“Harper, this really isn’t something we should—” It was some move, or so she would think when she could think again. With a subtle shift, a tiny bump, they were fitted together. Angle to angle, line to line so that every inch of her body felt the jolt.
“Oh,” she murmured. “Uh-oh.”
A smile flickered at the corners of his mouth, then that mouth was on hers. Hot and warm and sweet, like liquid sugar. The kiss was a slow, irresistible seduction, a drugging of the senses, as his hands cruised over her, a light and lazy touch. A touch, she thought mistily, of a man confident enough to take his time—sure enough that he had plenty of it.
And his lips rubbed silkily over hers until she’d have sworn she felt her own shimmer.
It was like being gradually, skillfully, thoroughly melted, body and will, heart and mind, until what choice was there really, but surrender?
She moaned for him, that soft, helplessly pleasured sound. And she yielded, degree by erotic degree, until the fingers that had gripped his shoulders went lax.
When he eased back, her eyes were blurred, her lips parted.
“Hayley?”
“Mmm.”
“That’s not the response of a woman who isn’t interested.”
She managed to get her hand on his shoulder again, but it wasn’t much of a push. “That wasn’t really fair.”
“Why not?”
“Because . . . that mouth.” She couldn’t stop her gaze from dropping down to it. “You should need a license to kiss that way.”
“Who says I haven’t got one?”
“Well, in that case. Do it again, would you?”
“Was planning on it.”
It was the same rush with the wind spewing in through the door, and his mouth lighting small, sparkling fires inside her. Little tongues of heat, she thought, that were going to lick their way through her until she simply dissolved.
“Harper.” She said it with the kiss, shuddering at the sensation of their lips moving together.
“Hmm?”
“We really have to stop this.” She couldn’t resist nipping that sexy bottom lip of his, just a little. “Sometime.”
“Later is good. Let’s say next week.”
She had to laugh, but it came out shaky, then ended on a gasp as his mouth slid from hers to find some magic point just under her ear.
“That’s good, that’s . . . exceptional. But I really think we need to wait, just a . . . Oh.” She let her head fall back as his cruising mouth found yet another magical spot. “That’s so . . .”
She turned her head to give him better access, and her heavy eyes blinked clear. Widened. “Harper.”
When she jerked in his arms, he just shifted his grip. “What? It’s not next week yet.”
“Harper. Oh God, stop. Look.”
Amelia stood in the doorway, the storm raging at her back. Behind her, through her, Hayley could see trees whipping in the wind and the bruised fists of clouds that smothered the sky.
Her hair was matted and wild, her white gown streaked with mud that dripped, it seemed to drip, into a filthy pool over her bare and bloodied feet. She carried a long, curved blade in one hand, a rope in the other. And her face was a mask of bitter rage.
“You see her, don’t you? You see her.” Hayley shuddered now from fear and cold.
“Yeah, I see her.” In one easy move, he changed his stance so Hayley was behind him. “Y