This time, she didn’t wait around to see if his sluggish brain had started working at normal speed. Instead, she pulled her arm from his hand and made a break for the stairs. He was hot on her heels as she took the stairs two at a time.
She stopped at the top, breathing rapidly through her mouth and she looked around for her parents. A long gallery hall ran from the top of the stairs to the guest room at the end. They’d have to pass the nursery to get there.
Crap, crap and double crap.
This was going to be tricky. She crept down the hall, praying that Jonathon would walk as softly. Or head back down stairs if he couldn’t.
She tiptoed right up to the doorway and pressed herself against the wall, listening. She heard the faint, steady creak, creak of a rocking chair.
If her mom was sitting in the chair rocking Peyton, there was a good chance Wendy could sneak past to the guest bedroom, make the bed and sneak out with anyone being the wiser. Or more importantly, becoming suspicious.
Slinking past the door, she heard two things that would have stopped her in her tracks if she hadn’t been in such a desperate hurry. The first was Jonathon’s heavy footfall behind her. The next was her father’s voice from within the nursery.
She glanced through the open door, but saw no one. Maybe they’d make it. But when she heard the rocking chair still, she grabbed Jonathon’s hand and made a dash for it.
If her parents heard them and followed, she and Jonathon would never have time to actually make the bed. Certainly not neatly enough to put her father off the scent.
And this wasn’t the day to leave up to fate.
Pulling Jonathon into the room after her, turning him so his back was to the door, she flashed him a wry smile. “Sorry about this.”
“About what?”
She only had an instant to appreciate how charming he looked with that bemused expression on his face before she launched herself at him. They both tumbled backward onto the bed in a tangle of arms and legs. He might have gasped with surprise. She didn’t have a chance to notice, as she pressed her mouth to his and kissed him.
The second Jonathon felt Wendy’s mouth on his, he gave up trying to figure out what she was doing. She’d been babbling about the bedroom one minute and kissing him like a woman overwhelmed by desire the next. A smart man knew when to hold his questions for later.
Instead, he wrapped his hand around the back of her head and deepened the kiss. Her lips moved over his in sensual abandon, her tongue stroking against his in the kind of soul-deep kiss that made a man forget everything except the burning need to possess.
Desire pounded through him, heating his blood and tightening his groin. He fought against the desperate need to strip her naked and plow into her. A need that had been building within him for what seemed like years. Hell, probably had been years. As desperately as he wanted her, he didn’t want this. This frantic, rapid rush of sex without fulfillment.
He wanted more. He wanted all of her.
Rolling her over onto her back, he took control of the kiss. Her hand had started pulling his shirt out from his waistband. If her hot little hand so much as touched his bare chest, he’d lose the last shreds of his control. So he grabbed both her hands in his and pulled them over her head, pinning them there. She let out a low groan, arching her back off the bed.
Yes. This was what he wanted: her, on the brink. As desperate and needy as he felt.
He slowed the kiss down, exploring every sweet corner of her mouth. Loving her sleepy flavor, the faint hint of coffee. The smooth heat of her tongue against his. Her hips bucked against his as she ground the vee between her legs against the length of his erection. Even through the multiple layers of her clothes, he could feel the heat of her.
But it wasn’t enough. Merely kissing her would never be enough. Not when there was so much of her body left to explore. That silken shoulder that had been tempting him for so long. That tender swath of skin along her collarbone. The hollow at the base of her throat. The glimpse of her belly he sometimes saw when she rose up on her toes to get a fresh ream of printer paper.
His hand sought the hem of her shirt. He slipped his hand up to her rib cage, relishing how incredibly soft her skin was. He felt the edge of her bra and hesitated. He’d waited years to touch her naked skin. His hand damn near trembled at the prospect.
But was this really what he wanted? A quick grope in the guest bedroom when her family was just down the hall?
No, he wanted her naked. Laid out before him like a feast. He wanted hours. Days.
He wanted—
Jonathon’s head jerked up as he pulled back from Wendy and sent her a piercing look.
Her family was just down the hall. What the hell had she been—