Page 541 of Summer Heat
He lifted his head and pressed an achingly gentle kiss against her lips. His blue irises were unstable, rolling with a thousand things Tamara could not read, and she had the sense that he wanted to speak, to say something, but instead he closed his eyes, supped again of her lips and began to move within her, his hands clasped with fierce gentleness around her head.
Tamara could not think, could not breathe. She only moved with him, marveling at the fit of him to her, as his lips had fit hers, as his hands had fit her breasts. It was the most perfect moment she could imagine, embracing him deeply. Her precious, gilded, lost Lance.
And as they moved, deeper and closer, yearning for wholeness, Tamara realized with an almost piercing sorrow that she loved him. As she tumbled into completion, feeling him come apart within her, she bit her lip to keep from crying out the words, and only clasped him tightly to her, his head against her neck.
Because she could not love him. She could not.
* * *
Lance did not go home. He stayed in Tamara’s bed all night, holding her, loving her, until both of them fell into a sated sleep.
Near morning, something awakened him, and he jolted awake into the stillness of the dawn. Cold, snow-tinted light pushed at the curtains over her windows, but he was warm next to Tamara. She slept on her side, her back to him, nestled close, and he had his arms around her. It was incredibly satisfying to simply wake up here, cozy under a heavy quilt, with Tamara in his arms.
He closed his eyes with a sigh, pressing his forehead against the flesh between her shoulder blades. Her skin smelled faintly of their mingled scents, and it was soft against his brow. He simply reveled in the feeling, the sweet, deep sense of relief he felt, and hoped he could go back to sleep.
But he couldn’t. He was too aware of her alluring nakedness, her soft skin just under his palms, the warm weight of a breast pushing against his forearm. He eased away, trying to resist the temptation to kiss her awake, and propped himself up on one elbow to watch her sleep.
Pale light caught on her dark hair and made pearlescent tracks over her flesh. He let his gaze wash over the curve of her neck and the vulnerable place just below her ear. The lines of her back, the long curve of her spine and the exquisite arch of her shoulder blades, seemed at once to be almost unbearably graceful, and it was those simple lines that proved his undoing. At first he only touched her spine with his finger, very lightly, and traced the shoulder blades.
But then he wanted to put his mouth against them, and he moved close to do it, just putting his mouth gently against each tiny rise, tracing her spine to the back of her neck. In sleep, she moved a little, nudging her bottom closer to him, bumping his arousal. Drawn by almost narcotic longing, he moved his mouth to her shoulder, then to the vulnerable place on her neck. She made a soft sigh and he ceased, waiting to see if she was awakening, but she was not. She only moved restlessly, and her foot moved against his shin.
But her movements had put one rosy-crowned breast within reach. He bent his head to that crown and tasted it slowly, closing his eyes so only his mouth and her nipple existed. She shifted, and her hand fell in his hair, pulling him closer. He loved the taste of her, and let her know it, not hurrying, just tasting and nudging and rolling her flesh in his mouth, loving the low sounds of pleasure she made.
She turned toward him, sleepily awake now. “Lance,” she whispered. “Cody will be awake any minute. We have to stop.”
He pressed his face to the soft, fragrant valley between her breasts. “Okay,” he whispered, kissing her lightly. He moved his hand down her belly and slid his fingers between her legs, careful to be gentle. “One more time, to remember tonight,” he said, and it was a much more ragged sound than he would have liked. One more time for her? Or for him?
He found her moist and ready, and he felt a jolt of almost dizzying need. She was the most responsive woman he’d ever known—deeply, genuinely passionate. And she didn’t take it all too seriously. All night she laughed and teased with him.
As she did now. She moved closer, touching his chest. “Well, if you insist,” she said. Her hand closed around him.
“I don’t have any more condoms,” he said, aching with the need to be in her one more time. Just one more time this morning—to see him through until tonight.
She gasped softly as he captured a nipple that strayed close to his mouth, too close and tempting to resist. He grazed it with his teeth and she arched against him, her hand closing alluringly around him, making him groan.
“We’ll just have to make do, then, won’t we?”
And they did. She stroked him, and he stroked her and each coaxed the other to a fever, until she spilled over and he, fell, too.
And this time, laying sated in her arms, Lance finally realized he was in trouble. Big trouble. Tamara Flynn was intelligent and strong and sexy. She had a sense of humor and a bawdy spirit that he doubted would ever tire him.
S
he was exactly the kind of woman he always avoided. The kind of woman he didn’t want to hurt with his wandering ways. The kind of woman who deserved a lot better than Lance could give.
And he’d taken her anyway, had given implicit promises he could never keep. A woman like this didn’t sleep with a man for fun. She didn’t just take a lover for the heck of it. Women like Tamara needed a man who would care for her and love her and her children for the rest of his life.
With a crushing sense of despair, he realized she was already a single mother. Some other man had done this to her in the past. Someone had loved her and left her, leaving her to bear the consequences of that passion alone.
Some other man. The thought of it gave him a sick feeling. He felt murderous and jealous and trapped all in the same moment.
What a dog he was! Like a greedy rake, Lance had been unable to resist seducing her. Instead of simply allowing himself to enjoy her goodness, accept her friendship, he’d had to take it all.
Guilt washed through him with a doomed clang.
“Lance?” she said next to him, smoothing a lock of hair from his forehead. There was bewilderment in the word.
Yeah, he thought miserably. I’m a first-class bastard.
