“How is Brent doing? Are you happy with him?”
His expression became wary. “Why do you ask? Have you decided to reconsider his offer after all?” A savage emotion flickered in the depths of his dark eyes. “Well, you can forget it. I may not be as pretty as Penrose, but you’ll have to make do. There’s no way I’m going to let you go now.”
Her eyes widened in surprise. Her question had been perfectly innocent, and she’d had no idea it would initiate such a violent reaction. “For Pete’s sake, I only asked how he was performing, not for permission to climb into his bed.” She raised her chin. “Not that I would have asked anyway. I run my life to suit myself, Roman.”
He scowled. “You don’t have to tell me that. Wandering around the country like a bloody swagman, running rapids and …” His scowl deepened. “What the hell is so amusing?”
“It just struck me funny that you compared me to a hobo. Do you know what my name is?”
“Manda Delaney.”
She shook her head. “Matilda. My father named me for the unofficial national anthem. He’s the most patriotic Aussie I’ve ever met. My two sisters were luckier. He only named them after principal cities, Sydney and Adelaide.” She wrinkled her nose. “But what kid could bear a name like Matilda? When I was six, I dug in my heels and announced that in the future Matilda would not exist. There would only be Manda.”
The fierceness gradually faded from Roman’s face. “I’d say that was more than enough.”
She nodded. “I was a handful.”
“You still are.” He crossed the room toward her. “Bend over and let me dry your hair. You’re just dabbing at it.”
She obediently bent over, and he immediately enveloped her head with the towel. He began to rub briskly with far more thoroughness than gentleness. “Ouch! I feel like a lamb being shorn.”
“Stop grousing. I’m trying to keep you from getting pneumonia.”
“And enjoying every minute of it.” She was silent for a moment, then asked thoughtfully, “You’re still angry with me, aren’t you?”
His hands hesitated before he resumed rubbing. “Probably.”
“Why? You’re not being reasonable.”
His words were so low they were muffled through the towel. “I’m jealous as hell, and jealous men aren’t known to be reasonable.” She tried to raise her head. “Be still. Let me finish with this.”
“I want to see your face.”
“You can delay that aesthetic treat,” he said bitterly.
“Roman … I don’t understand. You’re one of the most secure people I’ve ever met. Jealousy isn’t an emotion I’d attribute to you.”
“There are times when I’m not at all secure. You’d better learn that fact now. I can be jealous and possessive and more uncivilized than you could imagine. Some of the things I feel on the inside are just as ugly as what you see on the outside.”
She fought free of the towel, and looked up at him. “You’re not—”
“Don’t lie.” His eyes were blazing down at her. “I know what I look like. I accepted it a long time ago. I just wanted you to know you have to be careful.” He threw the towel aside, and she was suddenly in his arms. “Because you’re one of the things I’ve found I can’t be civilized about.”
His lips covered hers with so much hard passion that her lungs were robbed of breath and her knees of strength. Heat. She felt a throbbing heat that defied reality. As her breasts pressed against his hard chest, they became excruciatingly sensitive. His lips moved to her throat and he kissed the cord of her neck. He shuddered, his muscles coiled with tension. “I want to drive into you and never come out,” he muttered. His tongue moved yearningly against her throat. “I want to crush you and— Tell me to stop. I want to hurt you, dammit.”
His voice was so intense it rocked through her. “I don’t want you to stop.” She pressed closer and felt another shudder ripple through him. “But I also don’t want you to make love to me in anger. Why do you want to hurt me?”
“Go away.” His arms tightened around her even as he said the words. “I don’t want this. I don’t want anyone to have the power to churn me up and turn me inside out.” His next words were halting and muffled in her hair. “I’m scared as hell. I guess I want to strike out before you come too near. I don’t want to give anyone the power to hurt me.”
Manda could feel tears sting her eyes as a melting tenderness inundated every particle of her being. His confession had been raw and clumsy and poignantly touching. “I’ll never hurt you. I only want you to love me. Please trust me.”
