Each frantic, eager touch may have been her last.
SEVEN
The feeling of Eleanor caressing him slowly penetrated his short-circuited brain. Her hands struck him as sweet and soothing, like they were cooling the fire in his crackling nerves. But there was something else in her touch, an urgency he didn’t understand.
He pried open his eyelids and realized his forehead was planted in the pillow next to Eleanor’s. His cock was still embedded deep in her. He needed to withdraw. Her flesh quickened around him. She was so warm. So sweet. He groaned as reanimated pleasure rippled through his body. Instead of withdrawing, he flexed and groaned again, planting himself deep inside her once more. Her arms surrounded his head, hugging him against her. Had she too experienced that stab of desire to fuse even more than they already were?
It didn’t matter. He had to withdraw or risk spilling in her. He did so, grunting in displeasure at the harsh deprivation of her body.
“Give me a second, okay?” He leaned down and kissed her parted lips. He’d only meant it to be a quick peck before he rose, but her lips were so warm. Delectable. Responsive. It took him a minute to realize he was kissing her wholesale, and was only growing hungrier by the second.
He sealed their kiss, growling in dissatisfaction, although he couldn’t exactly say what he was displeased about. He rolled off the bed. Instead of walking to the suite’s bathroom, he walked out of the room and disposed of the condom in the powder room down the hall. The air felt cool against his perspiration-damp skin when he walked out into the open space of the living room.
He’d worked up quite a thirst. He’d been honing his self-discipline lately, forcing himself to practice his guitar, submitting his body to the most strenuous exercise of his life, beating his brain into submission with his tai chi. But none of that had tested him more than restraining himself with Eleanor just now. And despite expending every ounce of self-discipline he owned, he’d still taken her like a madman. He felt a little guilty about that, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to do it again.
And again.
He entered his kitchen, pausing when he glanced out the window. He heard Eleanor’s voice in his head.
All those times I saw you naked . . .
It was something he did with relative frequency, to be honest: walk around naked, sleep naked, even check his e-mail naked once in a while. He wasn’t a nudist, but he was pretty insouciant about what he wore or did within the confines of his own home. He hadn’t thought about the condo next door much, but when he had, he’d always assumed it was empty. It was usually dark, wasn’t it?
Yes. He peered into the adjacent high-rise, but only saw darkness.
He didn’t like the idea of someone spying on him when he thought he was alone or when he was with a lover. Few would like it. But when Eleanor had made her confession about looking inside to his private world, there’d been something else mixed up with his annoyance. Her honesty had turned him on. And he supposed it was excitement at the idea of a beautiful woman watching him and becoming aroused. That must be what had tempered his anger.
Although, when he tried to imagine other women he knew confessing the same thing, he didn’t experience quite the same reaction.
There was something about her looking into his world with those big, expressive eyes that excited him.
She was messing with his ideas of what he found arousing, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He wanted control sexually. He wanted his lovers to experience intense excitement and pleasure, but he wanted to be the one to sharpen it to a fine edge and then finally grant that blast of precise pleasure. He wanted to be the one in the driver’s seat. Eleanor had yanked that control from him with her exhibitionist displays and admissions of voyeurism. He’d been excited by her confession too. Incredibly so.
But he’d been even more excited by the idea of having her under him . . . completely at his mercy.
It’d been incredible.
When he walked into his bedroom a minute later, two glasses of water in his hands, the first thing he saw was Eleanor scurrying out of his bed. She paused in a sitting position at the edge of his bed when she noticed him. Her eyes went wide, like she’d just been caught red-handed at something.
Escape? he wondered darkly.
“Where are you going?” he asked her, his brows slanting as he walked toward her. She looked adorable, her long hair disheveled and falling over heaving breasts. Debauched. Sexy as hell.
“Nowhere,” she replied breathlessly.
He thought of asking her if she needed to go home to get some sleep. Maybe she had an early workday in the morning? That would be the logical assumption, wouldn’t it? But then her gaze dropped down over his naked body hungrily. His skin prickled beneath her stare. His cock stirred, which both gratified and annoyed him.
And instead of offering her an easy exit, he tilted his head toward the pillows. “It’s chilly. Get under the covers.”
She complied with an alacrity that soothed his ego a little. When she started to climb beneath the sheet, he set down their waters.
“Eleanor.”
She looked up at him, wide-eyed, in the process of pulling the covers over herself. He glanced down pointedly at a protruding boot.
“Oh,” she mumbled. She slid her feet and legs over the edge of the bed. Chuckling, he knelt and unzipped the boots one by one, letting them drop to the floor. Relishing the next part, he slipped his fingers beneath the top of her thigh-highs and began to roll them down her long legs, his fingers brushing against her satiny skin with more frequency than was necessary. He hadn’t lied while they’d been in the heat of things earlier. Her skin was remarkable.
He straightened, his flash of humor at her getting into bed with her boots on now mingling with renewed sexual interest. She pulled her legs up, lay back and yanked the covers all the way up to her chin, looking a little embarrassed.