Drake didn’t move. He simply watched her with molten eyes, still fully dressed.
“Do you want me?” he asked hoarsely.
“You have no idea,” Grace whispered.
“Show me.”
Show him?
She looked down at herself. Her nipples were hard, cherry-red. Her left breast fluttered with her pounding heartbeat. Of course, he couldn’t see her liquid knees, couldn’t feel how tight her chest was.
There was only one other thing she could show him.
Grace parted her legs, one knee slightly bent. Looking down, the angle was wrong for her, but surely he could see the lips of her sex glistening? With her legs spread, the air felt cool on her wet sex.
“Show me more,” he insisted.
O-kay.
Still gripping the corner with white fingers, Grace ran her free hand slowly down the center of her body. Her skin felt hot to the touch, slightly damp. One finger between her breasts, then the flat of her palm over her belly.
Drake’s gaze followed her hotly, riveted on her hand.
When she stopped her hand along her lower belly, his gaze snapped up to hers.
He didn’t even talk, just jerked his head downward.
More.
She nodded jerkily.
They were both beyond words now.
Grace opened her hand and slid it between her legs, closing her eyes as she touched herself. She needed Drake’s touch, she craved it, her vagina wept for it. At least her fingers quenched the red-hot heat, if only a little.
She ran her index and middle fingers along the lips of her sex and moaned a soft exhale of breath.
Drake shuddered again, throughout his entire body.
Slowly, because if she moved quickly, her legs would give way, Grace slid her middle finger inside her and breathed out again in a harsh gasp, as if she’d been hurt.
It wasn’t pain she was feeling.
Drake moaned too.
She slid her finger out a little, then back in. It wasn’t anything like feeling her husband’s member inside her, but it was something. Anything was better than this empty, hungry heat that cried for his touch.
When she slid her finger back in, her vagina clenched around it, hard. Her legs instinctively tightened, her stomach muscles pulled.
She looked down, saw it, looked up at her husband. He saw it too. Her hand slid away and she showed it to him. The palm of her hand and especially her middle finger coated with her juices.
She licked her middle finger.
It was as if he suddenly burst free of restraints. He lunged for her, pulled her against him while somehow, at the same time, freeing himself, pulling his huge, erect penis out from his pants.
With one arm her husband, the strongest man she’d ever seen, lifted her up, settling her legs around his waist, and entered her with one hard thrust.
They were kissing wildly and they both exhaled as he pushed hard into her.
With no effort whatsoever, one hand behind her head, the other holding her by the hips, Drake walked them to the bed.
Every step moved him inside her, inside her highly sensitized tissues, even the slight movements almost as exciting as his thrusts.
She was whimpering by the time he reached their huge bed. Bending over slowly, still embedded inside her, he gently placed her back on the bedspread and sprawled on top of her. When bending, she could feel the iron-hard muscles of his stomach against hers through his silk shirt.
It was exciting, being completely naked against him, his penis deep inside her, while he was fully dressed. She could feel the unyielding muscles of his back and shoulders under the silk shirt against the inside of her arms, the back of his hard thighs, encased in the polished cotton pants, against her legs.
She felt completely open, completely vulnerable to this hard, tough, highly dangerous man who would never hurt her.
His penis was like a hard, hot club inside her.
He was huge. When they made love, his foreplay lasted forever because he wanted to make sure she could take him without pain. He’d been able to enter her in one stroke only because she’d been so excited and so very wet.
She pulsed around him, another hard pull of her vagina and he winced.
“Not yet, my love.”
The words ran around her empty head, not making much sense. But there was only one answer to her husband. “Okay,” she panted.
Grace lifted herself, eyes closing as she felt him lengthen even further, something that should have been impossible. Already it felt as if he were reaching up into her heart.
She pulsed around him again and felt him jerk inside her.
“Wait!” He moved around on top of her doing something that pushed him even further inside her.
A shoe thumped on the floor, coupled with a huge thump of her heart. Her entire body stilled, centered totally on where he was inside her, so hot and heavy.
Moving on her, in her, another thump and she exploded in a climax, writhing under him, clinging to him with her arms and legs as she clenched around him explosively, pulling hard on his penis with her internal muscles.
Her back arched and sounds came out of her mouth, animal sounds, sounds almost of pain while the firebomb of heat kept her pulsing against him, clenching rhythmically, shaking with the intensity of it.
Finally, the pulses died down, became less intense, less on the knife’s edge of pain. Became a sensual pleasure, like rocking on an endless warm ocean. And then stopped.
She was coated with sweat from head to toe, utterly incapable of thought, incapable even of directing her muscles. Her arms fell to her sides, her legs opened, no longer able to cling to his hips.
She relaxed utterly, rocking on that endless ocean, simply breathing and enjoying the aftershocks of intense please.
Finally, she was able to open her eyes, only to find his dark brown eyes staring into hers from less than an inch away. He was so close she could feel the wash of his breath over her face.
He smiled, a slow curling of his lips that made her toes curl.
“Ah, my love. If you climaxed that hard when I took off my shoes, what’s going to happen when I take off my pants?”
