Up to Snow Good - Kelly Collins Page 0,28

Hers smelled minty fresh, and he couldn't stop thinking about what she would taste like

“Sitting on this very couch, in fact.”

His lips touched hers, and he spoke against them. “In front of a fire like this one?”

She sucked in a big breath. “Almost exactly.”

His smile came easily, all nervousness and doubt driven away by the power of the moment. He pulled back and looked at her. A look of disappointment crossed her face. She seemed unhappy with their sudden separation.

“I imagine a man looking into the eyes of the woman he loves,” he said.

After a prolonged pause, she seemed to manage a weak, “Oh?”

He nodded, his eyes finding her luscious lips. “He’s loved her his whole life, but he was convinced that he’d never be able to be with her.”

Her chest rose and fell rapidly. “No?”

“It was the great sorrow of his life, but then something happened, something changed.” He reached forward and cupped her cheek. His thumb ran across her lower lip.

“Did it?”

“Something inexplicable, the power of a certain place or just fate. Anyway, he finally had a chance to be with her.”

She cracked a little smile and turned away, but his hand gently led her chin back to face him.

“I’m sure she was just …” Lauren swallowed again, a pale shoulder arching up to her left ear. “Just another girl.”

He shook his head slowly. “Not to him,” he said. “To him, she was the most beautiful person in the world. It wasn’t her stunning face that attracted him, but her spirit and soul he loved. All he wanted in the world was for her to love him in return.” He leaned closer, slowly nearing her lips. “He wanted to tell her how much he loved her.” He moved nearer still, until his lips brushed against hers again, soft and sweet, a quiet reunion of two people driven apart by circumstance but brought back together by destiny.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Lauren

She couldn’t believe this was happening, but when Max’s lips covered hers in a heated kiss, there was no denying it. That tongue of his had always done things to her that made her dizzy. The kiss was no exception.

She pulled away, breathless. “Not here. There are still a few guests.” She looked behind her toward the kitchen. “There’s also Ruthie.”

Lauren’s heart skipped several beats as she and Max scurried up the stairs and down the hall to her bedroom. The door closed, and the lock clicked behind them. They finally got to relive their young love. There was nothing coming between them, nothing to stop them, and everything to push them onward.

Lauren threw her head back, hair falling as he kissed her left ear, then followed the curve of her neck. He moved her backward until the bed met her knees, and they both fell to the mattress.

They laughed like high school teenagers as they fumbled with their clothes. Tugging and tearing at them until they were naked.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he said, taking her in as if he hadn’t seen her in years. And he hadn’t, naked anyway.

Heat rose to her cheeks as she watched him stare at her like she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

She took her fill of him too. Broad shoulders and rippling muscles that led to narrow hips and heaven.

Max kissed his way down, her heart beating faster as his lips found her breast.

His tongue was skillful, and his fingers nimble as goose bumps rose from his gentle caresses.

She didn’t know how to respond, but the pleasure overtook the pain she’d been carrying in her heart. He knew just where to find the hidden clusters of nerves that made her body sing. He had experience, knowledge, and total confidence. He seemed made for her, and she for him. A squeeze of her arms around him intensified her desire to hold him there forever.

Max pressed another kiss to her lips that seemed to touch every cell in her body. It was a long, deep kiss she felt in the corners of her soul.

He rose and hovered above her, the taste of his kisses mixing with traces of chardonnay. His tongue danced with hers. His chest a sheet of muscle above her.

“My God, I’ve dreamed of this, of you,” he purred in her ear.

“Me too, with you.”

Max rested between her thighs, reaching for his pants to retrieve a condom. Once he rolled it on, all it took was one press inward, and Lauren knew the night would be well worth the wait. He paused and pulled