Donovans 03 - Pearl Cove

cream-licking kind of smile. It was still on her face when she opened the bathroom door. “I said, ‘No wonder Coco can’t wait to get past a man’s fly.’ ”
    He smiled despite the familiar stab of heat in his crotch when he saw the rise of her breasts against the white towel, a towel that was too small to entirely cover the dark nest of curls between her legs. All that kept him from kneeling and burying his face in those curls was the clock ticking in his head, the damned clock that told him he was running late. They should be on their way to Broome by now. Yet there were so many things he wanted to do to her, for her, with her; a whole world of sensuality waiting for them.
    It had waited for ten years, Archer told himself. It will wait a little longer. The fact that he wanted to suck on her tender flesh now—right now—was too damn bad. He was old enough to control himself.
    Or he had been, up until an hour ago, when he had laid her down on the tile floor and found out just how much he had been missing in life.
    “What do you usually wear when you go to Broome on errands?” he asked.
    Hannah didn’t miss the thickening of his voice, or the silver flicker of heat in his eyes as he looked at the bottom of the towel that almost covered her. “Shorts. A tank top. Sandals.”
    “The usual, huh?”
    She nodded.
    “Underwear?” he asked.
    “Bikini bottoms. Bras are too hot in the rain months. Why? Do you have some kind of thing for underwear?”
    He laughed even as his body tightened. “If it’s yours, I have a thing for it.”
    “And I know just where you keep it.” Smiling, she looked at the Aussie walking shorts he was wearing. It was her new smile, the one that told Archer just how much she had enjoyed being his lover. And that she was looking forward to being his lover again.
    Soon.
    “Get dressed, Hannah. My good intentions are getting even smaller than that damned towel you’re almost wearing.”
    “Who needs good intentions?”
    “I do. It had been a long time for you. You’re going to be sore enough without an instant replay.”
    “How about a slow replay?”
    “Even worse.”
    “You sure?”
    “Positive.”
    “Damn.” She sighed. “I’ll get dressed.”
    She turned away, only to go still when Archer’s palm slid up the inside of her thigh and tenderly cupped the soft curls.
    “I’m sorry I was rough,” he said quietly.
    She stared over her shoulder at him. “You’re kidding, right?”
    “No.”
    “Archer, have you looked in the mirror? I left marks on you!”
    He grinned. “Did I forget to thank you?”
    “Yes. No! Bloody hell, the point is you didn’t bite me or scratch me. I was a lot harder on you than you were on me.”
    “I’ll make it up to you when you’re not sore.” Gently he skimmed her hidden sex, parting soft folds. The flesh heated, moistened, until his fingertips were damp, too. “God, I wish this was my tongue.”
    Her eyelids flickered down and her legs trembled as she focused on the sweet caresses he was giving her, barely penetrating her with a fingertip, for all the world as though he was tasting her. “How do you know just how to touch me?”
    “I’ve had ten years to think about it.”
    He entered her tenderly once, twice, then withdrew so slowly that her head tilted back as though it was suddenly too heavy to hold upright.
    “Get dressed, sweetheart. Think of me thinking about you. Think of all those things I want to do to you. Think of things you want to do to me. I’ll wait for you outside.”
    Archer turned and left the room quickly, while he still could. The sweet heat and ease of her response made his blood burn and his mind go blank.
    The front door closed hard. Hannah sighed and opened her eyes. She was alone in the bedroom.
    And she was thinking about Archer thinking about her.
    She dressed by habit, picked up her purse, put on her sunglasses, and headed for the front door. When she stepped out into the white violence of the sun, she stopped dead. Archer was there as he had said he would be, backpack slung over one shoulder, waiting for her.
    And Coco was standing close enough to him that her hard-tipped breasts rubbed his bare chest every time she took a breath.
    “Something wrong, Coco?” Hannah asked.
    Coco’s black eyes gleamed as they roamed again over the man who had introduced himself only as Archer, the man who had neither backed up nor moved toward her. He was tall and rangy, with the kind of strength that made her