She laughed, as he’d intended. But then her eyes grew serious and her fingers traced small circles around his navel. “It’s your turn now.”
He inhaled sharply, drawing her hand away. “I can’t,” he said. “I’m not the kind of guy who carries protection around in his wallet. We already took one chance…”
“I don’t think it’s the right time for conception,” she said. “Besides, if we did…um, make a baby, it would be all right.”
His body leaped at her words, but still he hesitated. “I don’t have to.” He was reluctant to overwhelm her, even though his throbbing loins were calling his bluff in a most obvious way.
“What if I want you to?” Her voice was shy and so was the gentle hand that settled on him, but he jumped like a scalded cat and then groaned, relaxing into her.
“My mother raised a gentleman,” he reminded her. “I guess I can’t refuse a lady’s request.”
She stifled a giggle. “Gee, that was hard.”
“No,” he corrected her, rolling to his back and pulling her against his side, “this is hard.” He taught her how to stroke him, wrapping his hand around hers and showing her the speed and pressure that he liked. After her first few moments of tentative exploration, she got so good at what she was doing that he finally had to grab her hand and stop her before he lost it completely. Again.
“Wait,” he said in a strangled tone.
“Why?” Her voice was apprehensive and her hand stopped moving.
“Because I’m going to finish this right here, right now if you don’t.”
She took her hand away and he almost whimpered at the cessation of the hot, sweet pleasure coursing through him. “I liked the way you finished it before,” she told his throat.
He angled himself enough to peer down at her face, his body leaping at the mere suggestion. “The first time?”
She nodded, her eyes still on his throat. She was so shy, he thought with a touch of tender amusement.
He traced her jawbone and dropped his head to press a gentle kiss on her lips. This time she didn’t need to be coaxed to open her legs. This time, he held her gaze with his, looking intimately into her eyes as he slid his hard, hungry length into her receptive body and began to move, holding the eye contact as he felt the tremors of release scampering up his spine. He reached down between them and found her, gently rubbing and rolling her between his thumb and forefinger and her eyes widened in shock. Her mouth opened and she cried out, and as they both began to shudder in the final moments of the dance of completion, he sealed his mouth over hers and drank the sweet cries from her lips.
Allison’s alarm clock chirped a wake-up call at dawn. She’d slept in his arms through the night, and he’d woken several times to the novel sensation of sleeping with someone. It was surprisingly enjoyable even though it wasn’t something he was accustomed to. A doctor in training didn’t have time to sleep, much less think about sex.
But he was thinking about it now. Oh, was he ever!
Allison stirred when the alarm went off, reaching out a hand to turn it off. Still half asleep, he put a hand on her bare shoulder and she turned to him easily, letting him pull her down beneath him and slide into her, the soft wet depths of her body welcoming and already familiar. Hips pumping steadily, he rode her in a relaxed, easy rhythm that nonetheless stoked the fires that slumbered inside him. He took her legs and wrapped them around his waist, angling her hips up so that he was arousing her with each stroke, and when she started to whimper and buck beneath him, he let himself come to her, long slow streamers of release melting his bones and leaving him slumped on her equally limp body.
“Good morning,” he said into her ear when he’d gotten his breath back.
“Good morning.” There was a lilt in her voice.
“Today,” he said, his voice grim as he came awake enough to remember what he’d forgotten, “I’m going to start using birth control.”
She smiled up at him, her eyes sparkling as her hands massaged the muscles at the back of his neck. “Nothing like closing the barn door after the horse is out.” Then she turned her head and looked at the clock again, and immediately her small hands began shoving at his shoulders. “Get up! I’ve got to get moving or I’ll be late! I’m on dayshift today.”
He complied, rolling off her to lie on his back until she was out of the shower. He took a quick shower after her, and by the time he walked back into the bedroom, she was dressed and was brushing her hair with quick, hard strokes. As she pulled it tightly back and began to wind it into its usual confined style, he walked over to stand behind her and put his hands on her shoulders, looking into her eyes in the mirror.
“Are you about ready to go?”
She nodded, turning to the mirror and pushing a few more pins into her hair. “Almost.”
He was distracted by the small, feminine ritual as he watched her tuck up her hair. “I’m glad you wear it up at work,” he said. “I don’t like the thought of anyone else seeing all that hair and getting ideas.”
Her hands stilled in her hair and she turned to stare at him, clearly dumbfounded. Hell, he knew how she felt. Someone he didn’t know had just stepped into his head and uttered words he hadn’t expected to come out of his own mouth.
He cleared his throat. “Let’s go.”
Allison floated through her shift on autopilot, doing all her usual tasks with her usual efficiency, but her mind was back in her bedroom.
I want you to marry me.
When she went into the supply closet for something, she actually pinched herself. This couldn’t be real.
Yesterday, she’d been a plain single nurse with both her virginity and a hopeless crush on the hottest doctor in the whole hospital. Today…in whomever’s dream this was, she was marrying him. And she wasn’t a virgin anymore.
For years, celibacy had been a conscious choice. She’d expected to marry and give her husband the gift of her body. But the years had drifted by and love had never found her. Until Kane. And though she hadn’t known he would marry her, when he’d begun to caress her she’d realized immediately that this man and this moment were what she’d wanted for so many years. Kane had made love to her. To her. He’d marked every inch of her with his stamp—she had brush burns from his beard in some pretty darned intimate places!—and he hadn’t just done it once, either. He’d lingered over her, made sure that she was as satisfied as he was. He’d done wonderful things to her that she’d remember for the rest of her life.
The world was a very crazy place. And she was equally insane, to be standing here dreaming about a wedding and a life with a man like Kane Fortune. One of the Fortunes.
Kane wasn’t really going to marry her, no matter how hard her heart beat at the thought. He’d gotten brusque and abrupt as they’d met in the parking lot after the brief drive and walked toward the hospital doors together. He was probably regretting his offer already.
Well, she would be gracious. Treat it as if he’d been joking. That way she wouldn’t
