Only for You (25 page)

“Oh,” she cried out wildly as orgasm hit her. Her muscles seized.

“That’s right,” he said, his voice thick with triumph and lust. It was a little hard to keep up their frantic pace while she shuddered in pleasure. Seth took most of her weight, settling her into his lap. He continued to fuck her while she came, every muscle in his powerful body straining tight as he controlled her movement on him. He stabbed his cock into her with short, hard strokes, racing for his own release. It was such a discombobulating rush of pounding pleasure and straining sinew, for a moment everything blurred in Gia’s consciousness.

She finally focused on the reflection of Seth’s profile. He didn’t make a sound as he watched himself—not in the mirror, but in real life—drive his cock into her with ruthless abandon. In the mirror, she saw his rigid face, blazing stare and bulging muscles. Suddenly, a great shudder went through him and an ominous low growl escaped his throat. A thrill of anxious excitement went through her.

Talk about sitting on a bomb.

He pulled her down in his lap, and she felt his cock swell. His growl escalated to a roar. She felt him pulse high in her as he ejaculated. He kept her nailed to him as he came, the only exception being the way he pushed her buttocks together and circled her hips tautly in his lap. It was overwhelmingly thrilling.

Finally, he lifted her once and crashed her back to him.

He made a harsh, ragged sound. Instead of slowly fading, all the tension seemed to fall out of his big muscles. He encircled her waist and brought her against his torso tightly, his face pressing to her shoulder blade, his powerful chest heaving against her as he fought for air. He clutched her like he was afraid to let go.

Gia just stared at him in wonder in the mirror, as moved by the vision of him frayed and undone as she was by the ruthless, powerful lover.

Gia was beginning to get used to a vacation schedule, as new and alien as it was to her. She was starting to love the long, sweet hours filled with nothing but relaxation and discovery and pure, golden pleasure with Seth.

They spent the next week in a cocoon of warm intimacy, sitting in the hot tub under a dome of stars, talking, playing cards and watching old movies in bed far into the night. A few times, Seth brought some blankets onto the deck and they would lie on the wooden bench, snuggled together and cocooned beneath the covers.

“Do you like to go camping?” Seth asked her once as they had stared up at the beauty of the night sky.

“You mean sleep in tents and make campfires?” Gia asked doubtfully.

He lifted his head and peered at her closely. “Never mind,” he said, smirking, letting his head fall again. “City girl disdain is written all over your face right now.”

She laughed. “I’m not that bad. I’ve never been camping, so I don’t know if I’d like it or not. Maybe I would,” she said, touching his naked chest. “With you.”

Seth could make anything appealing, after all.

He smiled and pushed a tendril of hair behind her ear. “I’m thinking the best we could hope for in your case is glamping.”

“Glamping?”

“Yeah. Luxury camping. You get all the benefits of the beauty of the outdoors in addition to five-star restaurants and spas.”

“I don’t need a spa and restaurants,” Gia insisted. “I just want a clean bed and a lock on the door.”

Seth shrugged in a concessionary gesture. “Yeah. I can see how those things would be a necessity in your case.”

Whatever activity they undertook during those sweet, sensual days and nights, it usually never reached full completion because they couldn’t keep their hands off each other and ended up making love.

During that time, she found out that Seth possessed a shockingly accurate photographic memory, something that guaranteed she lost at poker every time they played. She discovered he ate his eggs over easy and liked English period dramas, even though he refused to admit it. He
would
admit to a penchant for sci-fi and horror movies, which she said she hated. Then she proceeded to grow enraptured with the genre while in the circle of Seth’s arms, listening to him explain the fascinating details of the special effects makeup on the screen. She learned his stamina for both exercise and making love was gargantuan.

They didn’t speak of their relationship beyond the days in the brilliant autumn woods, but instead did as Seth suggested, focusing on what worked between them instead of the obstacles.

And there was so much that
did
work.

Seth got up from bed one early afternoon, insisting she stay put while he made them a
real
lunch. They had subsisted almost entirely on easy meals thus far: Sherona’s delicious breads, fruit, eggs and some frozen chicken breasts and vegetables from the freezer that they would replace before they left. She hadn’t eaten all day and was both curious and starved by the time Seth entered the bedroom a half hour later, carrying a large tray.

“I didn’t know you could cook like
this
,” she said in amazed pleasure as she set aside her book, her gaze caught by the delicious-looking contents of the tray. She sat up against the pillows, drawing the sheet up to her chest, her appetite piqued.

