Vampires Are Forever (25 page)

She was grimacing at the likelihood of there being such a spot when something brushed her shoulders. Startled, Inez squealed, jumped, and whirled around, eyes wide as she saw Thomas standing there, hands raised, obviously to place them on her shoulders, eyebrows practically disappearing into his hairline at her reaction to his gentle touch.

They both stood still for a moment, and then Thomas cleared his throat and said, “Are you all right? I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I’m fine,” Inez said at once, wincing as her voice came out a high-pitched squeak that would have done Minnie Mouse proud.

“Hmm.” Thomas eyed her thoughtfully, and then said, “Well, I was going to suggest we order room service. Are you hungry?”

“Yes,” she gasped, grabbing at the suggestion. Anything to delay what was coming.

“Right,” he said slowly, still appearing thoughtful. “Well, why don’t you look at the menu and see what you want?”

Nodding, Inez moved swiftly across the room to grab up the menu. Thomas took her place at the window, peering silently out as she made her selection. It wasn’t quick. Her decision was, but then she spent a good, long time perusing everything on the room service menu at least three times in an effort to delay things. By the time Inez closed the menu, she figured she’d gained herself a good ten minutes with her dallying. And then she felt a hand on her shoulder. Inez jumped nervously, but managed not to squeal like an idiot this time.

Thomas was good enough to ignore her reaction. His voice was light as he asked, “Decided?”

Forcing a smile, Inez turned to face him, managing to take a step back as she did, and nodded. She held the book out between them and asked, “Do you need the menu?”

Thomas didn’t say anything, but she could have sworn his lips twitched with amusement as he took the book.

“Thank you,” he murmured and then glanced at her and suggested, “You seem a little tense. Why don’t you pick your room and take a nice relaxing bath. I’ll wait to place our orders so you can have a nice long soak.”

“Oh, yes. That’s a good idea,” Inez breathed with relief at the offer. It was yet another delay as well as a chance to shave her legs again and do various other little tasks that might boost her confidence. She could have kissed the man. Instead, she caught the handle of the rolling suitcase they’d bought in Amsterdam and promptly headed out of the room.

“Inez.”

She froze in the door and glanced back warily. “Yes?”

“You have to tell me what you want so I can order it,” he pointed out gently.

“Oh.” She gave a nervous laugh, babbled what she wanted in a rush and hurried out of the room before he could stop her again.

Inez rushed into the first room she came to, hefted her suitcase onto the luggage rack, unzipped it, and began pulling out items willy-nilly in search of what she would need for her bath. The room looked like a tornado had hit it by the time she was done, but Inez didn’t care. She was stressed and didn’t think she’d ever been this stressed before in her life.

She shook her head at herself as she hurried into the bathroom and dropped everything on the counter. She’d handled mergers, hostile takeover attempts, and various other business emergencies with easy aplomb, Inez thought with self-disgust as she squeezed bubble bath into the tub and turned on the taps. And it wasn’t like this was her first time. She’d had sex before and never been this distressed by it all, not even her very first time. But then it hadn’t ever really mattered before. She hadn’t cared for anyone else like she cared for Thomas.

“What?” Inez gasped the word as she met her reflection’s gaze in the mirror. But even as she asked the question, she knew it was true.

Inez had dated lots of men while at university, and then when she’d first started to work, but they’d all seemed terribly immature or even boring to her so that she’d begun to avoid dates and the whole social scene. Work had been more interesting. In effect, she’d had a love affair with her career for the last decade and hadn’t met a man who could compete.

Until now.

Thomas could definitely compete. And while she’d at first thought the most attractive part of being his lifemate was the complete lack of effort needed on her part, leaving her free to continue her affair with work, her feelings were changing on the matter. Work had never made her feel the exhilaration and excitement that Thomas could with a look or a light touch, let alone the passion she experienced with his kisses. Work had never made her laugh and feel as lighthearted as she had today as they’d toured Amsterdam. And work had never made her feel beautiful and sexy as Thomas had made her feel at the Kattenkabinet when he’d said all those lovely things to her.

