Her Druid Desire (The Amber Druid Series) (35 page)

           
They were sitting in the den, in the deep, overstuffed and extremely
comfortable loveseat. She hadn’t drawn in on herself after their question and answer
session in the
kitchen,
or even after her heart
stirring emotional words she had uttered into his shirt. Drake could have sworn
his body had turned to mush at that moment. To know that she would ask him to
do that overwhelmed him. Becoming something like him wasn’t a small
undertaking, and neither was the change that anyone would have to go through.
He wasn’t sure he could ever do that to her, knowing she might not come out of
it alive. But then he remembered how she had argued with him in her home, standing
toe to toe with him and accusing him of sleeping with some other woman. She had
spunk, which was definitely
good.The
stronger the
mind and body, the easier the slip into being Druid.

           
“You’re melting on yourself.”

           
Her voice slipped into his head. “What…I’m sorry?”

           
She nodded towards his hand where his ice cream had overflowed to the top of
his small bowl and was now dripping onto his fingers.

           
“Damn, I need to pay attention.”

           
She smiled at him then took another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth. Drake
almost groaned. In two or three bites, he had most of his ice cream finished.

           
“Thank you for being so patient with me, answering all of my questions.”

           
“I would rather you know all about me than be scared off by assuming that I’m a
monster,” he told her honestly, remembering his two failed marriages.

           
“So, you were married twice?” She asked, placing her now empty bowl on the
table beside the sofa and leaning back on the soft cushions, close enough for
him to reach over and touch.

           
“Yes, my first marriage was to Loraine. My second wife was Maria.”

           
“You loved them very much, didn’t you?” Her green eyes were curious in her face
and Drake didn’t have the heart to lie to her, even though he knew that the
truth would upset her.

           
“I did, very much,” he told her, taking his hand and placing it behind her
shoulders, wanting to reassure her even though he hadn’t touched her yet.

           
She nodded, but didn’t say anything until seconds later. “They must have been
very beautiful women to attract your attention.”

           
“They were beautiful, but they weren’t strong enough to handle me and my Druid
side, Nadia.” He had to let her know somehow, that those women and she were
nothing alike. “Loraine lasted longer than Maria, but Maria was nervous around
me for months, before finally gathering the courage to leave me. She just
couldn’t take it anymore. Living with me, sharing my bed, was too much for her
to handle. I was too much for her to handle.”

           
Nadia didn’t say anything, and Drake wasn’t sure of how to take that. Then he
felt her hand come over his thigh to capture his left hand with hers. “I haven’t
run yet.” The words were softly spoken and even through the loudest racket on
Earth, Drake would have heard them. He smiled, absurdly pleased with his little
angel.

           
His hand along her shoulder dipped down, tracing her right arm through the
material of her shirt. “No…you haven’t, which is why you are so special to me,
honey. You have no idea how at ease I am when I realize that I have nothing to
hide from you. From now on you know everything that there is to know about me.
You know me…period.”

           
The need she’d felt last night was back and no matter how hard, she would never
be able to hide it from him. He could almost taste it in the space between
them. He could feel the emotions rising inside of her, battling at her
defenses. There was also the underlying hint of passion tinting her aura. It
still amazed him that he had missed that certain aura until just weeks ago.
Apparently there were still some things that could stay hidden, even from him.

           
Turning his body towards hers, he closed the space between them. He left her
hand on his thigh and reached out with his left hand touching her jaw,
smoothing his fingers over her fine grained skin. “I pulled out some movies if
you want to look through them, or is there something else you would rather do?”

           
Drake’s insides burned. He still didn’t have a clear view on her exact wants or
needs but he could see the delicate fluttering of her pulse in her neck and the
deep swallow she took. That alone told him so many things without hearing the
words. But she would have to make the moves or tell him what she wanted.

           
“I would think that after last night you wouldn’t need to be shy with me
anymore,” he told her. She smiled at him and when she turned her face in his direction,
Drake felt it like a punch to his gut.

           
“You have no idea how badly you shocked me,” she whispered, her cheeks tinted a
delicate pink.

           
“You have no idea how aroused I had been. I wanted you so badly that I had to
take the edge off somehow.” He countered back.

           
Her smile dimmed and she gulped again. Drake let his fingers play in her
beautiful hair from where it rested on the back of the sofa. She turned suddenly,
facing him. Seconds passed while they looked at each other and Drake knew he
had never felt as intimate with a woman than he did right then. Even with
something as small as a shared glance, she made it feel like spiritual contact.
Her legs were drawn up in front of her body while her head rested in the same
place, still able to let his fingers sift through soft strands.

           
Her bare feet were pressing up against his knee. Drake let his left hand fall
onto her calf muscle and then to her foot. He noticed her toenails were painted
a bright pink color. “I like that color.”

           
“It’s called Shock-me-pink.” Her voice was husky and soft. Her eyes watched his
fingers move over the tips of her toes.

           
“Nice name.” But Drake was interested in the way she tried to move her foot
away whenever he lifted her foot to his lower chest. “Ticklish?”

           
She nodded, but didn’t say anything. He pushed the bottom of her jeans out of
the way and rubbed his hand along the top of her foot. Her skin was smooth and
so very soft. She had delicate feet, a rising arch that begged to be tickled,
and her toes were cute as hell. Drake was not what he considered to be a foot
person, but looking at hers was tempting him to change.

