The Misconception (5 page)

“For goodness sake, someone had to make the first move,” she said, but again he heard that strange little quiver in her voice.

Jax stood rooted to the spot, wondering if he’d have the strength of mind to walk away from this. He could make out the shape of her arms stretching overhead, of her waist bending, of the sheets of the bed being turned back.

“What are you doing now?” he asked, although he was pretty sure he already knew.

“Isn’t it obvious? I’m taking off my clothes and getting under the covers.”

She was taking off her clothes
. The part of Jax that had relaxed at the bizarreness of the situation came back to life with a vengeance. His mouth went Sahara-desert dry.

From the instant he’d seen her, standing at the airport holding her sign, he’d fantasized about how she looked under that ridiculous sack dress. Now, here she was, alone in a hotel room with him. Naked.

His conscience screamed at him, but he shut it out. He was only a flesh-and-blood man, after all. There was only so much he could resist. He couldn’t resist this.

He kicked off his shoes, shrugged out of his suit jacket and pulled off his tie as he walked slowly to the bed.

Then he turned on the bedside light and flung back the covers.

Chapter 4

A rush of cool air hit Marietta’s naked skin, but it was offset by the hot wave of humiliation caused by having this man’s brown eyes on her.

“Hey!” she said indignantly, trying to cover herself with her hands. Two of them weren’t enough. She tried to get hold of the bed covers, but he was quicker than she was, yanking them off the bed with a supreme tug.

Tears sprang to her eyes, and she tried valiantly to blink them away, but it was to no avail. She’d used up all her bravado in the bathroom, when she’d given herself a pep talk about how she could, too, bring herself to have sex with a handsome stranger. Her stomach had been churning with harmful anxiety, but she’d marched out of the bathroom, tipped the bell boy and put the plan into action.

She’d only lost her nerve when it came to the lights. She thought turning them off was a reasonable request. Except he hadn’t honored it. She was naked and exposed, and he was staring at her as though he’d never seen a woman without her clothes on. The embarrassment was almost too much to bear.

“Are you crying?” His voice was incredibly gentle, and the mattress sagged under his weight when he sat down on the bed. He reached out a hand, and she braced herself to withstand his intimate touch, knowing it was no more than she had invited. Instead of stroking her breasts or her thighs, however, his fingers came in contact with her forehead. He smoothed back the hair from her face. “Why are you crying?”

“I told you, but you didn’t listen,” she said on a sob, painfully aware that most of her was exposed to his gaze. “I’d rather you didn’t see me.”

“Why not? You’re beautiful.” His eyes had darkened so they seemed more black than chocolate, and tiny goose bumps formed on her skin.

“I am not.”

“Sure, you are.” His hand dropped, and he wiped away the tears under her eyes. Even though they were the only people in the room, he spoke in a whisper. A husky, sensual whisper. “You have one of the sexiest bodies I’ve ever seen.”

“No, I don’t.” Marietta shook her head vigorously at his ludicrous statement. “I’m five, maybe ten, pounds overweight.”

“You’re the perfect weight.” His eyes roamed over her as though to prove he meant what he said. “Neither too fat nor too thin.”

“Look at my legs, then,” she said, her voice shaky. “They’re way too long in proportion to the rest of me.”

He ran his fingertips from her ankle to her hipbone, sending delicious shivers over her. “I am looking at them. In my opinion, a woman’s legs can never be too long, which makes yours extensively beautiful.”

Marietta tried to dismiss the ludicrous compliment, attempted once again to make him see reason. “My stomach isn’t flat. That’s why I never wear a bikini. No matter how thin I get, it poufs out.”

“Flat stomachs aren’t sexy. Yours is.”

His big hand covered her stomach, his darker skin providing a stunning contrast to her paleness. Marietta’s pulse fluttered, and she put both hands to her hot cheeks. She wasn’t making much headway in convincing him she’d be more comfortable with the lights out.

“My breasts,” she choked out. “They’re too small. I barely fit into a B cup.”

