head drop back, an act of complete surrender.
At the water’s edge he put her on her feet and stood back to look at her, bathed in moonlight and glowing from arousal. “God, you’re gorgeous, Lacey.”
She just smiled. “You know what I think, Clay Walker?”
“What?”
“That nothing you do is casual, even sex.”
The water lapped his ankles and, as it ebbed away, the sand disappeared, leaving him in a sinkhole again. Once again he was digging himself deeper and deeper, but he just couldn’t seem to stop.
“You might be right, Strawberry.”
When they reached the sandbar, Clay pulled Lacey into his chest, crushing her mouth with a kiss and then leaning her back so that the moonlight poured over her body and her hair skimmed the water.
Every sense was alive and sparking, her hands desperate to feel every amazing inch of him, her mouth greedy for more of his lips and tongue. She felt light-headed from the scent of sex and salt and the sounds of his sexy words and helpless groans.
But another sense sparked, too, an undercurrent of awareness that had nothing to do with sex but everything to do with emotion.
Standing, embracing, entwining, they kissed, the water lapping waist-high, invading her most private parts as his tongue invaded her mouth. His hands were everywhere, on her breasts, down her back, under her thighs so he could hoist her higher. The tide took her right where she wanted to be, up against the shockingly hard length of him, already sheathed with a condom he’d put on before they got in the water.
That strange awareness, that sense of something familiar, teased her again, then disappeared when he turned her around so her backside was tucked into his hips. Nothing was familiar about that.
He positioned himself between her legs, closing his hands over her breasts, stealing her sanity as he caressed her budded nipples and glided his shaft along the super-sensitive skin between her legs.
Waves of déjà vu rolled over her.
How was that possible? Even if she could remember the last time she’d been intimate with a lover, there had been no water, no full-body assault of pleasure from a man who’d positioned himself behind her. Because she wouldn’t have forgotten that.
So why did it feel familiar?
The question tickled like his lips on her ear. “Do you like that, Lacey? Does that feel good?”
“Yes, I like it. I like this. I like—oh, that. I like you.” The admission felt good on her lips. Almost as good as his fingertips on her nipples.
“And this? Do you like this?” He dragged his hands down and cupped her backside, holding it firmly as he stroked from underneath with a granite-like erection.
“Oh my God, I like that so much.” She moaned as the swollen head rolled over her most tender spot, his hips grinding into her backside.
“And that?”
His body was a relentless, unstoppable assault on her senses, making her weak and helpless and lost, still reminding her of something so powerful she couldn’t stop it, something scary and huge and life-changing. But what?
She pushed away the thoughts and gave in to the building tension, the twisting, squeezing, aching knot developing low in her belly as his erection slid between her legs, from the back to the front, right over the knot that was about to unravel.
“Clay, if you keep doing that I’m going to…” She lost the last word as he bent his knees so she could sit on his lap, forcing his erection directly and mercilessly over her clitoris. She cried out a little, wild with pleasure when he reached down and used his hand to intensify the sensation, slipping one finger inside her.
“Are you ready, Strawberry?”
So ready. She nodded, unable to speak.
“Do you want me inside you?”
“Yes. Now. Please, now.”
“Now.” He echoed her thoughts and then turned her around to face him, the buoyancy of the water bringing her to his eye level. “This is it.”
For one breath of a suspended moment, they were eye to eye, mouth to mouth, chest to chest, then he lowered her right onto him… and they were body to body. This is it. This is it. The words had an eerie echo of the past, a warning and a threat as well as a promise.
Without closing his eyes or kissing or saying a word, he slid all the way inside, as deep as he could go. His breath caught as he plunged deeper, held still, then began to stroke in and out.
Everything faded. Every deliciously intense feeling and thrill faded