As she thrashed on the bed, a cry trapped at the back of her throat sprang free and echoed off the walls. The muscles in her thighs stiffened. The rest of her body followed. The precipice of pleasure rushed up to her. She could see right over the edge. Decker dangled her there—a lazy swipe of his tongue here, a starved suckling there. A frustrating nip at her inner thighs and a long, heated glance up her body later, she nearly howled with demand.

But he seemed to know exactly what she wanted and delighted in making her ache.

“Do you want to come like this?” he asked.

Rachel didn’t trust that sly voice. No matter what she said, he was going to do exactly what he wanted. He wouldn’t be cajoled or rushed or persuaded, even if she was about to lose her sanity.

Forget leaving her hands where he’d told her to. She thrust her fingers into the inky softness of his short hair and tried to press his mouth deeper over the heart of her need.

So, of course, Decker pulled away. “Be good or I’ll make you wait for it.”

“No!” she wailed, knowing it wouldn’t do a damn bit of good.

Decker just smiled as he eased off of her and stood at the edge of the bed, staring. “Your pussy looks so pretty when it’s pouting, beautiful.” He licked his lips. “You’re scrumptious.”

“Why are you tormenting me?” she demanded, then bit her lip. Her lack of orgasm for the last decade wasn’t his fault, just the last hour. “What else can I say to convince you?”

“That you need to come?” He shrugged. “I’ll know when it’s time. Now you stay here. I’ll be back in a minute.”

With that, he turned and searched the room. She couldn’t see really well in the darkness, but the backside filling her vision was taut and firm, supported by a pair of thighs that rippled with muscle every time he took a step. Rachel sighed.

She really had hit the jackpot.

Just thinking about what might come next, her entire body throbbed, and a satisfaction that would have been so complete and mind-twisting had been right at hand . . . then he’d left the bed? When he stooped down, Rachel frowned. What was he doing?

She shook her head. He’d be back to her. While she wasn’t usually confident about her sex appeal, one thing she did know? Men couldn’t fake erections, and Decker had been hard since the moment he’d barged through her front door.

Still, he’d left her alone and needy. Wasn’t he due a little teasing?

Smiling, Rachel lowered her hand between her legs, determined to put on a show. But when she dragged her fingers over her clitoris, just like Decker had, she hissed and arched her back. It wouldn’t take much at all to push her over the edge. Another few seconds and . . .

“Fingers out of your pussy.” Decker’s sharp voice resonated through the room as he stood again, fist curled around something. “That orgasm is mine to give you.”

“I wasn’t going to—”

“You say that now, but in thirty seconds? Two minutes? Five?”

Okay, so maybe he had a point. “You’ve left me aching.”

“And I’ll make it better,” he promised, dumping a few condoms on her nightstand.

Decker held up one and tore the foil open with his teeth. He wasted no time rolling it over his huge erection and sliding onto the bed again, right between her legs. Without warning, he scooped her thighs up in his arms, lifted them around his head, and dropped his mouth back to her clit. The intense suction and almost punishing nip made her scream—and her body jolt in a hot-blooded race for satisfaction.

As she flew even closer to blissful explosion than before, a damp sweat covered her body. She strained to get closer, lifting up to the heavenly touch of his tongue. Her breath hitched, then left her lips in a broken cry. Blood zipped by the bucketful south, filling the responsive little nub he played with. Rachel felt herself swelling, the pressure building, the burn scorching. Just another second or two . . .

He eased his lips away.

Before she had time to moan in protest, he trapped her body beneath his own with a growl. The lust in that feral sound nearly undid her. Full staff in hand, he aligned himself against her slick, vulnerable opening, probing, feeding her the head in shallow strokes before backing out to rub her clit with his rigid stalk.

The need to take him deep, feel him stroking her walls, had her tossing her head back, breathing hard, a frantic cry on her lips. “Decker . . .”

“Tell me you want me to fuck you.”

Her blood boiled, burning away any semblance of pride. “Yes. Please. I do. Now.”

“Tell me you want me to fuck you until you can’t take a moment more.”

Even the image had her squirming beneath him and crying out again. “Yes!”

The word hadn’t even finished clearing her lips before he thrust deep inside her. She gasped. Her eyes went wide with panic and pain. She couldn’t take another inch of him.

Stiffening, Rachel tried discreetly to wriggle and displace him, put some distance between them.

“Does that hurt?”

“A little.”

“Shh. Relax.” He grabbed her hips in his hands, easing back. Rachel sighed in relief.

But he wasn’t absent for long. He only put enough distance between them to work a pair of fingers inside her and stretch her. His clever digits found a sensitive spot inside her, and she arched her back, spreading wide for him until she accommodated another finger. Then another.

When she was mewling, Decker withdrew, then nudged his staff against her opening again.

His nostrils flared, his eyes narrowing. “Now you should be more comfortable. Tell me if you’re not, and I’ll work you open slowly. But you won’t get away from me, Rachel.”

As if she wanted to . . .

Then he reared back and thrust into her roughly, deeper, working against the swollen, constricting flesh of her sex. But his fingers had worked some magic. The discomfort was gone.

He groaned. “That’s right. That’s good. Let me in.”

Wasn’t he already in?

Lifting her hips up to him, Decker pressed down into her body with another shallow stroke. Then he withdrew slowly. The friction of his flesh over nerve endings she hadn’t known she possessed caused her to cry out.

“I’m getting deeper, beautiful. Yes . . . You’re so sweet and tight. I’m going to make you come for me. You want that. I want to feel it. Just take all of me.”

She still hadn’t?

Rachel moaned. Decker ground into her clit again with his hard length, then shifted down, rooting at her opening once more. With one heavy push, he grunted, then seared his way into her body, up, up, up, filling every corner and recess of her with his thick possession, stretching her almost beyond her limit.

