spread even wider, her hips raised high in silent plea.
But silent wasn’t good enough. Not for this.
He raised his head, a drowning man in sight of land. “Harder?”
“Yeah.” Her eyes closed tight, she gritted out one more word. “Now.”
One last rub of her clit as she twisted and moaned, and then he gave that stiff, hot bit of flesh a little slap, and God help him, she nearly snapped off his dick with the force of her orgasm. She arched beneath him, her pussy spasming again and again, and her cry was nearly soundless.
With a sense of profound relief, quickly drowned by the sort of intense, blinding pleasure he’d never, not once in his life, experienced before, he pushed inside her one last time and came until he couldn’t remember his own name—and was hoarse from shouting hers.
Sixteen
The blare of an unfamiliar alarm woke Tess the next morning, and she rolled over to see what the hell was happening. Only to find herself face to face with Lucas, who was just blinking open sleepy olive-green eyes.
He reached for her right away, and she let him draw her close, the hair on his chest tickling her nose. His skin was warm, his limbs long as they wrapped around her.
He’d wanted to cuddle as they slept too, telling her with his inimitable charm how romantic it would be to nod off while spooning or with her head on his chest. But she knew herself too well for even his particular brand of sweet talk to work. If they attempted to sleep intertwined, she’d never even doze. And if by some miracle she did, she’d either awaken sore or drown them both in a lake of her sweat.
She’d always run hot at night. A fact to which he’d responded with a certain amount of delightful innuendo.
In compensation for her refusal to sleep cuddling, she’d offered another round or two of lovemaking. And Jesus, sex with a twenty-six-year-old had its definite perks. As in, a perky penis with very little refractory time necessary—which meant a little bit of chafing but a lot of orgasms for her. Mind-blowing, multiple, and memorable.
She’d never believed that forty-year-old women are in their sexual prime bullshit, but she was starting to think she’d been way too cynical about way too many things for way too long.
“This is nice,” he murmured, nuzzling the crown of her head.
It really was. She tightened her arm around his chest and wedged her leg deeper between his. With a pleased rumble, he stroked her bare back, his indefatigable cock stirring against her thigh.
Mmmm. She wouldn’t mind starting every morning like this.
But the damn alarm kept getting louder as they failed to heed its call, and she needed to get moving, like it or not.
“You’ll have to address Mr. Perky on your own today, hon. Sorry about that.”
She pressed one final kiss below his jaw, where bristly whiskers had begun to emerge, inhaling as deeply as she could. That heady lungful of Lucas needed to last until evening.
His grip tightened for a moment before he let her slide out of his arms. “Mr. Perky?”
“I’ve given your penis its own adorable nickname.” Spying her pile of discarded, sweaty clothing just inside the bathroom door, she grimaced. “I don’t want to put any of that stuff back on, not even for the walk to my hotel room, and I don’t want to put clean clothes on a dirty body. Can I shower here? Or do you need the bathroom to get ready for your morning lessons?”
Without a word, he lumbered out of bed and into the living room. Hoisting her overnight bag over his shoulder, he brought it to the bathroom, set it on the tiled floor, and sat beside her on the edge of the bed again.
She smiled at him. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure.” The words were low. Intimate. Accompanied by his own devastating smile.
Holy Moses. Those dimples made her hotter than the last time the school’s HVAC system had malfunctioned. Which was saying something, since she figured she’d gotten a preview of menopause that late-July week.
When he reached for her again, though, she sprang up. “Nice thought. But I need to pee and brush my teeth before you get any closer. And I have”—she glanced at the alarm clock—“an hour to get clean and ready for the ferry trip to the mainland. There’s no time for any shenanigans.”
As she ran for the bathroom, he sighed. “And you call me a spoilsport.”
“I’m saving you from morning breath!” she