"Oh, baby," he breathed. He ran a caressing hand on her hair, staring in her eyes with tenderness that touched her heart powerfully.
Her eyes moistened and her heart swelled so that it became hard to breathe. She touched his face as her body moved in cadence with his.
"I love you, Jaz," Kane whispered, looking at her intently.
She smiled at him, tears escaping through the sides of her eyes. "I love you too, Kane."
He groaned softly and captured her mouth, his thrusting increasing in speed. They rocked together as their bodies and heartbeats shared the same rhythm.
Higher and higher they climbed, their pleasure sounds mingling, until they reached the crest and exploded together, gasping for air and breathing in each other's love.
*******
Jasmine smiled as Kane kissed her cheek loudly.
"What are you doing?" he asked, his lips against her ear as he leaned to peer at her laptop screen.
"I'm just responding to Facebook messages from some of my readers."
"Ah, fan mail."
She laughed. "I guess you could say that."
"Anything interesting?"
"They're mainly short messages about how they enjoyed my books."
"Do you get any weird, super fanatical ones?"
"No," she snorted. "My readers are mainly very nice. A couple of them have even become my pen friends."
"Really? Why?"
She shrugged. "Something just connected I guess."
Kane kissed her hair before straightening up. "I almost forgot to tell you I'll be coming home late tomorrow night. I'm having dinner with my fellow directors for some serious pow-wow. Two of the properties I designed have just been nominated for international awards and we want to maximise whatever exposure we can get out of that."
She jumped up and threw her arms around him. "Really? Wow? Congratulations, honey! Which ones?"
"An executive retreat in Singapore and a country estate in Kangaroo Valley."
"I'm so proud of you, baby."
"Thank you," Kane beamed at her.
"What do you think your chances are of winning?"
"Don't know," he answered with a shrug. "The other properties nominated have their own strengths. The main thing would be managing the press this would generate. There was a firm that won a prestigious award a couple of years ago but instead of getting good publicity, some nosy tabloid journalist aired the architect's dirty laundry instead."
"What kind of dirty laundry?"
"Something about his predilection to call girls. I think that shouldn't have been anyone else's business. But somehow, these things do get out and get magnified at inopportune times. Anyway, their firm lost out on a couple of big contracts because of that. The clients preferred not to get attached to any negative publicity so they chose not to go with them even though they were originally the front runners. I know this because we picked up those clients."
"Wow. That was tough for your competitor. Why were the clients so strict? Why should the exposé on the architect affect them?" she asked.
"The clients were big multi-nationals. When those types of corporations build new developments they themselves seek, even drive, good PR for themselves. They don't want any news about their big projects muddled with undesirable associations."
"I see."
"So I'm sorry I can't have dinner with you tomorrow night, but I should be home before eleven."
She sighed, a bittersweet feeling engulfing her.
"I'm really sorry, sweetheart," Kane murmured as he pulled her to him and nuzzled her neck.
"It's okay," she assured him. "I wasn't sighing because you have to work tomorrow night."
"Then what's the sigh for?" he asked, tilting her chin with a finger.
"I was just thinking how very soon, we'll be spending more time apart than together for two whole months. The past month has got me used to having you around every night."
"I know. Me too," he said, sighing deeply himself. "And unfortunately I will have to do some travelling for work in the near future. Do you think you could take some time off to travel with me?"
She played with his shirt collar as she thought about his question. She didn't think her boss would allow her to take more time off so soon after being away for five weeks. Oh, but his offer was so tempting. And she could already see herself missing him like crazy.
"I'll see what I can do," she said eventually.
"Please try hard."
"I will," she promised, although she didn't really know how she'd manage it.
"In the meantime, let's make the most of the next few days," Kane said, hoisting her up and tossing her on the bed.
She giggled, resolutely pushing away a deep sense of foreboding that arose out of the blue.