Charon's Crossing

He had awakened first this morning, with Kathryn in his arms. Just the pleasure of watching her as she slept, her head on his shoulder, her dark hair spilled like the finest China silk over his skin, had made him turn hard as granite.

He'd promised himself he wouldn't wake her. He'd begun stroking her skin with the gentlest of caresses. Her cheek, and her mouth. Her throat, and her shoulder. And then her breast. Just a grazing brush of his fingertips, that was all, and when she'd sighed in her sleep and the faintest smile had curved over her lips, he'd bent his head and kissed her, first her mouth, his lips just skimming the soft fullness of hers, and then her throat, where he'd left a trail of tiny kisses which had inevitably led to his burying his face between her breasts.

The intoxication of her scent, the warmth of her skin, the steady beat of her heart beneath his ear had all conspired against him until the pledge he'd made himself was as worthless as a farm boy in the foretop with a squall on the horizon.

His tenderness had changed to passion, his gentle kisses deepened with need his touch burned with desire and then Kathryn had been awake and aroused and hot as flame in his arms.

When, a long time later, she'd sighed and said she'd thought it might be a good idea if they had something to eat, he'd groaned fallen back on the pillows, and said, hell, yes, a meal was an excellent idea if she didn't want to see his bones melt into a puddle before her very eyes.

She'd started to dress, but he'd stopped her.

"Here," he'd said, tossing her his shirt, and when she'd protested that she could hardly go downstairs wearing so little, his response had been one of perfect logic.

"Don't be silly, Kathryn. The shirt covers more of you than the smallclothes you generally wear."

A wicked smile danced in his eyes because watching her now, he knew just how much he had lied, and how clever he'd been to have done so.

It wasn't that what he'd said hadn't been true. The shirt was loose and long and covered her from her throat to mid-thigh. It was what her glorious body did for the shirt that was driving him crazy. The rise of her breasts, pushing gently against the soft linen, was an instant reminder of the silken weight of them in his hands. The dark outline of her nipples brought back the taste and feel of that honeyed flesh when his lips and tongue adored her, and the sweet, exciting sounds that purred in the back of her throat.

And as she moved, doing all the mundane things one did in the preparation of a meal, the shirt was accomplishing things that were eons from being mundane. The hem fluttered against her slender, golden thighs, tantalizing him. The open neckline shifted, never enough so he could see her breasts but teasing him with hints of their lushness. And when she bent down or rose on her toes to reach for something, her softly rounded bottom peeped at him from beneath the tailpiece.

Matthew smothered a groan. A gentleman would surely have offered to do the stretching and bending for her but he was no gentleman, especially not at this moment. What he was, was a man in danger of being castrated by his own trousers if he didn't do something to stop the pictures crowding his fevered brain.

Kathryn opened the refrigerator door, bent down and peered inside. This time, his groan was audible.

"What?" she said, bumping the door shut with a provocative tilt of one hip.

He shrugged his shoulders and worked at looking casual as he rose carefully to his feet.

"Nothing," he said blandly.

"Are you sure? You have the strangest look on your face."

"Do I?" He smiled, or hoped he did. "Well, that's probably because I'm close to starvation."

She laughed as she set a bowl of fruit on the table. "We can't have that, Captain. Why don't you tell me what you'd like for your breakfast?"

That was easy. What he'd like was Kathryn, right there on the table, with that smoky look in her eyes and her knees up and him hard and driving between her thighs...

Another thought like that and he was liable to embarrass them both. He frowned and turned to glare at the coffee pot while he tugged surreptitiously at his trousers.

"Coffee, for starters. How long does that thing take until it's ready?"

"Another minute and it should be done." Kathryn's brows rose in a delicate arch. "Are you one of those people who's a grouch before you have your first cup of coffee in the morning?"

"I am never a grouch," Matthew said grouchily. Kathryn snorted, and he turned and tried to glare at her but it didn't work, and they both began to laugh. "All right, perhaps I am. Take pity, woman. I am a man in desperate need of sustenance."

"Sustenance, hmm?"

"Aye. A dozen eggs, a couple of rashers of bacon, oatmeal, potatoes and some buckwheat cakes with maple syrup would go down right."

She looked at him. "Tell me you're joking. Please."

"Well," he said, poker-faced, "it is only what I will need to restore the energy you have drained from me."

"The energy I drained from you? "

"Aye. Everyone knows women do not need to do anything in the boudoir save lie back and think pure thoughts."