Dangerous to Touch

warm, brown throat and stroking his shoulders until they were ready to return to shore.

Making a tacit agreement to call it a day, they gathered up their belongings and left the beach. Sidney didn’t feel her feet hit the sand once.

In the outdoor shower, they explored each other languidly, his mouth on hers, her hands gripping his water- slick back. She stripped away her bikini and he dropped his shorts, but their intimacy didn’t go beyond kissing and light touching for a long time.

“I want you in bed,” he whispered, burying his head in the curve of her neck.

She wanted him against the shower wall, but she acquiesced readily enough, needing no special intuition to realize he wouldn’t be fast or rough with her this time. Wrapping a towel around her body and handing him another, she slipped into the house ahead of him, pretty sure the terry cloth wasn’t keeping her bottom decently covered. Maybe it was cruel to tease, but the way he was looking at her, all lean cheeks and hungry eyes, made baiting him irresistible.

As they mounted the stairs, his tension was palpable.

In her bedroom, the oscillating fan whirred lazily, circulating whatever breeze was coming off the Pacific through her open window.

“Lay down.”

A hot thrill raced down her spine, turning her knees to jelly. Dropping her towel on a nearby chair, she crawled across the bed naked, watching him through half-lidded eyes. His body was truly gasp-worthy, every inch of it hard and strong. When he took away his towel, she stared at him unabashedly, wetting her lips in anticipation. It was all she could do to keep herself from spreading her legs and pulling him down on top of her.

Setting a different pace, he stretched out beside her and kissed her moist lips. He cupped her breasts, pushing them together and tracing her cleavage with his tongue. He licked and sucked at her nipples until they were wet and rock-hard.

“Marc,” she moaned, reaching out to curl her hand around his throbbing erection.

He let her stroke him for a moment, closing his eyes, as if her touch pained him. Then he brought her hand up to his mouth and kissed the center of her palm.

Desire flowered between her thighs, hot and sultry.

Moving down her belly, he dipped his tongue into her navel, dropped a kiss on her hip, nuzzled the tops of her thighs. When he finally put his mouth where she really wanted it, his tongue was indolent, his touch designed to heighten, rather than assuage, her arousal.

“Oh, please,” she breathed, lifting her hips.

To her intense frustration, he came up beside her and kissed her mouth again, stroking her parted lips with his tongue, sharing her taste. Easing a hand between her thighs, he explored the seam of her sex, separating her with his fingertip before he slipped it inside.

“You’re so wet,” he murmured against her mouth, sliding his middle finger in and out of her while she gasped and writhed. Then he withdrew, grazing his slick fingertip over her clitoris, barely touching her. With a feather-light motion, he rubbed her back and forth, using only enough pressure to drive her crazy.

Beyond self-control, she rocked her hips in a steady rhythm, straining toward ecstasy. When he replaced his hand with his mouth again, she begged for mercy, and he gave it to her. The instant his tongue came in contact with her sensitive flesh, she climaxed, lacing her fingers into his hair and screaming her pleasure.

Apparently drawing out the sensation also intensified it. Her scalp tingled, dark spots flashed behind her eyes and her pulse throbbed a wild beat in her throat.

Now that was an orgasm, she thought, resting her head on the pillows.

Before her vision cleared, he parted her legs and entered her slowly, bracing his weight on his outstretched arms. “Are you sure I didn’t hurt you last time?”

Her eyes fluttered open. “Yes.”

“When I first came inside you, you tensed.”

She smoothed her hands over his sweat-slick shoulders, realizing what maximizing her enjoyment had cost him. “It had been a while,” she said, touching her lips to his. “And you are rather…large.”

Groaning, he began to move inside her, drawing himself in and out with deliberate precision, letting her feel every inch. She knew he was holding himself back, and that made tenderness well up inside her, along with a renewed excitement.

Last night, in the cab of the pickup, he’d been hard and rough and uncontrolled, and she’d loved every second of it.

Tonight, she had time to savor an experience that transcended physical sensation.

They melded, mouths and hearts and bodies. They rolled, him on top, then her, coming close to the brink, then edging back. He put her leg over his hip and took her on her side, facing him, always touching full-length, damp skin sliding against damp skin.

She stroked his back, his shoulders, his sinewy arms, his taut buttocks. He did the same, exploring every part of her, flicking his tongue over her tight nipples, brushing his thumb over her wet clitoris. She lost track of how many times he brought her to orgasm.

When she couldn’t take it anymore, she straddled his waist and moved up and down on him with sinuous motions, milking him with her body, demanding his release.

“Sidney,” he grated, gripping her undulating hips, trying to slow her.

“Let me,” she murmured, moving faster, repositioning his hands on her bottom. Cradling his head to her chest, she let her breasts muffle his hoarse cry as he came.

Marc trailed his fingertips down Sidney’s naked back, watching the room grow dim as evening fell. She wasn’t asleep, but he wished she was, because every bachelor instinct he possessed was telling him to flee the scene.

He never slept with a woman after sex. Sometimes he stayed long enough for her to drift off, but he usually didn’t bother. It was part of the convenience of using condoms. He had to get up to dispose of it, and then he was gone.

Why he was still lying beside her, not exactly cuddling, but caressing her, was a complete mystery to him. An anomaly. An aberration.

The sex had been…different, too. Better than last time, and last time had been amazingly good. For him, at least.

He’d remembered to use protection. He’d shown a little more finesse, and a lot more restraint. Somehow, the experience had gotten away from him all the same. God, he’d almost wanted to weep when he came, the pleasure was so intense.

He must have overdone it. Held himself back too long.

“I have to go to the kennel,” she said finally, stretching her arms over her head.

“Fine,” he said, rolling out of bed as if he’d been waiting for an excuse to get up. Which he had been. Hadn’t he?

He watched her dress as he pulled on his own clothes, finding her yellow cotton panties and simple white bra impossibly alluring. Her baggy Bermuda shorts hung down to her tanned knees, and a blue dolphin arced across the front of her Sea World T-shirt.

His lips curved into a smile. At what point had her lame, sexless fashion sense become quirky and endearing? The answer hit him like a bolt of lightning: the same time he’d fallen in love with her.

For a moment, he was too stunned to move. He just stood there, his hands frozen at the fly of his jeans, as panic assailed him.

She sat on the bed to put on her shoes, oblivious to his plight.

He turned, buttoning up his pants and grabbing his T-shirt, every nerve in his body on red alert. He had to get out of here before she saw the dopey, lovesick expression on his face. He had to get away from her before she touched him.

Flipping open his cell phone, he strode out of Sidney’s bedroom.

“Lacy,” she answered, sounding breathless.

“I need you to do some surveillance.”

He heard another woman’s voice in the background, a muffled giggle. “On whom?”

“Sidney. Meet us at the kennel in fifteen.”