True Confessions

“Maybe you should recite something in your head.”

“I’ve tried that. It never works.”

“I’ll help you.” Hope tossed her helmet on the floor and slid across the seat. “Let’s try something that isn’t sexual.” She rose to her knees beside him. “Like, ‘Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation.’ ” She tossed his cowboy hat next to her helmet, then tugged at the front of his shirt, popping the snaps one at a time until the shirt lay open. She slipped her hand inside, and he sucked in a breath. His muscles flexed and turned hard beneath her touch. “ ‘Conceived in liberty. Dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.’ ” She ran her finger through the short hair on his chest. Abraham Lincoln had been wrong. Not all men were created equal. Some just possessed more. More than charm and good looks, they had that certain elusive something. Whatever it was, Dylan had more than his share.

He reached for her hand, flattening it against his chest so she couldn’t move. She kissed the side of his neck and slid her open mouth to the hollow of his throat, tasting his aftershave and warm skin.

“Hope, I can barely see.”

“You don’t need to see.” She moved his hand from on top of hers and placed his palm on her breast. “You’re a big boy, feel your way,” she breathed right before she sucked his neck.

“Jesus.” His fingers closed over her and the whoosh of air he’d been holding rushed from his lungs.

Hope’s breasts grew taut, her nipples puckered, and she pulled at the ends of his shirt from his jeans. She looked down at the hair on his chest, the gold light from the dash caught in the short curls and shined across his tight skin. As the truck motored down the highway, she combed her fingers down the thin line of hair to his flat belly. “Am I helping?” She moved her hand to his zipper and, through the heavy denim, pressed her palm against the impressive length of his rock-hard erection. “You haven’t answered my question,” she said, her insides turning liquid, responding to him.

“When you touch me like that, I can’t remember what you asked.”

She kissed her way across his collarbone. “Are you still having trouble keeping the truck on the road?”

“Hell, yes.”

She had a vague sensation like the truck was turning. Then the next thing she knew, they’d stopped and she was on her back on the bench seat, staring up into Dylan’s dark face. And he kissed her. Long and hard, his tongue thrusting into her mouth. The bottom of her skirt was up around her waist and he knelt between her legs. He shoved his pelvis snug against her crotch, and he might have hurt her if she hadn’t wanted him so badly. She wrapped her legs around his waist and placed her hands on the sides of his head, kissing him like he kissed her, like neither would ever get enough. Enough mouths or tongues or the hot, liquid juices flowing through their bodies.

Dylan hit the horn with his foot, and he pulled back, gasping for air. His shirt hung open, his gaze wild within the shadowy cab. “Let’s get out of here,” he said and somehow managed to get them both out of the truck. He grabbed a box of condoms from the jockey box before heading across the driveway to the back door.

Hope looked over her shoulder at the truck, parked sideways, like it had skidded to a stop. She couldn’t remember if they’d skidded or not. She couldn’t remember much beyond the taste of Dylan’s skin beneath her tongue.

As they walked into the kitchen, Dylan hit the switch by the back door and his keys and the box of condoms slid across the counter. Hope squinted against the overhead light, catching glimpses of blue walls, white floors, and appliances. Marble counter-tops and a wooden table in the middle of the room. Seeing a white cake with slices of candied peaches on top, sitting on the table, surprised her, but then Dylan tore at his shirt and she forgot all about the cake. He balled the shirt up and tossed it on the electric stove. Without a word, he pulled Hope against him. Her hands landed flat on his bare chest, her palms covering his nipples. She looked up from his golden-brown hair curling about her fingers to the dip in his throat. She placed a kiss on the mark she’d left there earlier, and she lowered her hands to his big belt buckle.

“You could kill someone with this,” she said as she unhooked it and pulled it from his pant loops. She glanced up at him and added, “It could be considered a lethal weapon in some states.”

His green eyes looked at her from beneath lids heavy with desire. A blatantly sexual smile pushed the corners of his mouth upward. “You got that right,” he drawled, and she had a feeling he wasn’t talking about the buckle. The belt slipped through her fingers and hit the floor with a thud.

