'Don't you think it would have been obvious? Especially given the kind of intimacy I'd planned to—'
He saw the excitement begin to burn in her eyes and he cursed himself for the way his body immediately responded to it.
'Are you sure this is what you want? An affair that—?'
Carly stopped him. 'I don't want an affair. I just want to have sex with you.'
'Just sex?' Ricardo questioned, not sure that he believed her.
'Yes. But of course if you'd rather not...' she added lightly.
No one gave that kind of challenge to Ricardo.
'You'll cry ''enough'' before I do,' he told her against her mouth.
He was barely brushing her lips with his own, a feather-light touch that, as Carly quickly discovered, made her hunger for more. Her own lips clung to his, willing him to part them with his tongue as he had done before, and a shudder of visible pleasure gripped her body when finally he did so, thrusting the seeking point of his tongue deep and hard within the warm softness of her mouth.
His hand cupped the back of her head and his tongue plunged deeper, twining with her own. She could feel the heavy slam of her heart as it banged against her ribs—or was it his?
He was holding her right up against him, so close that she could feel his erection. And she wanted to feel it. And not just to feel it—she wanted to see it, touch it...experience it deep inside her.
She felt weak and dizzy with arousal, her whole body shuddering with pleasure when Ricardo cupped her breast and then slowly circled his fingertip around her nipple. Lazy delicate circles that were driving her in sane. She sucked in a deep breath and felt the corresponding tightening low down in her body. Unable to stop herself, she reached out and touched the hard ridge of male flesh, mimicking Ricardo's caress as she circled the head of it with her fingertip and then traced its whole shape through the fabric of his clothes. It felt thick and strong. Her fingers trembled and so did her body.
To her shock Ricardo immediately released her. She stared up at him through the darkness.
'I need a shower,' he told her thickly, 'and you are going to share it with me.'
He had taken hold of her hand. She could break free of him if she wanted to, but she knew that she didn't.
He guided her through the darkness past the shape of a huge bed and then into a dressing room, switching on the light as he did so.
'It's a wet room,' he told her. 'So we undress in here.'
Undress. Her mouth went dry. But Ricardo had turned away from her and was already stripping off his clothes.
Mesmerized, Carly watched him, her curiosity followed by an awe that darkened her eyes so that when
Ricardo looked at her he could see arousal shimmering in them, just as she could see his arousal, straining tautly from its thick mat of dark springy curls.
Her legs had suddenly gone weak.
Her fingers trembling, she started to tug off her own clothes, hesitating only when she got down to the silky sheer thong that barely concealed her sex.
Ricardo had turned away from her and was walking towards the door to the wet room. Carly took a deep breath and then followed him.
Ricardo touched a button, and immediately lusciously warm water sprang from hidden jets, soaking her.
'Do you really need this?' Ricardo was standing in front of her, hooking one lean finger under the narrow strap of her thong whilst the pad of his thumb stroked sensuously against her bare skin. Thrills of pleasure skittered over her.
He leaned forward and stroked his tongue-tip over her lips. Carly exhaled in a voluptuous sigh and closed her eyes, moving closer to him. The soft stroking touch of his fingertip traced the edge of her thong very slowly, and then traced it again.
'Mmm... '
She could feel the heat building up between her legs.
Ricardo's fingertip was tracing down the side of her thong. She could feel herself starting to shudder.
His hand moved back, easing her thong down...out of his way. Her legs had gone so weak she could barely stand to step out of it.
Half dazed, she started to soap herself, tensing when Ricardo took hold of her hands and told her softly, 'That's my job—and my pleasure.'
The silky suds made his hands glide sensuously over her flesh: her breasts, exquisitely sensitive now to his touch, her belly, where the spread of his fingers caused the heat inside her to turn her liquid with longing, her behind, which he soaped with a long slow movement that left one hand resting on the back of her thigh whilst the fingers of the other stroked between her legs, and then right up along the wet cleft between the swollen lips of her sex.