He pushed her away to look down into her face; his was taut and pale, his jaw clenched, the jagged white scar on his cheekbone becoming more prominent. “I think I’m going to have to.” His voice was thick with emotion. “But heaven help you if you betray me, Manda. I don’t know what I’d do to you if I found—”
Her fingers swiftly covered his lips. “No threats,” she whispered. “No violence. Just love me.”
His eyes were still dark with torment as he slowly opened his lips and captured her fingers in his mouth. He sucked gently, his warm tongue outlining each finger.
She couldn’t get her breath; her breasts rose and fell as if she were running. The movement of his tongue was lighting tiny fires inside her that were spreading into her bloodstream and melting muscle and bone in their wake.
The torment was now gone from his eyes, replaced by a smoky sensuality. He reached up and slowly pulled her fingers from his mouth, his teeth gently serrating her flesh, his tongue both soothing and teasing. “I love the way you taste. I’m going to have to sample more of you.” He nipped lightly at the tip of her index finger. “Much more.”
She tried to think of something to say, but her mind was a haze of heat and sensation. She could only stare up at him helplessly.
His hands moved to the side button of her khaki shorts. “You’re wet. Let’s get these clothes off you.” His fingers were trembling as they moved to the zipper and slowly slid it down. “Are you cold?”
“No.” She barely managed to get the word past the tightness in her throat. “Hurry.”
“I don’t want to hurry.” His gaze was fixed on her full breasts which were outlined in bold detail by the wet cotton of her T-shirt. “For the last five nights I’ve been lying awake thinking about all I want to do with you. I don’t know if I can pull it off, but I want to do everything in slow motion.” He tugged the shirt out of her shorts and pulled it over her head. Then his fingers went to the front closure of her bra and slowly unfastened it. “I’ve never seen a more beautiful sight than you standing up in that Jeep with your hair flying around you and the look on your face as if you wanted to make love to the whole damn world.” He slid the straps of her bra carefully down her arms. His eyes fastened on her naked breasts, and his breathing became shallow and strained. “I wanted to stop the Jeep and rip your clothes off in the middle of the wind and the rain. I was hurting so bad I thought it would kill me.” His fingers slowly unbuttoned his ivory-colored shirt, and he shrugged out of it. “All I could think about was how you would feel around me. Silky and tight and … Come here.” He pulled her to him.
She inhaled sharply. Sensations she’d never experienced before assaulted her with stunning force. The thatch of dark curly hair on his chest was pressed against her sensitive breasts, his strong, heavily muscled thighs were suddenly on either side of her own, and his arousal was insinuated against the center of her womanhood. She was surrounded by the scent of soap and the erotic musky aroma of his maleness.
“Do you want me?” His voice was harsh. “I’m going crazy. If you don’t really want me, you’d better tell me now.” His heart was drumming wildly against her breasts. “I can’t hold on much longer.”
She didn’t want him to hold on at all. How could he doubt she wanted him when she was lying against him as pliantly as putty? “Roman, you idiot. I want you.”
His hips moved back and forth, thrusting and retreating
in jerky rhythm to his words, filling her with hard pulsing desire. “Tell me what you want me to do to you. Do you like this?”
“Yes.” Her hands ran up his shoulders, exploring the swell of muscles beneath his smooth, tanned skin. She instinctively widened her stance. “I think I …” She closed her eyes and her hands clenched on his shoulders as the muscles of her stomach knotted with painful tension. “Maybe not. I’m hurting so.…”
“Here?” His hand slid down beneath the layers of clothing to gently, sensuously rub the naked flesh of her stomach. He laughed softly as he felt her muscles contract beneath his hand. His hand wandered farther, and his palm cupped her, twining his thumb into the tight curls he found below. “And here?”
She swayed toward him with a little cry, jabs of lightning surging through her with every stroke of those long, clever fingers. Her eyes opened slowly, languorously, to see his face only inches from her own, his gaze intent, his lips curved with heavy sensuality.
