No Regrets (32 page)

He laughed at that, a rich, bold laugh that banished the lingering discomfort. Molly's ability to diffuse awkward situations was one of the things he'd always loved about her.

Loved?
The word reverberated through his mind like the civil defense siren that used to sound every noon in downtown L.A. This wasn't about love, Reece reminded himself. Oh, it was a lot more than the lust he'd felt for all the other women—the ones
Variety
had called “Longworth's playmates.”

But love? No way. Love was too dangerous. Too sneaky. It lulled you into complacency, got you to trust,
to relax in its warm golden comfort, then in one fell swoop, pulled everything away, leaving you alone. And empty.

Closing his mind to that perilous thought, Reece laced their fingers together and began walking toward the bedroom.

T
he bedroom was decorated in the same sparse, sterile style. The huge bed dominated the room.

Molly looked up at Reece, her anxious heart in her eyes. “I don't know what to do.”

If any other woman had said that to him, Reece would have taken it as a sign to run. But the woman standing in front of him, looking up at him with a blend of desire and uncertainty was Molly—his Molly—and that made all the difference.

“Don't worry.” He rocked forward on the balls of his feet and touched his mouth to hers. “I do.”

It was not a hard kiss. It did not plunder, not even when he slipped his tongue between her lips and swept the dark moist interior of her mouth in an enervating way that made her go weak at the knees and forced her to hold on to his shoulders. Part of her felt on the verge of crumbling to the floor. Another part felt as if she were
floating, high above them, in some misty, glorious place.

The dazzling kiss went on and on, creating warm ribbons of golden light that flowed through her veins like liquid sunshine.

“Ah, Molly,” he murmured against her mouth, “if you had any idea how many times I've dreamed of this.”

Her eyes, which had fluttered shut, flew open. “Me, too,” she admitted hesitantly.

She felt his smile curve beneath her lips. “I'm glad I wasn't the only one suffering.” He wrapped his arms around her and drew her into the cradle of his thighs. “But this is even better than my dreams.”

She sighed her pleasure. “Mine, too.”

He continued to kiss her lovingly, lingeringly, until Molly's entire world became focused on his mouth. She'd never known it was possible to feel so much from just kissing. She'd never realized a kiss could make you fly.

After a time, he took her hands from around his neck and placed them against the front of his shirt. “I think we're wearing too many clothes.”

She felt his heart pounding beneath her fingertips in a hard, pulsating rhythm that echoed her own. “You want me to undress you?”

“Only if you want to. In fact, if you'd rather stop—”

“No.” Even as her nerves rose to torment her yet again, Molly knew she'd die if they stopped now. “No,” she repeated more firmly as her fingers went to work on his shirt.

How could one man's shirt have so many buttons? Her fingers seemed to have turned to stone. For every
button she managed to unfasten, it seemed as if three more popped up to take their place. Nearly weeping with frustration, she glanced up at him and received an encouraging smile in return.

“We have all the time in the world.” He smiled and ran a fingertip along the tender flesh of her bottom lip, reddened from the way she'd been worrying it with her teeth. Grace did the same thing whenever she was concentrating, Reece realized.

Reassured and a bit emboldened, she returned to the task. Success! Finally she was able to push the crisp cotton aside and gaze in wonder at his muscled dark chest.

After another frustrating moment struggling with the buttons at the cuffs, she managed to push the shirt off his shoulders and down his arms. It landed on the floor at their feet and went ignored. Following her instincts, she leaned forward, touched her mouth to his gleaming chest and felt his deep guttural groan vibrating against her lips.

“My turn.” Displaying far more dexterity than she'd managed, he dispatched the buttons running down the front of her silk blouse. Within seconds, it was fluttering downward like a tropical pink bird, and landed atop his shirt.

Her breasts, clad in a skimpy bit of pink lace she'd borrowed from Tessa, felt unnaturally heavy. And although she never would have believed it possible, they'd begun to throb in anticipation of his touch.

“Lovely,” he murmured as he traced the scalloped lace with his finger, leaving a trail of sparks on her already heated flesh.

When he followed the burning path with the tip of
his tongue, Molly imagined water sizzling on a hot skillet. Her nipples, pressing against the lace, desperate for his touch, began tingling painfully.

