Giving in to the inevitable, she let her hands slide up his chest, revelling in the way his breath hitched in his throat at their slow, delicious progress. Ribbed muscle, solid chest, up to the hot skin of his neck and his dark, silky hair. Her fingers splayed on the back of his skull and she sought his mouth again.
Heaven!
This time the thrust of his tongue was more insistent, blatantly demanding.
And still she couldn’t get close enough to him. The edgy, unsettling sensation in the pit of her stomach intensified. She shifted her weight, trying to ease that indefinable ache, even as she returned his kiss with a passion equal to his own.
His thigh brushed hers. He stepped closer. Sophie felt his body lean in towards hers. His heat pressed against her from shoulder to hip.
And then, on a surge of energy, he crowded her back against the wall, trapping her with his weight so that she couldn’t move, even if she’d sought escape. Her breasts were crushed against him. Her breathing shallowed, but she didn’t want him to move away.
The feel of him, solid and hot along the length of her body, evoked a passion she’d never known before. She wriggled nearer. Immediately he pushed one heavy thigh forward, holding her still. And then he jammed closer, so close she could hardly breathe, nudging her legs aside so that he could anchor himself within the cradle of her hips.
Right where the fire he’d stoked flared brightest.
Every inch of her burned. Burned for him. It was as inevitable as the ceaseless motion of the waves down on the shore. Nothing had ever felt so perfect, as if her body had known him before and was impatient to welcome him home.
It should have scared her. But Sophie was lost. There were no warning bells clanging in her brain, only the certain knowledge that this was right. And that it still wasn’t enough. The musky scent of him, of powerful, uncompromising masculinity, should have made her pause, so blatant was it now as he clamped her body against his. But it only incited her starved senses. And when his hand swept down her side so knowingly, pressing into the curve of her waist, the swell of her hips, and back to tease the side of her breast, she was only aware of the sinuous push of her body into his touch, of her longing for him.
She stretched up against him, eager to match the demands of his mouth as it plundered hers.
Then he gripped her torso in both hands and lifted her higher, pinning her against the wall with his lower body. She gasped at the intimacy of his touch, his erection unmistakable between her legs, against her belly. And the need grew in her there, the restless, empty yearning for physical fulfilment.
His kiss became more potent, devastating in its ruthless sensuality, as he took her mouth, possessed it utterly. His heart pounded against her breasts, its rhythm like a racing train. Matching hers.
And then his hands slid round and cupped her breasts. Sophie sighed into his mouth. Darts of electric energy tingled from her nipples at his every caress and spread burning devastation along her nerves. To her womb. To her legs. To the juncture of her thighs that softened like warm butter against the press of his strength.
When he broke the kiss to press his lips to her throat, she gasped for air in huge, frantic mouthfuls. She was out of control, far beyond any mastery of her own body. She shuddered convulsively as he nipped her ear lobe, sending delicious tremors of awareness through her.
‘You like this, Sophie?’ His voice was a rasping, air-starved murmur that weakened her even more. Through the cotton fabric of her shirt he tweaked her nipple, creating another jolt of blazing excitement.
‘Yes,’ she breathed, her hands busy with their restless exploration of his muscled shoulders, so wide and so tense.
He lifted his head then to stare at her. His eyes glittered with a savage excitement that should have frightened her. Except that it matched her own. The laboured sound of their breathing echoed in the still hall.
‘Good,’ he said, his chest still heaving. ‘Because that’s what you can give me, Sophie.’ He slid his hand down to her waist, insinuating it between them to brush across the front of her jeans, lower and lower, till she shuddered at the explicit contact.
She stared up into a face ravaged by raw need. No evidence of softness, of gentleness there. Only stark lust.
She shivered, but this time it wasn’t with carnal excitement. Finally, too late, she realised she was dealing with a man who didn’t give a damn for anyone or anything right now except the need for release.
‘Sex, Sophie,’ he breathed. His dark-as-sin eyes locked with hers. ‘That’s what I want. That’s all I want from you.’
She watched his lips move, heard the words, yet somehow she couldn’t take them in.
But if she sought something else, some shred of tenderness, some deeper emotion from this man, she was doomed to disappointment. His eyes were febrile with lust. And nothing else. His face had a tightly drawn quality that proclaimed the extremity of his need. Pure physical desire. Nothing else.
What else had she expected?
Cold, hard, unwanted reality doused the roaring inferno that had held her spellbound.
She slumped, her hands still grasping his shoulders for support. He let her slide down the wall so she could stand on her own two feet.
Yet she would have collapsed in a heap if not for his possessive hold on her. Her knees shook as if she’d run a marathon.
‘Nothing to say, Sophie?’ His lips twisted in a humourless smile that finally eliminated the last trace of burgeoning excitement that had grown inside her during their kiss.
All her desperate desire was extinguished as suddenly and completely as a candle snuffed out in a strong wind. She felt hollow, as if something vital had been scooped out of her at his words, and at the emptiness she read in his features.