The image drove him one step closer to insanity.
Then Sophie said, “Would you touch me?” in a sultry voice that wrapped around his cock and squeezed.
Shuddering, he lowered his head, sucked hard at her neck, leaving a little red mark. “No, this is a Neanderthal fantasy”—one of his favorites—“I just rip off your panties and thrust into you.”
“That—” She swallowed, wet her lips. “I have . . . um, nothing against that fantasy.”
Now that deserved a hot, open-mouthed, inferno of a kiss. “I have another version,” he told her afterward.
Fingers clenching on his biceps, her breasts rising up and down in jagged breaths.
“This time, I get you to stand in front of me, and I push up your skirt inch by inch, while stroking my thumbs along the insides of your thighs.” Rising to kneel above her, he mirrored actions to words, parting her thighs to afford him the most delicious of views. “I know you’re not wearing anything underneath—though sometimes, I let you wear silk stockings and a suspender belt—”
Her breasts turned a hot blush pink as heat rolled over her body.
He moved his hands over her in a sweeping caress. “Shh, this is getting good.” She shivered under his touch. “And so I shove the skirt to your waist, bare you all pink and damp for me”—sliding his hands under her bottom —“tug you close”—positioning himself lower down her body—“and eat you up like candy.”
And then he took her. Hot and deep and with an open possessiveness. She bucked under him, lush in her femininity, making small sounds of pleasure that urged him to drive her ever higher. But today, he didn’t want her to go over without him. He needed to hold her in his arms, feel her pleasure. So when he felt intimate little muscles clench, her breathing alter, he took one final taste and rose over her body, his hand on her hip. “Together this time, Sophie.” The words were so deep, so hoarse, as to be almost unrecognizable.
Sophia realized her cop had reached the end of his control. “Yes, oh, yes.” Feeling wild and needy and hotly female, she wrapped her leg over his hip, opening herself even further for him.
He didn’t ask again, kissing her with a gut-wrenching blend of tenderness and an almost violent need as he nudged at the entrance to her body. The sensation was . . . indescribable. It might have driven her to madness if she’d tried it when they first met. But now . . .
Burying her face in his neck, breathing in the intoxicating blend of his scent, she gripped his body tight as he slid inside her. His entry burned a little, but that was a small thing subsumed in the agony of sensation. Shaking, she wrapped her other leg around him. The sudden act opened her up, made him slide inside faster than before.
They both cried out, and Max froze above her. “Sophie?”
She ran her teeth up the line of his throat. “Yes.” Always, yes for this man.
Tugging off her hands, he twined them with his own as he pressed her to the sheets, his mouth claiming hers. She felt deliciously exposed and shockingly exhilarated as he flexed his hips and buried himself to the hilt inside her. Her cry was torn out of her, her body arching toward his in primal response. When he began to move, she tried to follow. She was a fraction of a second out of sync . . . but only for the first few strokes.
And then, there was no more thought. Just the slick, hot glide of his body against hers,
“Hey you.” Braced on his side beside her, Max ran his hand down her front. “You look like a well-fed cat.”
She scrunched up her face. “That is not a sensual image, not when I know it’s Morpheus you’re likely using as a comparison.”
The tart response got her a kiss, a deep, intense claiming. “How’re you feeling?”
“Fine. My inexplicable”—but viciously strong—“shields are still holding on the PsyNet.”
“That’s good, but I was talking about the physical.”
Her body flushed. “Oh.” She’d made a visit to the bathroom, had looked at her face in the mirror, amazed at the rumpled, pleasured woman with the kiss-bruised mouth who’d stared back at her. “I’m a little tender, that’s all.” It felt strange to have such a conversation, and yet she could. Because it was Max.
He smoothed his hand over her abdomen. “Let me know when you’re ready for round two—like I told you, practice, lots and lots of practice, makes perfect.”
Catching the teasing light in his eyes, she punched him lightly on the shoulder, before turning to face him. “Thank you for making the experience so very . . .”
“Interesting?” A flash of the lean dimple she adored.
“Yes,” she said, tracing the laughter with her fingertip, feeling her own lips curve. “It was
“I’m so glad.” Sliding one arm under her head, he draped the hand of the other over her hip. “For a Psy, you were okay.”
“And you weren’t bad for a cop.”
They looked at each other, both of them utterly delighted in the moment. She wanted to snuggle closer to him, but her body was still humming with sensation. Better to wait a while, she thought, let things quieten a fraction. “Turn around.”
To his credit, he didn’t pretend not to know the reason for her demand. Scowling, he did as asked. The tattoo ran along the length of his spine, a sword with the tip just below his nape and an intricate hilt at his lower back. It was a gorgeous piece of art.
Fascinated by the spare beauty of it, Sophia pushed down the sheet so she could view the whole thing. “When did you have this done?”
“Sixteen,” he said. “I thought I was hot shit.”
She considered the boy he must’ve been—tough but slender, his musculature still developing, and wanted to trace every inch of that tattoo with soft, adoring kisses. “The blade’s so empty in comparison to the artwork on the hilt.”
His muscles bunched. “I left it blank on purpose. For you.”
Her throat locked. She wanted to give him a gift, too . . . a gift as precious, as enduring. “It’s near lunchtime in Port Vila. You could probably catch the professor in his office.”
Turning to face her, he said, “I know.”
Sophia stroked her hand down his arm, worried. “Why do you sound the way you do?” As if he was holding something tightly in check.
He shuddered, bending his head so his forehead touched hers. “I’m afraid.” A stark admission. “What if it isn’t River? Or what if it is . . . and he doesn’t want to see me?”
“Why would he reject you?” Max had fought for his brother, tried to save him.
“I’ve always thought that he went down the wrong path partly because of the guilt he felt at the way our mother always treated us so differently.” River had been her golden child, Max the whipping boy. “I tried to shield him from it, but I couldn’t, not in the end.”
Sophia’s fingers twined with his on the sheets between them. “If this is your brother, if he’s the boy I saw in that flash of backsight, he cares for you to the depths of his soul.”
“Sometimes, that isn’t enough.” Max knew he sounded harsh, but it was the only way he could handle this. If he allowed it to matter, it would hurt too fucking much. “I wouldn’t blame him if he doesn’t want to be reminded of the past.”
Sophia squeezed his hand, leaving the decision up to him, those violet eyes warm with an intense, unbreakable loyalty.
In the end, there was only one thing he could do, his love for his tormented, damaged younger brother stronger and far more tenacious than the fear that sought to hold him back. Picking up his cell, he made the call— the conversation with the professor took less than a minute, with the elderly man promising to pass on Max’s details to this River who might be his brother. Hanging up, Max released a long breath and drew the scent of Sophia into his lungs.
The temptation to curl up around her and just forget the world was almost overwhelming, but the cop in him wouldn’t settle. He’d taken an oath, made a promise. “I should let you rest,” he said to the woman who was trying
