“I think you should drop those shields right now, Pepper. It’s just the two of us. You and me. You know where this is goin’. So do I. I want to be inside you. I dream of bein’ inside you and I know you dream of havin’ me there. I want to feel your body wrapped around mine. I want to taste every inch of you. It’s goin’ to happen and both of us know it. There’s no need to hide from me. Be as sexy as you like. Seduce me. I’m a grown-up, babe, and I can handle a woman. I can give you whatever you need.”
He was killing her. He didn’t understand what they’d done to her. The heat and fire inside that burned and burned until she thought she’d go insane. If she dropped her guard, as connected as they were, and he saw the erotic images in her head, saw her cravings and her terrible need for him – for him – she would be lost. He would always be able to control and manipulate her. She wouldn’t be the weapon, he would be.
Desperate, she actually touched the door handle, thinking she might try to escape. There was no escape from her body’s demands. None. She couldn’t quiet the terrible hunger crawling through her veins, centering between her legs like a torch. Her mouth craved to wrap itself around his heavy erection every single time she saw it – which was hourly. He always seemed to be as hard as a rock.
She couldn’t think with wanting him. She couldn’t sleep. Her skin was hot and her breasts ached. She needed him… She just plain needed.
Wyatt swore in Cajun French, a bastardized version of the French she knew. “That’s it, Pepper. That’s all the time you’ve got. I was goin’ to do this the right way, courtin’ you like you deserve, showin’ you we could be a normal couple, but I underestimated what they did to you. The hell they gave to you. Needin’ sex is damned uncomfortable, and no woman of mine is goin’ to suffer when I can do somethin’ about it.”
Pepper just looked at him, feeling despair. She was fairly certain other men didn’t contend with the mother of their children needing sex the way she needed it. She was suffering. It was agony. She’d had a handle on it until she met Wyatt; now she couldn’t think of anything else.
Wyatt turned off the main road onto an adjacent road, much narrower, one that ran along the river for a distance and then veered away from it for a while.
“Pepper, take it down. The shield. Let it go. Give yourself to me.”
Her gaze dropped to the front of his jeans. His fierce, thick bulge. She licked her lips. Her mouth watered. The fire grew between her legs. It hurt to have her clothes on. Did she dare do what he asked? Reveal the dark side of herself to him? What would he think of her then?
“Damn it, babe. Open your blouse for me. Unbutton all those cute buttons. The moment you put the damn thing on, all I wanted to do was unwrap you.”
His eyes cut sideways toward her, his gaze so hot she felt her stomach somersault. Hot liquid spilled between her legs. Fine. There was no saving either of them and right then she didn’t care. The Jeep was hurtling through the swamp now on some old dirt road. He knew where he was going and he wanted to get them there fast. She hoped it would be fast enough.
Very slowly her hands went to the top button of the blouse Nonny had found for her. She might never get this chance again. She’d never been with a man who mattered, one she wanted, one who wasn’t training her. Aside from whatever made her outwardly tempting to men when she walked into a place, she was skilled and knew how to please a man, how to bind him to her. Never once had she ever wanted to use her craft. She hated it. Despised it. Until that moment. Her one chance.
There was Wyatt. A man who knew how to love. A man of family. A man who could take command of a situation, lethal one moment and gentle and loving toward a child the next. That man. Her man. She knew him better than he knew himself. He wanted her giving herself to him, but he was holding a part of himself in reserve. That was okay too. She recognized that this one time might be the only time, but she was going to let herself enjoy every single second with him. And she was going to make certain he was going to enjoy it too, that he’d never regret being with her.
She wanted to touch him. To feel his skin beneath her fingers. She was very tactile, and needed touch. Craved it. But only from him. Wyatt. She had no idea if the nightly erotic dreams had fed her hunger for him, and she didn’t know if they were her dreams or his, only that she couldn’t stop thinking about him.
“There’s no one else on this road, Pepper. We’re headin’ to the camp. Got a huntin’ cabin there.” His dark eyes moved over her, hooded, sensual, desire intense. “Keep opening the buttons, sugar. You’re makin’ me crazy goin’ so slow like that.”
Wyatt was lean, all compact, very defined muscle with just enough bulk to him to look as if he could handle himself with ease. He was all man and she wanted him so badly it actually terrified her. Her hands trembled as she slid the last button out of its closure. His voice was nearly a growl, but a sultry, sexy one. She found herself shivering in anticipation.