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He threw open his car door. He hurled himself out. He sprinted around to the passenger door at a speed no Olympic athlete had ever matched.
Her window was down. He leaned through it to latchhismouthonhers.Shewhimpered.Theripples, heck, the tidal waves of her passion washed through him.
Blind, he unlatched the car door and opened it, slowly, because he couldn’t bear to break their electric contact. But the thought of feeling the rest of her against him rasped through all of him. It had to be now.
He broke contact with her lips and threw the door open. He lifted her out of the car and backed her against it and pressed every inch of himself against her. The relief was exquisite. Every nerve ending sizzled with it.
The exquisite part kept on going. The relief part didn’t. He had to have more before his blood turned to steam right there in his veins. He moved both of them toward her door, as fast as he could without breaking one bit of their indispensable contact.
“My neighbors — ”
Oh. Yes. The neighbors. With one spark of rational thought, he considered that. Their surroundings had eyes. He picked her up and ran toward the house. “Yeah, I know. Now shut up so I can get us inside faster.”
She melted against him.
“The key. Where’s your key?”
She pressed it into his hand. Thank God. She’d alreadyfisheditoutofherpurse.Nowonderheloved her —
Wait a minute. Who said he’d say anything about love?
He thought he should think about that. But he couldn’t manage it along with holding Mary in his arms and getting her key in the lock and shutting the door on her neighbors so he and Mary could —
Yeahhhh!
***
Mary could have sobbed with relief when Van finally fumbled the door open.
He dropped her keys to the floor and shifted her closer in his arms. His hands were trembling. Look what she could do to him. Feel what she could do to him. Pride formed a sunburst in her belly that turned intonothingmore,nothingless,thansheerscorching lust.
His lips locked on hers again. His tongue danced with hers again. She forced one small thought through the haze: if he was as consumed as she was, he was probably too blind to see where he was going in a strange place. “Stairs,” she blurted. “Straight ahead.”
He barreled toward them. He mounted them. He was doing the Rhett Butler thing again. Oh how she had loved that movie man. Oh how she loved this flesh and blood man.
Half way up, she remembered that her bed, or at least its mattress, was still on the floor. A few weeks ago, when he was repairing everything else in her house,she’dthoughthewasgoingtofixherbedtoo, buthe’dsuddenlygrabbedhistoolboxandallbutrun out of the house.
She wasn’t sure what he’d do if she explained one more time about something she hadn’t had a chance to fix yet, but she had no choice.
“The bed — ”
“Later. Me. Fix. Later.”
Relief swooped in. It wasn’t going to incinerate the moodthistime.Shecouldn’tbearforthattohappen.
He banged open the door with an enthusiasm that might have ripped it off its hinges. More relief that it didn’t. He might have rushed off for tools to fix it.
Instead, he reached the side of her bed in a single stride. Then he stilled. He held her in his arms and stroked her with his gaze.
He sank to his knees. While holding her! She shivered.
All gentleness, he laid her down as though he were nestling a precious jewel into silks and satins. He stroked her hair back from her face. He sighed, low and long.
She agreed with everything he hadn’t said. They could take their time now because they could stop taking their time any time at all.
“Ah, Mary, what you do to me.”
He stretched out beside her, propped on an elbow, his leg hooked over hers. He cupped the side of her face in his hand, then freed his thumb to smooth her brow, outline her cheek, feather her lip.
