Chapter 15 #2
This woman was incredibly precious, light in darkness, grace in sorrow.
At that moment, Jack realized, with a sense of truth that went deep as bone, strong as blood, that Caroline held his heart forever, and that his mission in life was to keep her safe and happy, bring a smile to her face and the rose blush back to her cheeks.
As long as he drew breath, he would make sure no harm came to her that he could prevent.
But even more than protecting her, he wanted her to be her truest self.
Nothing could take her back to the carefree, privileged girl she’d been, but by God, he wanted the woman he’d caught glimpses of during the weekend back.
A charmer, good-natured, secure in her beauty without being run by it.
Well-read, with a good sense of humor, even earthy.
That woman was Caroline, the essence of Caroline, when life wasn’t beating her down with a big stick.
Jack couldn’t go back in time and undo today, but he sure as hell could drown her in pleasure at the end of it.
“Come,” he said suddenly, standing up.
She looked puzzled when Jack placed two clean stem glasses and the half-empty bottle of excellent wine they’d been having for dinner in her hands, then yelped as he scooped her up in his arms.
“Where—” she began, then held her tongue. Where they were going was very clear as he headed up the stairs.
“I thought we’d have a nightcap up here.” Jack smiled in her eyes as he carried her along the upper story landing to her bedroom. Their bedroom now.
He didn’t switch on the light in the bedroom, but the light on the landing filtered in.
It was just enough to wrap them in the intimacy of darkness, yet let him see her.
He needed to be able to watch her as he loved her.
He knew her body well enough by now to know that he could tell by touch what was happening to her, but he wanted to see it, too.
Nothing in the world was as exciting as watching Caroline’s eyelids drooping with arousal, as if keeping her eyes open was too great an effort. Or watching her skin turn an even deeper rose where he touched her, or the barely perceptible beat of her speeded-up heart over her left breast.
God, it all turned him on. Everything about her was designed to make his dick swell, his heart beat faster, his blood rise. The sight of her, the sound of her, the feel of her, the smell of her—everything kept him in a state of semi-arousal whenever he was near her or even just thought of her.
He wasn’t in semi-arousal now, it was the full blown deal. Jesus, good thing he’d bought himself another pair of tight jeans, because he needed to keep it in his pants for a while.
Tonight was a night for romance and romance meant foreplay, though it wasn’t what he was good at. Once he got a woman naked, sex was only a few minutes away. He wasn’t used to pacing himself, or holding back.
Tonight would be a crash course in control, because tonight was all about her.
Jack sat her on the side of the bed, poured her half a glass of wine and put it in her hand. He poured himself a glass and clinked it to hers. The pure ring of crystal blossomed in the room. “To us.” He drank, watching her over the glass.
“To us.” Caroline smiled, swirled the wine around, sniffed deeply, then sipped. That’s my girl, he thought. It’s all about the senses tonight.
Enjoy.
He sure intended to.
Jack dropped to a crouch, wincing a little as his dick rubbed up against the back of the zipper of his jeans. Fuck, it hurt. Maybe he should just go naked around Caroline, spare himself the pain.
He slowly slipped her right shoe off, then the left, getting a kick out of looking at her pretty feet and her toenail polish gleaming creamy pink through the stockings.
Her ankles were slender, he was easily able to encircle her ankles with his hands. “You have such beautiful feet,” he whispered, raising his eyes to hers.
They were silver in this light, rimmed by a darker blue. “Thank you,” she whispered back.
He leaned forward, running his hands from her ankles up the outside of her thighs, up under her skirt. Watching her eyes, he slowly pulled the stockings and her lace underpants down and off.
He leaned forward a little, his shoulders forcing her knees apart.
“Lie down, honey,” he said, his voice a little hoarse. “This will take a while.”
That brought a smile to her lips. She ran a hand over his hair, then slowly lay down, one arm covering her eyes.
Fine. She didn’t need to see. She only had to feel.
Jack reached around her to unzip her skirt and pulled it gently down and off. She was naked from the waist down, hips sharply outlined, belly concave, legs dangling over the edge of the bed, completely open to him.
Jack rarely went down. He didn’t have any objection to it, but he wasn’t wild for it, either.
Right now, though, his head was filled with the thought of kissing her there—right where his dick would go, but later.
A gentle movement of his hands and she opened her thighs wider and Jack simply couldn’t tear his eyes from her.
Pale pink, perfect flesh surrounded by a soft thatch of red-gold hair.
He hadn’t turned on the light to give her a sense of intimacy, but he had excellent night vision. He could see everything, perfectly. The long, pearly, silky slide of her thighs
He parted her with his thumbs, like unfurling a flower. He’d done this before, but it felt like the first time. It had never been Caroline whose legs he held apart, whose delicate flesh he was looking at.
