Chapter 29

Nicki flopped back down on the bed as Stefan pulled her legs wider, her mind lost in a riot of sensation. The midday sun streamed through the windows, leaving nothing to shadows or gloom, but she didn't feel self-conscious about her body being fully revealed to him. If anything, her body was something she could count on, at least the outside of it. She knew she was fit, knew she looked as good as her genetics would allow. She wasn't embarrassed, despite Stefan's intimate gaze.

But she was close to toppling over the edge, before the man had even laid a finger on her where it mattered most.

Stefan solved that problem as she thought it, dragging a soft finger against the tiny nub of nerves that made up the pinnacle point of sensation for her, the exact nexus of need and want that had her clenching the sheets with her fists as he zeroed in. Then he moved off it as quickly, and it was all she could do not to reach up and guide him back, give him a map, read off GPS coordinates if it would get him back to where she needed him to be.

"Patience," Stefan breathed and Nicki's eyes shot open, only to see him watching her face as he brushed his fingers against her once again. "I want to explore your body, to touch and taste you. That will take time."

"Not too much time, I hope," she gritted out. He swirled his fingers closer to where she most wanted him. He grazed her clit and she sucked in a breath, her legs locking down to stay still, and he rumbled a soft laugh.

"So sensitive," he murmured. And he spread his fingers over the skin of her inner thighs, kneading the oil in more deeply. He lowered his mouth to her hipbone and touched his teeth against the skin that rested above the bony knob, the shock and pleasure of the nip startling her. She jumped beneath his touch and his laughter sounded again, but his mouth traced a scorching trail over her leg and down the curve of her inner thigh, not stopping until his tongue had replaced his fingers over the sensitive folds of skin. He suckled her clit, and Nicki felt the pull of need more strongly than ever, the urge to burst getting inexorably closer.

"Yes, yes," she muttered as if it were some kind of incantation to bring what she most wanted into reality.

Stefan was happy to comply. His right hand shifted to grip her outer hip, and he flicked his tongue over her in a rapid staccato of movement that made her breath catch in her throat, her heat beginning to stutter-step but only for the best of reasons as he twisted her higher and higher, seeming to know instinctively when she would crest, when she would break, and easing back from that brink in time—only to start the progression all over again, each rushing tide faster and faster as she built toward her release.

"I think, perhaps, this?—"

Nicki's brain melted as the unmistakable pressure of Stefan's fingers slipped fully inside her channel, pausing momentarily before dipping deep inside her. As he filled her, he pressed more insistently against her clit, this time with his mouth, his tongue, the slight scrape of his teeth. The rushing tide became a waterfall and a strangled cry escaped Nicki's mouth before she clamped her teeth shut, half lifting out of the bed as the orgasm shook her entire body. She bucked hard, but Stefan only let up a little, allowing her to settle back into the sheets only a half breath before his tongue skated again over the over-sensitized skin, his pressure both within and without driving her toward another impossible release before the first one was complete.

"Stefan—I can't—" was all that Nicki could manage before she tumbled over the edge a second time, and then he did withdraw, but only briefly until he returned to her body, holding her against him, her back to his chest as she half-curled into a quivering mass of convulsions.

"Shhh," he said, again and again as she trembled in his arms. Surprisingly, she felt the sudden need to cry, and she blinked her eyes hard against the sensation. Stefan merely tightened his hold around her, his murmurs sliding between English to what had to be O?rois, then something else, and then back to English again. Except it all seemed the same—the words sounding different but her understanding of each new whisper crystal clear, as if she knew what he was saying in a zillion different languages. That couldn't be right—wasn't right, she was sure—but she didn't stop him from his quiet endearments. Her mind twisted and turned, doubling back on itself, and if he knew she was enduring a cacophony of reactions, he gave no indication. He merely held her, as if they had all the time in the world.

He did, of course. She didn't, but he did.

Nicki blinked out toward the windows of the hotel room, where light poured in past the sheer curtains. From this angle, she couldn't see the ocean or the city, or the boats clogging the bay. She could only see the crystal blue sky, staggering in its beauty, with only a few clouds chasing across. How many times had she laughed up into that sky, whether she was clinging to a mountain or toeing the edge of a cliff or standing at the top of a summit? That same exultation swamped her, the sense of it dizzying her almost—but not the dizzy of danger, of her heart beating too fast and her blood coursing too slow. It was the dizzy of magic, the dizzy of possibility.

She blinked. It was the dizzy of falling in love.

Oh, no you don't, she willed herself as Stefan leaned forward to nuzzle her shoulder. No, no, no. This wasn't real, what she had with Stefan. This wasn't long term. It couldn't be. Stefan wasn't lovestruck. She'd caught his fancy and she was certain he was earnest in all of his compliments, but she was a moment's fascination with him. The same way he was a moment's fascination for her.

Yeah. Exactly like that.

She schooled her breath to slow, her legs to unkink, and reaching her point of relaxation was easier than she thought it would be.

When she unbent enough for his satisfaction, Stefan spoke again.

"Had enough? Or would you—" His thick shaft nudged against her back, and she turned more fully to him, pulling him over onto her as she lay back on the bed again.

"Please," she said, surprised at the brokenness of her voice as she realized he was already sheathed. "I want—yes."

Fortunately, Stefan had apparently added "satisfied garble" to his list of foreign languages, and understood what she wanted perfectly. Slowly, with infinite gentleness, he leaned forward and nudged against her center, waiting until the next paroxysm of tremors subsided to ease himself into her. She sucked in a breath as he stretched her, but his gaze was locked on her face and when she met his stare, her body relaxed all at once, allowing him to slide into her with greater ease. He pressed forward, filling her, and her legs fell loosely to the side, her back arching. She savored the pure sensual pleasure of the two of them so intimately connected.

"Good?" Stefan asked, and she sensed the intensity of his stare—she'd closed her eyes again, and now she fluttered her lids open to meet his beautiful blue-gray eyes. He watched her with such infinite tenderness and unmistakable desire that her heart swelled with joy—it was so much—too much—yet she wouldn't trade this moment for the world.

"Good," she managed, her mouth wobbling into a smile. "So, so good."