Dylan reached for her waist and grasped the edge of her tank top. “Raise your arms,” he said and slowly pulled the shirt up her stomach. The soft cotton snagged under her breasts and he gathered the material in his hands and drew it over her head. The cool ends of her hair fell about her shoulders, and she dropped her hands to her sides. Dylan tossed her shirt with his, and Hope stood before him in her black stretch bra and khaki skirt.

Suddenly she didn’t know if she could go through with it. Not like this. Not in the bright kitchen light where all of her flaws would be magnified. When she took off her panties, he’d see the thin silvery scar on her lower belly. He’d see her scar and he’d ask about it.

She looked up at him, up past the perfection of his corrugated stomach and broad chest with its swirls of fine hair and hard muscle. Up past the strong column of his throat and chin and the finely etched lines of his sensual lips. He was perfect, standing there beneath the bright light, wearing nothing but his jeans and boots. Absolutely perfect, while she had an old scar.

He reached for the button on her skirt and she grabbed his wrist. Maybe he wouldn’t notice the scar, but he would notice she wasn’t wearing pink silky panties. For a few seconds she couldn’t remember if she was wearing her good underwear or getting-close to-laundry-day underwear. Then she did remember and relaxed a bit. White. Plain white bikini panties. They were new, but they didn’t match her bra. She should have planned better. She should have worn something silky. She should have worn something to knock him off his feet, but she hadn’t even known he was in town. “Maybe we should turn off the lights,” she suggested.

“Why?”

He was going to find out soon enough. “My panties don’t match.”

He looked at her as if she weren’t speaking a language he understood. “Don’t match what?”

“My bra.”

He blinked once and his brows lowered. “You’re kidding me.”

“No, my panties are white and…”

Dylan lowered his mouth to hers. “I don’t give a goddamn about your underwear,” he whispered against her lips. “I’m more interested in what’s inside.” He kissed a warm trail across her cheek to her ear. “Inside where you’re soft and warm.” The wet tip of his tongue touched the side of her throat, and he slid his fingers between her breasts to the black rose holding the cups together. “But I’ll tell you what I’ll do.” With a twist of his wrist the closure sprang free and he pushed the straps from her shoulders. The bra fell to the floor. “Problem solved.” His hot hands closed over her bare breasts as his mouth once again closed over hers. And suddenly Hope forgot about everything but the touch of his rough palms sliding back and forth across her hard, sensitive nipples. She drove her tongue into his mouth as he walked backward, driving her against the kitchen counter. Lust coiled low in her abdomen, pooled between her thighs, and tightened her breasts. The feelings were almost painful, they were so intense. Wonderful and overwhelming. She moaned deep, deep in her throat and ran her hands over him. His hair, the sides of his face, down his neck to his shoulders. She touched everywhere she could reach, his back, his sides, and his belly.

His hungry mouth slanted hard across her lips, and he gave her hot feeding kisses. He tasted like excited man. Like sex. She arched into him, into the warm wall of his chest and kneading hands, into his erection. Against her lower belly he was fully aroused, hard as stone, and she craved more, needing closer contact. Wanting the one thing he had, the one thing that only he could give her, she moved her hands to the front of his pants. She unsnapped the waistband, and when she pulled down the zipper, she found him naked beneath his jeans. His flesh jutted forward into her palm, and she closed her fist around the hot circumference of his erection.

A groan tore at Dylan’s chest, and Hoped pulled back to look into his face. His eyes were slits of green and his breath was uneven. She lowered her gaze to her hand, to the dark pubic curls visible between the edges of his zipper and his large penis. She slipped her palm up the smooth shaft and slid her thumb over the velvet head. She spread a bead of clear moisture over the plump cleft, learning the weight and texture of him.

“Hope,” he whispered, his voice rough as if she were torturing him. He took her hand from his body and set it on his shoulder. Then he grasped the backs of her thighs and lifted her until she sat on the counter. He took a step back and within less than a minute he stood before her completely naked. She would have preferred a moment or