Helplessly Carly leaned into his caress, her body clenching on shudders of arousal. Driven by age-old instinct, she reached out and enclosed him with her hand, eagerly caressing the full length of him, and then released him again so that she could explore the swollen head of his erection. Now he was the one doing the shuddering, then subjecting them both to a sudden swift pounding of more water jets to rinse their bodies free of suds.
She had always believed that she was far too tall and heavy for any man to ever be able to pick her up bodily, but now, for a second time, Ricardo was proving her wrong, Carly thought, as Ricardo finished toweling her dry and then lifted her into his arms.
The bedroom was now bathed in soft lamplight, and the bed linen was cool beneath her skin as Ricardo laid her on the bed and then bent his head towards her own.
'Still want this?' he whispered against her lips.
'Yes,' Carly whispered back. 'Do you?'
For the first time since she had known him she saw genuine humor in his eyes.
'My arousal and desire are quite plainly evident.'
'So are mine—to me,' Carly told him huskily.
His hand cupped her breast. 'You mean this—here?' he murmured, his thumb stroking lightly against her nipple. 'Or this—here?' His knowing stroke the full length of her sex made her moan with pleasure. Her arousal-swollen flesh housed a million nerve endings that were pleasure points, and it seemed to Carly that Ricardo's caress lingered over each one of them. And then he stroked her clitoris, rhythmically and deliberately.
Immediately her body arched in supplication, her gaze fixed on his. How could she ever have thought his eyes were cold? They burned now with dark ire.
His hand moved away. He kissed the side of her throat and then her collarbone, sliding his free hand into her hair and cradling the back of her head. Already she was anticipating—longing for the feel of his mouth against her.
Her throat tightened, shudders of pleasure running through her as his tongue-tip traced a lazy line down to her breasts and circled each nipple. A soft breath of longing bubbled in her throat. His lips closed over one nipple, his tongue working it. She gasped breathlessly, reaching out to hold his head against her body, her fingers locking into his hair as she arched up against him, unable to stop herself from wanting th
e wild surges of pleasure his mouth and fingers were creating inside her.
Of their own volition her legs fell open, her muscles contracting as she felt the warmth of Ricardo's hand skimming her body and then coming to rest against the small curls covering her sex.
Heat ran through her to gather beneath his hand. A pulse of need was beating where he touched her.
She had believed that she knew desire, but all she had known was its shadow. This, its reality, was over powering, overwhelming her.
She felt Ricardo's thumb probing the cleft below the soft curls. A pleading, mewling sound broke from her lips and she lifted her body towards him.
The dark ire in his eyes burned even more hotly. But not as hot as the ire burning inside her.
Wild tremors seized her and she whimpered in help less arousal as he parted the outer lips of her sex and then started to caress her.
The white heat of ravening need filled her, her head falling back against the pillows. Her hips writhed frantically against the movement of his fingertip as he rubbed it the full length of her, lingering deliberately on the hard swell of her clitoris.
No woman had ever abandoned herself, given herself to him and his pleasuring of her like this, Ricardo acknowledged. He didn't know how much longer he could keep his own arousal under control.
She felt hot and wet, the swollen lips beneath his fingers opening to him of their own volition to offer him the gift of her sex.
A wild surge of longing engulfed him. It wasn't enough that he could feel her; he wanted to see her as well.
Carly cried out in protest as she felt Ricardo move, but his hand was still resting reassuringly on the mound of her sex and his body was still openly aroused. Her eyes, though, still asked an anxious question, and as he sat up Ricardo answered it for her, telling her rawly, 'I want to see you. I want to watch your sex lush with pleasure and lie open and eager for my touch.'
Wild thoughts of urging him, begging him not to, led, as she felt him caressing her again. But this time... This time, as her head dropped back and her body was gripped by intense surges of pleasure, she could feel him caressing her lips apart, exposing her swollen, glistening secret inner flesh to his gaze and his touch. Just the pressure of his fingertip against her clitoris made her cry out in frantic arousal. He bent his head and his tongue stroked along her silken folds. All the way along them, Carly recognized on a shudder of fierce delight, as the hard-pointed tip of his tongue probed and stroked into life sensations she had never imagined existing.