Chapter Twenty-Four
The vulnerability on her face, the fear in her eyes. Where was the strong, confident woman he’d met on the airplane, the force of nature embodied by a woman he thought he knew?
She stood after dropping what he was sure she thought was an epiphany to him, but in fact was old knowledge.
He joined her when she turned her back; the bathrobe he’d placed in the guest room dwarfed her frame. He placed a hand on her shoulder, was surprised she didn’t jump.
Victor realized, on some level, that he was acting a little bit like a high school senior pressuring his prom date to get naked. He wouldn’t, of course. But he did want to push Shannon out of her comfort zone and make her at least consider the possibility.
“Shannon, look at me.”
She didn’t.
He ducked closer, made it impossible for her to look the other way.
With a heavy sigh, she leveled her eyes with his.
“Pregnancy is always a risk—” he said.
“I will. It isn’t a question of risk. I stopped all forms of birth control months ago. One slip, one tear . . .”
He knew the answer to his question before the words formed in his head but wanted to hear it from her first. “Why?”
She studied the floor, looked up. “I’ll be thirty-five next month.”
“And you want a child.”
She didn’t look at him when she nodded. “It’s why I was in Tulum . . . I mean, outside of your wedding.” She rolled her eyes. “Your nonwedding.”
“You were meeting somebody?”
A quick shake of her head dashed away that thought. “No. Not somebody . . . just any . . . I shouldn’t be telling you this.” She turned.
He placed a hand on her arm. Kept her from walking in the opposite direction. “You had a plan.”
“A loose plan.”
“I didn’t fall into it.”
She looked at him as if he were crazy. “No, you didn’t. You crushed it. Not that I had found someone, but you were there and reminding me that maybe there was—” She stopped short, her thoughts unspoken.
“You’re a beautiful woman, I can’t imagine you haven’t been given plenty of opportunities.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Less than you would think.”
“What do your friends think about this plan?”
She hesitated, so he talked over her thoughts. “And to be clear, you went to Tulum to have sex with someone you didn’t know for the purpose of having a child.”
He waited for her to deny him. Her expression gave her away.
“Avery hated the idea.”
He smiled. “I always knew I liked her.”
Some of the stress, anxiety, or whatever it was on Shannon’s face faded with his comment. “It didn’t happen.”
“You met me.”
“And we didn’t have sex.”
“We could have,” he said. “You didn’t let us.” Because he wasn’t a stranger. Because he brought something to her life that made her revise her plan. The more he thought about what her motivation was for not having sex with him, the bigger his smile became.
“You do realize that all of my friends would have advised me to not have this conversation with you.”
Victor stepped forward, brushed a hair from her face, and tucked it behind her ear.
She sucked in a breath.
Such a simple touch, and yet she responded in a way that few did. “And what are your thoughts on this conversation?” he asked.
Her gaze met his and paused. “It’s liberating, I suppose. Honesty. I’m not used to it.”
“Paul wasn’t honest with you,” he deducted.
Her gaze lowered. “I wasn’t honest with him.”
That, he wasn’t expecting.
He lifted her chin. “One day, I want you to tell me what you weren’t honest with him about.” Victor stepped closer. “But today, I want to relish in the fact that you are honest with me.” And he lowered his lips to hers.
She was timid, maybe a little shocked . . . but she didn’t move away.
Victor closed his eyes and pulled in her scent as he drew her close. Her full lips parted. For air? Invitation? He didn’t know, but he took advantage of the opening and deepened their kiss. He tasted coffee and mint and Shannon. His mornings would never be the same after such an intoxicating combination.
The timid tip of her tongue met his and shot all the blood from his head south to his groin. Shannon reached around his waist. He felt her nails through the fabric of his shirt. He stepped closer, pulled her body flush with his. The outline of his erection pressed against the softness of her belly and wept to be closer.
He fanned his fingers through her hair, tilted her head back, and worshiped her with open-mouth kisses that left her gasping.
“This . . . this . . .”
He kissed her words away and finally moved to her jaw and the lobe of her delicate ear.
“Oh, Victor.”
Her pelvis pushed against him, so he nibbled her ear again.
She responded with a soft moan.
