Throwing his head back, he howled with the welcome of his release—the passionate proof of his desire.
Eight
W hat have I done ?
Dana couldn’t catch her breath while her heart still hammered in her chest. It’d just hit her that making love with Marc was the most powerful…the most startlingly beautiful experience of her entire lifetime.
He pressed a kiss against her neck. A gentle kiss, it was filled with a tenderness that was threatening to break her heart.
In her head the whole thing had been way over the top. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Probably thousands of women lost their virginity every day. They couldn’t all feel this same stupendous surge of…of…power. That was the only word Dana could think of that explained what she’d felt—was still feeling.
Marc had been crazy with his need for her. When she’d hesitated or when she begged for more, he complied with her every wish. She’d been the boss, the one in control. And he’d been the one to show her what her body was capable of feeling.
As if he sensed her disquiet, Marc lifted his upper body, leaning on his elbows above her. “Dana,” he groaned. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, but had the feeling she wasn’t going to like having any conversation with him right now. His tone of voice sounded guilty and full of regret. Dana wasn’t in the mood.
“You were a virgin.” He blurted it out as if it were an accusation—not like the statement of fact it was.
“True,” she admitted. “But just leave it be. We don’t have to talk. It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.” He idly stroked his hand along her shoulder and down her arm. “You’re so…sexy…sensual.”
The blazing morning sun made the red highlights in his brown hair gleam, sparkling like the glassy reflections off the top of the ocean’s waves. He was so good-looking she nearly cried just staring up at him.
“Thank you. So are you,” she managed on a half-choke.
His expression turned grave. “Oh hell, Dana. I thought since you weren’t a schoolgirl—and you’re an FBI agent, after all.” He looked so exasperated and so adorable. “I was too rough…and I forgot to use any protection…and I didn’t use my head at all.”
He bent and murmured against her lips. “Forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive.” She tried to choose her words carefully. “Where I grew up, sex was a dirty word. If a girl was easy, she was just as likely to get gang raped as she was to snare a boyfriend. So, very early on I made a vow not to let any boy talk me out of my virginity…to become tough enough to fight my way out of potential hot spots. I learned to fight…not make love.”
Dana twisted so she could look up into his eyes. “By the time I entered Quantico for training, the idea of being the world’s oldest virgin was too humiliating to contemplate. I didn’t dare date anyone who might tell the others. I just pretended that I had a boyfriend who lived out of town, and stayed to myself on off hours.”
She swallowed and continued. “But this morning I wanted to be with you. When I saw you looking at me with that…desperation…and desire in your eyes, I wanted you to be the one. I gave myself permission to take what was offered—for the first time in my life.” Touching the tip of his beautiful Roman nose, she let her finger wander down to trace the line of his lips. “And you were worth waiting for.”
“Dana…” He sucked her finger into his mouth and pressed his body hard against hers, his chest brushing her breasts and their hips jamming together. “I thought I’d never make love to another woman. Just the idea of it seemed totally impossible after last year. But then suddenly—I was desperate for you. I’m still desperate for you.”
Marc kissed her with a fierceness that stirred her soul, drinking from her lips as if she were his first sip of water after an impossibly long thirst. “I want more. Again and again,” he groaned against her lips.
He moved his powerful upper body closer to hers. Dana jolted as surprising new sensations began spreading from the point where his hard arousal pressed inside her body. She’d thought he would take a long while to recuperate. But all of sudden, he was moving, pushing, sending rippling currents of need and pleasure to every inch of her.
Slow and searing.
Marc stoked the fire between them once again as his lips moved across one breast at the same time he teased the other nipple between two fingers. Dana felt the fire ignite under her skin. Felt her mind growing soft along with her body.
The eruption of her senses came fast this time as he shuddered into her, gripping her tightly enough that the world spun and shook with wild explosions rocking between them. After all that, she thought that both their hearts must’ve stopped altogether. But he kept her secured in his arms and firmly rolled them over on the blanket together.
They lay sated and drugged with pleasure as the sun beat down on their naked bodies and the gentle ocean breeze caressed their hair. With her still cradled snugly against him, he closed his eyes and Dana listened as his breathing evened out and slowed.
She lay still and watched him sleep, then began to take inventory of what she was feeling. Nothing hurt. Nothing that is except a general achy feeling in the vicinity of her heart.
Dana gazed at the long smooth lines of his legs and hip, as he sprawled on the blanket next to her. The man was genuinely beautiful. She took in every inch until the torture of wanting him became a poignant, depressing pain running through her entire body.
Oh man, she’d really gotten herself in a world of trouble this time. Wanting anyone this much was bound to turn out wrong.
The sun dipped behind a cloud and Dana felt a cold chill run across her skin. They could never have a lasting relationship. She wasn’t positive that either of them would even know how.
Their situation had just become impossible. Unless…she could find a way to go back. Go back to being a tough, law enforcement professional, using her knowledge and connections to help a man who needed her. Go back to nothing more than friendship.
Determined to somehow put aside what the last few hours had really meant to her, she eased out from under his arm and sat up. The sun eased through a hole in the clouds and she realized it must be nearing mid-morning. Sighing, she reached over and grabbed a handful of warm sand, letting it slip between her fingers like the minutes of the time they had left.
Her first experience of desire was becoming just a memory. It had to be put behind her and forgotten. That was the only way. The best way.
A gentle tickle, like the flutter of butterfly wings, moved across his skin and pulled him from sleep. When Marc opened his eyes, he remembered where he was. And he remembered…Dana.
She sat across from him on the blanket, fully dressed and slowly pouring sand over his body. “Good afternoon,” she said quietly. “I wanted you to get enough rest. But as the day got later and the sky darker, I began to worry that it might rain on us.”
He reached out, wanting to pull her to him for one more kiss. He was still not completely shed of his drugged sense of need. Though his brain was still fogged over with sleep, he wanted to experience yet another taste of her.
But she scooted back—away from his touch.
A tiny sliver of dread replaced the drifting sense of lust he’d felt upon awakening. In the overcast light, he saw a purplish bruise along the base of her neck and noticed her lips were swollen from his kisses. He touched his own lips and wondered if he had that same well-loved look.
When he looked down and saw the faint scratches on his