heavy silken mass of her braided chignon. She guided his head down, and he lost the battle, all his will vanquished as he began to kiss her as if the world were about to end.

For him, it was.





Chapter 8




In truth, the kiss started a bit awkwardly. Garrett puckered her lips into an innocently round shape, as if she were pressing them against someone’s cheek. Had Ethan not been so inflamed, he would have smiled. He brushed his mouth over the gathered circle of her lips, playing softly, coaxing without words . . . Like this . . . nudging at her lips until she parted them hesitantly.

All the hungering minutes of his life, the years of bitter struggle, had led to this moment. The scars his soul had worn like armor were dissolving at her touch. She allowed the gentle intrusion of his tongue, made a little sound of pleasure, and to his eternal delight, she tried to pull him deeper. The graceful hands he so admired lifted to his head, slender fingers wandering behind his ears and into his hair, and the feel of it was so exquisite, he all but purred.

The kiss turned into something dark and dreaming, an unspoken language of heat and silk, tenderness and greed. He was so famished for her, had worshipped and wanted her for so long, but he’d never expected to have her in his arms. He’d never imagined she would yield to him like this, her response natural and searing. Nothing had ever devastated him the way she did. He pulled her closer, as if he were trying to protect her with his entire body, and she moaned softly, clinging to him as her knees began to give out like slip-joint hinges.

Lifting her easily, Ethan sat her on the edge of a metal table and collected her against him, one of his hands guiding her head to his shoulder. She conformed to him bonelessly, her legs forced to part beneath her skirts. Her breath came in flutters, like the bursts of a sparrow’s wing beats.

Take her right now, came the lust-drenched thought. He could make her want it. He could have her begging for it, right there on the table. It would feel so damn good, better than anything either of them had ever experienced. It would be worth anything.

“Don’t trust me,” he managed to warn unsteadily.

Garrett’s breath struck his neck in a little puff of amusement. “Why?” she whispered. “Are you going to seduce me in my own laboratory?”

Clearly she had no idea how close he was to doing just that.

Ethan crushed his mouth against her smoothed-back hair, his gaze wandering over shelves filled with vaguely menacing instruments and flasks of mysterious fluids. “What man wouldn’t be carried away in a setting like this?” he asked dryly. Although there actually was something provocative about it, this scientific room of cold, hard surfaces, and the pretty green-eyed creature in his arms. She was the only soft thing in here.

“Science is romantic,” Garrett agreed dreamily, missing the sarcasm. “There are secrets and wonders waiting to be discovered in this laboratory.”

Ethan’s lips twitched as he charted the length of her spine with his palm. “The only wonder I see is you, acushla.”

Garrett drew back enough to look at him, the tip of her nose brushing his. “What does that word mean?”

“Acushla? It’s . . . a word for female friend.”

After a moment of consideration, a skeptical grin crossed her face. “No, it isn’t.”

It was pure reflex to kiss her again, a response to an impulse before it had even reached his brain. Her mouth shaped to his with a willingness that drew a primitive grunt of satisfaction from his throat. He felt the innocent tightening of her thighs against his hips, and his groin pumped with heat.

Ethan damned himself as his fingers went to the buttons of her basque. Just a few minutes more, and he would live on it to the end of his days. The front of her bodice fell open to reveal a chemise fastened with a tiny silk bow, and a simple white corset with elastic panels, the kind women wore for riding or exercise. With great care, he untied the little bow and ran his forefinger inside the loosened chemise. As the back of his knuckle brushed her breast, a rush of intense excitement made it difficult to breathe. He eased the fine white cotton down to reveal a soft pink nipple peeking over the molded corset edge.

He bent over her, compelling her to lean back on his arm, and slipped his fingers beneath the boned fabric to lift the firm, silky weight of her breast. His head lowered. Taking the rosy tip into his mouth, he tugged it into a stiff bud. She gasped and trembled, her hand gripping his shoulder repeatedly, like a cat kneading her paws.

For Ethan, the sexual act had always been a transaction or a weapon. He’d been trained in the arts of seducing anyone, man or woman, into yielding their most closely guarded secrets. He knew endless ways to stimulate, torment, and satisfy, how to make someone mindless with desire. He’d done things, and had things done to him, that most people would consider beyond decency. But he’d never experienced anything like the intimacy of this moment.

He spread a path of slow kisses to her other breast, taking his time, savoring the unbelievable smoothness of her skin. As his lips reached the edge of her chemise, Garrett fumbled to pull the garment down. Even as aroused as Ethan was, he grinned briefly at her impatience. Cupping beneath her breast, he kissed the pale curve, deliberately avoiding the pink center. Her fingers slid into his hair as she tried to guide his mouth to where she wanted it. He resisted, blowing gently against the contracted point. Garrett quivered in frustration as he hovered over the nipple for a torturously long moment, making them both wait. Finally relenting, he caught the firm bud, pulled it deep, teased it with his tongue.