Dangerous Tides (45 page)

He thought about how Libby teased him, their conversations which would be strange to anyone else, but were so much a part of who he was. Facts were always interesting to him. Facts and science. She'd even managed to turn a clown fish and an anemone into a fascinating, fun discussion.

He sat up abruptly, staring down at her face. Her lashes were two thick crescents and her breathing was even, but she smiled and settled her fingers around his wrist. Even her beauty, the sight of her body, couldn't stop his mind from racing at a hundred miles an hour now. He was on to something. He was certain of it.

"What are you doing?" Libby asked, her voice drowsy.

"I'm just watching you while I think."

She opened her eyes at the distracted, almost elated note in his voice. "You've thought of something."

"Not quite, but the data I need is there, working its way to me. Go to sleep, baby." He brushed back her hair and bent to kiss her. "I'm going to think this through and then try to get a little work done."

"How?" She touched the back of his hand with her fingertips. "Didn't the explosion destroy everything?"

"I back up everything. I have several computers at BioLab and I sent everything there as well. I never know where I'm going to be so I make certain I can access it from everywhere I am just in case I get inspiration."

"So your work wasn't destroyed?" A slow smile broke out on her face. "You really are a genius, aren't you?"

"And thorough. I don't take chances with my work, or my woman."

"Do you have to go back to BioLab to access it?"

"Before I set up anything else, I started setting up a laboratory here. I only have a computer in it at the moment, but I can get everything I need into the computer."

"What are you considering that is so different from what you'd been thinking before?"

"Something we were joking about earlier. A symbiotic relationship. The clown fish and the sea anemone have one, but you know, so do many other things, including plants. Some plants are dangerous, and poisonous, just like the anemone, but often growing right near them is a plant or fungus that can provide an antidote for the poison."

Relationship dawned immediately. "You used a plant for your original work, didn't you?"

He nodded. "That's how the drug got part of its name. I used the
Ibenkiki cyperus
from the rain forest in eastern Peru. The bottom line, Libby, is when something isn't working you go back to the beginning."

"To the
Ibenkiki cyperus
plant?"

"To the rain forest."

"You really do need to sleep, Ty."

"Not while I'm working. When I figure this out, I'll crash and sleep for a couple of days." He bent to kiss her again. "I'll stay here until you fall asleep."

There was no point in arguing with him. She could see how Sam could become so frustrated trying to take care of Ty, but she felt Tyson's need for his work. His mind refused to let him go, refused to allow him to relax. His brain was working too fast, making leaps and pushing him to continue. There would be no rest for Tyson until he solved the puzzle.

If she accepted Tyson, she'd have to accept all of him. And his brilliant mind was the biggest part of him. It was what drove him and always would. Libby touched his face and then turned on her side, curling up beneath the sheets, closing her eyes. The last thing she thought of before she drifted off was how lucky she was to have him.

Chapter Eighteen

LIBBY woke to find Tyson gone. She lay for a moment staring up at the ceiling, feeling inexplicably happy. He was somewhere in the house and she had a good idea what he was doing, she'd just have to find the room. Whatever he'd been working out last night, he'd obviously decided he was on the right track.

Wrapping herself in a sheet she walked through the house. Light was beginning to filter in through the windows, turning the rooms to a soft dove gray. She should have asked for a tour earlier, but they hadn't been able to keep their hands off each other and had barely managed to find the bedroom. It was a little spooky walking down the wide hall and peeking into the various rooms.

Tyson had told her the house was five thousand square feet without the garages and she felt a little lost. She was used to a big house having grown up at the Drake family home, but the house seemed enormous without her sisters as she walked on the hardwood floors. The only two rooms she knew had furniture were the living room and master bedroom. She paused in the large kitchen to look around. Like all of the rooms, it was wide, open and gleaming. The tile was cool under her feet, looked like marble and picked up the colors in the counters. It was definitely her dream home and she still had to pinch herself to believe it wasn't all a hallucination.

"What are you doing up, baby?" Tyson asked, coming up behind her. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed the back of her neck. "You should be sound asleep. Didn't I wear you out? I was doing my best."

She reached behind her to find his neck, tilting her head back as she brought his face down so she could indulge in one of his long, sinfully sexy kisses. "I don't ever wear out. You've been up for hours, haven't you?"

"After you went to sleep I got thinking about our conversation and the more I did, the more this idea just wouldn't let go." He kissed the corner of her mouth, swirling his tongue along the seam of her lips, kissed a path down to her throat where he nuzzled his face for a long moment, simply inhaling her scent. "How the hell do you manage to smell so good?"

"What do I smell like?"

"Sin. Sex. And peaches. Rain. It turns me on." He pressed his body close to hers so she could feel his heavy erection.

