Things inside of you? What a sodding idiot he was. Where was his rock-star cool when he needed it?
Helen pressed her lips together, a muffled, airy giggle slipping from her sealed mouth. “An appeal to my scientific side? Bold move there, Brian.”
He figured himself to be the color of tourmaline, or perhaps even persimmon, at the moment. “Never mind. At least let me buy your ticket home.”
“I’m joking. Sorry, I have a bad habit of using humor and sarcasm to mask emotions. You had a good idea, made a sound point. And a private show from Brian Shepherd? Amazing. Count me in.”
He managed to stop himself from grinning like a besotted fool.
An odd silence passed. They looked at each other for a little to long. Helen played with her hair, batted her eyelashes. Another second dragged. She rubbed her thighs with many vigorous strokes.
Brian couldn’t read her signals, the confounding way they collided, so he doubled back to an area where he’d achieved success. Being straightforward, no games, was proven a strategy when faced with uncertainty.
“Fantastic. I’ll get the equipment and bring it out here. My best guitars and amplifiers are in the bedroom.”
Helen’s eyes darkened to the hue of the chocolate that spilled from a lava cake. She closed the space between them and kissed him until the focus of all thought narrowed to his greedy dick and her luscious, supple curves and pockets of wet heat.
Breaking the kiss with a nip to his bottom lip, Helen whispered in hot, minty breath, “Show me this bedroom of which you speak, Brian Shepherd.”
Eleven
“What hypothesis are we testing again?” Though she asked an earnest question, Helen ached for a break from curse talk. She could lose herself in the body and attentions of a sexy, smart man and forget the things in her life that sucked. Selfish? Sure. Heavenly? Hell yes.
And Brian was making it damn easy to forget the suckage. She arched beneath him, pressing their smooth bellies together. Her back sank into the firm mattress, scents of detergent and his personal fragrance swirling through the room.
His erection pressed into the juncture of her spread legs, his hot breath quick against the side of her neck. “The effects of desire, I think. Except you’re so fucking sexy I can’t think.”
The first f-bomb Brian uttered, a roughness taboo in his sleek, polished accent, shot a dose of lighter fluid through her system. Her sex clenched, hungry to be filled, every nerve in her body awakening.
She wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him closer and urging the hem of his T-shirt to the middle of his back. “Checks out.”
With an eager, two-handed pull, he tugged his shirt over the back of his head and threw the garment to the floor, a gesture of assuredness steeped in erotic potency.
She ran her hands up and down his torso, making a tactile study of chest muscles and firm biceps, those strong male arms caging her in their sensual fort.
An epic black tattoo painted a path of swirling Celtic knots from hip to pectoral to collarbone, covering the majority of his left side. “Stunning. There a story here?”
“Yes.” He trailed a row of kisses down her neck and peeled off her top. She pushed her chest up, affording him access to her bra. He undid the clasp in a single, one-handed maneuver.
No bumbling or fumbling in his experienced, practiced fingers. This distilled sip of arousal, fine as wine, warmed her inner spaces.
She danced her fingertips through the maze of his ink latticework, stroking his lightly tanned skin. His warm flesh brushed her bare breasts, skin-on-skin intimacy for both of them.
In an unhurried, claiming motion, she traced a trimmed nail through the black pathways. His nipple stiffened beneath her touch. “That feel good?”
“Quite.” He cupped the sides of her breasts and curved slow hands down the sides of her waist. Under his nimble motions, the button and zipper of her jeans yielded.
“So what’s the story with your tattoo?” Matching her actions to his, keeping up, she attacked the fastener of his pants until the fly opened.
Tandem wiggles of synchronized bodies shed two pairs of jeans. She smiled, nibbling his earlobe. Their sexual compatibility so far was stellar. A good sign. Egad. She shouldn’t be watching for signs. This was a one-time thing. At least she figured.
Toeing his socks over ankles and feet, Brian pushed up on his palms and gazed into her eyes. Though primal lust darkened his irises, soft affection offset that hard glare of male desire.
“I wanted to make my body into a living diary of sorts. Every swirl and line in the gathering of knots represents something meaningful that happened on a tour. Someone I met, a landmark, an experience. It’s my reminder to appreciate my life in all of the peaks and valleys, to live in gratitude for the journey.”
Right then, Helen’s surroundings overpowered her. She slipped beside herself, awash in strangeness. Strange city, aiming a glitter blast of skyline lights through the chic window of a swank penthouse bedroom. A man, mega-famous and all over television, on top of her. Someone adored by everyone was hers for a bit, telling her a personal story about his tattoo.
For a sweet, eternal second of surrender, she forgot the malevolent thread uniting them.
With nothing to say, awareness of her maleficent connection to Brian returning in a loathsome creep, she looped her arms around his shoulders and let his sea-candy eyes spirit her to a distant universe far away from the self-created prison of her own meddling.
He kissed her forehead. “Are you alright, Helen? You got a little tense there. Did you want to stop?”
“No, I’m just thinking.”
“About what?” He skated the pad of his thumb over her cheek in a reassuring touch.
“The circumstances that
