chapter 30
She was sound asleep, her foot dangling from beneath the covers. She sighed, one leg shooting off the bed, giving Gabe a view of excellent thighs beneath a blue nightshirt.
He ignored the desire ratcheting to his groin.
He told himself it was simple, uncomplicated lust, the kind any normal male would feel finding a beautiful, complicated, prickly-as-hell female asleep in his bed. He ran a hand through his hair and smiled to see that she’d left his side of the bed empty, with the covers neatly turned back.
Something worked into his chest, but hell if he could put a name on it. Not simple lust, not mere male curiosity. Something jarringly protective.
Hell, again.
All thoughts of sleeping on the sofa vanished. How could a man resist an invitation like turned-down covers when he was dead on his feet?
Gabe woke up with his hand on Summer’s hip and her leg wrapped around his thigh. For long moments he didn’t move, feeling his blood slam down to places he shouldn’t have been thinking about. How the hell did a man stay oblivious when a woman’s half-naked body was wedged against him?
Grimacing, Gabe tried to disentangle himself, but Summer gave a throaty sigh and burrowed closer, her soft breasts thrusting against his chest. Gabe figured she was having a nice fantasy of her own, because her nipples were hard, clearly evident through her cotton nightshirt.
Gabe closed his eyes as her fingers slid across his chest, settling below his waist. When her hand started to move lower, he gripped it hard, biting off a curse. In her exhaustion, Summer seemed oblivious to her movements. Her breath puffed softly as she lay facing him, her hair a dark curtain on his pillow.
There was a gut-wrenching intimacy to sharing a pillow, Gabe realized. Though he’d never thought about it before, it felt more personal than sharing sex. Or maybe it was the way Summer lay, completely trusting, her body relaxed and vulnerable beside him.
Sleeping Beauty had a few thorns, Gabe thought wryly. She had trust issues the size of Texas, her relaxation skills were abysmal, and she was married to her job.
But he wouldn’t have it any other way. Simple women got boring, and Summer was anything but simple. Stubborn, secretive, meticulous, and abrasive came to mind, but she was also brave, supportive with the girls, and smarter than most men he’d worked with. Gabe would trust her guarding his six o’clock anyplace, anytime, which surprised him because a military career didn’t exactly breed gender equality.
She rolled onto her side, her lips nuzzling his neck. Gabe took a harsh breath as desire broadsided him. Cursing softly, he tried to pull away, but Summer followed him when he turned to his other side. Within seconds she was wrapped around him again.
And this time her hand was between his thighs and her cotton nightshirt was pushed halfway up her chest. Gabe closed his eyes as he felt her nipples against his back. With tense fingers he tried to pull her hand away from his thighs, only to hear her murmur irritably and push closer.
He took a deep breath, fighting primal temptation.
The woman was completely trusting in sleep. Only a jackass would take advantage of the situation to open her legs and slip inside her.
Even if it did make for one hell of a fantasy.
Summer turned sleepily, saying something about prank mail. More fallout from her partner’s death, Gabe realized.
She muttered again, tossing restlessly. This time it was something about her sister and an old broken swing. Gabe shook his head. He’d had his own share of bad dreams filled with memories of faces and places he’d worked hard to forget in his waking moments.
“Have to go.” Summer sat up stiffly. “Have to check house, test the alarm. See if girls are okay.”
Before he could move, she pushed away the covers, her shirt bunched above full pink breasts. The sight hollowed a path right to his erection, but Gabe didn’t try to hold her back or touch her in any way.
She was still sound asleep, he realized.
“Go back to sleep,” he said hoarsely. “The house is fine and the girls are safe.”
“You sure?” she murmured.
“The girls are fine.” Gabe tugged her shirt down. Though he ached to touch her perfect breasts, he ignored the urge. He had never taken advantage of a woman and he wasn’t about to start, not that Summer would ever appreciate his nobility, since she fell back onto the bed, her arm thrown to one side, sound asleep instantly.
She was one hell of a woman, Gabe thought wryly. And if he didn’t have her soon, he was going to lose his mind.
She was hot, restless. The sheets felt heavy, scraping against her naked skin. Something was pressing her back, rubbing her hips, pinning her to the soft bed, and she murmured in pleasure, welcoming the weight between her legs, welcoming the hands that were giving her so much pleasure.
A fine sheen of sweat covered her breasts.
She tugged up her shirt, trying to cool off.
But the heat didn’t stop as she tossed back and forth, searching for heat and contact.
And she sighed when she felt the muscled shoulder press against her chest and callused fingers stroke her breasts.
“Gabe,” she whispered.
Summer came awake in a rush.
Gabe was right beside her and he was naked—or half-naked, wearing pajama bottoms that rode low on his hips. To her mortification, she was spread over his body like confetti after an out-of-control party.
Her tangled up shirt revealed all of one breast and most of the other.
Red-faced, she shoved down her shirt and inched back to her side of the bed, praying Gabe wouldn’t wake. When his steady breathing didn’t change, she closed her eyes in relief.
One problem solved.
With sleep out of the question, she pulled a book off the nightstand. Unfortunately, it was a lurid male action-adventure.
Book in hand, she dug out her reading glasses and a penlight and tried to focus on the macho hero being groped by a sultry female spy. The text was leaving her cold even before Gabe’s hand slid onto her thigh.