Sydney, Australia
The next day
Drake stood at the huge picture window of the luxury penthouse apartment he’d rented. It had been expensive, but that was nothing. As a matter of fact, if this trip went well, and Grace enjoyed herself, there might be other trips to Sydney and he would buy this apartment or one like it.
They wouldn’t come often. It is not good to tempt fate, as the Americans said. Maybe twice a year. He could just buy this flat under an assumed name and keep it for their use.
Because, well, Grace was excited and happy, and next to keeping her safe, that was his priority.
The apartment wasn’t a fortress like his penthouse in Manhattan had been. The windows weren’t bullet-resistant, as they had been in Manhattan. The truth was, though, that with all his security in Manhattan—the armed guards 24/7, the elaborate electronic sensor system, the bulletproof windows—it hadn’t been enough to keep him safe.
The assassin’s attack had almost taken his life and would have if not for Grace, who’d saved him.
New York had been dangerous for him in a way Sydney was not.
New York was a nexus for the kind of men who bought what he had had to sell. No doubt there was some kind of arms trade in Sydney but it was small scale and didn’t involve the major global players. He should know. He’d been at the top of the pile.
He looked out over the exquisite harbor, the brilliant setting sun painting everything with a vivid glow, bringing out the intense colors of the ocean, the light reflecting like diamonds off the many beautiful buildings.
Seeing things from an aesthetic point of view was new. It was his curse and his pleasure, and entirely Grace’s fault. All his life, it had never occurred to him to look at things and see their beauty. All he had ever done was scan his environment for threats
and, God knows, there had been enough of them.
Threats.
He sent out his senses, reviewed the situation. They’d flown over in his company’s private jet. They’d entered the country under different identities, he’d rented the apartment in the name of a shell corporation that could never be traced back to any specific human being, and the tickets had been bought in the name of yet another identity.
They’d worn broad-brimmed straw hats and large sunglasses from the airport to the apartment, which was perfectly plausible since it was nearly 100 degrees outside.
Heat at Christmas. He’d spent his entire life in the Northern Hemisphere with the exception of two visits to Johannesburg. A balmy Christmas season still surprised him.
It had been 92 degrees in Sivuatu when they’d left.
He admired the scenery while continuing to scan for threats, but nothing pinged his radar.
Of course, it was perfectly possible that his radar had been permanently ruined by the most frightening emotion known to man—happiness.
Happiness could kill him.
Happiness terrified him and fascinated him. He’d never been happy in his previous life. Though he’d been the top player in a dangerous game for a very long time, his ascent there had been brutal and he’d had to remain vigilant every second of every day to stay alive on the top of that heap.
What he’d had had seemed enough. Power and the luxuries money could buy.
But then, of course, there was the blood price to be paid—hatred and fear and envy. Murderous rage. Men on three continents whose only thought was to assassinate him and take his place.
Vigilance was in his DNA, but he’d had little reason to exercise it since he’d died and started his new life with Grace.
Was he getting soft?
He mulled that over. A safe life, someone to love… would that be his downfall? Men had been known to grow soft, lose their edge, and then their life.
He searched inside himself carefully because he was betting not only his life but Grace’s.
No. Certitude settled in his chest. They were safe. This could be done. This might even be the new normal.
A safe, happy life with the woman he loved. Unthinkable before now.
“Darling?”
Drake whirled and his heart turned over in his chest. How could that be? They’d been together a year. He’d had her hundreds of times. He knew her body and her soul inside out. And yet, there it was.
When he saw her unexpectedly, his heart would give this huge thump in his chest like a heart attack, only not. He knew because he’d gone to a cardiologist and had his heart checked. The doctor had smiled and said he would live to be a hundred.
It was Grace who did this to him.
There she was, in a beautiful dress she’d had made from a bolt of pale turquoise Chinese silk her seamstress’s son had sent from Shanghai. It had cost practically nothing. The seamstress was superb but inexpensive.
Grace had made her own jewelry—glass beads with intricate swirls of color strung on strands of silk. She had a cream shawl in case the air turned chilly later on, simple sandals, a simple small black purse. Her entire outfit cost about half what he usually spent on wine at dinner with one of his mistresses back in Manhattan and she looked like a million dollars.
“You look beautiful,” he said softly and she looked up at him in surprise.
His entire body felt on edge, skin too tight to contain it.
“Thank you,” his love said with a smile. She walked up to him and touched his cheek. He covered her hand with his and brought her hand to his mouth. He touched his tongue to her palm and watched her pupils dilate.
Ah, yes. She felt it, too.
Grace stepped back sharply, as if against a magnetic current.
She shook her head. “I know what you’re thinking. And much as I’d like to play with you, we have reservations for dinner and the opera.”
“Yes, ma’am.” With some difficulty, Drake reined himself in. Over the course of the past year, he’d grown used to having Grace whenever he wanted. There had never been any constraints other than if she was feeling desire or not.
She felt desire right now, it was clear. A faint rose under her light tan, breathing irregular and fast. Oh yes, she desired him too.
