Getting It Now! Read online

  Then the most horrible thought occurred to him, one that he hadn’t failed to consider since he started dipping his wick—he didn’t have a condom. He held himself perfectly still and wretchedly confessed. If he had to stop now, he’d probably expire.

  “I’m clean and covered,” she said breathlessly, her eyes glazed with want. “Please tell me you are.”

  Philip pushed against her once more, felt relief melt every bone in his body except the one eagerly nudging between her hot legs. “Not to worry. I am.”

  “Oh, thank God. Philip,” she pleaded, her voice a breathy plea. She bracketed his face with her hands, pulling his mouth up for another frantic kiss. Her tongue pushed into his mouth, thrust back and forth and his hips automatically caught that rhythm. Her wet sex rode the ridge of his erection and with every push he felt her body tightening, relaxing, then tightening again. Her breath came out in jagged little puffs and her skin dewed with sweat.

  His thighs quaked and burned with the effort of restraint and when he feared he might collapse, he finally drew back enough to nudge her center. His vision blackened around the edges.

  Carrie’s sexy chuckle sounded in his ear. “Oh, thank God. I need—I want—”

  Me, dammit, Philip, thought. Say me.

  “—you,” she finally said, a confession that touched him all the way to the core. With a primal growl which would have made his Cro-Magnon ancestors proud, he pushed into her, impaling her on his throbbing dick. Her breath caught, then eased out in a vastly relieved sigh.

  Philip buried himself to the hilt, seating himself firmly between her thighs. If he’d ever experienced anything more perfect than the sensation of having Carrie locked around him, her feminine muscles clamping over him—claiming him—then he couldn’t recall.

  For the briefest of seconds between that first thrust and the second, in the smallest recesses of his mind, he recognized that something was different this time. Something significantly special had happened.

  Then she’d leaned forward and nipped at his shoulder, tightened around him once more, and the sentiment was lost to sensation.

  He just wanted her.

  Philip grabbed her hips and pistoned into her, her soft pliant body eagerly absorbing his frantic thrusts.

  Her hands were everywhere—on his back, his neck, into his hair—impossibly enflaming him even more.

  She mewled, gasped and swore and he felt her go rigid and melt…then go wild. “Oh, please,” she cried, her fingernails biting into his back. “Philip, I—”

  “I know,” Philip all but growled. He could feel the tingle of beginning climax burning in his loins, knew he couldn’t last much longer.

  Her tight heat fisted around him and she met him thrust for thrust, forcing him to up the manic tempo.

  Impossibly the refrigerator rocked behind them and, perhaps it was merely his imagination, but he thought he could hear jars and cans wobbling around inside.

  He didn’t care. The whole damned house could come crumbling down around them and he wouldn’t move from between her legs until she came, until every last spasm of pleasure had been milked from her magnificent body.

  Just when he was certain that he wasn’t going to be able to hold out—that he wasn’t going to be able to make it happen for her before he came apart—she sang for him.

  A sharp gasp, a desperate growl, every muscle in her body atrophied, she clamped hard against him, her head fell back against the refrigerator door and a soundless wail tore from her throat.

  It was the most beautiful melody he’d ever heard.

  And the most welcome because he thought he was surely going to die before he brought her to release.

  Her wet heat fisted hard against him, evidently the secret code, because he suddenly came. Hard. Philip felt his lips peel back from his teeth. His legs weakened, his knees wobbled and it was all that he could do to keep them upright. The final pulses of her orgasm milked him of his—of the rest of his—strength and he slowly lowered her to the floor, then pressed a kiss against her forehead.

  “You’re amazing,” Philip whispered, because the moment asked for it. Needed some sort of acknowledgment, even if it seemed horribly inadequate.

  Carrie leaned forward and kissed his jaw. “You’re not too bad yourself.”

  The idea of going home—of leaving her—and making the trip back across town to his big empty house made his stomach fill with a chilly horrid dread. He didn’t want to be lonely…and knew he’d never be lonely with her.

