Out of Hours...Boardroom Seductions: One-Night Mistress...Convenient Wife / Innocent in the Italian's Possession / Hot Boss, Wicked Nights. Anne Oliver

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СКАЧАТЬ closer so that their knees touched, their hips bumped, her lips grazed the line of his jaw and chin. Christo nuzzled her hair, breathing deeply now, allowing himself to relish the scent of it—of her.

      Minutes ago he’d resisted, fought off the desire it provoked, tried in vain to remain indifferent to her.

      But that was then. And now?

      Now he didn’t think. He didn’t analyze. He didn’t argue pro or con. He simply savored. And wanted more.

      He took it, too, because Natalie encouraged him. She made soft sounds that made his heart beat faster, made him want to hear more, feel more, taste more.

      He stroked her silken skin beneath her shirt. It was so smooth, so warm, it seemed to encourage the glide of his fingers. Then he shoved himself up to kneel beside her and draw her shirt up. He tugged it over her head, then bent to press his lips to her collarbone, and nibble his way down between her breasts. His hands framed her rib cage and he kissed his way down to her navel.

      “Christo!” Her eyes were dark and wide, her lips formed a soft O at his touch. And then she skimmed his shirt over his head as well and rose to kiss his chest and run her fingers over his pectoral muscles.

      It was a dance of fingers and lips. Touches and nibbles, light friction, gentle stroking. And every one stoked the fire building within.

      He dispensed with her bra then knelt between her knees and cupped her breasts in his palms. And she watched him, unblinking, her lower lip caught in her teeth, her breath coming in soft thready whispers.

      With his fingers he traced the aureoles around taut nipples, then bent his head and laved each one in turn, making her shiver and shift beneath him. And the look on her face made him as eager for her as she was for him.

      He pulled back and hooked his thumbs inside the waistband of her shorts when she lifted her hips, slid them down her legs and tossed them away. Only a scrap of pale-blue cotton and lace covered her now.

      “Christo.” She reached for his zip, and with fumbling fingers he yanked it down and shed his jeans, kicking them aside, then peeled off his boxers as well, sucking in his breath as the cool night air coming through the window hit his heated bare flesh.

      He would have bared her, too, then, but she reached out a hand and touched him lightly, stroked the length of him, made him clench his teeth and suck in a sharp breath. It hissed through his teeth and she said, “Are you all right?”

      “No. I’m going to lose it completely in half a second if you do that again. Don’t. Touch.”

      Her eyes widened as she jerked her hand away. “Ever?”

      He laughed, a strained laugh, one that revealed to him, if not to her, just how tenuous a grip he had on his control. “No. Just now. I want—I want to take it slow and that’s…not going to happen.”

      He skimmed the lacy panties down her legs and then slid trembling fingers back up the length of them, touched her, teased her, probed her gently.

      Now Natalie sucked in a breath, too. Her hips shifted. Her fingers clenched on the quilt that covered the bed. And Christo moved between her knees, stroking her now, parting her, finding her as ready for him as he was for her.

      Then she was grasping his hips and pulling him down to her, her need as naked as her body as she opened to him.

      Naked bodies meant nothing more than pleasure. Naked emotions were something else again. But he couldn’t look away. She mesmerized him, made him ache with the need of her.

      He couldn’t turn back now. Couldn’t resist the pull to join his body to hers.

      He slid in, took her. Gave himself over to the need that surged within him, and tried to give Natalie the satisfaction that she was giving him.

      She was so hot, so tight. So right.

      He wanted the feeling to last forever. Wanted desperately to slow it down, hang onto it, to let it build and ease and build again, to make it grow as well inside her.

      But Natalie thwarted his best intentions with intentions of her own. She moved against him, rocked her hips, drew him deeper, arched her back and clenched around him.

      “Now,” she whispered, her fingers digging into his buttocks, her heels hard against the backs of his thighs. They moved together, eager and desperate until together they tipped over the edge into oblivion.

      Spent, shattered, Christo could barely lift his head. His heart thundered. He pressed a kiss to her cheek, to her lips, then pulled back enough to look down at her, to feel sanity returning, but what else he wasn’t sure.

      Natalie stared up at him, speechless, her gaze unreadable.

      And Christo felt a stab of anxiety. Of doubt. He stroked her cheek with still-trembling fingers. “Are you all right?”

      Because she didn’t look all right. She looked stunned.

      And then, like morning light, a smile dawned. Slowly at first, touching her lips, then suffusing her whole face. She loosed her hands that were locked around his back and brought them up to frame his face.

      “I don’t think all right really covers it,” she said. And then she raised up to press her lips to his.

      They loved again that night.

      Slow and easy the second time, as they let their touches linger, she and Christo learned each other’s bodies, each other’s needs, each other’s desires. But slow and easy was no less shattering than fast and desperate.

      Nor was lying in the narrow bed and watching Christo sleep afterwards.

      “I’ll go,” he’d said only moments after they’d spent themselves the last time. He was lying on his side, his body curved around hers, his arm slung possessively across her waist, holding her against him. And she had felt the whisper of his words against her ear.

      She hadn’t moved then. She’d simply held onto the moment, reliving the night from its unpromising beginning to this, marveling at the change.

      Who’d have thought?

      After a while she realized that he hadn’t moved. His hold on her hand had loosened, his breathing had slowed. He was sleeping.

      With exquisite care and deliberation, Natalie shifted her body. There wasn’t much room. She hugged the edge of the bed as she rolled onto her back, still in his embrace, then turned just enough to face him, wanting to see him, to study his features in the dim light that spilled in through the window from the street.

      She had never seen Christo unguarded before. Never seen him without armor. She didn’t mean clothes, though of course his lack of them allowed her to learn that part of him as well. It could have made him vulnerable.

      But it didn’t. Christo had a strong body, lean but well-muscled, with hard ropy arms, a flat abdomen, strong thighs. He didn’t look like a man who went to meetings and wrote arguments all day. It reminded her that that was only a part of who he was.

      He was also the man who slept next to her, his features softened slightly by sleep. His jaw was relaxed now, his lips slightly parted. The hard, often wary green СКАЧАТЬ