But he couldhave her, any time he wanted. It would be selfish of him to indulge himself now and miss the dinner date, when dinner and the theater were his Christmas gifts to her.
Drake had a great deal of control over his body. He’d held perfectly still while a bone had been set and stitches had been taken without anesthesia. He could deal with the tiny bite of deferred lust.
He held out his arm like the gentleman he wasn’t.
“Ma’am? I thought we’d walk to the restaurant. It isn’t far.”
He enjoyed the inrush of breath, the blinding smile she turned up at him, the blush of joy. “We can walk to the restaurant? That would be wonderful. It’s a beautiful evening. But—but is it safe?”
For the millionth time, Drake realized what he’d asked of Grace. To give up almost everything for him. She’d told him she used to love taking long walks around Manhattan. They hadn’t gone for a walk—a real walk—since they escaped the assassination attempt over a year ago.
He tucked a shiny red-brown lock of hair behind her ear and bent to kiss her cheek. “We can walk.”
They took the elevator down and plunged into the happy Christmas crowds on the street. Grace’s head was swiveling to catch everything. He knew she was storing up images, colors, shapes, and nuances of light.
His head wasn’t swiveling but he was alert. They walked a pedestrian street filled with happy crowds. Some kids were breakdancing and they stopped to watch. They were very good, a delight to watch. Fluid and lithe, awash in the joy of youth and health. Unobtrusively, Drake let an Australian hundred dollar bill flutter into the silk top hat on the ground.
“Your spidey sense telling you everything is okay?” Grace’s amused voice sounded behind him.
He turned to meet her smiling eyes. “Hmm? My spidey sense?”
Grace laughed, hooked her arm through his again. “Obviously, your knowledge of pop culture is deficient. It comes from Spiderman. He has a spider’s senses, greater than ours. Your pickle.”
He looked down at her and she laughed again, elbowing him in the side. “Your pickle? Of awareness?”
“Oh.” Drake looked around as they walked. No, strolled. Strolled. To his certain knowledge, he’d never walked slowly through any city, enjoying the sights. And for the last ten years of his criminal career, he’d never walked at all, but had himself driven from point A to point B in an armored Mercedes with tinted windows and its own air supply. Cut off from the world in a steel cocoon of safety.
Never, ever like this—alive to all the sights and sounds and smells of a great city.
He expanded his awareness. He had a highly refined sense of danger, born of a lifetime of battle. An entire lifetime where a moment’s inattention, underestimating an adversary, not noticing the details of a hidden threat could get him killed.
Danger usually manifested in a sense of dread, a tingling at the nape of his neck, cold in the pit of his stomach.
Nothing. He was feeling absolutely nothing like that. No coldness, no darkness. No threat. Just happy human beings as far as the eye could see. Some were hurrying, yes, from point A to point B, but most were ambling along, looking at the brightly lit shop windows, enjoying the last of the sunshine. Many poking their heads into restaurants, planning the evening meal.
How had he missed this his entire life? All this movement and activity, sights, sounds, smells? There was a palpable essence in the air he could only ascribe to happy people all in one place and it was something he had never experienced before. Something he had never even known was possible.
“No pickle at all,” he said absently. He took another sweep, encountering only people minding their own business, with no interest in him whatsoever. If anythi
ng, a couple of men took appreciative looks at Grace, then turned their heads when he stared them down.
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Grace rubbed her head against his shoulder, the kind of gesture that still baffled him. A gesture of affection, totally unrelated to sex. “Being with all these happy people on a sunny day?”
“Yes, my love. It is. It is very nice.”
By now Drake had grown used to Grace’s uncanny understanding of his emotions. At times, she seemed to understand him better than he understood himself.
It would have frightened him, but the one thing he had come to understand this past year, the thing that now formed the bedrock of his existence, was that Grace truly loved him. He was safe in her hands, in every way.
“I checked the map. The restaurant is not far from here. And the opera is just around the corner.” He gave an exaggerated shudder and Grace laughed again.
This was all so delicious. So unusual. So… so new. He was getting no danger signals at all. He saw very few security cameras and was certain that their hats and sunglasses were sufficient disguise.
So. They might be able to do this a few more times.
It would please Grace and damned if it wouldn’t please him.
A quarter of an hour later, they were at the restaurant.
The restaurant was beautiful. La Mer.Modern fusion cuisine with French overtones, or so the restaurant site had told him. He had no idea what that meant, but the food smelled delicious.
It was a large, modern space filled with light. The entire back wall was plate glass doors looking out over the glorious harbor. The doors were open. Directly outside the doors was a long, narrow infinity pool, artfully situated so that it looked as if the edge of the pool merged with the ocean.
Instead of air-conditioning, there were big ceiling fans and an ocean breeze wafting through the room.
Waiters bustled by holding plates of food that looked like works of art. Judging from the pleased expressions of the diners, the food tasted as good as it looked.
Grace stopped on the threshold, looking around slowly. Her face glowed as she sighed with pleasure. “This is fabulous! And the food smells so good! However did you find it when you said you’d never been to Sydney before?” She smiled up at him. “What a foolish question. You Googled ‘Most expensive restaurant in Sydney’.”