  Philip slid a finger reverently down the side of her face, then hesitated. “Can I spend the night?” he asked, for the first time since his childhood opening himself up for rejection.

  A soft smile curled her lips. “Only if you’ll carry me to bed,” she said. “I’m not sure that I can walk.”

  Relief jimmied a sigh loose. “Well,” he said, promptly gathering her up in his arms. “I was rather hoping you’d carry me. After all, I did all the work.”

  Carrie gasped and shot him an outraged look.

  “You did all the work?”

  “Didn’t I?” he asked innocently. Philip retraced his steps through the dining room, back to the living room and toward the staircase. “Is this the way to your bedroom?”

  “No,” she said, an odd light gleaming in those sleepy violet eyes. “It’s at the back of the house.”

  Philip paused, slightly embarrassed that he’d hauled her in the wrong direction. Sort of ruined his gallant gesture. He should have asked. Served him right.

  He retraced his steps, went back to the kitchen and looked for an entrance to her bedroom. He saw the back door, what was obviously a pantry and washroom, but nothing which remotely resembled her sleeping quarters.

  An odd suspicion rose and his gaze slid to hers. Her eyes sparkled with humor and her lips twitched at the corners. She looked completely comfortable wrapped up in his arms. Relaxed, and unlike him, not the least bit out of breath.

  He felt his eyes narrow. “Your bedroom is upstairs, isn’t it?”

  She laughed, the she-devil. “It is.”

  “Then why—”

  “You did all the work?” she asked with a significant lift her brow.

  Philip turned and made his way back through from whence he’d come, then headed up the stairs. He chewed the inside of his cheek. “That might have been a small exaggeration,” he conceded.

  He reached the landing and realized the upstairs was a lot larger than what he would have thought. A wide hall bisected the middle and six doors—three on each side—loomed in front of him.

  Carrie chuckled, sensing his dilemma. “Only a small one?”

  “Which one is your room?” Philip asked, rather than going in and out of the wrong doors.

  “I’ll let you know when you go in it.”

  Since he’d rather get her into bed than belabor the point, Philip bit his tongue and smiled. “Okay,” he relented. “It’s quite possible that you did some of the work.”

  “Thank you,” she replied with a prim nod of her head, evidently pleased with his reluctant concession.

  “Now which one is yours?”

  “Third door on the right.”

  “Excellent,” Philip said, and headed in that direction. “But I still did most of the work.”

  Carrie gasped and punched him lightly on the arm as he finally strolled into her bedroom. “Fine,” she said. “I suppose that you think I should make it up to you?”

  He gently deposited her on the bed, watched her hair fan out over her pillow. A startling combination of affection and need broadsided him, forcing him to set a knee against the mattress.

  Philip cleared his throat. “Making it up to me sounds like a fine plan,” he managed.

  Smiling, Carrie tugged him toward her. “You win,” she said.

  Philip felt a laugh break up in his throat. “Win what?”

  She rolled him onto his back, then straddled him. Her eyes twinkled with humor and were sleepy with want. “Me.”
/>   God help him, Philip thought.

  10

  IF SHE COULD SET THE SCENE any more perfectly, Etta James’s “At Last” would be drifting softly through the room and a steady rain would be pouring down outside, punctuated by the occasional rumble of thunder.

  Instead, they’d showered together in lieu of rain—a blessedly sensual pastime which involved lots of shower gel and a mental thank-you to the contractor who’d firmly secured the metal shower ring to the ceiling above her claw-foot tub. It was the first time she’d ever had occasion to practically hang from it, Carrie thought with a slow smile. As for the storm, Hoover’s dubious grumbling from the floor beside the bed doubled for thunder.

  But she had managed to make one part of her fantasy with Philip become a reality. Carrie tipped the black truffle oil nozzle onto her finger, got just a little—waste not, want not, after all—then painted his nipples with the heady, fragrant oil.

  Laying flat on his back, hands laced behind his head, he epitomized sexy and relaxed as candlelight illuminated the fascinating landscape of his smooth, muscular body.

  Living art, Carrie thought with a quiet needy sigh.

