Once Upon a Rose(72)

“I think I’m in over my head,” she whispered, her fingers itching, hovering over those muscles as if instinct kept insisting that so much heat, when touched, could really burn.

“I’ve got you,” he said again, and pressed her hand to his skin. A jerk ran through his body. “I’ve got you, Bouclettes.”

“God, you’re hot.” Her fingers spread over those hard muscles, pressing across the ripples of them.

“It’s you.” He covered one breast with that big hand, its heat crossing instantly through the fine lace of her bra.

It wasn’t, though. Her looks were ordinary, she knew that very well. People loved her for her music, and he had never heard her sing. His attraction to her was so confusing and so sweet—as if there was more to her that mattered than whether or not she could perform.

Her hands slid around to that smooth, strong back, and she shivered again at the privilege of touching it. “It’s definitely you.”

He shook his head a little, thumb hooking in under her bra cup, rubbing. “Allow me to be the judge of how hot you are, okay? I don’t think you have any clue.”

She arched up into the rub of his thumb involuntarily. “Are you going to take it off?” she whispered.

He bent his head to rub his jaw gently against her cheek until his lips were close to her ear. His thigh slid up between hers, pressing them apart. “I liked when you took off your dress for me,” he said, rough and low. His hips replaced his thigh, surging, his erection hard against her panties. “I liked that a lot.”

This close, in this intimate and dark a space, the vibrations in his voice were utterly irresistible. She wanted to capture that voice, turn it into a fur coat she could wrap around her body against any chill. She arched again, her hands sliding under her back to the catch of her bra. “I think you could get me to do anything you want when you use that voice.”

“Yeah?” His eyes were fixed on her breasts, as her bra cups started to loosen. “I’ll keep that in mind. Merde, Bouclettes, you’re so…you’re…you…”

Apparently there wasn’t a word for her, there was only a touch. Both his hands, coming to cup her bared breasts, both his callused thumbs, rubbing gently over her nipples.

She couldn’t bite back the little moaning sound of pleasure, any more than she could stop herself from reaching for him, pushing at the panels of his shirt that fell to either side of her, finding his bare shoulders, then sliding up his neck to bury her hands in his hair and pull his head down.

“Yeah,” he muttered, bending willingly. “I’m on my way.” He opened his mouth over one nipple, kissing and sucking, gentle at first, then testing how much she wanted, until she writhed and gripped, until she said no, no, that was too much that almost hurt until she said…

“Yes.” Her head pressed back into the pillow, chest lifting up for more of this. “Yes, yes, yes.”

“I love that sound in your mouth.” He reared back, shrugging out of the white shirt and dropping it, revealing that tan, muscled torso and the white gauze still around his left forearm.

She came after him, his bared torso irresistible, stroking everywhere, testing muscles and smoothness of skin and the texture of his hair across his chest. It was all good. Every single inch of him was touchable. She pressed her ear into his chest and tried to think of a way to make him growl, but her brain was all fogged.

Finally she just pressed her hand down, down, down his stomach, flat and tense under her touch, and curled it over his jutting sex.

He growled.

Her hand squeezed in involuntary delight as she shivered, pressing her ear harder into his chest.

He growled again. She wrapped her other arm around his waist and hugged herself in closer to that strength and that sound and squeezed again. “I like this position,” she said mischievously.

“You’re asking for trouble.” He pulled her hand off him and then lifted it and completely unexpectedly kissed it before he stood free of the bed, reaching for his pants.

She curled her fingers wonderingly into that kiss of her palm, watching him as he unbuttoned his pants. He reached for the waist and froze. “Oh, shit.”

“What?” Layla sat up, wrapping her arms around her nakedness, startled and not very concerned. Right about then everything seemed fixable, as long as she had Matthieu Rosier in the same room with her, with that muscled torso bare.

“I don’t have anything.” He thunked his head against the slanted wall. “It’s Gabe’s tux, and I was right in the middle of a workday when this all started, and I…I can’t believe I forgot—” Thunk against the wall again. “Usually I would have—” He broke off abruptly.