Maureen Child - The Jarrods - Temptation - Claiming Her Billion-Dollar Birthright / Falling For His Proper Mistress / Expecting the Rancher's Heir

“This was my spot when I was a kid,” Christian said softly as he came up behind her. “When I needed to think, when things got bad, I came here and everything felt … all right again.”

“I can see why,” she said and wondered how anyone could be sad or depressed if they had somewhere so beautiful to go. She looked at him and asked, “And how many women have you brought here, I wonder?”

“Counting you?” he asked, gaze fixed on hers with an intensity that shot a lick of flame through her center. “Just one.”

“Why did you bring me?” she asked, her voice as breathless as she felt. “After everything you told me about Don and the will and everything … why did you bring me here?”

“Because,” he admitted, his gaze moving over her face like a caress, “I had to.”

Then he pulled her in close and kissed her.

He took her mouth with a hunger he’d never known before. Instantly, her lips parted, allowing him access, welcoming him into her warmth. He’d known, somewhere deep inside him that it would be like this with her. Known that the pulse of electricity between them would erupt into a shower of light and heat the moment he got close enough to her.

With a groan, he surrendered himself to the sensations pouring through him, refusing to think about anything beyond this moment. This kiss.

This taste of her that was filling cold, dark corners within him.

Their tongues tangled together, breath mingled and her soft sighs gave him all the encouragement he could have wanted. Sweeping one hand down her back, he traced her curves and wished he could peel her out of the dark red shirt she wore. Instead, he settled for tugging the hem of her blouse free of her crisp, white linen shorts and then slid the palm of his hand across her bare skin. She shivered as his fingers caressed the line of her spine, up and down and then up again. He needed the feel of her as badly as he needed her taste in his mouth.

Her arms came up and wrapped around his neck as she leaned into him. Her breasts flattened against his chest and he felt the hard points of her nipples pushing into him. He groaned again, felt his body go hard and ready and ground his hips against hers, looking for ease, but only managing to torture them both.

Christian kept his mouth on hers as he lifted her off her feet and deepened the kiss further. Slower, longer, hotter, he wanted all, wanted everything. For days now, his mind, his body had been clamoring for just this and now that he had his hands on her, his mouth on her, he didn’t want it to end.

The roar of the river was right behind them, the insistent rush of it playing counterpoint to the thudding of his own heartbeat. When he finally tore his mouth from hers and dragged in a ragged breath, she smiled up at him.

“So much for medievalism.”

His breath strangling in his lungs, he nodded. “I’ve never had to work so hard to stay within the rules. But I’ve wanted to taste you since the moment we met.”

“Good to know,” Erica said, moving one hand to cup his cheek in her palm. “I felt the same way. I still do. I want you, Christian.”

His body tightened even further and he wouldn’t have thought that possible.

“You’re not making this any easier,” he said, setting her back on her feet, keeping his arms around her, one hand on her bare back.

“I’m glad. It shouldn’t be easy. It should be damned hard to walk away from whatever it is that’s between us.”

“It is. That’s why I brought you here. I need to have you to myself. If only for today.”

“And that would be enough for you?”

“No,” he admitted, sliding both hands under her shirt now, moving over her skin to cup her breasts over the lacy cups of her bra.

She gulped an unsteady breath.

Through the lace, his thumbs and forefingers toyed with her nipples, eliciting another soft moan from her. “I’ve thought about tasting you, touching you. I’ve dreamed of having you alone and under me, over me.”

“Oh, my …”

Slowly, he moved his hands until he reached the waistband of her shorts. She took a shallow breath as he deftly undid the snap and zipper.

Her gaze locked with his and Christian couldn’t have looked away if it had meant his life. Suddenly the entire world, or at least all he wanted to know of it was there, in her amber-colored eyes.

“I need to touch you,” he whispered, his voice almost lost in the thunder of the swift-moving river.

“Yes,” she said, leaning toward him again, giving him all the welcome he needed.

He snaked one arm around her waist while his other hand dipped down, over her belly, beneath the thin elastic band of her panties. Then lower still, inch by glorious inch, past the tight curls at the juncture of her thighs. She gasped and stiffened, holding herself perfectly still as his fingers smoothed over her heat.

A low-throated groan slid from him as he felt her wet warmth and knew it was all for him. That she wanted him as desperately as he did her.

Then she jolted in his arms and a tiny, want-filled sigh slid from her lips. Her eyes closed as he dipped his hand lower still.

He touched, he caressed, he explored her delicate folds, learning her, learning what pleased her, what sent her soaring. He watched her face as he took her and her every sigh fed the flames of his own desire. He claimed her with a slick stroke across that single bud at the heart of her. That one spot that was the most sensitized and she trembled in his arms.

As sunlight played down around them and the world went about its business, Christian took Erica on a fast ride to pleasure. His fingers deft, he drove her relentlessly until she whimpered and pleaded his name on sighs torn from her throat. Her hips rocked into his hand as she sought release only he could give her. She parted her thighs wider, hoping he would take more, silently offering the invitation.

And he did. Dipping his head to the line of her throat, his lips and teeth left a trail of flames along her skin as he dipped first one finger and then another deep into her heat.

“Oh, Christian!” She swayed against him, but then held still as if afraid he’d stop.

He wouldn’t. The feel of her beneath his hands was magic. Everything he’d dreamed and more. He wanted to lay her down and take her body with his completely, right here, on the soft, warm grass under the shelter of the trees. But he wouldn’t. Couldn’t risk someone stumbling across them. So he would settle for this stolen moment. This one instant when the two of them were alone and nothing was more important than the next sigh.

He took her higher, his fingers moving over her most tender flesh. She gasped, she sighed, she shivered against him and still he pushed her on, dragging out the sensations, taking her to the edge and then drawing her back. Lifting his head, he looked down at her and she opened her eyes as if needing to see him as tension coiled tighter and tighter within.

“Let go,” he whispered, bending to brush her mouth with his. “Let go and come for me now.”

Her fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt and clung to his shoulders as if she were half-afraid she would slide off the edge of the world.

“Christian …” His name came on a breath as she trembled against him.

His thumb caressed her again and then she shattered in his arms. Her body quaked and shivered, her eyes slid closed. She held on to him as pleasure rippled through her again and again until finally, the last waves died away and she was left nearly boneless.

He held her closer, wrapped both arms around her middle and held her pressed tightly to him. His own heartbeat was crashing in his chest and matched hers beat for beat. This was so much more than he had thought it would be. He felt so much more than he’d expected.