And to taste her again.
He waited for her to pull back, fully aware of her rules, counting on those rules to protect them both.
Her breasts pressing into his chest didn’t feel as if she was pulling back. Nor did the sweet lips opening beneath his. With a vague sense of assurance that she’d stop them soon, Kirk deepened the kiss, his lips playing with hers, tasting, discovering.
She was sweet, with wine—and with her own unique essence. Her tongue was bolder than he’d expected, confident, not at all shy in either advancement or exploration. The intrusion set his blood on fire, making him instantaneously hard.
And if he’d thought she wouldn’t notice that reaction, she quickly disabused him of that idea as she pushed her hips against him, fanning a flame spreading quickly out of control.
“Valerie?” He drew back, breath ragged, wondering if he’d have to be the one to prevent a disaster from happening. Though, at the moment, with the wine slowing his brain, he wasn’t sure how anything that felt so incredible could be a disaster.
“Mmm?”
Her eyes opened slowly, focusing on him. He waited for reason to dawn. And while she stood there, gazing up at him with a peculiarly peaceful expression on her face, he continued to wait.
He kissed her again before he lost his chance. Just one quick caress… A quick caress that turned into minutes of mutual hunger, of mutual response, inciting something—a feeling—he’d never experienced before.
Kirk knew about passion. The giving of it and the receiving. He knew about desire, about blood that boiled and bodies that consumed. He didn’t recognize the compulsive drive pushing him to know this woman. An instinctive perception that he would be changed, and that if he missed this chance, his life would never be what it was meant to be.
Still, he drew back a second time. They had an understanding. Important decisions and choices that had already been made.
Her moan of disappointment cut through him. Laying his forehead against hers, bringing an end to an inexplicable interlude, he forced words he didn’t want to speak. “What are we going to do?”
“Well…” She sounded as though she’d been running. “I guess my bed is the most logical choice, but the couch is closer.”
The surge of pressure in a groin already swollen to uncomfortable proportions consumed all awareness for a second. And then he was kissing her again. Like a man who was on his way to much more than kisses.
She took his hand, this judge who was also completely woman, soft and sensuous, a mystery and a coming home. She led him through a house he’d yet to see and, eventually, into a bedroom every bit as large and elegantly appointed as his own. Where his wall of windows overlooked the mountain behind him, hers had a view of the city lights.
Not that he gave them more than a cursory glance.
Her bed was king-size, a four-poster of light pine, that stood a foot higher off the ground than normal beds. Just the right height for him to lean her back against it, letting the bed support her while he pressed into her.
“You’re wearing too many clothes, Judge Simms,” he whispered. He’d used the title without thinking, but knew the distinction was important. He could do this, couldn’t not do it if he was honest with himself, but he could be under no illusions about who she was. Who he was.
While his mind was occupied with the things he couldn’t forget, Kirk’s hands were just as occupied, removing the lime-green button-down silk blouse Valerie had worn to dinner. A blond curl snagged on the top button as he pulled the blouse off her shoulders. Bending closer to gently free it, he found his lips irrevocably drawn to the indentation between her neck and shoulder blade.
“You’re as soft as powder,” he said.
“And you, sir, are far too good at this,” Valerie answered back, her chuckle turning into a moan as his lips continued across her chest to the opposite side of her neck.
His hands shook as he dropped her blouse on the floor at their feet and ran his palms along her lower back, around to her belly and up to her waist. All the while, his lips were floating across her skin, to her lips, along her neck. He felt as though he was never going to get enough of her. She was exquisite.
When he could stand the anticipation no longer, he moved to the front clasp of her bra, hardly daring to believe he was finally going to see her breasts. To touch and taste them. He’d been trying for weeks to pretend he hadn’t noticed them. Or wanted them.
“Hold it.” He could hardly suck in breath when he heard Valerie’s demand. Didn’t she get that it was about half an hour too late?
He stopped anyway, hands at his sides, and stepped back.
For someone who’d just put an end to sublime sensation, she wasn’t doing much to help the recovery process. Still spread before him, arms splayed behind her, hips jutting out at the edge of the mattress, she looked more like a wanton than a woman of the court who’d just given a mandate she meant to have followed.
“I might be slightly desperate, but you gotta join me here.” Her words didn’t make sense.
“Take off your clothes, Kirk, if you’re planning to take off mine.”
Never had he undressed so fast, or so clumsily. The old Kirk Chandler might very well be alive and well inside him, but it was definitely the new Kirk in this woman’s bedroom.
“Better?” he asked, standing before her completely naked, reveling in what had to be the best moment of his life.