Thomas could, and was, competing with work and winning hands down.

“I’m in trouble,” she murmured to her reflection, because it certainly felt like trouble to her. Thomas was the first person who had touched the calculator that past boyfriends had claimed was her heart…and he could quite easily smash it. While he had talked about her being his lifemate, he’d never once mentioned love, and Inez feared she was heading down that dark, frightening path. It put a whole new light on everything. Before, she’d just had to decide if she could handle living centuries, now she had to decide if she could live centuries with a man she would no doubt come to love with every fiber of her being, but who might not ever love her in return.

Panic giving way to a solemn mood, Inez turned off the taps, stripped, and slipped into the tub to consider the problem.

“Inez?” The soft question, accompanied by a light tap at the door brought her eyes open and had her sitting up abruptly in the water, and then quickly dropping back down until the few bubbles still remaining covered her to the shoulders.

“Oh, you’re awake,” Thomas said, peering at her through the door he’d eased half open. “I was afraid you’d fallen asleep.”

“No,” Inez said quickly, forcing a smile. “How long have I been in here?”

“Well over an hour,” he answered. “The food has arrived.”

“I’ll get out now,” Inez said and started to sit up, but came to an abrupt halt as she recalled she was naked.

Thomas smiled faintly and grabbed a towel from the rack. Holding it open, he stepped to the side of the tub. When Inez eyed the towel and hesitated, he said quietly. “Shy? You weren’t this morning.”

Her eyes flickered to his face at the way his voice had suddenly lowered and she saw that his eyes had that silver glow. Swallowing, Inez hesitated another moment, then stood, knowing her cheeks were blushing furiously even as she did. Much to her relief, he immediately moved the towel forward and she lifted her arms to keep them out of the way as he wrapped it around her. Inez’s eyes widened in surprise, however, when he didn’t then release her and step away, but lifted her out of the tub like a child. That child image died an abrupt death when he kept lifting her, bringing her up until their lips met.

Surprised, she clutched at his arms with every intention of putting some space between them. Inez hadn’t been sleeping, she’d been thinking, and what she’d come up with was it was better if she kept her distance from the man and refused to agree to be his lifemate until she knew if he could come to love her. That grand plan flew out the window, however, when his tongue slipped between her lips, coaxing a response from her.

A little moan of defeat slipping from her lips, Inez gave up her hold on his arms and slipped her hands around his neck, blinking in surprise when she felt that his hair was damp. Obviously, he’d taken a bath too or perhaps a shower. She didn’t know which, but in the next moment didn’t care. He’d turned with her and set her on the edge of the marble counter and the moment he took his hands away, the towel dropped to pool on the counter around her hips, caught beneath her, but no longer covering anything.

Inez shuddered as Thomas took advantage of the lack and urged her legs open so that he could step between them as he kissed her. His hands slid over her naked back, pressing her closer until her breasts rubbed against the soft cloth of his shirt as he kissed, and she moaned, scraping the nails of one hand through his hair, while the other clutched at his shoulder, urging him closer still.

She felt one hand leave her back and slide around to her side, feathering lightly across the side of one breast. She shuddered and kissed him more eagerly, her upper body suddenly taking on a mind of its own and twisting slightly, pressing one breast tighter against his chest while making space between his body and her other breast.

Thomas accepted the silent invitation, his hand closing warm over the eager orb and Inez moaned and arched into the caress, and then cried out into his mouth as he plucked at the excited nipple. She groaned in protest, however, when he tore his mouth away from hers, but then gasped and arched even more as his head dropped so that his lips could fasten on the nub he’d been teasing.

Catching both hands in his still-damp hair, she held on tightly and shivered as he alternately laved and suckled at first one breast and then the other, gasping little half-phrases of encouragement and need in Portuguese. However, her ability to speak deteriorated even as the excitement he was stirring in her built and Inez was soon merely moaning and then tugging firmly at his hair, demanding he return to kissing her.

