okay for his hands to be on my body. I stared into his eyes; they were now a kaleidoscope of colors: caramels and chocolates with little flecks of gold around big black centers. I took his other hand, and without saying a word, I placed it on the other side of my waist. This hand wasn’t as gentle as the first one was, and as soon as it came into contact with my body, his fingers dug into my skin a little. I heard myself let out a small moan which made the gold flecks in his eyes disappear into the black.
“Then kiss me,” I said, the words sticking in my dry mouth.
CHAPTER 60
A small smile flickered over his mouth, but only for a second, because soon his lips were parting, as his face came closer to mine. I closed my eyes and waited. Waited for the moment of connection to come. The anticipation of those lips coming into contact with mine was enough to make me want to jump out of my skin. But when the lips didn’t come. When I’d felt like I’d waited for an eternity, I opened my eyes.
“What are you . . .” I said, when I saw he’d pulled away. He was watching me with a smile now.
His smile grew and then he shook his head a little. “You’re cute, that’s all.”
“Cute?”
He nodded. “So damn fucking cute, Mrs. Frankie Taylor, with a heart for a dot.”
I blushed and put my hands over my cheeks, which suddenly felt hot. “I’m not going to live that down.”
“Unlikely,” he said, pulling my hands away from my face and then holding them. He moved closer. I looked deeply into his eyes as his face came right up to mine and finally, his features blurred together when he couldn’t come any closer.
The kiss was slow and soft and short. It was more of a series of short little kisses, only lips. The short kisses soon grew longer though, until the spaces between them disappeared and it became one, long kiss. Deep. Slow. My fingers found a place in the back of his hair and his slipped around to the small of my back, pulling me closer to him. I held on as we kissed. He tasted sweet. Of chocolate and maybe a little bit of gin. His stubble was rough against my face, but in just the right way.
Soft and rough. Warm and deep. My hands left his hair and trailed over his shoulders, until they came to rest on his chest. He groaned against my lips, as if me just touching him there was driving him wild. The thought made me brave, so I ran my hands down even more, pulled at his shirt, and then slipped my hands into it. My fingers traveled up to his warm chest; it was smooth and firm and as the kiss deepened, I dug my nails into his sides, feeling his rib cage expand and contract beneath my hands. Another groan escaped his lips and this time, I heard myself whimper in response to it.
And then, everything was suddenly electric. As though a switch had been flipped. The kiss became fast, hungry. Devouring each other with lips and tongues and teeth. His hands slipped down my back, they cupped my ass, and then he pulled me into him. I could feel he was hard against me and this made me want to climb out of my clothes and climb right onto him. He pushed himself into me, moving his hips a little, and I swear, stuff in my head went fuzzy and fluffy around the edges until the angles and shapes of the real world fell away and it was just us. Outside. In the desert. Under the stars and . . .
“OH!” I exclaimed loudly when my feet were no longer on the ground. “Wh . . . what . . . Oh my God.” I let out a loud giggle as Mark lifted me off the ground and started rushing me back to the house. “You’re going to drop me,” I laughed.
“Let’s hope not,” he said. I could hear he was starting to strain as he walked up the stairs with me, which wasn’t very reassuring.
“Hi, Harun!” I said, as I reached the veranda and Mark finally put me down. Harun opened his one eye and looked at me as if he was totally disinterested in what I was doing. I looked back at Mark, whose breathing seemed a