Mercy . . .

He rubbed a sensitive spot so deep inside her that Rachel felt herself swell even more. He drew back and kindled all those nerves again. And again. The flames licking her body turned incendiary. She bucked under him, cried out for him, clenched her fists and begged. His bared teeth and determined face told her that nothing would stop him from giving this pleasure to her.

Holy cow! Rachel had known he would be every bit as good as her fantasies, but never had she imagined this sort of ecstasy.

Relentlessly, he pushed in and out of her, hitting that spot so deep and shocking with every last plunge. She closed her eyes, struggling to breathe. Her thighs tightened. She wanted her arms around him, but he held her pinned to the bed and drove into her again and again.

“Open your eyes.”

She squeezed them even more tightly shut, so focused on the sensations that stacked on top of her restraint, crushing it. Her clit burned. He shocked the end of her passage with every forceful thrust.

“Fucking open your eyes and look at me.”

Something about his deep growl forced her to obey. His face hovered just above hers, and he fused their stares together. A jolt, a zing, an electric sizzle—they lit her up. The forces in her body swirled together, spinning faster and faster, taking her down with them like a whirlpool sucking away her ability to breathe, to care about anything but the ecstasy about to sear across her soul.

“Decker,” she whispered almost soundlessly, out of breath.

Using all the power of his muscled arms and thighs, he fucked his way even harder inside her. His stare penetrated deeper. This didn’t feel like a one-night stand. Decker utterly possessed her, from their linked fingers above her head, to their locked stares, all the way to their joined bodies.

The uproar of tingles and aches throbbing with need all compounded to overload her, but they had nothing on the sudden fervor that seized her heart.

All the sensations inside her melded, conjoined, rose dangerously. Then her body combusted. Her sex clamped down on him, womb clenching, as pleasure spilled over in a lush melding of wonder, ecstasy, and thrill.

Above her, Decker pounded into her mercilessly, jaw tensing, eyes raging, breath sawing in and out of his chest with effort, with excitement. He crushed her lips under his own and gripped her hands fiercely. Then his entire body tensed as he submerged himself completely inside her, setting off another storm of astonishing pleasure. As she screamed into his kiss and held on for dear life, Rachel wondered if she’d be able to forget this night or this man—ever.

FIVE

TEN MINUTES LATER, RACHEL WAS CURLED AGAINST HIS SIDE, hand brushing up and down his chest. The room was still mostly dark, broken only by a nightlight coming from the bathroom and a twinkle from the silvery moon streaming through the window. He’d disposed of the condom and caught his breath. Even on the comfy mattress wrapped in soft sheets and what had to be homemade quilts, Decker couldn’t relax. His brain wouldn’t downshift to a gear other than sex. Over and over, one thought plagued his head: What the hell had happened between them?

They hadn’t just fucked. She hadn’t merely been aroused. He hadn’t simply wanted her. What they’d done here had been . . . something more.

That made no fucking sense. He didn’t really know this girl. But the very first time he’d clapped eyes on her picture had been a visceral blow to his chest. Touching her shook him even more. Filling her tight cunt had been absolutely earthshaking. Despite an orgasm that had all but fractured his restraint and sent him rocketing into a pleasure so surreal, he still felt stunned and dazed; he still hadn’t managed to unleash all the lust broiling inside him.

It didn’t add up. She wouldn’t be capable of the same sexual gymnastics as that girl from Moscow. She’d never be as freaky as those twins from Mexico City. She probably didn’t give a mind-bending blow job like the show dancer he’d hooked up with in Rio. But Rachel had something none of those women possessed, a quality he couldn’t put his finger on that made him want to bury his cock inside her again and stay for a sweet long while. She drew him in. He liked her mix of vulnerability and sweet teasing. Her intelligence probably ranked higher than most women he’d taken to bed. The soft chime of her laughter made him smile. She was truly a terrible dancer, but she cared about the people in her life. And she trusted in a way none of the jaded women he’d met could. Hell, more than he ever had. She deserved to be protected, adored, cherished.

How fucking crazy was it that he was wondering if he could be the man for the job?

One thing at a time. First, he had to keep her safe, figure out who wanted her dead, then he could decide if he was actually capable of sharing his picket fence with any woman, let alone this one.

At his side, Rachel sighed, caressing him with a leisurely sweep of her hand up and down his torso. The thought of her drifting off in his arms made him smile. On the corner of the bed, the orange tabby yawned and looked at him like an unwelcome interloper. As far as Decker could tell, the cat had remained planted on his little corner of the mattress the whole time he and Rachel had rocked it. The hairball was seemingly far less annoyed that Decker had violated his mistress than he was about having his nocturnal beauty rest disturbed.

“Meow.” The cat’s tone made it clear he was registering a complaint.

Rachel smiled against Decker’s chest, then propped her chin on him to look at the cat. “Be a nice kitten, Val.”

Kitten? That thing had to weigh fifteen pounds.

“Is he possessive?” Decker sank his fingers into her plush dark hair. It was so fucking soft, not weighed down by a ton of goop or hair spray. It wasn’t coarse, and she didn’t have extensions. It was just naturally beautiful. Kind of like her.

Shit, now he sounded like some sappy jewelry commercial.

“Not really. He’s my cat, for sure. He typically doesn’t like other people. He hated Owen. It was mutual, however. And Owen swore that Florida was a little bit safer when we moved here because I’d removed the ‘beast.’ The fact that Val hasn’t attacked or run off means he’s at least willing to tolerate you. Since he’s a better judge of men than I apparently am, I take it as a good sign.” She flashed a tired but teasing grin in the shadowy room. “Isn’t that right, Valentino?”