“Not yet. You’re going to take me with you and I don’t want to end this.” He pressed kisses down her spine, his hands caressing her br**sts, her belly, flexing at her hips. “Not yet. I want to stay here awhile.”
“Please, Kadan, I can’t stand it.” She felt almost crazy with need, her body on fire, her insides swollen and aching and desperate for release. She couldn’t help herself, pushing back, twisting her hips, finding a frantic rhythm, grinding hard against him.
The breath slammed out of his lungs. Inside his throat—in his mind—he sounded wild, feral, a demon possessed. He buried his fingers deep in her hips, holding her still, his grip hard. He surged deep and she screamed. He pistoned forward, hard and deep, each thrust driving through the bundle of inflamed nerves so that she bucked and cried out, the sensations swamping him as her sheath tightened, strangling him, clamping down so hard he thought he’d go mad with pleasure. An explosive orgasm tore through her and took him with her, destroying all control so that he speared into her harder and faster in a frantic attempt to prolong the tidal wave that ripped up his thighs, down his belly, and centered in his shaft where her body continued to tighten around him, milking him dry. He jerked convulsively and then shuddered with pleasure as he filled her with hot se**n.
He stood behind her, buried deep, his arms wrapped around her waist now while she hung exhausted over the couch. He didn’t even know how they’d gotten started in the first place, only that he would never be sated. He wanted to spend every waking minute just touching her, filling her.
Kadan rested his head on her back, drawing in great deep breaths. “You know, for me, you’re my woman. My wife. Whenever you’re ready, say the word and we’ll do it legal. There’s no way you weren’t meant for me.” Hell, he’d never believed in God; there were too many sick, perverted people in the world, too much crime, and too many natural disasters for him to believe anyone who cared was really out there in the cosmos watching. But Tansy was a miracle. For the first time in his life, it occurred to him that if there was really such a being, Kadan owed big-time—for Tansy, because he believed absolutely that she was created for him. And he knew he’d been created for her.
“Damn it, woman, you’ve even got me thinking spiritual crap.” How pathetic was that?
Her body shook. He straightened up, allowing his shaft to slip out of her, enjoying the ripple that ran through her belly, telling him she was having delicious little aftershocks.
“Are you laughing at me?”
She turned her head, looking over her shoulder at him, a small smile teasing her mouth. “A little, yes.”
“I have what could be a revelation and you’re laughing.” His hands were gentle as he helped her straighten up. He drew the edges of the shirt together and rebuttoned it.
“And your revelation is what?”
“You don’t deserve to know.” He leaned down to kiss her because he couldn’t resist her beautiful mouth. “We’ve got work to do. Stop distracting me.”
“You can set up the game pieces while I take a bath. If I don’t, I’m going to be too sore to walk.”
“I like that idea.”
“You’re so bad, Kadan.” She tossed another grin over her shoulder and left him.
Kadan listened to the bathwater running as he pulled on jeans and padded barefoot into the war room. He didn’t want her here, not where the photographs of the dead would surround them. He took the pieces out into the dining room and, wearing gloves, positioned them on the table in the order of the murders on the East Coast and then the West. He hated that she was going to do this, but he was going to make damned certain she didn’t have the same repercussions as she’d had the time before.
Tansy surveyed the ivory pieces Kadan set on the table. The game pieces were beautifully carved. Whoever had made them knew what he was doing. Each figurine was detailed meticulously. She held her palm over the pieces, an inch or so above the tallest, and passed her hand over them, feeling the waves of excitement and violence embedded in the ivory. Taking a breath, she dipped her hand lower.
Kadan’s hand slid beneath her wrist so fast it was a blur, his fingers circling hers and jerking her hand away before she could pick up one of the ivory carvings. Standing behind her, he held her wrist away from the game pieces. As he placed a proprietary hand on her shoulder, his body curved over hers so that his heat enveloped her.
“Wear gloves.”
“But . . .” She frowned at him over her shoulder. “I won’t pick up the details you need unless I touch the objects with my skin.”
His grip tightened, fingers digging through the thin material of the silk shirt, into her soft shoulder and into the sensitive skin of her wrist. “Gloves.” His voice brooked no argument. “See what impressions you get. We’ll start there. If we’re lucky, it will be enough.”
“You know better, Kadan.”
He pushed a pair of gloves into her hands.
“Do the men on your team ever tell you that you’re a tyrant?”
She pulled the material over her hands and felt some of the tension leave his body. He’d already grilled her for an hour on the layout and security of the house, going over every single detail a hundred times, until she considered hitting him over the head with something. He was very thorough when it came to questioning—no, interrogating—someone.
“You’re so dramatic.” He slid his hand down her arm, tugged on the glove, and then splayed his fingers across her belly.
Heat spread as if he’d branded her. She felt the familiar ache beginning. He pressed even tighter around her, so that she felt him breathing in the same rhythm.
“You’re distracting me.”
“That’s the point. Well . . .” There was grim amusement in his voice. “The point is, I want to touch you.”
She was very aware of his body pressed tightly against hers. His shaft was full and heavy, rubbing along her bottom with only the thin tail of the shirt separating them. How could he be so ready so fast? A part of her was ines-capably pleased. “I’m working here. Do you want to get this information or not? You’re already handicapping me by insisting on the gloves.”
“I’m protecting you. And I’m going to keep protecting you. I have the feeling that once you get started, you can’t stop yourself.”
She frowned and leaned forward to look over the game pieces. Kadan didn’t move, and the action only pressed him tighter against her.