Knight In Black Leather by Gail Dayton (ebook reader ink .txt) 📕

They kissed and kissed. Her impertinent hand, the one he'd set near his shoulder, decided to go exploring again, sliding down until she felt the mad race of his heartbeat. Eli traced the neckline of her gown, fingers ruffling the eyelet lace dipping from one shoulder to the other, over and over again.

He slid his mouth across her cheek to her ear and teased the lobe with his tongue, his breath harsh and rapid in her ear. "Lie down with me," he murmured, words coming sporadically between breaths. "I want you so much. Please, God, say you want me too."

"I--You do?" She shouldn't be so surprised. He'd been kissing her like--like a man who wanted the woman he was kissing. He'd been telling her so for a week or more. But she hadn't really believed it. The idea was so impossible. Even now, in the middle of his sweet, seductive kisses, she had her doubts.

"God, Marilyn, what does it take to convince you?" With his cast, he shoved her hand down his chest into his lap and lower, using his fingertips to urge hers to wrap themselves around his hot, hard erection.

"There," he said, pausing to gasp as those independent-minded fingers of hers traced the rigid shape inside his shorts. "Is that enough? Do you believe me now? I want you."

She tried to pull her hand away, but it refused to obey her. It wanted to touch, feel how he filled her hand, explore his dimensions, measure his heat.

"Death," she said, struggling to make her thoughts obey. "And life. We saw--your friend is dead. We're not. You just want to--to spit in death's eye. Celebrate living."

"I've wanted you a hell of a lot longer than today." Eli closed his eyes as Marilyn caressed him. "And I'm not sure I care what your motivations are. I want more than just a one-time pity fuck, but if that's all I'm going to get, I'll take it. God, Marilyn--"

He dove back in for another kiss, this one hotter, more steam than sweetness. His arm behind her moved down, pulled her in until her breasts plumped against his chest. And all the while that hand of hers kept exploring his state of arousal.

She couldn't think any more. Didn't want to think. Thinking would get her into trouble. Or was it not thinking that did that? She didn't know, didn't care. Didn't think she cared, anyway.

Eli bore her down onto the bed, his leg cast scraping the foldout mechanism as he turned to bring the other one up over hers. He pulled her hand away and pressed his erection hard into her hip, dropping his head on her shoulder as he panted. "It's been too long," he said. "I want you too much. Give me a second."

She couldn't stop touching him. Her hand slid up into his light brown hair, ruffling its silky softness, and down across his shoulders. He shifted position, kissing her shoulder, and his leg cast banged on metal again. The reminder of his injuries helped her think, but didn't bring her back to her senses. Her senses were too saturated with Eli.

"Wait." She pushed at him, shoving him off her.

Eli groaned. "Marilyn, no. Please." But he moved as she asked, falling onto his back sideways on the bed with another mighty groan. "You're going to kill me."

Marilyn sat up and scooted across the bed, tugging Eli with her. "Come up here. Straight in the bed, so you don't get any more scrapes or bruises." She picked up his broken leg and set it on the bed as Eli moved, a wary hope in his expression.

"Okay." He lay flat on his back, shifting his hips as if wanting to be sure she remembered the erection tenting his shorts. As if she could forget. "Now what?"

Now what, indeed. Seeing him laid out before her like some smorgasbord of erotic delights, Marilyn couldn't decide what she ought to do. Lie down and go to sleep, probably. But that wasn't what she wanted to do, so she tossed all the oughts out the window.

She didn't want a one-time pity fuck either. That was why she'd hesitated so long, because she found it so hard to believe Eli was offering anything else. But if he wanted more and she wanted more too... Oh hell, why worry about it now?

Marilyn moved one knee between Eli's and he spread his legs to accommodate her, spreading them wider so she could kneel there. His eyes darkened, blazing with intensity as he watched her. She leaned forward, setting her hands on his thighs. The new cast bared his knee, so she could touch more of him, and she touched to her heart's content.

She trailed her fingers through the coarse hair on his legs, smiling as his thigh muscles contracted and relaxed. Bit by bit, she slid her hands higher, beneath the hem of his shorts to trace her thumbs along the line where his legs joined his body.

Eli held his hands out to her, beckoning her. Marilyn just smiled. She lowered her face toward his stomach and right before her lips touched skin, he caught her, stopped her. "Much as I'd love for you to do that," his voice rasped out, "I don't think I can take it. Not now."

Marilyn kept her body curled over, lifting only her head so she could see him. "I was only going to kiss you. Here." She traced a small circle with her finger around his navel.

Again she dipped her head, and again he interposed his cast and hand to block her way. "I know," he said. "I don't think I can take it."

"Just a little kiss?" She teased him, blowing on his stomach through his fingers.

"God, Marilyn--" He sat up, lifting her as he did, and kissed her--twice, three times as hot as he'd kissed her before. His hand went to the neckline of her gown, wrestling with the row of tiny buttons running partway down the front.

"Let me." She sat