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The blankets were fuzzy and thick, but she was stone cold from the inside. She huddled into a ball and watched him, teeth chattering.
Bruno kept looking over at her as he built a fire in the stove. When the flames were crackling, he came over to the bed, flung off his jacket, kicked off his shoes and slid under the blanket with her.
Her glands went bananas. The bed creaked under his weight. Plastic crackled. He smelled like salt, sweat, the coppery tang of blood, and under that, his own special Bruno smell. He hugged her. The release of tension in her body was cataclysmic. It felt so good, so hot.
“You’re freezing,” he said, his voice disapproving.
“Yeah, well,” she said. “You’re helping.”
“Not fast enough.” He rolled over right on top of her, squashing the breath out of her. The bed sagged, creaked. “That better?”
A flush rose, like a hot cloud until her whole body felt red. She wanted to say something offhand. Sure. No biggie, having a gorgeous sex god who held all the keys to her destiny, squishing her onto a bed.
He propped himself onto his elbows so that she could drag in some air. She didn’t do it consciously, but suddenly, she’d moved so he was resting the stiff bulge of his crotch against the vee of her opened thighs. The wind moaned, singing of a vast empty solitude outside that made it so much more intimate within. The last two lovers in the world.
There was no reason in the world for him not to just open his jeans, twitch the gusset of her thong aside, and have her. She ached for it. A hot pull of mindless yearning that actually hurt, it was so strong.
He answered her silent call, settling into an incredibly slow, sensual pulse. Her face got hotter, her breath shallow. They couldn’t break their eye contact. It blazed out of her like light, how badly she needed him to press against that sweet ache, just like that, again…
She lifted herself against him. He seconded her every move with such grace, such perfect swirling pressure and the slow…firm pulse and push, and oh God, yes…yes…
She exploded, energy pumping down to her fingers and toes. Beyond. Extending out into infinity, fused with him, with everything.
When she got enough presence of mind back to be mortally embarrassed, he was kissing her. Tender, coaxing kisses, wordlessly asking for something from her that she didn’t even dare put a name to. Let alone grant him. She just didn’t have it to give. She turned her face away, but Bruno was having none of that. He cupped her face, forced her gaze back until their eyes locked. “You warmed up?” he asked.
She nodded.
“I just meant to get you warm. I swear to God. I didn’t mean to dry hump you. That just sort of happened.”
He lifted himself up. Before she knew what she was doing she’d yanked him back down. He landed on his elbows, wary. “Huh?”
“Don’t you want…?” She couldn’t say it. She wound her legs around his thighs, and let her body ask the question.
He gave her an are-you-kidding look. “Of course I want it. But you’ve been skating on the edge of a breakdown ever since those guys attacked us. You almost had one right outside. It’s not a good time.”
“I’d be OK,” she assured him.
He shook his head. “You can’t be sure how you’d feel. And if I started, I wouldn’t be able to stop.”
So? Who wanted him to stop? She wanted to scream, slap him, force him to stop trying so hard to be a good guy. But that would make her seem crazier. Push him further away.
“Get warmed up,” he said. “Get on your new clothes, get some food into you, then we talk about everything we know, suspect, or guess, or fear about what’s happening to you. Then we hike up to the bluff.”
She jerked up onto her elbow. “Are you kidding? Is this a time for a flipping nature walk, Ranieri?”
“It’s the only place with cell reception,” he said. “I’ll use the phone Aaro gave me. All loaded up with encryptation software.”
“To call who?”
“My brother’s brothers. My adopted brother Kev recently hooked up with his biological family a few months ago. Real eventful, you might say. But you know all about that, right?”
She dropped her gaze. “Um. Some of it.”
His eyebrow tilted. “I figured that. Anyhow. Once I’ve talked to them, I can make some decisions.”
She blinked. “Um. Excuse me?Youwill make the decisions?”
“Yes.” He stared her straight in the eyes. “Me. It’s your own fault, Lily, for dragging me into this. Now you have to deal with me.”
