Her arms tightened around his neck and Sam ran his hands down over the boning of her gown. She arched against him, her breasts rising and falling above the low-cut neckline, threatening to spill out. Breasts he’d longed to see, longed to taste.
Telling himself that he’d stop this lunacy in one more moment, he slid his hand along the slender curve of her arm and shoulder and down to cup her rounded flesh in the palm of his hand.
Her breath caught inside her chest and she arched higher against him. Sam sensed the need in her, felt it in his own blood, and seared an urgent path of heated kisses down the long line of her neck. Her head fell back as a shiver went through her, her body leaning more heavily against his. He braced his arm across her lower back, his feverish eyes taking in the creamy skin of her décolletage, pearl-white in the ribbons of moonlight that breached the overhanging trees.
Heat and fire coursed a dangerous path inside him, burning up all rational thought as sensation overwhelmed him. A vessel blew its horn somewhere out on the harbour, someone laughed gaily as they jumped into the pool. Sam barely heard a thing, the sounds receding beneath the heaviness of his own thundering heartbeat.
Ruby’s lips were soft and yielding beneath his, feeding off his with the same violent hunger that turned him harder than stone. He shifted closer, bringing their bodies into perfect alignment, taking her soft moan deep into his mouth.
‘Damn, you taste good,’ he murmured, his lips moving to the sensitive skin beneath her ear. She writhed in his arms, her greedy hands growing more restless and bold as they ran over his shoulders and into his hair.
His mask was in the way and he was about to wrench it off when she pushed his jacket back and he had to shuck out of it. Then her sharp little nails raked his skin as she tugged his shirt out of the waistband of his trousers. Hunger bit deep and he hauled her upwards, his mouth returning to hers with a primal need.
Sam had been with many women in his thirty-one years, pleasured more than he could remember, and he knew he was a good, giving lover, but this...touching Ruby, hearing her soft cries of pleasure as he discovered what pleased her, was a sensual delight he hadn’t reckoned on. He was completely at the mercy of his senses and he not only wanted to take everything she had to offer but he was also prepared to give her everything in return.
‘More,’ she begged, leaning into him and kneading his back muscles like a hungry kitten might a downy quilt. Sam swore under his breath and gave her what she wanted, urging her back against the vine-clad wall of the house and putting his hands all over her. Moulding her hips and her ribs, the soft swell of her round breasts. Breasts he had to see. Had to touch.
Somewhere in the back of his head an alarm bell was ringing but it was competing with the soft sounds of their mutual need, and really, what was one more minute of madness?
Lifting her so they were at eye level, Sam leaned forward and kissed the rounded swells of her breasts and then forced the top of her gown to give so that one pert nipple popped free.
‘I want to taste you.’ His voice sounded guttural with urgency and he didn’t wait for her response, lowering his head and taking the tight pink bud deep into his mouth. He flicked her aroused flesh with his tongue, relishing the soft keening sounds that told him she was as lost to this madness as he was.
‘Oh, God.’ She arched into his hold, her fingers threaded through his hair. ‘I need you,’ she said on a rushed breath, her fingers fumbling as they moved to his belt buckle.
Knowing he should stop, but unable to, Sam gathered the yards of fabric between them and skimmed his hands along her thighs. A tiny, flimsy scrap of silk was all that separated him from paradise and with one tug it gave, falling to the ground between them.
A low growl radiated up from his chest as his fingers found her soft and wet. He wanted to drop to his knees and taste the sweet honey coating his fingers but she was already rising against him.
‘More, please, I want more.’
He caught her mouth and propped her against the wall. Part of his brain tried to kick in, tried to remind him that he was a civilised man who did not have sex with women outside at important parties, but the hot throb of her body shredded his sanity and made a mockery of his self-control.
All he could think about was replacing his fingers with his throbbing shaft and making her his. Something she obviously wanted just as badly because she was tearing at the zip on his trousers and then he was free and she was open and ready, her thighs cradling his hips intimately against his body.
That first contact of his flesh against hers gave him pause because he didn’t have a condom on him. Cursing himself for his lack of preparation he was about to tell her when her lips cruised down the line of his neck and she bit the tendon between his neck and shoulder.
A shiver went through him, a groan dragged from deep inside as he forgot all about reason and responsibility and gave into a need that was stronger than he was, entering her on one hard, perfect thrust.
She was so tight. So snug... His body tensed as he fought to control his most basic urge to possess her.
‘Relax for me, angel, and this will go easier.’
Sweat beaded his forehead but before he could fully process that there was something untutored to her movements Ruby angled her body upwards and took him deeper, scattering his thoughts.
‘Slowly,’ he urged, holding her hips steady between his hands. ‘That’s it, let me all the way in.’ He groaned as her silken muscles rippled around him, holding him tight. Careful not to crush her, Sam placed a hand against the wall to support them both, his legs shaking as he strove to hold off his own release until he felt hers first.
‘Oh, God.’ She clutched at him, her little nails scoring the nape of his neck. ‘I...I...’ Her body squeezed his, small lake-like ripples pulling him in deeper and harder as her body sought, and found, the ultimate release.
As soon as he felt her peak Sam let go, moving inside her with controlled power as his own climax raced through him like never before.
He didn’t know how long they stayed like that, their bodies joined in the most fundamental way, their lungs heaving. Gradually he became aware of their surroundings: the way his shirt stuck to the damp skin on his back, a cicada making a racket in a nearby bush, the low throb of the music coming from far inside the house.
He lifted his head from where it was buried against Ruby’s sweetly curved neck, his legs so weak he had to fight to hold them both upright. He felt her shift against him and the enormity of what they had just done, of how out of control he had been, hit him hard.
He cursed softly and lowered her to the ground. He didn’t regret many things in his life but taking Ruby with all the finesse of an untried schoolboy just might turn out to be one of them. He wanted nothing more than to wrap her up and take her home so that he could do that all over again. In a bed this time. ‘Are you okay?’ he prompted softly, knowing that he felt as dazed as she looked.
‘Water.’ She blinked up at him, her mask slightly askew from his fingers. He wanted to rip it off, yank off the wig and let all her long, golden hair tumble free. ‘I’m so thirsty,’ she croaked. ‘Do you mind?’
Sam raked his hair back from his forehead. No, of course he didn’t mind getting her a glass of water, but first he wanted to apologise, tell her he hadn’t meant for things to go that far. At least not outdoors, at a party of all places! He cursed inwardly again. ‘Sure, water.’ The apology could wait. ‘Just...stay put until I get back.’ Hesitating, he glanced down at her, his brows pulling together as he took in her trembling mouth. ‘You’re sure you’re okay?’
She nodded, fussing with her voluminous skirts so that she wouldn’t have to look at him.
Leaving his jacket on the ground Sam strode back the way they had come, blinking as he rounded a corner and his eyes met the brighter lights of the terrace, small clusters of partygoers thankfully ignoring him as he stalked inside.
Quickly