  His broody silver eyes watched her carefully and a faintly wicked smile caught the corner of his mouth. “Why do I get the feeling that this is something you’ve given quite a bit of thought to?”

  Carrie bent her head and lapped at him, sighing with pleasure as the pungent taste hit her tongue. “Because I have,” she murmured huskily. “It’s all part and parcel of my wild-gorilla-sex-with-Philipon-a-dark-and-stormy-night-with-truffle-oil fantasy.”

  His head tipped back, allowing a deep chuckle to vibrate up his masculine throat. “Well, I think we covered the wild gorilla sex part in the kitchen, you’ve got the truffle oil and it’s dark, but I’m afraid stormy wasn’t in tonight’s forecast.”

  Odd, then, Carrie thought, because when he’d pushed into her downstairs tonight, she’d felt like she’d been hit by lightning.

  Positively electrified.

  Every hair on her body had stood on end from the shock of his hot invasion. Every cell had peaked, her skin had prickled, and every molecule which made up her quivering form had sung with that bizarre, impossible recognition.

  Her body knew him, craved him, needed him.

  Had she not been on the brink of orgasm from the instant she touched him, she would have been terrified. As it was, she hadn’t had time to be terrified.

  She’d merely felt.

  And it had been amazing.

  Carrie had wanted him—there had never been any question about that. She’d fantasized, dreamed and longed for Philip since the first time she’d caught sight of that crooked smile on her television screen.

  She’d wanted to taste, treasure, and touch every inch of his body.

  She’d wanted to cook with him, curl up on opposite ends of the couch and read a book with him. She wanted to talk politics and religion with him—the sticky subjects which revealed more than a person’s opinion but a measure of their character.

  She wanted to know the names of the pets he’d had as a child, an explanation for every scar on his body. She wanted to know if he’d been popular or shy, when he’d lost his virginity and to whom. Had his interest in cooking come from a family member or, like her, was there a deeper meaning behind her desire?

  To put it simply, she wanted to know everything about him. Every last niggling detail.

  Her gaze slid over his chest, down his belly and rested at the long hardened length of him jutting proudly toward his navel. Carrie snagged her oil once more and let go a shuddering breath of anticipation.

  But first things first…and admittedly, her fantasy was a priority.

  She loaded her finger once more and drew a line down his ridged belly, into his navel, then further south until she reached her ultimate destination. He jumped eagerly into her hand, warm and thrilling, hard and ready.

  Philip hissed with pleasure and his thighs tensed. “Carrie,” he said warningly.

  “Shhh. I’m doing something.”

  A choked laugh broke up his throat. “I know that. It’s what you’re doing that’s killing me.”

  Then prepare to die, Carrie thought with a wicked chuckle. She flipped her hair out of the way, swirled her oiled finger around his engorged tip, then bent and slowly licked it off.

  “Sweet mother of—Carrie.” Philip’s hands fisted in her sheets.

  She smiled, then took the whole of him into her greedy mouth. The taste of warmed black truffle oil and musky man tantalized her tongue, hypnotized her senses. He was smooth and hard and he felt like living velvet in her mouth. Carrie worked the base of him with her hand, chased it with her mouth and tongue, up and down, making a feast of him. She moaned in pleasure against him, wanted him to know just how much she enjoyed him, how much she relished feeling him in her mouth.

  Honestly, she could get addicted. There was something so hedonistic about being with him. He lit every sense, heightened every feeling.

  Apparently unable to withstand her single-siege against him, Philip’s hands were suddenly on her, rolling her onto her side. In the blink of an eye, he realigned their bodies, hooked her thigh around his shoulder, then parted her curls and lapped at her weeping flesh.

  The first shock of contact—his facile tongue against her pulsing clit—made the air rush out of her lungs in a startled broken exhalation.

  “Mmm,” he moaned. “Why should you be the only one to get fed?”

  Carrie licked the underside of his penis, sucked at the sensitive skin. “Funny. I was thinking, why did I have to do all the work?”

  His chuckle echoed against her and he parlayed the taunt by slipping his finger deep inside her, then upping the tempo against her tender nub. “I know exactly what you mean,” he told her, the wretch.