She gulped as heat spiraled through her body, then targeted her nipples.
The man was a threat to her sanity.
Firmly, she moved his hand and went back to her book, where the hero was now cramped in the backseat of a taxi while the exotic spy probed at his zipper. As if real women acted that way with a stranger, Summer thought irritably. What was the author’s idea of foreplay, saying hello?
Gabe muttered in his sleep, and then rolled sharply, his leg sliding over Summer’s thigh. Her throat went dry as she felt his erection drill against her stomach. The man was built, and he smelled wonderful, a mix of lemon and cloves and old leather.
She tossed her light and book on the floor, fed up with the improbable coupling in the backseat of the taxi, but as she moved, Gabe’s hand closed on her breast. Summer sucked in a stunned breath as her body went liquid with need.
He rolled again, pinning her beneath him. When Summer tried to talk, only a croak emerged, and his hands tightened, pulling her over onto his chest, so there was no way she could avoid the wonderfully insistent bulge at her stomach. It irritated her that she didn’t want to.
“What are you doing?” she rasped.
“Umhh.”
“Gabe, wake up.”
His fingers slid into her hair. “Dreaming. This has got to be a dream.” His eyes opened. “Maybe not. Nice glasses,” he murmured. “Very sexy.”
“Yeah, right.”
His lips curved. “Honey, you could wear duct tape and work boots and I’d still have trouble zipping my pants.”
Summer felt heat fill her face. The rough edge in his voice was making her toes curl, and his hands were doing things that left her nipples aching and tight.
Gabe smiled crookedly. “If this bothers you, just shout.”
Summer considered shouting, but the thought was blocked by a stunning wave of lust.
You’ve got to trust someone, and it may as well be me.
His words came back to her, and Summer realized they were dead right.
She didn’t stop to think or plan. In a burst of movement, she circled his neck and pulled him toward her. Unfortunately, at the same moment, he was reaching for her, and they collided midway.
Gabe yelped as her teeth scraped his cheek. “Damn, Summer. There’s no need to bite me.”
She stared at him, flushed and mortified.
He traced her cheek and smiled crookedly. “Not yet, anyway. Not until you’re wrapped around me and we’re both ready to scream. Which, at this rate, should be in about three minutes.”
“You really want to—”
“Of course I do. You want to stop now?”
“But why—”
“How about you quit telling me all the reasons I shouldn’t want this, because none of them are going to change a thing.” He pulled off her glasses and put them on the nightstand. “These glasses of yours should come with a warning: hot sex may occur if used indiscriminately.”
Summer still couldn’t believe this tough, gorgeous man was holding her hungrily, but she wasn’t going to change her mind. Before she could lose her nerve, she wriggled up his chest until she was stretched out across him.
“You’re definitely going to kill me, honey.”
Her panties went flying. Summer smiled, amazed at how fast his control was being battered down. To help things along, she reached tentatively between them until she found his straining erection. She couldn’t resist a sigh of pleasure when her fingers found their goal. Suddenly bold, she tightened her hand, imagining how he would feel inside her.
“My turn, damn it.”
Suddenly she was flat on her back and Gabe was kissing his way over her tight nipples while she wriggled restlessly. Her ribs were next, then her navel and flat stomach were treated to a slow, wet exploration that left her breathless as he whispered erotic promises and approached the spot no man had ever touched so lovingly.
Gently Gabe nudged apart her thighs, stroking her with his tongue, pulling her sensitized body fully awake. Then he did something amazing with his tongue that made her stare at him in confusion and light up like a city block on the Fourth of July.
She was fairly certain she called his name hoarsely as the pleasure roiled through her. Gabe’s dark laughter told her that he had heard, too.
She had never been so close and connected to someone, and the feeling was pure freedom, giving her the confidence to try anything, to share everything.
Gabe moved over her again, making her body weep, making her back arch as another blinding climax tore through her.
Even before her pleasure peaked, she wanted him again. She closed her eyes. “Gabe, please—”
“Coming, honey.”
The blanket went flying, landing near her panties in the middle of the floor. Summer watched him kick free of his pajamas.
Amazing and hot and ready for her.
Then he pressed against her, and Summer felt the shivery aching begin again, before their skin had done more than slip closer. She climaxed wildly, scratching his chest, panting his name.
“God help us both,” Gabe muttered, hands on her hips, not moving until her shudders stopped. When she opened her eyes, he pushed down, trapping her, giving her time to feel the slow power of his body filling her. There was nothing left that separated them, and as she stared into his hard face, watching his focused intensity, she felt the heat snap through her again.
She moved restlessly, her body on fire. Gabe thrust once, withdrew, and filled her in one hard stroke. She clawed at his back, driven by a need she’d thought only happened to other people.
Yet now with her body molded perfectly to his, she was open to a flood of amazing sensations, poised at the edge of something totally new that she wanted more than breath itself.
“Let it go, honey.” Gabe’s jaw hardened as he pushed up on his forearms, licking the tip of her breast and then biting down gently. “Let me feel you now.”
The shock of his restless fingers made her gasp and spiral out of control while he gripped her tight, driving rhythmically inside her. She felt his penis, hot and huge, and she came to the edge and slipped over, her nails digging into his back while the force of his release filled her.
But of course by tomorrow they would both be gone, their job complete.
And Summer knew that after this night, she would never be the same again.