He kissed her, exactly as he would her mouth.
She tasted like the sea, spicy and warm.
She was panting lightly, the sound loud in the quiet room, a little moan with each pass of his tongue.
Jack closed his eyes a moment and concentrated on her—on the moisture welling out of her, on the way her thighs shook slightly, on the way her stomach muscles clenched when he entered her with his tongue.
“Jack,” she murmured, drawing in a sharp breath when he licked her more deeply. He angled for a deeper taste of her, and felt the walls of her sex move, a sharp contraction.
Oh, yes.
Silky soft, wet. Tasting of the sea, smelling of roses and sex. He lapped and licked and completely lost all sense of himself, kneeling before her, like a supplicant kneeling before his goddess.
When she came, it was with strong little tugs of her sex against his tongue, the most amazing feeling.
“Jack.” There was need there in her voice.
Caroline needing something…he was programmed to respond. Though part of him wanted to spend the next ten thousand years kneeling by the bed, loving her with his mouth, the rest of him needed to be in her.
A second later, he’d entered her in one long stroke, both of them moaning with relief. He bent to kiss her, and the rest of her moans were lost in his mouth.
The strokes were long, deep, lazy, the entire world reduced to the woman under him and to where they were joined.
There were no thoughts possible in this enchanted land of Caroline—just sensations. The warmth and softness of her, the wet welcome he could feel along every inch of his dick, her arms and legs holding him tightly.
Strong as he was, he could never break her hold on him.
For the first time in his life, Jack lost all sense of himself. He felt like he’d entered her skin, her head, pulling out exactly what she wanted. When she came, he prolonged it, changing the angle of his thrusts, until her head fell back over his arm and her arms and legs fell back onto the bed.
That was when he took his own pleasure, hard and fast. She was wet and soft enough to take him fully and—oh my God—when he came, he exploded with his entire body, from his toes to the top of his head.
He collapsed on her, wrung out, a completely different man, Caroline filling his head. She’d been violated today, but he’d make it better, and from this moment on, nothing would ever touch her.
He nuzzled against her ear, head lying on her hair, the scent of roses rising sharply in his nostrils.
“After the security system goes up, we’ll do some decorating together. Paint the kitchen and the bedroom. And we can paint the dining room yellow again. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You won’t recognize the house when we’re done.” His voice was slurred with sleepiness and the aftereffects of sex.
He kissed her temple and went out like a light.
Caroline lay on her back, muscles lax with pleasure, inner muscles still so hypersensitive from the powerful orgasm that she couldn’t move her thighs without feeling a jolt of pleasure-pain.
Her body was sending a huge packet of powerful messages of joy to her head, but it was like feeling something happening far away.
Her face felt numb with shock. Jack tried to move her into his arms, but she turned herself into a dead weight, as if fast asleep, and could feel his decision to let her be, to let her have her rest. He pulled the blanket up over her shoulders and settled down himself, so close she could feel his heat, but without touching her.
If he touched her again, she didn’t know what she would do. Run maybe. Scream. Her jaw muscles tightened.
The meal and the wine lay curdled in her roiling stomach. She had to swallow heavily against the bile rising up her throat.
Her instinct told her to get up out of bed and run—but run where?
Her head ached as she stared dry-eyed up at the dark ceiling, wondering whether some answers lay up there in the shadows, knowing there were no answers at all. Knowing that either she was insane or Jack had been lying to her all along.
Somehow the huge man lying next to her, who’d made love to her for hours, who had been inside her body, who’d given her such mind-blowing pleasure, somehow he wasn’t who he said he was.
It would be wonderful to forget what he’d said. She’d found herself a magnificent lover, sexy as hell, who’d done nothing but help her since he’d arrived. Courteous, gorgeous, fantastic in bed, focused completely on her.
Rich, too, unless Jenna had played a trick on her.
Total dreamboat, Jenna would have said in high school.
Of course, the question of how a former soldier, a man who traveled with two pairs of ancient jeans and a leather jacket in the dead of winter could also have fifteen million dollars was better left unasked. Just let it ride, she’d told herself.
But his words ran round and round in her head, in an endless loop, mocking her. Words that shifted the ground beneath her feet and made her doubt her own senses. Words that made no sense at all coming out of his mouth. Out of the mouth of a man she’d met for the first time four days ago.
We can paint the living room yellow again, he’d said. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?
Yes, of course she’d like that. A nice canary yellow instead of puke green. Who wouldn’t?
It was very thoughtful of him to think of it.
Except, of course, the last time the living room had been painted yellow was over six years ago.