Rules of Engagement (3 page)

All of a sudden, wings of panic and uncertainty fluttered in her stomach. What if he rejected her? What if he became upset like Marcus and sent her packing? No. No, he wouldn’t. She had to think positively.

Katarzyna nearly laughed. And would have if her stomach wasn’t tied into knots. She took a breath. She was a homicide detective. She went after killers for a living. And here she was, afraid of exposing herself to a man.

Heart pounding so loudly she was sure Jake Duquesne could hear it, her hands went to the bottom of her shirt and grabbed two fistfuls of material. Male hands covered hers and tightened. Her eyes flew to his.

“What are you doing?” he asked hoarsely, his breathing audible and shallow.

Her tongue flicked out and moistened her unexpectedly dry lips. “Taking my shirt off.”

He squeezed, his grip cutting off the blood circulation to her hands. She must’ve made a sound because he immediately loosened his hold.

“Why?”

She bit down on a corner of her lip and inhaled deeply through her nose. She couldn’t be coy. Not now, even though it felt like she was about to jump off the side of a cliff. No lifeline, no parachute. “Because I want you to see me. I want you to touch me,” she said, the words so soft she wasn’t sure he heard them.

Something flared in his eyes, making her sex clench as a twinge of alarm flickered through her. He
did
hear her. He leaned in a fraction of an inch. “Do you know what you’re asking? Did you hit your head harder than I thought?”

A choked laugh escaped her, but his fingers flexed in warning and she cut off the sound. “I want you.”

“You don’t know me.”

Her lips thinned. “I don’t care,” she insisted, frustration making her bolder. “I want you and I know you want me.”

“Yes, I do,” he growled, not sounding entirely pleased.

“Am I going to have to beg?”

An emotion too fleeting to identify crossed his features. Then he shoved her hands aside, whipped her shirt over her head and tossed it carelessly on the floor. He gave the scraps of white cotton covering her breasts a cursory glance before reaching behind her and unfastening the bra. The garment joined her shirt. Then he covered her soft globes with his rough hands.

Katarzyna forgot to breathe again as he stared at her while his hands cupped and molded and squeezed her naked flesh, his fingers plucking the taut, pink nipples. The feel of his calluses abrading her skin was amazingly sensual, making her moan softly. She closed her eyes, letting her other senses take over—and cried out sharply when the wet heat of his mouth enclosed one nipple. She braced her hands on the mattress behind her as her head fell back.

He suckled her, gently at first, one large hand supporting her back while the other kneaded her other breast. He let her feel the edge of his teeth and she moaned, arching her back to push more of her aching flesh into his mouth. He complied, taking more, increasing the pressure. She moaned his name, making it an entreaty, and he trailed his lips across her chest and lavished attention on her other breast.

Katarzyna gasped as the air chilled her wet flesh where his mouth had been, but the molten fire moving through her soon made her forget everything else except for the voracious mouth that was now moving down to her navel.

He lifted his head just an inch from her rapidly rising and falling abdomen. His eyes gleamed. “Lie back,” he ordered huskily.

As soon as her shoulders touched the bed and her legs were uncrossed, his hands moved to the snaps on her jeans, undoing them all with one single tug. He pulled her thong and her jeans off simultaneously, baring her from head to toe for his eyes.

As he stood by the bed and loomed over her naked body, she flushed, but not with embarrassment. How could she be embarrassed when all of her ached with the need for him to touch her, to fill that emptiness deep inside her?

“Fuck, you’re beautiful.”

The words were almost guttural and made her reach for him with her arms. He splayed a hand across her tummy, his fingers easily spanning her hipbones, and kept her flat on the bed. Then he sifted through the short, damp curls covering her sex and slid two fingers inside her. Another gasp, not entirely of pleasure, escaped her as her inner muscles automatically tightened around his thick fingers. There was discomfort, but it wasn’t painful. Just a fullness that made it hard to breathe.

She had the notion to tell him she was a virgin, but it was a fleeting one.

He closed his eyes and groaned. “Jesus, you’re tight,” he said thickly. He shoved his fingers in deeper, then moved slowly back and forth. She inhaled sharply. “So tight. So wet.” His thumb found her swollen clitoris and rotated, pressed. “Fuck, I can’t wait.”

His hands withdrew from her body. He stripped off his clothes in a blur and was suddenly kneeling between her spread legs, his body a golden statue in the lamplight. Hands on her thighs, he spread them wider, then cupped a buttock in each palm, lifted her hips and thrust powerfully.

Katarzyna bit her lower lip to hold back the scream as her body bowed with the sudden pain, her hands twisting the sheets. Losing her virginity hurt more than she imagined it would. But it was done. He was inside her, a hard, heated length that filled her more than she thought possible.

“What the hell!” he exclaimed harshly. He stared at her, his expression incredulous, his fingers digging into her ass.

The pain was subsiding and the aching need was back, twisting inside her. “Please,” she whispered, arching her hips. “I need…” She moved again, this time flexing her inner muscles, and, with a deep groan, he snapped out of his shock-induced immobility.

He moved wildly between her legs, plunging hard and fast. The friction of his shaft rapidly rubbing her inner walls was borderline painful and made her cry out again and again. She writhed in his hold, not sure if she was trying to escape or get closer. It didn’t matter because his iron grip wouldn’t allow her to get away.

She felt a little helpless as he loomed over her, surrounded her, filled her. The need inside her grew and tightened unbearably. She opened her eyes and there he was, sweat glistening on his skin, his chest working like a bellows, his face frozen in a frightening expression. Panic stirred in her chest once more.

“Don’t fight it,” he forced out between clenched teeth. “Come for me.”

