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She shook her head vigorously, suddenly desperate not to have him know the truth or this moment would take on a far greater significant than it already had.
He waited, searching her face as he held her hips, and didn’t move.
‘Really, I’m not...it’s just been a while,’ she finally managed, hating the lie, but hating the miserable feeling of inadequacy that she remembered far too well from her childhood more.
He nodded, and at last he began to move. But emotion scraped against her throat.
The pleasure ignited again—a flicker, then a throb in the deepest recesses of her body. It built and built as he rocked his hips, finding a rhythm that propelled her with staggering speed back towards that terrifying edge.
She clung to him as she had on the bike, her fingers slipping on his sweat-slicked skin. He grunted, growing huge inside the tight sheath. Her throat closed, and she felt the emotion gathering in her chest to form a fist, punching against her ribs.
The pleasure turned to exquisite pain, hurtling towards her. So fierce, so furious, she couldn’t think any more. All she could do was feel... Until the wave rammed into her at last and he made her fly once more.
CHAPTER FOUR
Ash. Help! I slept with Luke last night! Luke Broussard of Broussard Tech. The guy I’m supposed to be checking out for Temple. What do I do now? I’m freaking out. You have to help me. You so owe me, Ms Don’t-Wear-a-Bra-with-That-Dress. xx
LUKE PROPPED HIS shoulder against the kitchen doorframe and watched Cassandra furiously tapping with her thumbs and chewing on her bottom lip while she typed what looked like a novel into her cell phone. She kept pausing and looking into the middle distance, then tapping some more. But he could tell by the pucker on her brow that she wasn’t seeing the ocean beneath the cove, quiet now, and gilded by a bright new day after last night’s storm.
His body tightened. As it had so many times during the night. He eased himself upright, careful not to make a sound. He didn’t want to alert her to his presence—not yet—only too aware of the storm in his gut which still hadn’t been tamed. And the storm in his chest which refused to go away.
Jesus, how could she look even more stunning, with her tangled, sleep-mussed hair tumbling over her shoulders, her bare legs going on for miles under the T-shirt she must have snagged from his dresser while he was comatose?
Heat bloomed in his gut and he tensed. By rights he should be well satisfied and still comatose. From the angle of the sun, filtering through the forest behind the house on the east side of the inlet, it wasn’t much past nine. But when he’d woken up, he’d reached for her and found her gone. And then he’d seen the spots of blood on the bed sheets. And he had wondered, just as he had suspected when he’d thrust heavily inside her last night and felt her flinch... Had she been a virgin after all?
And, if so, why had she lied?
Waking up with an erection was nothing new. But why did the possibility of her virginity make it seem more intense? She might be inexperienced, but she was a grown woman. How the hell she might have managed to stay untouched for so long, he had no idea, but it was her choice—he hadn’t pushed or pressured her—in fact he’d gone out of his way to do the opposite. She’d even accused him of being ‘gallant’ for the first time in his entire life.
He hadn’t exploited her or taken anything from her she hadn’t been willing to give.
And if she had been a virgin, it didn’t make him a bad guy.
But, as he continued to watch her unobserved, something told him that for the first time in his life, with Cassandra James, all the usual rules didn’t apply. She’d changed them. And he didn’t like it. Because normally after a one-night booty call he’d be looking to find a way to get her out of his home without things getting too awkward. But instead all he could think about right now was walking up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, inhaling that glorious scent which had invaded his dreams last night and finding out if she’d picked him to be her first lover. And if she had, why had she?
But how could he do that without making this even more intense and awkward? Even more weird? Why had he broken his own rules with her, bringing her here?
Would she expect something from him now? Something more than pleasure? Even though he hoped he’d made it clear he couldn’t offer her more?
He felt a strange contraction in his chest as he imagined her turning round and opening her arms to him with the same enthusiasm and spontaneity she’d shown last night.
He frowned.
How did she do that? How did she make him forget that this situation was now all kinds of screwed up? He couldn’t touch her again. It would only make him feel more invested.
Whatever happened now, he needed to lay off her until he could get her off the island.
Perhaps she was expecting him to ask again about her virginity—but he wasn’t falling into that trap.
Why did it have to be a big deal? They were both adults. And the sex had been incredible. She’d been so responsive, so cute and sweet and hot and uninhibited. No reason to make this anything else than what it had always been intended to be. And if she brought it up—which she probably would eventually, because why else would she have kept her virginity a secret other than to use it at a later date—he’d tell her the truth: that her virginity was her business and had nothing to do with him.
She finally stopped tapping on her phone and placed it on the countertop. The sharp click of metal against granite echoed in the silent room. But she continued to stare at her phone as if it might leap up and bite her. Kind of the way she’d stared at the bike helmet the night before, until she’d decided to take it.
He cleared his throat, deciding it was time to stop thinking and start doing. He needed to get past the awkwardness so he could get her off his island.
She spun round. A blush blazed across her cheeks and hunger fired through his gut on cue.
He forced a smile to his lips. Relax, man. ‘Good morning, cher,’ he said.
