The Millionaire's Marriage Demand(17)

"So you've noticed that, too …  you see, I do the same sort of thing."  Travis named the international organization he'd worked for the last ten  years, establishing that he'd left Tanzania the year before Julie had  arrived.

She frowned at him. "I thought you were a rich doctor who looked after the rich."

"And I thought you catered to the privileged and pampered."

"You know the kind of things people think. Do-gooder with a savior complex."

"Guilt-dumpers. Disturbers of the status quo."

"Weirdos, wackos and neurotics."

He gave her a warm smile. "It's not easy work, is it, Julie?"

His smile made her tingle all the way from her head to her bare toes.  "No," she muttered. "No, it's not. Would you like some more pop?"

"Sure." As she padded into the kitchen, he followed her. "I'll help you with the dishes."

If he'd dwarfed the living room, he filled the kitchen. Almost dizzy  with longing, Julie picked up the sweet peas and buried her face in  them. "They're my favorite flower," she mumbled.

He put down his glass on the counter. "It's interesting that we do the same kind of work …  means we share a basic value system."

"So what?" she blurted.

"One more thing we have in common."

"You're playing games with me, Travis."

"Okay-I'll cut to the chase. Do you know why I'm here?"

She looked at him warily. "Not really."

"Then I'll tell you. I've thought about you all week, night and day.  I'll be honest-I figured if I came here today and saw you again, I'd  realize that you weren't anything special, that I'd been fooling  myself."

She looked down at herself with a shaky grin. "You've got your proof. In spades."

"It wouldn't matter what you wore or how you looked," he said with  suppressed violence. "The moment you answered the door, I knew nothing  had changed."

She found she was gripping the edge of the counter with bruising  strength, mostly to keep herself from pulling his head down and kissing  him until neither one of them could breathe. She said carefully, "What  exactly are you saying?"

"Hell, I don't know." He ran his fingers through his damp hair. "I want  you as much now as I wanted you on Manatuck. I guess that's what I'm  saying."

The intensity in his face made her tremble. She reached past him for the  pop bottle, inadvertently brushing his bare forearm with her own. The  pop was forgotten. Her hand stopped in midair. Then, very slowly, she  lowered it to lie on his arm. She closed her eyes, oblivious to  everything but his nearness and a tumult of longing. All those authors  were right, she thought. Desire does exist. It's like fire, hot and  urgent and leapingly alive.

In a strangled voice Travis said, "Julie … "

His arms went around her. She buried her face in his shoulder, inhaling  the clean masculine scent of his skin, so very much a part of him, so  uniquely his. Then, of her own accord, she looked up, took his face  between her palms and kissed him full on the mouth. As she'd been  wanting to do ever since he'd arrived.                       
       
           



       

She'd learned a thing or two about kissing on Manatuck. But just in case  he doubted her intentions, she whispered in between fierce, heated  kisses, "Make love to me, Travis. Now."

"There's nothing I want more in the world," he said, kissing her back  with such blatant hunger that her body melted into his. Then, awkwardly  because the kitchen was so small, he picked her up. "Don't kick the pop  bottle," he added, his eyes giving her a very different message.

His eyes were undressing her. Against her cheek she felt the hard  pounding of his heart, under her knees the sinewy strength of his arm.  As he edged out of the kitchen, she said, "Down the hall on the right,"  and added with a tiny chuckle, "it's not usually so tidy."

Because the room was small, she'd bought a three-quarter spindle bed,  covering it with an old-fashioned quilt. Not bothering to pull the quilt  back, Travis laid her down on the bed and covered her with his big  body, his weight on his elbows. She was trembling very lightly. Then his  head swooped down like a falcon to the prey, his mouth plundering hers  until she was nothing but an ache of passionate need.

Only then did Travis reach for the top button on her shirt. His fingers  brushed her skin; his irises were a blazing blue. Straddling her, he  eased her arms out of the shirt, then in the same intent silence undid  her bra, tossing it to the floor. She said softly, "Take your shirt off,  Travis."

His hands weren't quite steady as he fumbled with the buttons, and this,  more than anything, touched Julie to the heart. Travis, she already  knew, was a man both self-contained and very much in control of himself:  that she should make him lose that control filled her with a confusing  mixture of wonder and excitement. Very deliberately she reached for the  zipper on her shorts, easing them down her hips, then kicking them to  the floor. She said with a faint grin, "Because I always wear  utilitarian cotton in the tropics, I go overboard on lace when I'm  home."

"Black lace," he said huskily. Then with sudden impatience, he stripped off his slacks and briefs.

She wriggled out of the black lace. "Watch out for my knee, it's still  sore," she said, and pulled his head down, her tongue darting to meet  his in a kiss that seemed to last forever. A kiss in which the old Julie  vanished.

The new Julie, not knowing quite what to expect yet utterly willing to  find out, tugged at Travis's shoulders. "Lie on top of me," she begged,  "I want to feel every inch of you."

He slid his mouth down her throat, finding her breast, his hips pressing  her into the quilt. She wrapped her arms around him, glorying in his  weight, crying out with pleasure as he laved her nipple with his tongue.  Sensation lanced through her, fiery and imperative. With a sensuality  she had never thought she possessed, she ran her fingers through his  chest hair, tugging at it gently, following it all the way to his navel  and then beyond.

Briefly he lifted his hips. And then she found his center, hot and  silky, infinitely desirable. He groaned deep in his throat as she  touched him, burying his face in her shoulder, his heart pounding  against her ribs. As though he couldn't help himself, he eased her legs  apart and plunged into her.

She gasped with delight, welcoming him and gathering him in. Inexpertly  she moved her hips until he filled her, so that she scarcely knew where  she ended and he began. Her own rhythms seized her, urgently and  inexorably, mounting toward an unbearable peak. "Travis," she muttered,  "oh Travis … "

"Sweetheart … " he said roughly, his fierce thrusts pushing her over the  edge, the hard plane of his chest inflaming her nipples until she arched  to meet him, crying out his name in an avalanche of release. He  convulsed within her, his own cry echoing in her ears. Then he collapsed  on top of her.

Julie lay very still, and for several minutes couldn't have said a word  to save her soul. Gradually she came back to herself, to two hearts  racing as one and a feeling of peace and fulfillment such as she'd never  known. I've come home, she thought. It's taken me all these years and  many thousands of miles, and now I've come home …                        
       
           



       

Abruptly Travis raised his head. "Julie, I'm sorry-that was over before it began."

A slow smile spread across Julie's face. "You're sorry?" she said. "I  hope not. But maybe I'm the one who should be apologizing. I was so  impatient, so demanding-in such a big hurry. I wanted you so much, I  couldn't bear to wait."

Travis gave a sudden exultant laugh. "How about we both forget the word  sorry? And how about we do it again? Say in five minutes. And this time  maybe both of us can restrain ourselves so that it lasts longer than  five minutes."

"You were timing us?" she said, batting her lashes at him.

"Not exactly. Too much else was going on. As you may have noticed."

"Who, me?" Julie chuckled. She'd never known laughter could be part of  lovemaking. She was beginning to suspect that there was a lot she'd  never known. Letting all her newfound wonderment show in her face, she  said ingenuously, "So I'm supposed to kiss you with restraint? Is that  the way it works?"

"No," he said, "you're supposed to kiss me like this." He bent his head,  finding her mouth, moving his lips over hers with tantalizing  lightness. His tongue sought out hers, dancing with it, advancing and  retreating. And at the same time, with exquisite pressure, he was  stroking the warm slope of her breast, again and again.