"I woke up turned on. I knew the moment you were gone you'd thought of something brilliant. I have to say, that's a total turn-on."

He lifted her to the kitchen counter, spreading her knees so she could wrap her legs around him. "So you like brainy men?"

"Check for yourself," she invited, dropping the sheet.

He slid his fingers over her soft mound, a slow exploration, dipping deep into the moist heat to find her slick and ready for him. "So you're a brain groupie."

"Absolutely."

He ducked his head to swipe over her hot bare lips with his tongue, savoring the taste of her, the fact that she wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her. He thrust against her clit, tormenting until her muscles clenched and she moaned softly, fingers digging into his shoulders. He straightened and caught her around her hips. "I'm keeping you out of the BioLab, where all the smart men are, but you can hang around my private laboratory. That way, when I'm on to something exciting you can strip naked for me."

She slid her arms around his neck and wrapped her legs around his waist, sliding forward until she could feel the head of his shaft pressed tightly against her, demanding entrance. "I'll strip naked for you anytime without you being on to something exciting," she confessed. She settled over him, closing her eyes as she felt him invading her, pushing through soft, tight folds to bury himself deep.

"I'm still not letting you near BioLab."

"Aren't you the smartest man there?" She lifted herself, began a slow, sensual ride, head thrown back, utter bliss transparent on her face.

"Hell, yes," he answered, drinking her in. He'd never get enough of seeing her like that, wrapped up in sex, wrapped around him, that look of ecstasy on her face.

"Well, then, you have no worries. I go for the man with the brains." She opened her eyes and smiled at him, arms tightening around his neck. "Silly. I love you. I don't care how brainy any other man is."

His hands dug into her hips as he thrust hard. Waves of pleasure washed over him. "I should have gone after you the very first time I realized I loved watching you."

"You're a little slow, Ty, but I'll forgive you."

"Slow?" He thrust harder, deeper, picking up the rhythm until she was gasping and clutching at him. "I. Don't. Think. So." He gasped out each word.

She laid her head on his shoulder, inhaling the scent of him, feeling surrounded by his body, by his love. Every hard stroke of his body drove him deeper into hers. She could feel every sensitive nerve ending rippling with pleasure. He was thick, driving through her tight folds, stimulating knots of nerves she hadn't known existed so that she gasped for air with each penetration.

His fingers gripped her, lifting her to bring her body down over him as his hips thrust upward and his speed increased. Libby moved, tightening her muscles deliberately, using her body as if she were slow dancing seductively on a pole. The more his breath turned ragged, the more she responded by grinding down over him, and milking him with her tight, inner muscles.

The orgasm rushed over both of them, taking them by surprise with its intensity. They clung to one another, trying to slow their hearts and recover their ability to breathe. Instead of allowing her legs to fall naturally to the floor, he eased her back onto the counter, kissing her over and over.

She lost herself in his passion, her body still sizzling with pleasure, rippling around his with strong aftershocks. "I'm sure this is unsanitary," she pointed out when she could talk again.

"We aren't using it for anything else," he said, reaching for a roll of paper towels. "I think this room is perfect."

"Sanitary or not, I'm fixing you food and you're going to eat it, Ty, so you may as well resign yourself to telling me all about your new ideas on the drug before you disappear again. I'll leave you alone after you eat so you can work your little heart out."

"I thought you said you didn't cook."

She gave him a little smirk. "I didn't say it would be good, only that you had to eat it."

"Fortunately for me, and maybe our kitchen, I forgot to buy groceries."

"Nothing?"

"Only the essentials."

"And that would be?" Libby asked.

He shrugged with a small grin. "Coffee and paper towels. I'm messy." He pointed to the coffee maker already filled with the dark liquid and then to her wet thighs.

"You crazy man. I'll run to the nearest diner and get you something much more nutritious and substantial."

He poured himself a cup of coffee. "I already had something nutritious and substantial. You're enough for me to live on. If you want to just lie on the counter, I'll do my best to devour you." He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"You know," she said casually. "I've been thinking of doing another article for the
American Medical Journal
."

"Really? On what?"

"Male multiple orgasms. You'd make a fantastic study. I'm thinking if we have sex a few times with you hooked up to an EEG…" She broke off with a little laughing cry of alarm as he put down his coffee mug and swooped down on her. "I was joking. It was a joke!"

He wrapped his arm around her neck and ruffled her hair, ducking his head to kiss her again. "Get dressed and quit trying to tempt me. You can drop me at the other house, that way we'll both have a car. I need to talk to Sam and make a few phone calls. I have things at the lab I'm hoping didn't get ruined in the explosion. Most of the blast went to the left side of the room, damaging everything there, but if I'm lucky a few things escaped. We can meet back here later this evening."