“Too small for what?” he asked and smiled. The hand covering her stomach skimmed over her ribcage and cupped one of her breasts. She gasped at the heated rush of feeling that blasted her. “It fits perfectly, don’t you think?”

Marietta tried to swallow, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t seem to do anything but feel. Jax’s left hand joined his right until both of them were lightly kneading her breasts, his fingertips circling her nipples until they pebbled.

“They’re getting bigger,” she informed him.

“What’s getting bigger?” He moved closer to her on the bed, skimming his lips across her cheek.

“My. . .” Sensation pooled low in her belly. “. . . breasts.”

“Your breasts?” His mouth moved down to the body parts in question, and he kissed them, one after the other. She felt her back arch as she tried to get closer to his mouth. He laughed. “What do you mean your breasts are getting bigger? I thought, when a woman reached adulthood, they stopped growing.”

Her brain was so muddled that it was difficult to think, but she managed to dredge up material from one of her more popular biology lectures.

“Female breasts enlarge up to twenty-five percent,” she began, gasping as his tongue circled them, “and nipples swell by as much as one centimeter during, uh, you know.”

“Sex?” He raised his head and smiled, looking straight into her eyes. “That is what you’re trying to say, isn’t it?”

Marietta was known around campus as one of the more erudite instructors. She was seldom at a loss for words. Now, she said, “Uh, huh.”

His lips moved to her right earlobe. His teeth tugged on it, then his tongue laved it.

“Did you know,” she asked, more than slightly breathless, “that the earlobe is an erogenous zone?”

He chuckled softly near her ear. His warm breath sent shivers through her. All over her body, tiny hairs stood on end.

“I love it when you talk brainy like that,” he whispered, drawing back to look at her face. “Tell me more.”

“Nostrils flare and pupils dilate.” She noticed that, despite the light, his pupils were so large she could barely make out the brown rim of color surrounding the black. She breathed deeply, trying to draw in more air. Her breath brought with it the scent of his cologne mixed with an intoxicating something else. “Sweat glands open, releasing a signature scent. Some people call it a pheromone. In the insect kingdom, the female gypsy moth emits a specific kind of pheromone to attract a male.”

He brought his nose to her neck and breathed deeply. “You smell better than any moth I’ve run across.” He nuzzled the sensitive skin of her neck before trailing kisses over her jaw and across her cheek. He stopped when he reached the side of her mouth. “What happens to the lips?”

“They get redder.” She licked them, already feeling the physiological changes. “They swell and become sensitive.”

“I’ve got an idea.” He whispered the rest of the words inches away from her lips. “Let’s try out your sensitive-lip theory.”

He touched her lips with his. His mouth, which looked so hard, was incredibly soft. He seemed in no hurry to gain entrance to the inside of her mouth, instead running his tongue over her lips and kissing her over and over, on the corners of her mouth, at the center, as though he couldn’t get enough.

A rush of heat enveloped her, and Marietta recognized what was happening. Her body was readying itself for sex. Marietta was familiar with the tingling that preceded the actual act, although she couldn’t quite remember the sensation being this intense.

She remembered the disappointment, though. After her partner had his fun, that was always the same.

She pulled back slightly from his mouth, suddenly wanting to get the disillusionment over with. “We can skip the preliminaries, you know.”

He ignored her as though he hadn’t heard, and plunged his tongue into her mouth. She moaned as his tongue traced the roof of her mouth and then transferred its attention to the cellar. The tip of it ran over hers, coaxing her into a sensual session of give and take.

For a moment, she forgot about the impending disappointment and kissed him back.

He gathered her into his arms, and there was something amazingly erotic about having her bare skin against his clothing. One of his hands tangled in her hair, loosening the knot of her bun so her hair fell long and free, and his other hand cupped her bottom, kneading. She felt herself grow wet, her body readying itself for him.

He drew back slightly and smiled at her. “Unbutton my shirt,” he invited.

