“So you didn’t mean all that?”
“Of course I did, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to get into your pants.”
“I wish you would,” she said softly, sliding one bare thigh between his two willing ones. Chance dug his fingers into the sheets because although the unmistakable moisture between her legs said yes, he could still hear the worry in her voice. In his opinion, if a woman wasn’t fully committed to the task at hand, then his duty as a first-class lover had failed.
“In case you haven’t noticed, we’re already 99.9% to liftoff, sweetheart. I don’t know why .01% would stop you now.”
She lifted her head and he could feel her stare, hear the relief in her voice. “We are, aren’t we?”
“Don’t think I’ve ever been this close without sealing the deal before,” he offered, pleased to see his words were helping. He’d never had a woman tax his mental skills before, and it was kind of fun.
“You seem very unafraid.”
“I might be quaking inside, but I give you my word, I do my best work under pressure.”
For one moment, she was silent, and he thought his well-honed instincts might have been off, but then her hands reached down and she stripped off her panties. The nightstand drawer squeaked open, and Chance sighed with relief. Sure, he would have tried to seduce her out of that small yet significant piece of cotton, but his conscience rested easy now that she was the one who’d made the final move.
“If something bad happens,” she started, and he pressed his mouth over hers, squeezed himself into the condom and then pushed inside her.
“Oh,” she breathed, and he loved that soft sound, that quiet hitch in her breathing. Something soft and quiet whispered inside him, yet he froze because his world was the ground-shaking roar of Pratt & Whitney engines, the shrieking sound of sirens and reveille at dawn. Against all those booms and rattles, Chance had forgotten what calm was like.
But then her muscles clenched around him, firm and demanding, and he drove into her, deep and hard.
6
THERE WAS THUNDER and some sort of shattering explosion, but Devon didn’t care. All she wanted was to stay here in bed, over Chance, under Chance, submerged in mindless bliss.
Her nails raked over his back, his sculpted ass. Her mind knew her house was going to collapse, but she needed this. She deserved this.
After all, it was April Fools’ and she was having the very best sex of her life. Her back arched in ecstasy, and she felt the harsh bristle of his jaw against her neck, most likely drawing blood, and before the first orgasm passed, the second one began.
Her mouth flew open, trying to form words, a scream, a prayer, and the buzz of the alarm clock brayed in her ears. Chance threw it against the wall, hitting the mirror.
Breaking it.
Over and over he thrust inside her, the old wooden bed no match for what was apparently a lifetime of unexplored passion. First there was a crack, then a thud, and finally a splintering sound that meant disaster.
Right as the bed frame collapsed, Chance rolled them to one side just as they crashed to the floor. He took the brunt of the fall, one quiet oomph. Before she could call 9-1-1, he was filling her again.
Certain that this was her last, best sexual experience ever, she rained desperate kisses over his sweat-damp neck, the hard planes of his chest, willing him to stay, in case her thighs padlocked around him weren’t a big enough hint.
But somewhere in her mind, it dawned on her that he wasn’t running, he wasn’t leaving, he wasn’t even slowing down.
The unbreakable window shattered, shards of glass flying, but he picked her up and ran to the living room before she was hit.
“How you doing?” he asked, climbing on top of her, busy hands on her chest, and she loved the sound of his unruffled drawl.
“I told you I was cursed.”
He kissed her mouth, her neck, the tip of her breast, and she didn’t feel cursed. Quietly she sighed, a breathy, exhilarated sound that definitely indicated delight.
“And I told you I do my best work under pressure. Lay back and relax, honey. The night is young, and I want to hear all that dirty actuarial talk again. Assuming, of course, that the roof doesn’t fall in,” he added, tempting the fates.
Thankfully, he had her safely in the basement before it did.
7
DEVON AWOKE to the unfamiliar sensation of a brawny arm thrown casually across her breast. The basement floor was hard and cold, and her body protested as she began to move.
A new day. April 2. Ah, yes, she thought, steeling herself for what was to come. Rejection day. Normally it didn’t hurt this much.
“Good morning,” he told her, sitting up and rubbing his dark hair, and looking too darn cheerful to reject her. Sometimes men could be pigs. Sexually virile pigs with finely honed bodies, but pigs nonetheless.