“And what about here?”
She gasped and a shudder racked her body. His fingers … She stood there, immobile, staring into his eyes as if hypnotized. She couldn’t have moved a muscle even if she’d been told a cyclone would strike the next moment. A cyclone would have been minor compared to the tempest her body was experiencing.
“Tell me what you want.” His voice was as soft as velvet and was coaxing, wooing her. “Words excite you. Say those words, Manda.”
“I want you … inside me.” She had to wait a moment to recover from the wave of heat that rolled over her. He was right. Saying the words added to the excitement she was feeling. “I want your tongue on my breasts.” The clenching in her stomach spasmed once more, and her breath was coming in little gasps. “Roman, I can’t talk anymore. I can’t—”
“Lord, neither can I!” His hands left her. An instant later the khaki shorts and the bikini panties beneath them were sliding to the floor. Then he lifted her up and carried her to the bedroom.
“My tennis shoes,” she said vaguely. It seemed oddly undignified to be totally nude with the exception of her shoes.
“I’ll take care of it,” he said as he laid her on the deep brown satin coverlet. “I’ll take care of everything.”
He was already taking care of everything. The tennis shoes were gone, and he was stripping the rest of his own clothes off quickly. In the dusky half-light he appeared as a huge shadow standing over her. His broad shoulders tapered down to a slim waist and hips, and his heavily corded thighs bulged with brawny power. She suddenly felt very small and defenseless lying before him. Strange. She couldn’t ever remember experiencing a feeling of helplessness before. Did all women feel this same sensation of weakness in the final moment before total physical commitment?
She was acutely conscious of even the most minute details of her surroundings. The drumming of the rain on the metal roof, the cool feel of silk beneath her naked body, the silver gleam of a mirror on the wall beyond Roman’s shoulder.
“You’re so little,” he said. “I didn’t realize how little you were until now.” His tense voice echoed her reaction as if he had read her mind. “I know I’m a big man, and I’ll do my best not to hurt you. Don’t be afraid of me, Manda.”
Warmth and tenderness banished her temporary uncertainty. She held out her arms. “I’m not afraid. I’ll never be afraid of you.” She laughed huskily. “I’m only afraid you won’t hurry.”
She couldn’t see his expression in the dimness of the room, but she knew he was smiling. There was a smile in his voice as he sat down on the bed beside her. “No chance of that. I couldn’t slow down now even if you asked me to.” His large hand hovered over her breast. “You have magnificent breasts. You should never wear anything to cover them. I’d like to keep you prisoner in a lovely suite where only I could come to see you. I’d dress you in silks and velvets, but they’d all be designed to reveal your wonderful breasts.” His hand closed on her left breast.
She gasped. She’d been expecting it, but his warm hard hand still carne as a sensual shock. He hesitated, and she could feel his gaze on her face. “I didn’t hurt you?”
“No.” His thumbnail was flipping back and forth on her nipple, and she had to bite her lip to keep from moaning. “You have a very erotic imagination.”
He slowly lowered his head. “You couldn’t say the words, so I’m saying them for you. Do you think you’d like dressing like that for me? Can you see me coming into the room and moving toward you? I’d walk very quickly because all through the day I would have been thinking about you waiting for me. By the time I walked through the door, I’d be ready to explode.” His lips brushed back and forth on her erect, pointed nipple. “Just as I am now.” His tongue flicked out slowly, teasingly. “You’re trembling. I’m trembling too, love. Does it excite you to know all you have to do is let me touch you, and I tremble?” He went on with his fantasy tale, interspersing it with strokes of his tongue and the gentle pressure of his teeth. “I’d try to spend a long time pleasuring your breasts because I love them so much, but I wouldn’t be able to hold out for long. I’d pull you down to the soft white fur of the carpet and move over you.” He was over her now, parting her thighs. “I’d be nearly frantic by that time, and I’d push up your silk skirt and …” His fingers were rubbing, stroking. She gasped, her hips arching helplessly up to him. “I hope I’d be able to wait until you were ready for me, but I don’t know if I could be that patient. I’d be so wild for you. My guts would be tied in knots, and all I’d be able to think about is how wonderful it would be to come into you. To have you take every bit of me.” He slid slowly between her thighs. She clenched her teeth and held her breath. Fullness. Heat.
