The world exploded around her. Spasm after spasm shook her body, and all she could do was cling to Marcus. She felt the hard length of him probing her, and she lifted herself to meet him.
She felt herself stretching and stretching, then suddenly he stopped. When she opened her eyes, he was staring at her.
“You’re a virgin.” His voice and his eyes were full of shock.
“What difference does that make?” she asked, her voice wobbly.
“It makes a hell of a lot of difference,” he retorted. He tried to move away from her, but she wrapped her arms around him and held on tightly.
“Please don’t stop.”
She felt him quivering in her arms, felt the tension that pulsed from him. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. Please, I want you to make love to me.”
He groaned and pressed his forehead to hers. “You’re a virgin, Jessica. It’s going to hurt.”
“Only the first time, right?”
He stared at her for a long time, and she could see that he wanted to stop. He was trying to move away from her. So she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him to her. He took her mouth in a deep kiss and pushed into her with one stroke. Then he lay still.
The pain was sharp and stinging, but after a moment it receded. Then he began moving slowly and gently. At first it felt like she was being stretched beyond the limit, but as her body began adjusting to him, she felt sensation stirring all over again.
Wrapping her arms around him, she held him close as the tension built. Then suddenly, she exploded all over again. Marcus tightened his arms around her and shuddered above her, whispering her name.
They lay tangled together, unmoving, for a long time. When the world finally stopped spinning, she shifted her hands so that she could explore his broad, solid back.
He moved to his side and propped himself on one elbow as he stared at her. There was a shadow of sadness in his eyes.
“You should have told me before I touched you,” he said.
“I wanted you to touch me. I wanted you to make love to me.”
“How could you know what you wanted, when you’d never done it before?” He reached over to brush the hair out of her face, a gesture that seemed almost unconscious. “I took something that I had no right to take, Jessica.”
“You didn’t take it. I gave it to you.” Her voice was fierce.
The sadness seemed to fill his face. “Your virginity should have been a gift to the man you love.”
“I didn’t feel like waiting around for him,” she said tartly. She reached up and touched his face. “I wanted to make love with you, Marcus. I’m old enough to make my own decisions.”
“Just how old are you, Jessica?”
“I’m twenty-one, almost twenty-two.”
“And I’m a very old thirty-five.” He stared at her for a moment, then he lay down and pulled her close. “God help me, I know I shouldn’t have done that. But I can’t regret it if you don’t.”
“Not for a minute,” she said. She turned so that she was cuddled against him. “Stay with me, Marcus,” she said, and she heard the weariness in her voice. She was already half-asleep.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Marcus looked at the woman wrapped around him and cursed himself long and silently. He was a real bastard. He should have stopped the moment he realized she was a virgin. Hell, he told himself, he shouldn’t have started in the first place.
He’d known she was upset, known that she needed to be comforted. But what had started out as an innocent embrace had become anything but innocent. And it had happened very quickly.
He’d been too aroused, too hot for her, to be able to think rationally. And she hadn’t done anything to stop him.
It wasn’t up to her to do the stopping, he reminded himself. Once he realized she was a virgin, that had been his responsibility.
She murmured in her sleep and moved closer to him, and he tightened his arm around her. She was only twenty-one years old, for God’s sake. She was far too young for him.
But he had never responded to any woman the way he’d responded to Jessica. The heat of their lovemaking still lingered, and he was becoming aroused all over again just thinking about it.
It was the circumstances, he told himself. That would explain this intense, uncontrollable attraction. It was a well-known fact that danger and excitement were potent aphrodisiacs. Satisfied with his explanation, he closed his eyes and allowed himself to pull Jessica closer against him.
The hushed stillness of the deepest part of the night surrounded him when he woke suddenly. He could feel that Jessica was awake, too. She was tense and silent beside him.
“What’s wrong?” he whispered.
She turned to him, and he saw the fear fading from her eyes. “I’m all right now,” she whispered. “I woke up and didn’t recognize the room, then I remembered being kidnapped. It just took me a moment to figure out where I was.”
“You’re safe, Jessica.”
“I know.” She stared at him in the darkness, a pale sliver of moonlight falling on her face from the window, and he wanted her all over again. She must have seen the need in his face, because she reached up and put her arms around his neck. “Kiss me, Marcus.”
He knew he should untangle himself and tell her to go back to sleep, but he couldn’t look away. Desire raged inside him, and her dark eyes were luminous with need. Slowly he bent his head until he was kissing her, and as her mouth opened beneath his, he felt a rush of need fill him.
She must have felt the same thing, because she turned so she lay pressed against him from her chest to her toes. Almost as if they had a will of their own, his arms came around her and pulled her tightly against him.
He gave in to the need coursing through him and covered her body with his. This time, he tried to be gentle and careful, as he should have the first time. This time, he tried to go slowly. But she arched her back and cried out for him, urging him inside her, and he lost control.
And when she lay clasped around him, her fingers digging into his shoulders, her mouth fused to his, he poured himself into her, feeling the ripples of her release clamping around him. He drank in her cries and clasped their hands together, holding on to her tightly.
They fell asleep still bound together, holding hands. Marcus’s last thought was that nothing had felt this right in a long time.
The sun was shining through the window when he woke up again. He stretched, then went still as he realized that he wasn’t alone in the bed. He looked at Jessica’s blond hair and knew that the night before hadn’t been a dream. It had been very real.
He
