with masculine intent she would have been alarmed, except then he strummed her again.
And told her how sexy she was, how badly he wanted her, how this was only the first of many so let him watch. Give him this because he needed to see he could make her feel good—
She cried out, embarrassed by the sight of herself losing control, so weakened by the buffet of climax she was wholly dependent on his support as he made it play out for her in lingering strokes that caused pulses of fading delight.
When she hung in his arms, he pressed hot, dry kisses and sexy compliments to her damp temple, finally turning her into his embrace so he could kiss her properly.
She belonged to him then. He utterly and completely owned her, and she didn’t care. If misgivings surfaced, she brushed them away before she could identify them, too busy cradling his face so she could kiss him, telling him with her lips and body how incredible he made her feel.
He was hard, so hard all over. Absolutely primed with arousal, chest like sun-warmed bronze as she opened his shirt and caressed his hot, hard muscles. When she kissed her way across his chest, lightly brushing his beaded nipples with her fingertips, he threw back his head and groaned at the ceiling.
His reaction wasn’t fake. What man as contained as he was would let her see the blind passion in his gaze as he cupped her cheeks and kissed the life out of her? What man that aroused would strip them both, then take his time pressing her to the bed?
What man wanting only to use a woman for his pleasure would kiss his way past her navel and ensure she was as ready as he was?
Sweeping her arms as though she was making angels in the satin sheets, she encouraged him with lusty moans, abandoning herself to the heaven of his tantalizing play. “Roman, I’m so close,” she gasped.
He turned his mouth into her thigh, biting the twitching muscle there, drunk on her scent and taste, wishing he could hold out to finish her like this and arouse her again, but wanting her with him when he lost it inside her.
With a growl of strained control he slid up the silken length of her, pausing for light bites of her gorgeous breasts, eyes nearly rolling into the back of his skull as she framed his hips with her bent knees, offering herself. It was all he could do to fumble a condom into place.
The barest few words could be found in the miasma of his consciousness—heat, softness, roses, citrus, wet, welcome. Melodie.
She arched as he entered her, taking all of him in one slick thrust that sent a streak of sensation down his spine, flexing his shoulders and yanking his stomach muscles into a hot knot of masculine energy. His thoughts grew even more base. Thrust, own. She panted and clutched at him, opened her mouth to his kiss and licked at his tongue without inhibition.
The animal in him took over, protective enough to ensure he didn’t hurt her, but driven by instinct to imprint himself indelibly. He returned to her again and again, his tension and level of stimulation so high he was blind and deaf to everything but her wordless expressions of yearning and need. He wanted everything she was. Everything.
“Give it to me. All of it,” he ground out, needing her complete surrender to passion before he could give in to it himself.
Tossing her head, she cried out jaggedly, trembling beneath him, nails scraping down his upper arms as she bucked. Then it happened for her. He felt her release and his own struck like a hammer. He drove into her pulsing center and held himself there as they both were clenched in the paroxysm of orgasm.
Time stood still. Nothing mattered except this pleasure. No one existed but him and Melodie and this state of ecstasy.
* * *
Roman rolled away, forcing Melodie back to awareness of the room, how intimate they’d just been, that she was supposed to be working...
She covered her eyes with her forearm, not ready to face any of it.
The ring of the phone on the bedside table jarred into the silence. Roman came up on his elbow, damp skin brushing hers as he leaned across her, lifted the receiver and promptly dropped it back into its cradle.
Melodie peeked at him from under her arm. “Booty call from your Swedish friend?”
“For you, I imagine. I only booked the room an hour ago. No one I know would think to look for me here.” Continuing to loom over her, he slid his leg across hers, pinning her erotically to the mattress as he picked up the receiver again and punched a number before bringing it to his ear. “Put my phone on Do Not Disturb,” he ordered, then lowered the phone to ask Melodie, “Do you want anything?”
“I should go,” she said, shifting restlessly under the weight of his leg.
Holding eye contact with her, he said into the phone, “We’ll need a pair of overnight kits, toothbrushes and—” He paused to listen, then said, “Perfect. Thank you.” He hung up. “The drawer in the bathroom likely has everything a couple might need, including more condoms.”
“They said that?”
“It was implied.”
“Did I imply that we needed more? Because I think I said I should go.”
“Exactly. Should. Not that you were intending to.”
“I begin to see why women tire of you,” she said in a pert undertone. “Apparently you don’t tire at all.”
His grin flashed as he settled more of his weight on her and began searching her hair for pins. “Look, I’m no expert, but I’m thinking this hairdo of yours is not going back to the ballroom. So you might as well stay.”
She should have taken her own hair apart, but instead she turned her head on the pillow to allow him to find the rest of the pins while she played delicate fingers across his collarbone and down to his biceps, where he braced himself on his forearm.
This was nice, she thought. It was the sort of sweet moment that should happen after lovemaking. If only...
“Why the sigh?” he asked, making her aware she’d released one. The last of her hairpins went onto the night table and he slid lower so they were eye to eye. “Regrets?” His tone held a fresh note of reserve.
“No,” she said halfheartedly, then more sincerely, “No, this was...” Nice? Hardly. It had been basic and regressive. The blatant way he’d watched her come apart in the mirror, then devoted himself to her pleasure before stamping her with guttural thrusts rushed back at her. The burn of a self-conscious flush crept into her throat and face. “I’m embarrassed, if you want the truth. I don’t fall into bed with men. I don’t behave like this at all. Ever.”
“Except with me,” he said, as though making the statement of a closing argument.
“Except with you,” she agreed softly, shifting her head so she felt his forearm under her cheek and had her lips against the smooth skin inside his biceps. He tasted faintly salty against her openmouthed kiss and smelled dark and masculine as she drew another fatalistic sigh.
“I’m not intuitive, Melodie, but you don’t sound happy about that.”
“Because even if I stay the night, I still
