He wondered if she had any experience with that. Because he didn’t. He liked the encounter so far, though. “Feels good to me.”
“Great. Then we’ll just...get rid of these clothes.” Her hands were shaking, and he wasn’t feeling any steadier. “I have to admit I’ve wondered what you’d look like,” she said as she pulled off his shirt.
“You have?”
She kissed his chest. “Haven’t you wondered about me?”
“Only every night.” He caught her hand as she unfastened the buttons on his jeans. “But are you sure this is going to be okay? There’ll be no regret in the morning?”
“No, of course not,” she replied, and that was enough for him. As far as he was concerned, they’d reached the point of no return. He realized now that he’d wanted her from the first moment he’d laid eyes on her, and he was so charged up at finally being able to touch her in this way that he could no longer form coherent thoughts, let alone come up with an argument that might make him choose a different course.
“God, I’m glad the furnace at the farmhouse didn’t work,” he said and brought her down the hall to his room.
*
Lourdes hadn’t slept with anyone except Derrick for...years. Before him, she’d been too focused on her career to get involved with anyone. And she’d never been the type to take the risks associated with random hookups. There’d been her high school boyfriend. Then the guy she’d lived with when she first moved to Nashville. They’d had a rocky on-again, off-again relationship that had stemmed mostly from physical attraction, since they’d had nothing else in common. After she broke up with him and moved out, she’d gone long stretches without a love interest.
She was probably looking at another one of those long stretches now—once she returned to Nashville—so she figured she might as well enjoy herself in Whiskey Creek. Kyle wasn’t the kind of man a woman ran into every day. She didn’t agree with Noelle’s methods of trying to keep him, but she could see why his ex was sorry about losing him. Not only was he easy on the eyes, he was solid in every other way—and there was no question that he knew how to arouse a woman.
Just before they reached his bedroom, she pulled him back to her for another kiss—and pressed her face into his warm neck as he unzipped her dress. These days she was constantly plagued by agonizing worries. Everything had such high stakes and dire consequences. But for right now, for this minute, Kyle seemed capable of holding all of that at bay. He made her feel something both powerful and positive, and she wasn’t about to deny herself what she most needed. After what Derrick had done, why should she?
She watched Kyle’s face, noting his anticipation as he tugged her the rest of the way to his room and finished removing her dress. Maybe he was just a friend, but with him, she felt more desirable than she’d ever felt before. He didn’t offer her the outlandish praise or the promises that Derrick had in the beginning. Kyle said nothing. It was the way he touched her that seemed so meaningful.
Goose bumps broke out on her arms as he took the time to look at what he’d revealed. She still had on her bra and panties, but he smiled as though he liked what he saw. In any case, he didn’t take off the rest of her clothes. He kissed her until she was so ready for him to go further she was about to take them off herself—and yet she stiffened when his hand finally slipped inside her panties.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, raising his head in concern.
Nothing was wrong. That was the problem. This was almost too right. What if, in the process of slamming the door on her relationship with Derrick, she ran headlong into a love that could be even more consuming—and ravaging? One that might have the power to make her want to stay in a place like Whiskey Creek?