“I’m a single man. If I don’t cook, I starve most nights. It’s nothing fancy,” he downplayed, handing her first a cloth napkin and then a plate.

She disagreed and told him so several times in the midst of wolfing down sesame-citrus halibut, wild rice, green beans and a warmed piece of Sherona’s delicious cinnamon-raisin-walnut bread. This bounty was accompanied by a lovely dry chardonnay.

After Seth had taken her empty plate and glass and set it down, along with his, on the tray, Gia fell back on the pillows in content, sensual lassitude.

“I’m going to make you dinner tonight for payback,” she sighed dreamily, thinking of what she’d stowed away in the locked compartment of her suitcase. She smiled to herself.

“What’s got you looking so smug?” Seth asked.

“Nothing,” she said, meeting his stare. “Thanks again. That was the best meal I’ve ever had.”

Seth gave her that amused, fond glance she was starting to recognize and cherish seeing. “Right. Never a better meal, even though you’ve lived in restaurant meccas like Manhattan and L.A.”

“None of those were made by you,” she said quietly, her cheek on the pillow as she studied him. He was reclining on his hip, elbow bent, his head resting on his hand. Unlike Gia, who was naked under the sheet, he was partially dressed in a pair of black cotton pajama pants that he’d donned before cooking for them. She languorously followed the beautiful upward slant from his narrow waist to his wide chest to his face. “I mean the whole experience, not just the food, although that was delicious. I’m not used to having someone cook for me.”

“Are you a cook yourself?”

“When I focus on it. Which is never,” she added under her breath, grimacing slightly. “I’ve been so busy lately, I live off catered food from a movie set or I order in. I try to eat fairly healthy, but still . . . there’s something less fulfilling about the experience of eating food like that, you know?”

He nodded. “Impersonal. The person preparing it doesn’t know you.”

“Yeah, exactly. The ingredients are first-rate, and the preparation is skilled, but there’s no love or caring, no acknowledgment of you as an individual.” She realized how wistful she sounded and blinked, darting an anxious glance at Seth. She’d probably freaked him out by suggesting he’d prepared her meal with
love.

He didn’t look at all ruffled by what she’d said.

He
did
change the subject, however.

“Is this good?” he asked, picking up the book she’d been reading and had discarded on the mattress when he arrived with the food.

“Excellent. Do you know much about Eleanor Roosevelt?” she asked, drawing the sheet more firmly around her breasts and sitting up against the pillows.

“A little. I had to write a paper about her in a college history class.”

“Could you do me a favor?” she asked, taking the book from him and setting it down between them on the mattress, still facing Seth. She rifled through the pages to a series of photos. “These are of her in her late teens and twenties.” She said, leaning forward as they both studied the pages. “There’s a producer interested in adapting this book into a movie, and he’s asked me if I’d be interested in playing a young Eleanor. Cecilia doesn’t think my looks are at all suited for the part,” she said, referring to her agent. She frowned. “Actually, she also thinks it won’t have a wide-enough commercial appeal, but I don’t care about that. Eleanor has been an idol of mine for a long time. It’d be a dream to play her. But I
am
worried about if I could pull it off, from a physical-appearance standpoint. There’s no one better to ask than you. What do you think?” She tapped her finger on the page of a young, quite pretty Eleanor with dark blond hair styled in a poofy upsweep. She had a pensive face and intelligent, soft eyes. “Could I become her?”

She waited anxiously while Seth flipped through a couple pages, studying the images silently. She trusted his opinion completely. If he said it was impossible to transform her physically into Eleanor, it was. He finally glanced up at her, his stare moving slowly over her face. She experienced, not for the first time, his intense focus and that cool, penetrating . . .
all-seeing
gaze that defined his genius.

After a tense pause, he nodded once. Her heart leapt with excitement.

“It would be a subtle, but complicated, makeup. A mouth insert would have to be used to shape your lower face, and it would have to be a really good one, sculpted to not only Eleanor’s facial features, but yours as well. Your lips are usually a problem—not in everyday life, or for
me
,” he added dryly, “but to disguise.” Gia smiled. He nodded at the page. “Eleanor has a nice, full mouth, though, and it was much softer-looking when she was young. It would mostly be your acting that counted for embodying her, though. Roosevelt had very characteristic mannerisms and voice intonation.”

She nodded eagerly. “I think I could do it.”