A smidgen of sense came back to Marietta. That was an action that reeked of intimacy, and this was a business deal. It wasn’t supposed to be sensual, wasn’t intended to be enjoyable.

“I. . . I couldn’t,” she began, but he silenced her by capturing her hands and bringing them to his shirt front.

“Go ahead,” he urged. “You’ve probably seen the movie Alien, but I promise there’s nothing under there but a chest. No monster’s going to jump out at you.”

A smile creased her mouth. This was bad, very bad. Above all, she wasn’t supposed to let herself like him.

“Do you know,” he said, tipping up her chin, “that’s the first time I’ve seen you smile.” He traced her curving lips with his finger. His eyebrows danced. “The second time is going to be when you get up the courage to unbutton my shirt. I have an amazing, monster-free chest.”

She’d been clenching her fingers in an effort not to take him up on his invitation, but he’d given her the perfect excuse to do exactly what he wanted her to do. Exactly what
she
wanted to do.

“Oh, you do, do you?” she heard herself say. “Let’s just see about that.”

She reached for his shirt, her fingers fumbling with the buttons. When she finished, he freed the tail of his shirt from his trousers and shrugged out of it. She stared. Bronzed skin and golden-brown chest hair stretched over some of the most impressive pectoral muscles she’d ever seen.

“I look even better without my trousers,” he prompted.

She was still too stunned by the glorious sight of his chest to take him up on the hint. He laughed, lifted her easily off his lap and made short work of the rest of his clothes.

She watched him as he undressed, growing even more amazed. His body was the kind a sculptor would appreciate. Every muscle was defined, every sinew beautifully realized. It looked more like a work of art than a body. Michelangelo’s David wasn’t far off the mark. In fact, Marietta thought Jax had a better body than David.

The only marks marring his perfection were a large purplish bruise beside his hip and three slashes — from a cat’s claws? — across the middle of his stomach. She started to ask how he’d gotten the injuries, but she forgot the question when he turned back to her fully aroused. She’d been right. He was big. Big and spectacular. His gaze followed hers, and she knew he could hear her breathing become ragged.

“Did you know,” Marietta rasped, trying to camouflage her nervousness, “that respiration increases to four times its normal level during, uh, you know. . .”

“Sex?” he supplied again.

Now that he was naked, she expected him to be concerned with fulfilling his own needs. Instead, when he rejoined her on the bed, he caressed the arch of her foot and planted a soft kiss on her ankle.

“What. . . what are you doing?”

“What does it feel like I’m doing?” he asked, a chuckle in his voice. He kissed her calf, the underside of her knee, her thigh. “I’m kissing you all over.”

“But. . . but. . . that wasn’t part. . . oooohh.” He’d reached the juncture of her thighs, and she felt the warm wetness of his tongue invade her. Nobody had ever done that before, and it felt wickedly good. “No. . . ooooohhh.”

Calling on her willpower, she pulled his head up. His fingers immediately replaced his tongue, taking over where it had left off, and he kissed the soft skin of her stomach. By the time he kissed his way up to her mouth, she was trembling.

“Touch me,” he commanded, and she was powerless to do anything but obey him. First she smoothed her hands over his glorious chest, reveling in the hard ridges and soft chest hair. Then she moved her attention to his flat, rippled stomach, being careful not to aggravate the scratch marks. Finally, she found the most impressive part of him and encircled him with her fingers.

“Baby,” he breathed into her mouth, “oh, baby, that feels good.”

Her vocal chords could only seem to produce moans and murmurs or she might have told him not to call her baby. Then again, maybe she wouldn’t have. As long as he kept doing what he was doing, whatever he called her was just fine.

He shifted his body slightly and she moved with him. It was the most natural thing in the world when he slid into her. She expected a vaguely pleasant fullness but multiple sensations crackled in the place they were joined and radiated outward. This feeling was like nothing Marietta had ever experienced before. She wrapped her legs around his buttocks as he buried himself deeply inside of her and slowly withdrew.