And she met him. Her arms wrapped around his neck, her mouth moved against his with the same urgency, the same demand. He thought she said his name. He wasn't sure he could speak or if he did, what language he might use, or if it would all come out as nonsense. He didn't care.
She was intoxicating, and he could finally let himself indulge in her as he wished.
At last, he sank his hands into her dark hair, exulting in the feel of it, the scent. Warm silk and the faint hint of vanilla. He pulled out the band that held her hair and let the mass of waves fall around her shoulders. He angled his mouth for a better fit, gathering her closer, taking what he wanted, at last.
He smoothed his hands down the sensual curve of her back, then tested her pert bottom, making them both groan when he moved her against the thrust of his arousal. It wasn't enough. It was barely a start. He took and he took until she was gasping his name, breathing hard, and he had to rein himself in. Or have her right there in the hallway-and he had no intention of going too quickly.
Not with this woman. Not with Dru. Not when it felt as if he'd waited lifetimes for this. For her.
He moved to taste, briefly, the freckles the sun had already raised across the bridge of her nose, then traced the line of her cheekbone, her satiny cheek, her stubborn jaw. She smelled of coconut and flowers, and tasted like magic, and he could not seem to get close enough.
She made a small noise in the back of her throat, like a purr, and it nearly undid him. Mine, he thought, with a surge of possessive triumph. All mine.
He took her hand in his, marveling at how delicate she was, how perfectly formed. He led her down the hall, the afternoon sun still golden and shining through the windows of the rooms they passed, and he couldn't pretend he didn't feel victory thump through him like a drumbeat when she simply followed him like this, those gray eyes dizzy with want-very much like the docile, biddable female she had pretended to be for so many years, but wasn't. The surrender of a strong woman, he thought with pure male satisfaction, was so much more exciting than that of a weak one. He intended to revel in hers.
Once in his bedroom, he pulled her to him again, luxuriating in the feel of her in his arms. Finally.
He took her mouth again, kissing her anew as he maneuvered her toward the bed. When the back of her knees hit the mattress she pulled away and looked up at him, her breath coming too fast, her fathomless gray eyes dark now and dazed with need, her pretty face soft and flushed and his.
She was his.
Cayo didn't speak. He didn't counter his own uncharacteristic possessiveness, or even try. Nothing about Dru had made sense so far, not since that rainy morning in London when she'd changed everything he took for granted. Why should this? He tugged the vest up over her head, sliding it over all of that long, dark hair, and smiled when he saw her royal blue bra and the round breasts he'd only glimpsed through her wet blouse before now.
"Perfecto," he murmured, and leaned down to press his mouth against the crest of one breast, sucking on it through the thin, glossy material. Dru gasped, and so he did the same with the other, waiting until her head was thrown back and her eyes closed before he reached around and unhooked the bra. She reached to pull it from her arms and he bent and licked the closest nipple, pulling it into his mouth.
And Dru went wild.
Cayo got lost in it then, in her. In her heat, her softness, her beautiful cries. He stripped her trousers from her long, sleek legs, then that other scrap of satin and lace. He hardly noticed as he shrugged out of his own clothes, because it wasn't fast enough, it meant he wasn't touching her, and it took entirely too long before he was naked and she was sprawled across his bed the way he wanted her, the way he'd wanted her for longer than he'd been aware of it. This was no new need that roared in him, demanding he take her again and again until they were both sated. What moved in him felt old and complicated, as if he'd hidden it from himself. But he wasn't hiding any longer. He stretched out beside her, propping himself up on one arm, fiercely satisfied to see her nipples were hard and her tattletale English skin was pink and rosy.
His.
She rolled as if she meant to begin exploring him herself, but he pressed her back down.
"But I want-"
"Sit," he murmured, tracing a finger down to her breast and toying with its peak, making Dru arch from the bed with a moan.
He bent to replace his fingers with his lips, and she cried out again, writhing beneath him as he tugged her nipple into the heat of his mouth even as he cupped her other breast in his hand. Then he kissed his way down the gentle swell of her abdomen, licking over her navel and the gentle curve of her hips. He learned she had a trio of small birthmarks near her left hip bone, and that she couldn't keep her hips still, especially when he held them between his hands and then curved his fingers around to test the shape and sweet, silken perfection of her bottom.
And then he parted her thighs and kissed his way even lower.
"Cayo-" she started again, naked passion in that voice, so full of want it made his hardness ache in response.
"Stay," he ordered her, and licked his way into her molten core, exulting in the fresh, hot taste of her desire.
She arched from the bed again, her hips rising to meet his mouth as he took her, tasted her, made her his. Unequivocally. And then she exploded all around him, sobbing out his name as she fell off the side of the world.
And it was not nearly enough.
He moved back up the bed, and pulled her to him, then rolled them both, sitting up and lifting her so she sat astride him. He wanted to see her. He wanted to see everything.
"Cayo..." She whispered his name, her eyes fluttering open, to gaze at him as he pressed against the core of her.
She was wet and hot and soft, and he wanted her so badly he nearly shook with it. He held her bottom in his hands, lifted her, and watched as she shivered in turn when he slid himself along the entrance to her core, teasing her. Her gray eyes darkened again. She pulled her perfect lower lip between her teeth. She lifted her arms and wrapped them around his shoulders, bringing her breasts flush against his chest.
"Surrender," he whispered, and then he drove into her, and there was nothing at all but fire.
That perfect, encompassing fire. It roared through him, into him. It incinerated everything he thought, everything he knew, until there was nothing at all but Dru. And she was supple and curvy and draped all around him. She began to move her hips and he groaned, too close to the edge.
He wrapped his hands around her hips to slow her down, then set his own pace. Slow. Deliberate. Torturing them both. Hot and endless strokes that made him grit his teeth and made her drop her head to his neck and sob out her pleasure. He moved her up and down as he thrust into her, again and again, wanting it never to end. Wanting to stay balanced in all this lush perfection forever. Wanting to breathe her in like this, so deep inside her he hardly knew which one of them was which.
She lifted her head then and her gaze locked with his. Held. He felt her breath on his face, her legs tight around him, and still he moved, building that fire into a raging blaze, making her moan even louder, watching those gray eyes of hers glaze over with the same incomparable passion that stormed through him. Taking him over. Making him want nothing more than to burn in it, over and over, too hot to bear, until there was nothing left of him.
This is Dru, he thought, unable to stop looking at her, touching her, feeling her in every part of him. And this is mine.
And he understood then that he had no intention of ever letting her go. Whatever that might mean.
She closed her eyes and threw back her head, her lovely back arching toward the setting sun through the windows behind her, the fading light casting her lush body in oranges and golds.