Touch me,
they seemed to be crying out.
Taste me.

Displaying the patience that had once made him the best ER doctor she'd ever worked with, Reece touched his mouth to the startlingly sensitive spot where her shoulder and neck met, then continued to kiss his way along her collarbone.

“Reece…”

“Mmm?” After skimming his lips hotly up her throat, then back down again, he seemed intrigued with tasting the crook of her elbow.

“Please.” If anyone had ever suggested she'd ever plead for a man's touch, Molly would have scoffed at the possibility. But at this moment, she was willing to beg, if that's what it took to get that treacherous mouth back up to her breasts. “Touch me.”

“I am.” He trailed his fingers down the inside of her other arm.

“Not there.” Unable to bear the tension another moment, she combed her hands through his thick hair and literally dragged his head up to her breasts. “Here.”

“Ahh.” He nuzzled the soft yielding flesh, then once again proving himself an expert when it came to women's clothing, unfastened the front clasp of her bra so quickly, it seemed to dissolve in his hands before he sent it flying. “You are so beautiful.”

Her breasts were round and ripe and tipped with pale pink nipples. Reece cupped them in his palms while running his fingers over those rosy crests. When she began to tremble, he bent his head and took one between
his lips, laving lightly at first, then sucking in a way that made her gasp in stunned pleasure. When her hips began to move instinctively against his thighs, Reece realized that although Molly might not think she knew how to make love, her body definitely knew what to do.

The way she was moving against him, the heat of her body, the soft little sighs she was making, conspired to make him forget that he'd vowed to take his time, to be careful with this precious gift she was bestowing upon him. Fires burning in his loins, Reece scraped his teeth against one of the taut nipples and felt her immediately stiffen.

Damn!
Cursing himself for his impatience, he looked down into her face and witnessed the sheen of tears glazing the wide, midnight blue pools of her eyes.

“I'm sorry, I—”

“No.” She pressed her fingertips against his mouth. “Please. Don't apologize. I was loving it. You can't be blamed for old, knee-jerk responses.”

“I should be more careful. I got carried away.”

“Please, Reece, don't treat me like something that might break.” She held her arms out from her sides, as if offering herself, body and soul to him. Which, of course, she was. “I want you to treat me like a woman.”

The tension in the room disintegrated as he realized she was telling the absolute truth. “Well, then,” he drawled around his own answering smile, “if you insist.”

Drawing her back against him, he kissed her again, harder this time. His hands moved over her with a practiced touch that had her own palms roaming over his chest, up his arms, across his shoulders, down the muscled smoothness of his bare back.

He sat her down on the bed and unfastened her sandals. When he touched his mouth to the arch of first her right foot, then her left, Molly bit her lip to hold back her cry.

“Don't do that.” He kissed her again, soothing the wounded pink flesh with his tongue. “I don't want you to hold anything back, Molly, love. I want to know everything you're feeling. I want to be sure I'm bringing you pleasure.”

“Oh, you are,” Molly assured him as she kissed him back in an openmouthed wanton way that she'd never imagined she'd want to do with any man. Tongues tangled, lips ground against one another, teeth clashed.

“Oh, God, I knew it,” he said as he managed to unfasten her jeans and pull them down her legs. He released her mouth to kiss his way up each leg.

The hot touch of his mouth was making her legs quake. Her body bowed as Molly lifted her hips off the mattress, seeking…needing…something.

“Knew what?” she managed as the erotic heat took her breath away.

“That you'd be sweet.” He dispensed with the final silky barrier with ease.

The heat flowing through her veins had coalesced into a tight ball that pulsed like a newly born star. A roaring filled her head. When he touched his tongue to her ultrasensitive clitoris, the star exploded within her, around her, flinging her somewhere far above herself.

She couldn't breathe. She was dying. Surely it wasn't possible for anyone to live through such heat. But Reece was merciless. As she felt herself crashing helplessly
back to earth, he sent her up again. And again, each crest higher, each climax more shattering than the last.

“Please.” She wanted to reach for him, to pull him deep inside her, but her arms lay limp and useless at her sides. “Reece, I need you.”