Thomas chuckled at the silent command and raised his head to kiss her again, pressing forward as he did so that his chest and groin brushed against hers as his arms enveloped her. Inez groaned into his mouth at the assault to her senses and reached between them to catch the hem of his T-shirt and begin tugging it up.

Thomas broke their kiss and leaned back, his arms rising accommodatingly so that she could remove the item, but when he started forward again to kiss her after that, she didn’t let him. Her hands were now on his chest, holding him back as she explored the muscular surface. His muscles weren’t unattractively bulky, but sleek and well defined and his shoulders and chest were wide, a veritable playground for her to explore. Inez ran her hands over all that male flesh with awe, and then leaned forward to press kisses to the firm surface, before stopping to lick and nip at one flat nipple.

Thomas sucked in a breath and immediately caught her head between both hands to force her face up. His mouth then covered hers in a kiss that was hungry and carnal. Inez smiled against his mouth. Emboldened by this small success, she trailed her fingers lightly down his chest until they reached the top of his jeans. She worked blind at his belt buckle, then at the button and zipper and then quickly pushed the heavy material down over his hips until the upper half of his behind was bare. Her hands stopped then for a brief foray over the taut flesh, before slipping back around to the front to find him hard and free of the encumbering jeans.

A sigh of satisfaction slipped from her mouth to his as Inez closed her hand around his arousal, and then she stiffened in surprise as a wave of keen excitement coursed through her. Thomas growled into her mouth and reached down to catch her hand and try to drag it away, but all he managed to do was draw it the length of his shaft and Inez cried out with startled pleasure as another wave of pleasure, this one larger and heavier, poured over her. Her eyes blinked open as she realized that her own cry had echoed a growl from Thomas.

Inez tried to break their kiss to ask what was happening, but Thomas wouldn’t let her. He also wouldn’t let her touch him again. He forced her hand away from him and brought it up over her head, catching and raising her other hand at the same time. He then switched his hold so that he had both wrists caught in the fingers of one hand against the mirror.

Realizing how he’d trapped her, Inez tried to protest, but it was hard to do with his tongue in her mouth, and then his free hand closed over one breast and she arched and shuddered and forgot all about it as he drove her wild with both his kisses and caresses.

Just when Inez thought she couldn’t stand it anymore, Thomas suddenly released his hold on her hands. Gasping with relief, she reached to wrap them around his shoulders, but he wasn’t there to hold. He’d broken the kiss to travel her body with his mouth, his lips brushing over her throat, her collarbone, her breasts, and continuing downward as his hands caught her by the hips and pulled her bottom to the edge of the counter.

Gasping breathlessly, Inez dropped her hands to the counter and braced herself to keep from falling back against the mirror, hardly hearing the skitter of the cosmetics she sent skipping across the marble. Her attention was focused entirely on what Thomas was doing as his lips burned a trail over her stomach. When the path continued down over her hip, Inez shook her head and tried to close her legs, but he held them open with his hands, and even urged them farther open to accommodate his shoulders as he dropped to his knees before her.

Inez knew where he was going and what he planned to do, but still cried out and jerked in surprise as his head bowed between her legs. She may have known what was coming, but nothing could have prepared her for the shocking jolt of pleasure that shot through her at the first rasp of his tongue over her sensitive flesh.

That cry was one that seemed to have no end. It became an ululating sound that rose and fell and dropped into breathless gasps, but then rose again as Inez struggled on the counter, her hips and pelvis fighting to rise into the caress or alternately to shrink away when the sensations became too intense. She was allowed to do neither. Thomas held her in place, his grip firm on her thighs as he drove her toward the edge of sanity. When he suddenly stopped and lunged to his feet between her legs, she didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. He didn’t say a word, simply slid his hand under her bottom and scooped her off the counter.