AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Right.”
An abysmal depression came over her. She staved it off by asking, “Do you ski?”
“Some. Do you?”
“Yes. Or I did.” She glanced down at her leg. “I may have to sit this season out.”
“Maybe not. Since the bone wasn’t broken.”
“Maybe.”
And that, it seemed, was all they had to say. By tacit agreement, they ended the inane small talk and did what they really wanted to do—look at each other.
His hair had been cut, but was still unfashionably long. She liked the way it brushed the collar of his casual shirt. His jaw and chin were smoothly shaven, but if one single hair in his mustache had been altered, she couldn’t tell it. The lower lip beneath it was as stern and unyielding as ever. If anything, the grooves bracketing his mouth looked deeper, making his face appear more unrelievedly masculine. She couldn’t help but wonder what particular worry had carved those lines deeper.
His clothes weren’t haute couture, but he would turn heads on Rodeo Drive and be a refreshing change from the dapper dressers. Blue jeans still did more for a male physique than any other garment ever sewn together. They did more for Cooper’s body than for most. Of course, there was more to work with—so much more that the bulging denim between his thighs made Rusty’s stomach flutter.
His cotton shirt was stretched over a chest she still dreamed about. The sleeves had been rolled back to reveal his strong forearms. He had carried a brown leather bomber jacket in with him. It was now draped over the back of his chair, forgotten. Indeed, he seemed to have forgotten everything except the woman standing only a few feet, yet seemingly light-years, away from him.
His eyes tracked down her body, stripping her as they went. As though he were actually peeling away layer after layer of clothing, her skin began to burn with fever. By the time his eyes paused on the uneven, stringy hems of her cutoffs, where the soft threads tickled her bare thighs, Rusty was warm and moist.
His gaze moved back up to her face and the desire he saw registered there reflected his own. His eyes were like magnets drawing her into their field. On her crutches, she closed the distance between them, never breaking their stare. He didn’t either. As she drew nearer, he had to tilt his head back to maintain eye contact. It seemed to take a lifetime but was actually only a few seconds before she stood directly in front of him, leaning on her crutches for support.
She said, “I can’t believe you’re really here.”
Groaning, he lowered his head and pressed it hard against her breasts. “Rusty. Damn you. I couldn’t stay away.”
Overwhelming emotions caused her eyes to close. Her head tipped forward in total surrender to her love for this complex man. She whispered his name.
He folded his arms around her waist and nuzzled his face in the soft, fragrant valley between her breasts. His hands opened wide over her back, drawing her body closer even though she couldn’t move her feet.
“I’ve missed you,” she admitted hoarsely. She didn’t expect him to make a similar confession, and he didn’t. But the ardency of his embrace was unspoken evidence of how much he’d missed her. “I’d hear your voice and turn, expecting you to be there. Or I’d start to say something to you before I realized you weren’t there.”
“God, you smell good.” Openmouthed, he gnawed on the soft inner curves of her breasts, catching cloth and all between his strong, white teeth.
“You smell like the mountains,” she told him, kissing his hair.
“I’ve got to have—” he was frantically untying the knot at her waist “—just one—” it came undone and he ripped the buttons apart “—bite.” His mouth fastened on the fleshy part of her breast, which was overflowing the cup of her brassiere.
At the first hot contact of his mouth with her skin, she arched her back and moaned. Her knuckles turned white where they gripped the handles of her crutches. She longed to drop them and plunge her fingers into his hair. She felt it dusting her skin when he turned his head and kissed her other breast. He took gentle love bites through the sheer cups of her brassiere and delicately sipped at the tips.
She released a keening sound much like a sob. It was both frustrating and thrilling not to have the use of her hands. The sense of helplessness was titillating. “Cooper,” she gasped imploringly.
He reached around her and unhooked her bra strap, working it down as far as it would go before the straps got caught in her sleeves. But that was sufficient. He had completely uncovered her. His eyes drank their fill before his lips surrounded one taut, pink crest and drew it into his mouth. He sucked it lovingly, then sponged the very tip of it with his tongue before drying it with his mustache. His whole face moved over her breasts, rubbing them with cheek and chin and mouth and nose and brow. Rusty, leaning precariously on her crutches, chanted his name with religious fervor.
“Tell me what you want. Anything,” he said huskily. “Tell me.”
“I want you.”
“Woman, you’ve got me. What do you want?”
“To touch. To be touched.”
“Where?”
“Cooper...”
“Where?”
