His lips quirked at her certainty. She began unbuttoning the placket again. "Close enough, sweetheart."
Her fingertips brushed the blunt hardness of him as she fumbled with the last two buttons. "God…Allie…" he muttered roughly. She slid the jeans down past his hips and pulled them off. He sat up and shrugged out of his open shirt, then leaned back against the pillows, his skin dark in contrast to the white bedding.
Allie stood at the foot of the bed, his jeans in a heap at her feet. Slowly, she reached for the row of buttons down the front of her shirt. Even though the air cooled her heated skin, her breasts flushed with passion, her nipples rising.
With shaking fingers, she unbuttoned the placket of her jeans and pushed them down, then stepped out of them.
Brandon held out his left hand to her and she took it. She tried to lie down gently beside him, but he was ready for her, moving closer. "I want to feel your skin on mine, Allie. Not just your fingers, or your hand, or your leg. I want to feel you next to me, all the way."
She nodded. "I want that, too."
He put rough fingertips to her cheek, his gaze drinking her in, memorizing every line of her features. Her breasts grazed his chest before settling lower against the bandaging. She gave a self-conscious laugh that brought a smile to Brandon's lips. He reached to touch the softness of her skin with his left hand, exploring the velvet curves and valleys of her flesh, the hollows of her ribs.
She moaned and thrust her hips forward in a silent plea.
"Easy, sweetheart," he whispered. "Gotta make it good if I'm gonna prove I deserve the prize, remember?" He rolled, his body covering hers exquisitely, his flesh flushed even darker by his heated blood that eclipsed the remains of his fever.
Her hands came to his sides, then halted, her fingers tentative on the bandaging, below his ribcage. "I won't break."
"No. You'd never break, Brandon Gabriel. Never." Sudden tears filled her eyes and Brandon knew she was remembering that hot summer day ten years earlier – when he'd been flogged for a crime she had committed; pilfering that extra piece of bread. Ten strokes of the lash. He'd never broken then. Never cried out. But she had. She'd run forward and thrown her arms around his waist, her own small back bearing the mark of the seventh stroke. They'd peeled her off of him and finished up, and he was gone two days later. As soon as he could travel.
He brushed his lips across hers, and she closed her eyes, hiding the tears.
"Touch me now, Allie. Touch my back."
She shook her head. "It'll hurt." A sob escaped her, her breath hitching.
Brandon kissed first one eyelid and then the other, tasting her salty tears. "No, it won't. I promise."
She opened her eyes to look at him, and he slanted her a half grin.
"I want your hands on me, Allison." He reached to smooth a strand of hair away from her face. "You made me well this time, sweetheart." His voice was husky, as he bent to kiss the corner of her mouth. "I know what you're remembering. You couldn't stop it then, Allie, but this time – this time, you made up for it in spades." He ran his thumb up across the ridge of her ribs, her chill of pleasure following in its wake. "Trust me." His mouth was on hers before he finished the words, her hands slipping around his sides, across the bandage at his back. His mouth curved over hers, and he lifted his head. "Only good thoughts from here on out, okay?"
She nodded. "Okay."
He bent to the curve of her neck, just under her jaw, and trailed light kisses lower, burning a path of fire to her aching breasts. He circled first one nipple, then the other with his tongue, gently drawing each one into his mouth. Allie moaned and arched her back. Her fingers skimmed up his back gently, then threaded through the length of his hair. He left her breasts and moved lower, his skin dragging across hers like polished steel on satin. As his tongue dipped into her navel, and her breath hissed inward. He laughed as he kissed the hollow beside her hip bone, his tongue on her skin for an instant, tasting, before he gently closed his teeth over the swell of her hip.
"Brandon," she whispered raggedly, her hands gripping the sheets as he moved even lower.
His finger trailed fire down the center of her, then slipped inside. She turned her head into the pillow to muffle her cry. They would fit perfectly, two halves of the whole…but this first time, he would take extra care.
She reached for him and he let his taut belly slide up across hers, his shaft hard and thick, poised at the juncture of her thighs.
Allie opened her legs for him, and when he met her eyes, the love he saw for him there nearly undid him. He took a ragged, slow breath, soaking up every bit of what Allie was giving him; herself, and her love.