He gave a small smile and glanced back at the page. “I’m sure you could. The face would be easier than her body though. Wasn’t Eleanor one of the tallest first ladies?”

“Five eleven. I’m barely five six,” Gia admitted.

“Well . . . the trick of film and costume could diminish that, and the way you move your body, of course,” he said slowly. “I can make some sketches, and I brought my kit. Do you want to experiment a little with it while we’re here?”

“Yes,” she enthused. “That’d be amazing. But only if you want to. It’s supposed to be a vacation for you too.”

He didn’t speak for a moment, and she wondered if indeed he’d only offered to be polite. Then she noticed his quirked brow as he studied the book intently. She could almost hear his brain whirring.

“Seth?”

He glanced up distractedly.

“Oh . . . sorry. Yeah, I definitely want to do it,” he replied simply.

His phone buzzed on the bedside table. He twisted around and snagged it with his left hand. She saw a small smile shape his lips as he read the message once he faced her again.

“Apparently even the gossip grapevine is slower moving in the vicinity of Vulture’s Canyon than the rest of the world. Katie Pierce has just found out from Sherona that I’m up here.”

“Rill’s wife?” Gia asked.

“Yeah.” He glanced up at her. “She’s asking us to come to dinner tomorrow night. They just got back from Los Angeles. Do you want to go?”

“As Jessie Bauer?”

He nodded. “As my nephew.”

She bit her lip, considering. It would be interesting to meet Rill in person. He was one of the youngest, most respected directors in Hollywood. Seth seemed to notice her hesitancy.

“What are you thinking?” Seth asked her quietly.

“I’m not so sure I feel like sharing you with anyone else,” she said impulsively.

Something flickered into his amber eyes. He reached out and cupped her waist warmly in his hand. “I know what you mean. It’s nice alone up here on this hill with you. Should I tell Katie no?”

“Well . . . maybe we
should
wander out tomorrow?” she asked, her heart not in what she was saying. She realized that a dark, murky cloud of emotion was hanging at the edge of her consciousness. Maybe that unnamed emotion was fear, that if they left the little world they’d created between themselves, the magic would be broken. What if they could never return?

Gia mentally rolled her eyes. Her anxious, unrealistic thoughts weren’t at all in sync with her practical planning self. She reined in her disquietude.

“Yeah . . . we really
should
get some groceries, venture into the real world, I suppose. I wanted to thank Sherona for all the supplies, although I suppose it’d be more in character for you to want to go do that, since I don’t think it’d be typical for Jessie to return social calls. We could walk through one of the local towns, check out the sights, and then go to Katie and Rill’s for dinner?”

“Sounds like a date.”

“Except that you’ll be dating a boy,” she said drolly. “But would that be so bad? A date, I mean?”

That sexy smile tugged at his mouth. “Not in the slightest.”

“I mean, if I have to be in disguise, we might as well get it over with all at once, right?”

“Get what over with?”

“Halting cabin fever from ever setting in?” she suggested, shrugging.

“A preventive measure?”

“Exactly.”

“Fine with me either way. You’re the one who hates being confined.”

“That was before,” she admitted, touching the side of his ribs. She thrilled to feel his skin roughen beneath her stroking fingertips. He growled softly when she touched his stiffening nipple. He promptly dropped the phone behind him on the bed.

“Before what?” he asked, suddenly dead serious. He pulled the sheet down, exposing her bare breasts. Without pause, his head lowered. He pressed his mouth over her heart and softly cupped a breast.

“Before being confined with you,” she whispered, enthralled by the sensation of his light, brushing lips and the slight abrasion of his whiskers on her skin. He found her sensitive nipple, his warm mouth enfolding her.

Gia closed her eyes and forgot Rill and Katie Pierce. Nothing existed but Seth and the new, amazing world he was opening up to her.

*   *   *

Later, after they’d made love, Seth held a warm, supple, dozing Gia in his arms, her cheek against his chest. He thought she’d fallen asleep until she spoke.

“Do you know what would be amazing?” she asked, her voice dreamy and slurred with sleep.

“Hmmm?”
he asked, running the soft coils of her hair idly between his fingertips.

“If you could work on the Eleanor film and do my makeup.”

The citrus fragrance from her hair and the unique scent that came off her skin after orgasm filled his nose in the silent seconds that followed. He couldn’t think of how to respond to her sweet words. He lifted his head to peer into her peaceful face.