Portland.”
“Too long.”
She chuckled, then squirmed back into her seat. “I was thinking the same thing.”
She zoomed out of the lot, keeping her eyes peeled. With a grin of satisfaction, she pulled into the first motel she spotted. “I think we can use a break.” After snatching up her bag, she strolled into the office to register.
This time she used a plastic card—something much less foreign to him. With little trouble and less conversation, she secured a key from the clerk.
“How long have we got?” Jacob asked as he swung an arm over her shoulder.
She shot him a look. “It may be a motel,” she said, steering them toward a door marked ‘9’, “but I don’t think this particular chain rents rooms by the hour. So . . .” She turned the key in the lock. “We’ve got the rest of the day—and all night—if we want.”
“We want.” He caught her the moment she stepped inside. Then, wheeling her around, he used their joined bodies to slam the door closed. Because his hands were already occupied, Sunny reached behind her to secure the chain.
“J.T., wait.”
“Why?”
“I’d really prefer it if we drew the drapes first.”
He ran the palm of one hand over the wall, searching for a button while he tugged at her coat with the other.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for the switch.”
She chuckled into his throat. “At thirty-five a night you have to close the curtains by hand.” She wiggled away to deal with it. “I’d love to see the kind of motels you’re used to.”
The light became dim and soft, with a thin, bright slit in the center, where the drapes met. She was standing just there, with the light like a spear behind her. And she enchanted him.
“There’s this place on an island off Maine.” He shrugged out of the borrowed coat, then sat down to pry off his boots. “The rooms are built on a promontory so that they hang over the sea. Waves crash up beneath, beside, in front. The windows are . . .” How to explain it? “They’re made out of a special material so that you can see out as far as the horizon but no one can see in—so that beyond one entire wall there’s nothing but rock and ocean. The tubs are huge and sunken, and the water steams with perfume.”
He rose slowly, picturing it. Picturing her there, with him. “You can have music, just by wishing for it. If you want moonlight, or the sound of rain, you’ve only to touch a switch. The beds are big and soft, so that when a man reaches for his woman she all but floats to him over it. While you’re there, time stops for as long as you believe it.”
Aroused, she let out a shaky breath. “You’re making this up.”
He shook his head. “I’d take you there, if I could.”
“I have a good imagination,” she said as he pushed the coat from her shoulders. She shuddered when he ran his hands down her. “We’ll pretend we’re there. But I don’t think there’s moonlight.”
Smiling, he eased her down and pulled off her boots one by one. “What then?”
“Thunder.” Her breath shivered out when he trailed his fingers up her calf. “And lightning. That’s what I feel when you touch me.”
There was a storm in him. He saw the power of it reflected in her eyes. She rose so that her body skimmed up his, inch by tormenting inch. Before he could take her lips, she was pressing them, already hot, to his throat. The pulse that hammered there excited her, the taste inflamed her. Wanting more freedom, she pushed his sweater up and up, then let it fall to the floor in a heap.
With a lingering sound of pleasure, she traced her lips over his chest, absorbing the texture, the intimate flavor, of his skin. It was soft, dreamily soft, over the hard ridges of muscles. His scent, earthy and male, delighted her.
There was thunder. She could feel it when she let her mouth loiter over his heart. It beat for her. There was lightning. She saw the flash of power when she looked into his eyes.
He was surprised he could still stand. What she was doing was making him dizzy and desperate. Those long, lovely fingers already knew his body well. But every time they explored they found new secrets.
And her mouth . . . He gripped her shoulders as she took her lips on a lazy journey down his chest, over the quivering muscles of his stomach. Her tongue left a moist trail. Her throaty laugh echoed in his head.
He felt her fingers on the snap of his jeans, and the denim as it slid from waist to hipbone. Pleasure arrowed into him, its point jagged.
Time didn’t stand still. It reeled backward until he was as primitive as the men who had forged weapons from stone. With an oath, he dragged her up into his arms, his mouth branding hers, all fire and force.
Then she was under him on the bed, her body as taut as wire. Her breath heaved, seemed to tear out of her lungs, as his hands raced over her. Possessed. She could hear him speak, but the roaring in her head masked the words. Driven, he ripped her shirt down the front, sending buttons flying. Wild to touch her, he hooked his fingers in the collar of the thin cotton beneath it and tore it aside.
She called out his name, stunned, elated, terrified by the violence she had brought out in him. Then she could only gasp, fighting for air, for sanity, as the first climax rocketed through her. But there was no weakness this time.
Energized, she reared up, enfolding him so that they were half sprawled, half kneeling, on the bed. Torso to torso, hip to hip. With her head thrown back, she let him take his mouth over her, pleasuring, receiving pleasure.
Like a madman, he tore, pulled, dragged at her jeans, until her body was as naked as his. Her hands slid off his slick skin as she tried to draw him to her. It was then that she realized that he was shuddering, his body vibrating with a need even she hadn’t guessed at.
She started to speak his name, but he was inside her, filling her, firing her. His muscles were taut as he braced her against him, letting her frenzy drive them both.
Faster, deeper, as she soared over wave after wave. Passion became abandonment as her body bowed back, tempting his eager mouth to feast on her. Sensation layered over sensation until they were all one torrid maze of light and color and sound. As he pulled her back, his body thrust inside hers, she no longer knew where she began and he stopped. She forgot to care.
Chapter 9
Sunny unlocked the door to her apartment, ignoring the faint creak behind her that meant Mrs. Morgenstern had cracked her own door to watch the comings and goings on the third floor.
She had chosen the third floor, despite the vagaries of the elevator and the nosiness of the neighbors, because the tiny apartment boasted what passed for a balcony. On it there was just room enough for a chair, if she angled it so that she sat with her ankles resting on the rail. It overlooked the parking lot.
It was good enough for her.
“This is it,” she announced, a bit surprised by the surge of nostalgia that filled her at the sight of her own things.
Jacob stepped in behind her. Sunlight poured through the skinny terrace doors to his right. Pictures marched along the walls—photographs, sketches, oil paintings and posters. Even in her own rooms, Sunny preferred company.
Piles of vibrantly colored pillows were heaped on a sagging, sun-faded sofa. In front of it was a table piled with magazines, books and mail—opened and unopened. In the corner, a waist-high urn held dusty peacock feathers.
Across the room was another table that Jacob recognized as a product of expert workmanship from an even earlier century. There was a fine film of dust on it, along with a pair of ballet shoes, a scattering of blue ribbons and a broken teapot. A collection of record albums were stuffed into a wooden crate, and on a high wicker stool stood a