She wanted to come. It felt like she was at the breaking point, but it just wouldn’t happen and it felt maddening. Needy, helpless, frustrated sounds tore from her throat as Jake’s thrusts grew in force and speed. Her hands dug into the mattress and her fingers tore at the sheets. So close. His hands moved to her hips. It felt so close. He tilted her hips, found another angle. The tension shattered and there was brilliance and she was falling endlessly.

Above her, Jake felt her climax, threw his head back, sealed her body tightly to his and came with a harsh cry, his strong body shuddering.

When awareness returned, Jake stared down at the woman beneath him.

“Did I hurt you?” he managed to ask in between gasps for breath.

Breathing laboriously herself like she’d just run a marathon, Katarzyna simply nodded.

Stupid question. Of course he’d hurt her. She was a virgin and he hadn’t been gentle. He’d introduced her to sex with all the finesse of an overeager teenager. All at once, a primitive possessiveness filled him. He was the only man she’d had sex with and he was fiercely pleased.

He wanted to collapse on top of her, let the exhaustion take over and sleep for the next hundred years. But he couldn’t. Instead, he slowly withdrew himself from her body with a wet sound, lowered himself onto his side next to her limp body and fell onto his back. Not questioning the need, he captured her hand, dragged it over his hammering heart and kept it there.

For a long time, their harsh breathing filled the room.

“Care to explain?” he asked when his heart no longer threatened to beat right through his ribcage.

“What’s there to explain?” she asked, still a little breathless. “I was a virgin.”

“You should’ve told me. It might’ve been a little easier for you.”

She attempted a laugh, but she didn’t have enough air in her lungs. “I’m fine,” she reassured him. “In fact, I’m feeling pretty damned good right now.”

Contentment and something else, something more intense, moved through him. He felt pretty damned good himself. Jake couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt like this, if ever.

“How are you still a virgin?”

She blew out a breath. “I have three older brothers. All big. All very intimidating. Their missions in life are to make mine miserable.”

She sat up and tugged on her hand, which he reluctantly released. He looked at her, both brows lifted in question. She flushed. “I, uh, I have to clean up,” she explained awkwardly, sliding her legs over the side of the bed.

He sat up abruptly, struck by the realization that he hadn’t used protection. “Shit!”

She glanced at him over her shoulder, one brow cocked inquiringly.

He raked his fingers through his sweat-dampened hair. “I have a clean bill of health. My last physical was six months ago. I swear I’ve never had sex without a condom until you.”

Her throat muscles moved as she swallowed and, despite his panicked realization, Jake wanted to press his mouth to her neck so he could feel the play of muscles. She must’ve read his sudden urge because she went even redder. “And I’m on the Pill. I take it to regulate my cycle,” she explained hastily.

She stood up and clutched the bedpost with both hands when her legs wobbled. Jake was instantly on his feet and scooped her up against his chest. Her arms went around his neck. “Thank you,” she whispered into his throat.

He made his way to the bathroom, nudged open the door with his foot, set her on her feet in the soaker bathtub, letting her lean against the cool, white tiles, and joined her.

Her eyes widened. “What are you doing?”

“Making sure you don’t fall down and hit your head,” he said, whipping the white, almost sheer shower curtain across the shower rod, enclosing them in a private world that seemed more intimate than the bedroom. He twisted the taps, tested the temperature and pulled the lever to divert the water to the showerhead. “Besides, you can’t wash your own back.”

And, with a soapy body puff, he proceeded to wash her back and every other part of her body, ending up on his knees before her as the hot water beat down on them and filled the small room with curling steam. He let the body puff fall from his hands and ran his palms up the inside of sleek, toned thighs. They quivered at his caress. Fingers clutched at his head.

With his thumbs, he parted her trimmed nether curls and her plump labial lips. She was soft and slick, and he couldn’t resist a lick. A moan sounded above him and the fingers in his hair flexed. He licked her again, a broad stroke from her vagina to the tiny bundle of nerves he now teased with tongue and teeth. She gave a tiny thrust of her pelvis at him and he smiled against her flesh.

He returned to her vagina. She was more open now, and her own clear juices helped her easily accept three of his fingers. He lapped at her, all the while twisting and pumping his fingers inside her heated channel until she gasped out incoherent pleas. She tugged on his hair. He stood up and flattened her body against the hard, wet tiles, her breasts crushed against his chest, her taut middle cushioning his cock. And, for the first time, his mouth was on hers, kissing her voraciously, as if he wanted to devour her, absorb her into him. It was their first kiss and his greedy tongue left no part of her mouth unexplored.

Katarzyna’s fingers clutched at his shoulders, raked down his back and found his tight buttocks. Her fingers dug into his muscles and pulled him closer.

He tore his mouth from hers. “You can’t, babe. Not yet. I’ll only hurt you.”

She was shaking her head. “I don’t care,” she whispered. She rose on her tiptoes, rubbing herself against him and making him groan. “Please.”

“Oh fuck.” He squeezed his own hands between the wall and her ass and kneaded. She wrapped one leg around his hip. He wanted to lift her up and impale her on his throbbing, aching shaft, but he couldn’t. He’d already hurt her once tonight and he didn’t want to do it again, no matter how much she begged.

His kissed her again, hard, and, against her lips, muttered, “I’ll take care of you.”

Jake dropped to his knees once more, bracketed her hips and sealed his lips over her sex. He kissed her pussy like he was kissing her mouth, his tongue wild and his lips hard. He licked and nibbled, then, finally, thrust his tongue inside her vagina. Repeatedly.

He was lost in the taste of her, nearly mindless as he ate her. Dimly, he was aware of her sobbing as she pumped against his face, her hands again fisted in his hair. Then her entire body went rigid with her climax and her juices gushed against his mouth, and still he kept going, relentlessly bringing her to another hard peak. This time she slid down the tiles and fell into his arms, crying and shaking.