  She felt her muscles clamp against him, felt the first sparkler of impending climax light deep in her womb. Oh, no, Carrie thought, upping her ministrations, he wasn’t doing this to her. The next time she came she wanted to be on top of him, riding out the climax above his magnificent body.

  That had been her fantasy, after all.

  Carrie tongued him a few more times, simply because she couldn’t resist. He was like a chocolate kiss or a potato chip. One taste was never enough. Another tight flash of tingling heat engulfed her sex, forcing her to rethink her current position.

  This was nice…but him being inside her would be better.

  She gave him another slow, tender pull, then gently untangled herself from him long enough to roll him onto his back. She scaled his body, settled herself above his hard sex and winced with pleasure as his smooth head bumped her swollen clit.

  “Carrie,” he said warningly again.

  Like she was actually going to listen to him? she thought, smiling. What was he going to do? Stop her? She had him right where she wanted him—where she’d needed him for the past year—firmly beneath her thighs.

  She bent forward, purposely raking the tips of her breasts against his chest, and licked the side of his neck. His masculine hair abraded her needy nipples, sending another lightning bolt of electricity through her.

  “Holy…” he choked out.

  Carrie chuckled, slid over him once more, coat ing his rigid length with her feminine juices. “We’re getting there,” she said.

  Philip’s big wonderful hands moved over her back, spanned her waist, then molded to her rump, causing her belly to shudder with a broken breath.

  “Not soon enough. Bloody hell, Carrie. If you’re going to—Would you please just—” Philip lifted his hips and pushed against her, desperately trying to get inside her.

  Since she wanted that, too, she leaned back, raised her rump and slowly, painstakingly lowered herself onto him. The sensation was exquisite.

  Timeless.

  Her lungs deflated with each increment of his hot welcome invasion into her body and by the time she’d fully seated herself on top of him, she was in serious danger of pa
ssing out. An involuntary thing like breathing was suddenly beyond her. Every thought, every sensation, every ounce of her energy was invested in what was happening below her waist, at their joined bodies.

  Philip looked up and those heavy-lidded pewter eyes tangled with hers. The emotion she saw there—the stark need—made something in her chest swell and fracture. Something extremely significant had just happened, hovered right out of her immediate understanding, but she let it drift away, too caught up in him to heed it.

  Philip growled low in his throat, pushed up again and her feminine muscles instinctively tightened around him. She lifted herself up, dragging the tension out, savoring the erotic friction between them. He filled her so completely she could feel every pulse, every ridge and vein deep inside her.

  He tightened his hold on her hips, then leaned forward and dragged the crown of her breast deep into his mouth, unwittingly causing an answering tug in her muddled womb. Carrie’s breath hitched in her throat and she rode him harder.

  Up, down, up and down. Philip suckled her harder, seemed to sense the exact instant to lick and tug, to thrust and hold back. He was reading her, Carrie realized, impressed. She subjected him to similar scrutiny, watched his face for every flickering lash and wince of pleasure. Listened to those intensely sexual sounds—a keening growl of approval, a restless grunt of satisfaction, then corroborated those telling gestures with the appropriate action.

  He dug his heels into the mattress, veins appeared in his arched neck and a long guttural howl tore from his throat. A hot flash of heat bathed the back of her womb as his climax tore through him and rocketed into her.

  As though his somehow tripped a hidden trigger, Carrie’s own orgasm crested and broke through her. A soundless keening shriek rose in the back of her throat and she threw her head back, channeling the sensation. Her feminine muscles clamped around him, each exquisite squeeze of her release sapping her strength as it tightened around his still-pulsing shaft.

  When the last tremor subsided, she collapsed onto his chest, spent and boneless. The warm scent of hot sex, dark truffle oil and vanilla candles permeated the air. Her hair slithered over her shoulders, cascaded onto his side and pooled onto the mattress. His heart pounded against her cheek and his talented fingers drew lazy circles on her back. That nagging sense of homecoming and well-being blanketed her as her lids drooped.