He wanted this woman more than he needed his next breath. “Let me make love to you,” he whispered.
Tight fingers spread against his back as he kissed the column of her neck. “The risk . . .”
He’d take the risk. But he told her what she needed to hear. “There are more ways to make love to you without taking risks.” He reached for the belt of the robe and gave it one tug.
Her eyes, half open with desire, met his. He could see her weighing her choices and questioned her resolve as she took a small step back. Shannon reached for the sides of the bathrobe and slowly pulled it off her shoulders.
Victor smiled, his body firing in all directions, praising the prize he was about to receive.
“This is a bad idea,” she said as the robe slid to the floor.
His T-shirt hung on her, filled out in all the right places, and stopped at the tops of her thighs. Long legs, legs he wanted to worship with his tongue, reached to her painted, bare toes. “A really good bad idea,” he countered.
Victor reached for her hand and drew her down the hall to the room where she’d spent the night.
He turned her into his arms the moment they crossed the threshold and kissed away any doubt she had.
Something inside of her clicked. He didn’t hear it, but he sensed it. Her lips traveled over his with renewed energy and need. Her hands roamed the span of his back and down over his ass.
His cock jumped in his pants. If he didn’t get control now, he would embarrass himself before she could take him in her hand, her mouth. And that was how he was going to make love to her. With kisses and strokes of his tongue. It was as if the thought evoked some kind of pheromone from her skin, because it tasted sweeter when he kissed her neck and pulled the T-shirt aside and licked her shoulder.
“You smell so good,” she told him. She nuzzled his neck, took a deep breath. “On the plane I thought it was cologne. But it was you.” Teeth grazed his chin.
“I thought you were sick,” he teased. “Had I known you were trying to smell me, I’d have leaned over and let you.”
Shannon tugged at the edges of his shirt.
His hands rode down her back and then traveled up her shirt. Slender curves and smooth skin had him closing his eyes and imagining what he’d find when he removed the shirt from her back. His thumbs traced the outline of her breasts and ran over the pert nipples. Would they be pink, or dusty mauve? Tan, or a darker brown?
She pushed into his palms and he lowered his head to kiss them through the cotton of the shirt.
“Yes, please,” she said.
Her body responded with tight restraint. She pushed forward, head back.
He sucked in one nipple, through the cloth, and caught her when her knees buckled. Shannon was a ripe berry ready for harvest. He teased and nibbled. Let her pull the shirt from her shoulders.
His breath caught.
Victor had seen her frame through the moonlight over Tulum, but never did he imagine just how majestic it would be to hold and touch. “You’re exquisite.”
A soft, almost doubtful laugh made him tilt her chin and force her eyes to meet his. He didn’t repeat his words, he simply kissed her. And when she went pliant in his arms again, he felt his own knees give way and moved her to the bed.
He guided her back, felt her knee slide up his leg as he lowered her. Her dark hair spread over the pillow. He’d imagined this moment the first time she started singing to him at the bar in Tulum. There were fifty ways to leave the one you were with, to be with the one you wanted.
“Touch me,” she pleaded.
Victor lowered his lips to the hollow of her neck and farther, until he found and captured one dusky nipple between his teeth.
She surged, all of her. Welcoming, asking.
He answered with the spread of his hand over her ribs and down her slim waist until he met the elastic of her underwear. Slow fingers searched.
So wet. How was it possible she was so ready?
Victor had made love to many women in his life. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t enjoyed nearly every one. The first time, with fumbling fingers and a climax that only satisfied him . . . to the women that pretended and called out long before their breath had a chance to be snatched away. But this woman, Shannon. His fingers found her again . . . she jumped, so he repeated the motion.
“Yes.”
Her single word of approval had his lips grazing her skin as he moved down her body, pulling her panties away from her legs until they sat on one of her ankles.
Everything about her was intoxicating . . . the scent, the taste . . . he moved lower and replaced his fingers with his lips. Tease.
He did . . . with his lips, his breath . . . his tongue.
Her hips surged forward and his pelvis pushed against the bed between her legs. The need to bury into her was as carnal as it comes, but he held back and made love to her in a way that left them both in need of something more. He settled between her legs and felt his heart singing when she placed a hand on the back of his head to hold him exactly where she needed him.