“It’s time for me to make good on my rain check,” she finally managed to reply in a very breathless voice. “I can’t do that if you’re touching me.” And driving me absolutely crazy.
Slowly, as if he knew precisely how much she liked it when he teased her, he untangled his hands from her hair and lifted them to the headboard. “Not much time left on the clock,” he warned her in pretty much the sexiest voice ever.
Oh God, knowing that he was quickly approaching the end of his patience with letting her play sent sizzles all the way to her core.
“Then I’d better make the most of every single second.”
The muscles and tendons of his shoulders, arms, and torso flexed as she pressed her palms flat over his chest. For a handful of precious moments, she closed her eyes and just let herself feel his heart beating.
When she opened her eyes, she nearly gasped at the way he was looking at her. Not just with desire, but with something that looked like love.
She couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.
Could only yearn for a love like his.
How could she do anything but kiss him again and wrap herself all around him and wish that she never, ever had to let go? It had never been this easy, this good, with anyone else. So good that she wanted to freeze-frame right here in this moment, forever.
The next thing Rosa knew, she was beneath Drake, his strong limbs pressed over hers.
“I know I should have some control by now,” he said as he ran sweet, hot kisses all over her body, sending her spinning around and around and around, from head to heart, body to soul, by the time he spoke again. “But when it comes to you...”
He was inside her before she could take her next breath. Somewhere along the way he must have slipped on protection, but she’d only barely been able to hang on to her senses when he was kissing her, touching her, thrilling her.
As they moved together as though they’d been made only for each other, Rosa finally gave up trying to control the magic. For this one perfect morning, she simply let herself be utterly bewitched. Enthralled. Possessed.
And when she felt herself falling, she not only trusted Drake enough to let herself go, but for a few wonderful moments in his arms as pleasure peaked higher than ever, she trusted herself too.
*
Working together in the kitchen a little while later, they devoured huge helpings of bacon, eggs, and toast. Oscar did his fair share, licking their plates so clean that washing them almost seemed like a waste of time and water. But since Rosa was eating Drake’s food and sleeping in his bed, she washed while he dried. They were just finishing up when Oscar nudged the back of her leg with his leash in his mouth.
Rosa laughed as she washed off the soap bubbles and dried her hands. “Time for a walk, is it?”
“You don’t want to see him when he misses it,” Drake teased. “Grouch city.”
She couldn’t imagine it. “Actually, I wouldn’t mind stretching my legs a little before I get back into serious posing mode on your leather chair.”
“My sister left a pair of mud boots here last time she visited, if you want to try them on.”
Sleeping in his arms, making breakfast together, walking his dog in his sister’s borrowed boots—if she let herself, it would be so easy to believe this was something more than a temporary break from her life. Especially if she let herself stay much longer.
It was going to be hard enough to finally face the public, the TV producers, and her family. But leaving Drake was suddenly looming even larger than all of that. Because once she left him, she could not only never come back—she could never speak of their time at all. Not if she wanted to keep him clean.
“Rosa?” His big, sexy hands were on her face, and he was gently stroking her cheeks with his thumbs. “I lost you there for a minute, didn’t I?”
There was no point trying to deny it. “I was thinking about the show.” And how much I hate the thought of leaving you soon. She tried to smile as if her stomach wasn’t in knots. “Do you have a jacket to go with your sister’s boots?”
Serious eyes held hers for a few more moments, before he nodded. “Out on the mud porch.”
Once jackets and boots were on, the three of them headed out into the woods. The sun was out, but the morning air was cool enough that she was glad for the jacket over her sweatshirt. For the past five years, she’d worn custom and couture, but she wasn’t sure she’d ever been quite as comfortable as she was in a faded red raincoat, yellow mud boots, and her Montauk sweatpants. She felt surprisingly sexy too, which mostly had to do with the fact that this morning after they’d made love, she’d washed her bra and panties in the bathroom sink and left them hanging to dry, so she was currently going completely commando beneath her sweats.