Hot Blooded

hand. His
tongue was clearly cleverer than the common run, finding nerves she hadn't known
she had. As her muscles threatened to turn to water, he laid her back against
the knife-scored wood of her work table. He was suckling strongly, making small,
hungry noises as if he liked what he was doing as much as she did.
    The vanilla bean she'd been splitting crushed beneath her back.
    On top of everything else, the scent was more than she could take, the sense
that he had pushed into a sphere no other lover had been a part of. The kitchen
was her fortress against the world. Suddenly her heels were locked in the small
of his back and she was grinding against him. She'd never been so desperate for
a climax, so hot and needy and tight.
    "God," he choked, breaking free of her breast and breathing hard. His palm
slid smoothly up her hip. "Please. Allow me."
    Beyond inhibitions, she ripped her zipper down herself, inviting his hand to
slip over her mound and between her folds. He sucked in air as he found her
wetness. She was more than slick; she was drowning. Without resistance, two of
his fingers slipped inside. His thumb rubbed slow, firm circles against her
clit.
    "Go ahead," he rasped, reading the way her muscles tensed. "Squeeze your
thighs around my wrist."
    She obeyed his coaxing without hesitation. What he was doing felt better than
she could believe, better than anyone had ever done for her, better—she thought
with astonishment—than she could do for herself.
    Maybe she should have tried a Frenchman long ago.
    A particularly sharp ache of pleasure dragged his name from her throat. His
eyes came up, shocking her with their fire. His face was strained, his lips
pressed whitely over his teeth. The sight told her how selfish she was being.
    "You don't have to do this," she said.
    He laughed and she realized with something like awe that he was shaking. "You
don't know me very well if you think that."
    "But you—"
    "
I
want to watch you come."
    She had an orgasm as he said it, a sweet, unexpected burst that seemed to
swell just from the husky growl of his voice.
    When it ended, his tongue curled out to wet his upper lip. "There's a start,"
he said with a humor that robbed her embarrassment of its sting. "In case you
haven't guessed, however, I'm a bit more orally fixated."
    Any question about what he meant vanished when he yanked her sweaty chinos
down to her knees. His hands slid up to caress her legs, kneading deeply where
they met her torso. She fought an urge to close her knees, unable to doubt he
liked what he saw. His eyes were glittering with admiration. With a salacious
grin, he squeezed her admittedly well-formed thighs.
    "Must be the bike," he said. "Bet you'll wrap me good."
    "Bastien—" Her protest was lost as he dropped down on his knees. Abruptly off
balance, she grabbed his hair. He had swooped onto her without warning, but any
thought of objection dissolved into a soundless
wow
. Everything he'd
put into his kisses, he brought to this. And this was a man who could tie cherry
stems in double time.
    She gasped as he found her favorite spot and teased it with his tongue,
faster and faster, one hand massaging her sheath while his second formed a V
pointing downward from above his mouth. Those fingers pressed broader, subtler
nerves, spreading sensation throughout her groin. The pleasure was almost
frightening. Her skin was humming, her toes curled hard. She tried to keep quiet
but could not, mewling and twitching until her hips bucked upward and her body
seized deliciously from head to toe.
    He gave her a second to gulp for air, then pushed her over again.
    This climax was even sweeter, more than her greediest hunger could have
asked. She was helpless beneath the spasms, gripped by ripples of joyous surfeit
for long minutes. Her muscles were as warm as cinnamon when she relaxed.
    "Wow," she sighed, the word coming out at last.
    He was quiet, but she felt him smile, his cheek resting on her pubis, his
hand spread across her abdomen.
    To her surprise, she was stroking his decadently lengthy hair. She didn't
know when she'd started and wasn't sure she could stop, though it
seemed—perversely, perhaps, given their recent actions—a too-intimate thing to
do. His hair was thicker than she expected but just as silky. The strands felt
strong when she combed them up off his back, more like a cat's than a human
being's. She smiled to herself,