Conceal, Protect - By Carol Ericson Page 0,45
She skimmed her fingernails across the cotton of his briefs.
His entire body shuddered, and he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “It’s just...” He clenched his jaw as her nails made another pass across his briefs. “You were so upset before. What were you do—?”
She yanked at his waistband and caressed his tight, smooth flesh.
He sighed and repositioned his hips so that she slid off his thighs. Then he pulled his jeans and underwear off together and dragged her back into this lap.
That’s right. No thinking allowed. No questions.
She kicked off the robe, still clinging to her lower body, and pressed her inner thighs against his outer thighs. Skin against heated skin, they sizzled when they met.
He ran his hands down her sides, circling her hips. “Do you want to move to the bedroom?”
Shaking her head, she pulled the band from her hair that held the remains of her ponytail. She tilted forward and trailed her hair from J.D.’s chin to his belly.
J.D. reached behind him, grabbed the throw pillow tilted into the corner of the love seat and tossed it to the ground. Then he reclined.
The cushion belongs in the corner.
Noelle clenched her teeth and dug her fingers into J.D.’s shoulders, moving her hips against him.
He cupped her buttocks, the biceps in his arms bunching. “Let’s take this onto the floor. We’re going to end up falling off this little couch and breaking our necks.”
Lifting her against his chest, he slid to the floor. On the way down, Noelle made a grab for her bathrobe, discarded in a tangled heap.
She needed to hang it up.
J.D. rolled on top of her, the firelight picking out the golden highlights in his hair and casting a glow over his bronzed skin. If she couldn’t allow herself to let go with this fine specimen of manhood, the crazies really had taken control of her mind.
He dipped his head and ran the tip of his tongue between her breasts.
She rolled her head to the side and caught sight of the edge of the rug, curled under from when J.D. dragged the love seat before the fire.
Her fingers crept toward the wavy rug, and she stared at her hand as if it were some part of her body with a mind of its own. In the confines of her head she screamed, Stop!
But the hand wouldn’t obey. Slowly, the fingers stretched out and flattened the rug into submission.
“Noelle?” J.D.’s voice rasped in her ear.
“Mmm?”
Is the rug straight enough? Should I try again?
Her fingers walked toward the edge.
“Don’t you like that?”
Noelle blinked. “What?”
J.D. pinched her left nipple between calloused fingers while drawing the right between his lips for a soft kiss. The contrast between pain and pleasure drew a garbled cry from her throat as her hips bounced from the floor.
“That’s more like it. Thought I lost you.” His fingers and his lips switched places and he continued his exquisite torture.
She thrashed her head from side to side as tension coiled in her belly. The fire warmed her face as J.D. warmed her body. A log slipped off the grate and the wood popped.
The log should be on the grate.
The basket holding the logs is too close to the edge and not lined up with the horizontal cement grout between the bricks.
She squeezed her eyes closed and wrapped her legs around J.D.’s hips. “Hurry. Let’s go.”
J.D.’s body stopped its delicious movements. His fingers, which had been stroking her inner thighs, froze.
Her words had sounded bad.
“I—I want you. I want you inside me. I can’t wait.”
He rolled from her body, taking all his warmth with him. Sitting up, he rested his forearms on his knees, which he’d drawn up to his chest. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
She reached out and rubbed her knuckles along the back of his calf. “Come back to me.”
“You come back to me, Noelle, because you’re not into this at all.” He dropped his hand and toyed with her fingers. His tone softened. “You’re not ready for this. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have pushed you. You just found out about your brother. What kind of idiot seduces a woman after she’s just found out her brother has been kidnapped?”
“It’s not you.” She clutched his fingers. “You don’t have to be gallant here. You know I jumped your bones. I came on to you—practically ripped off your clothes.”
Grinning, he spread his arms wide. “Do you see me complaining?”
She sat up and rubbed the side of her breast against his leg. “We can still do