           
He knew his stomach muscles jumped against her sole every time her foot
twitched in response, but there was nothing he could do about it. Sliding his
hands over her ankle, he then traced her calf muscle, and next, the soft skin
behind her knee. She jerked her leg against him when he did that.

           
“You might want to stop the urge to move, unless you want me to know all of
your ticklish spots.” His fingers scraped gently there again. Once again her
leg moved and she smiled, biting back a laugh.

           
“Maybe another time I can test out those same spots on you.” Well, he hadn’t
been expecting her to say that.

           
“I believe you just propositioned me.”

           
A berry bright flush heightened the tops of her cheeks. Drake noted the drowsy
look in her eyes and the slight smile on her lips. Oh yeah, she was more than
relaxed right now.

           
“I can’t believe that after knowing you this long, watching you with other
women, seeing the way they look at you like you’re some kind of
God, that
I’m now sitting in your house while you are
seducing my leg.”

           
Drake couldn’t help it; he burst out laughing. It took more than a few seconds
to stifle the sound. When he looked back at her she was smiling too. “Damn,
that is a different perspective.”

           
“I’ll say so,” she twitched her toes against the material of his tee shirt.
“But that doesn’t mean you have to stop doing that though.”

           
“What, seducing your leg?” he asked her with a smile and another swipe behind
her knee. He tried moving his hand higher, scoundrel that he was, but the jeans
were more fitted to her thighs. There was no way he was going any higher. “Why
couldn’t you have worn shorts?”

           
“You pig,” she said then nudged him in the chest with her foot. He caught her
foot up high, her calf across his
pecs
, her heel
sliding over the edge of his shoulder when she tried to kick him again. Then
Drake looked at her face. She wasn’t smiling anymore. He could easily, so very
easily, push her other leg out of the way and lean over her body, pinning her
to the loveseat with his body, feeling her feminine curves press against him.

           
“I am a pig. You guessed right.” He told her as he did, indeed, lean forward.
He pulled her other leg to slide her under him. Grabbing her upper thigh, he
tugged her until her inner thighs were holding his hips. He felt the shock roll
through her system as he settled there, letting her feel how hard he was from
their teasing moments earlier. His hands left her leg and moved up to her face,
framing the softness, letting his thumbs swipe over smooth skin. “God, you have
no idea of the things I could do to you, do you?”

           
“I have a very active imagination,” she muttered, and Drake could see her eyes
take in every thing about him. The words surprised him. She was always saying
something he least expected.

           
Instead of saying anything in return, he pressed his lips to her eyebrows, then
her cheeks, feeling the fire of her blush against his lips. “Last night was so
good angel, but there was so many things that we didn’t get the chance to do.”
He heard her indrawn breath and her chest moved against his. Placing a kiss to
the edge of her mouth, her soft skin trembled beneath his kiss. When was the
last time a woman had actually
trembled
for him?

           
“But there is no need to rush. We’ll take things slow and see where they lead.
How’s that?” he mumbled against her lips, fighting the need to plow
inside her mouth and body.

           
“Okay,” her hands rose up to touch his hips and Drake couldn’t stop the hip
action that ensued. He could feel each of her ten fingers through the denim,
like little hot needles.

           
“What do you want angel? Do you want me to kiss you? Do you want me to touch
you?” Drake licked her jaw and then down her neck, feeling her pulse thrum
against his tongue. “Tell me, baby, tell me what you want.”

***

           
Delicious, spine tingling heat infused Nadia. Her hand twitched against his denim
clad hips as she took stock of the way he felt under her fingers while lying
against her. She had never assumed that having a man lie against her would be
so stimulating, now she realized her error. Drake was a very, very masculine,
virile man. He was hard in the places he was supposed to be, and soft in areas
where he should be too, like his lips, which were now nibbling their way down
over her collarbone.

           
Thank God this loveseat was one of those newer models with deep, wide cushions.
Nadia felt dwarfed, while she knew that to Drake it was probably a decently
sized sofa. He was expanded over her, holding her body down with his much
larger one, and she didn’t mind one bit. It was exciting to feel the ridges of
his muscular body stretched out over hers.

           
Her mind reminded her that he had asked her a question.
What did she want?
What didn’t
she want, was more like
it.
She wanted
every thing and anything he could give her, but she didn’t want to feel the
heartache and pain that would surely follow whenever he decided he had had
enough with her and dumped her for the next woman. She wanted him to herself,
knowing that he would never get tired of her and never want to end this so
called relationship they were beginning to have.

           
That will never happen.

           
Of course it wouldn’t. She wasn’t that lucky. But she knew one thing, she would
take whatever time she had with him and use up every drop of it, hoping to
change his mind along the way.

           
Her fingers left his hips and slipped under the edge of his shirt to the hot
skin beneath. She tugged on the material, and called on her inner wild child,
“I want this off.” He stopped nibbling at her neck long enough to not even
question her statement; instead, he lifted high enough to grasp his shirt
behind his head and pull it from his body. Glorious burnished skin appeared
right before her eyes. She stopped all movement for a moment, taking him in,
and God above there was
a lot
of him to take in.

           
With the wild beating of her heart surely slipping under his radar, Nadia let
her eyes travel slowly over his upper body. Fantasies she had dreamed of when
she was sixteen flashed through her mind swiftly. This was that man. This was
the man that had caused her dreams and daydreams to be X-rated. This was the
man that had unknowingly taught her the way a woman responded to a man she was
attracted to. Now he was here, right at her fingertips, resting on his elbows
above her body, letting her call the shots.