He paused and was still. Great shudders racked his body. “End of fantasy,” he said thickly. “The rest is reality. All right, Manda?”
She was breathing so hard her answer was almost a whisper. “All right.”
“Will you take me?”
Didn’t he know she wanted nothing else more passionately? “Yes.” She moistened her lips. “Oh, yes.”
He plunged forward. An instant of blinding pain caused her to cry out, then there was only hot fullness and savage satisfaction.
She felt him freeze above her. “Manda?”
“It’s all right. I’m fine now.” Her legs curled around his hips, and she hugged him to her. “I guess I was startled.”
“You’re not the only one.” There was a touch of grimness in his tone. Another shiver ran through him. He flexed yearningly within her. “What the hell am I supposed to do now?”
“Go on.” Her teeth pressed against his shoulder. She could barely speak. So full. Part of him. “For heaven’s sake, go on.”
“I don’t think I have any choice.” His voice was hoarse with desperation. “Lord, I can’t even think.”
She licked delicately at his shoulder. He tasted smooth and salty. “I like the way you taste too. Perhaps later …” She couldn’t remember what she’d been about to say because he moved suddenly. Forceful, pistonlike strokes shook her to her foundations and drew low half-moans from deep inside her. Friction, beauty, a fiery hunger that fed and was reborn from its very satiation.
She could hear his harsh breathing somewhere above her. She wished she could see his face. He was deep, and then deeper inside her. She opened her lips in a silent scream to relieve the tension. Too much. Not enough. Pounding. Beauty. Heat. Her head tossed back and forth on the pillow. “Roman …” It was a whispered plea.
“Soon.” The word was spoken through gritted teeth in a tone so guttural it was almost inaudible. “Move with me.” His hands cupped her buttocks and lifted her into each stroke. “Give to me.”
She gave to him in a flurry of response she thought would destroy her. The tension grew into a fever of hunger. The muscles of his thighs bulged, gripping her hips as his knees dug into the mattress. “More,” he said thickly. “More, Manda.”
There was no more. Only blinding rapture, a release from tens
ion that offered not freedom, but a different bondage. Roman gave a low cry as he buried his lips in her throat.
It might have been minutes or hours before she was able to fight her way through the silken languor that was filling her senses. Her heart was still beating wildly and she felt too lazy even to open her eyes. She wanted to stay where she was forever. Possessed, possessing, fulfilled.
“I’m crushing you,” Roman said jerkily. “Though I don’t know why I’m worrying about that now. I must have almost torn you apart.” His voice was heavy with self-disgust. “And I said I’d be careful with you. How badly did I hurt you?”
“Hardly at all after the first …” She opened her eyes. “And what pain there was, I invited.” She smiled. “As I’ll always invite you, Roman.”
He moved off her and swung his legs to the floor. He sat on the side of the bed, his hands clenched into fists, his spine taut with strain. “Why, Manda?”
“Why was I a virgin?” She shrugged. “I don’t kn—” She stopped. “Maybe I do know. I guess I always knew someday the great adventure would come my way. I’ve gone after every bit of excitement and adventure that ever came beckoning to me, but maybe it was all leading up to this. Why become jaded and risk not recognizing the real thing when it came along?”
“The real thing?”
“Love,” she said simply.
He was silent for a moment, as if searching for words. “You really meant it when you said you were in love with me?”
“You still don’t believe me?”
“I’m beginning to think you believe it.” His words were halting.
“Of course I believe it. I was pretty skeptical myself at first, but I guess it has something to do with heredity.”