He'd planned to be gentle. Worried that she'd link the rape with their lovemaking, he'd vowed to be tender. But the animal within had burst free when she'd responded with such surprising passion to his lovemaking, bringing with it a possessive need to plunder. Reece had wanted her hot and hungry, writhing and screaming. And by God, that's just the way he'd had her. And it still wasn't enough.

He left her only long enough to strip off the rest of his clothes and sheathe himself in the condom he was never without. Then he drew her back into his arms and resumed kissing her, slow, deep, devastating kisses that went on and on. When he slipped his hand between her thighs and pushed aside the soft slick folds to slip a long finger inside her, he found her hot and wet and tight.

Molly had worried that her old terror would kick in when he sought to penetrate her, but now, as a second finger joined the first, stroking her in an intimate way no man had ever done before, pleasure overruled fear.

“You're so wet,” he murmured, feeling himself on the verge of explosion as her body softened, opening for him.

“I know.” Molly was amazed to discover that she wasn't the slightest bit embarrassed by the sucking sound of his fingers moving in and out of her body. On the contrary, it was the most erotic sound she'd ever heard. “I can't seem to help myself.”

“Don't try to help it.” He leaned down and kissed her,
his tongue thrusting into her mouth, its rhythm echoing the wild pulsating one between her legs. “Wet is good.” When she bucked against his hand, he thought he was going to explode. “Wet and hot is very, very good.”

His own desire was nearly out of control now, causing his caresses to become less controlled. He suckled on her breasts as his hand probed deeper, he groaned as she reached between them and wrapped her fingers around his throbbing erection.

“You're so big.” Her eyes, which had drifted shut to better concentrate on these new sensual sensations, flew open. “We'll never fit.”

“Believe me, love—” he kissed her again, a soft featherlike promise “—we'll be a perfect fit.”

He knelt between her silky thighs. “I'll try not to hurt you.”

“You could never, ever, hurt me.” She twined her arms around his neck and drew his head down to hers for a long, passionate kiss. When she began sucking on his tongue, the last of Reece's control slipped away.

“Put your legs around me, Molly, love.”

She wrapped her legs around his hips, crying out with surprise and ecstasy as he surged forward, fully embedding himself inside her.

“Oh!” She never could have imagined that anything could have felt so wonderful. She never could have imagined that having Reece inside her could make her feel so complete.

When she began to move against him, Reece feared he wouldn't last long enough to show her just how good sex could be.

“Honey.” He put his hands on her hips, stilling her
restless movements. “Please, just lie still and let me…” He lifted her hips and went even deeper, until he could feel himself pressing against the back of her womb. “Oh, yes.” It came out on a guttural groan of masculine pleasure against her throat. “God, you feel so good. So tight. So warm.”

He was shaking from need for her. He was burning up from the inside out. He'd wanted to watch her, to witness her expression as he took her up over that final peak. But smoke clouded his mind, and a red haze shimmered in front of his eyes, blinding him as he plunged harder, deeper, faster.

All the time she arched against him, keeping up with the merciless pace, her hands moving up and down his back, clenching his buttocks, pulling him even deeper inside her velvet wet warmth.

It was mad. It was ferocious. And it was glorious.

Her vaginal orgasm racked her body; she shuddered convulsively beneath him. Engulfed in a rush of heat, her body clutching at him like velvet fingers, Reece lost all control, shouting out her name as he gave in to his own explosive release before collapsing on top of her.

Not wanting to crush Molly, he shifted them onto their sides, deftly managing the maneuver without slipping out of her. They lay there for a long, silent time, breathless. Spent.

“I don't think I'll ever be able to move from this spot,” he groaned when he was finally able to speak again.

The idea sounded fine to Molly. Better than fine. It was wonderful. “I never knew,” she murmured, pressing her lips against his damp neck, tasting on her tongue
the salt born of his exertion. “Never in my wildest imagination did I believe it possible for people to feel so much and not burn up from the feeling.”

Neither had Reece. Sex with Lena had been hot and wonderful, a manifestation of their love. Sex since her death had been hot, but his heart had never been involved in the action.

But sex with Molly had been like throwing himself on a fiery funeral pyre, only to rise again, reborn. He remembered thinking, just before his own orgasm, that if he were to die at that moment, his only regret would be that he wouldn't be able to do this again.