Simone turned to glance at him. He kept his eyes on the road. “Where?” she asked, almost too eager to prolong their time together, she realized.
“It’s called Harvest House…a small bed and breakfast.”
Her heart thumped, then settled into a more reasonable rhythm.
Chad turned to her, his dark eyes roamed over her face. “Only if you want to,” he said gently. “We can have separate rooms. Whatever. No pressure. No strings. I just want to spend some more time with you.”
She thought about it for a moment, contemplated the possibilities—and the consequences. “Sure. Why not?” she answered, simple and direct, the way she was about everything.
When they arrived, Simone was instantly captivated by the Old World charm of the rambling building, which looked to be a converted mansion snatched from the pages of a Civil War history book.
Chad held her hand and led her to the front desk.
“Do you have any rooms available?” he asked the desk clerk.
The middle-aged woman with slightly graying hair smiled brightly and opened an oversized, leather-bound register. “Name?”
“Rushmore, Chad. I…uh, don’t have a reservation,” he added.
The woman frowned for a moment, then her expression cleared like a cloud passing over the hillside. “Well, Mr. Rushmore, you’re in luck. My reserved clients aren’t due until the weekend. I have three rooms to choose from—one facing the garden, one along the side—but very private, and one on the ground floor, which gives you easy access to all of our amenities.”
“We’ll need two rooms.”
“One,” Simone piped in, and squeezed Chad’s hand.
He looked down into her eyes, saw her intentions reflected there. “Are you sure?” he asked quietly under his breath.
Simone nodded.
“One room, please,” he uttered, his voice low and personal, his gaze fixed on Simone’s face.
After checking in and exploring the accommodations, Simone and Chad took a tour of the grounds, then sat for a while in the cozy den, talking about his impending trip and looking into the flames that pulsed in the fireplace.
But the inevitable, the underlying reason for their being there arrived, no longer held back by time and circumstance. And almost as if by tacit agreement, they left the room with the fire and danced to one of their own making.
There was no hesitation, no fumbling moments of embarrassment. It was as if they, this time between them, had always been, only waiting for the perfect moment to expose itself.
Chad walked toward Simone as she stood framed in the moonlit window. Watching him come to her, she imagined him as the dark knight, the virile seducer. Her mouth curved into a smile of invitation.
His right hand, smooth for a man, reached out and tenderly stroked her cheek, cupping her chin, easing her face closer.
A warm breath was all that stood between them and their first kiss, as Simone raised her mouth to taste his. Sweet, shocking sensation rippled through her limbs, the energy, the heat of it pooling in her center. A lightness of being, that’s what she thought through the waves of euphoria.
Chad pressed the full length of his body against her. Every line, every curve, every dip was defined, one fitting within the other. She felt the distinctive pulse of his erection swell against her stomach. She wanted him lower, needed to feel him between the heat of her thighs. But she couldn’t rush this. Tonight was to be taken slow, savored and sipped like a fine wine.
So they toyed with each other, from tender nibbles on exposed necks, to long deep kisses lavished over yearning mouths, to hungry fingers seeking warm flesh. They taunted and played, laughed, sighed and groaned, danced against the moonlight, their beautiful naked bodies gleaming like polished wood sculpture in its glow.
When Chad cradled her body against him and gazed down into her eyes, Simone was certain, at that instant, he had more than entered her body, he’d penetrated her soul, the only thing separating them was the thin sheath of latex.
The exquisite shock of it set her entire being ablaze. She became sensation, gratefully submitting to the push and pull of him. But Chad wouldn’t give himself over that easily.
He slowed his dance inside her until he barely moved at all. The thrust was almost indiscernible, which made it all the more maddening. She felt her walls clamp around the length and breadth of him, demanding that he fill her, complete her, satisfy her.
In turn, she raised and lowered her hips in a slow, sensual spiral and reveled in her power when he groaned in sublime agony, trapped within the deep, wet hollow that made him shudder, advance and retreat, and urge in a hot whisper to give him more of the same.
But still Chad refused to succumb to the temptation that writhed beneath him. Her hot passion spurred him on. He wanted to hear her moans, her sighs, the sound of his name on her lips. And he made it happen over and over again as he dipped deep and long into the honey, then pulled away until only the tip touched her throbbing outer flesh.
Her body trembled, heated. Tighter she gripped her thighs around his waist to capture the pleasure that rose at a blinding speed within her.
“Let go,” he whispered in her ear. “Let go and come to me.” He cupped her breasts completely, capturing her peaked nipples between his fingers. And the heat began, starting at her toes, winding its way along the lines of her strong legs, settling for a moment in her hips, rising to the pit of her stomach, then returning to that hot, dark, damp place where she held him, exploding in a torrent of white light and pulsing, shuddering release.
Chad held her there, suspended, wouldn’t let her go, turned up the heat with a deeper thrust, pulled her closer, sealed their bodies, letting his empty completely into hers.
For several moments they lay there, locked together in the final throes of aftershock, the tiny tremors continuing, their breath pushed out in deep, hot riffs.
And they kissed, touched, slept, still connected.
The blare of a car horn jerked Simone out of her daydream. Blinking quickly and shaking her head to clear the vision, she eased across the intersection.
Her heart was racing and she could feel a distinct wetness between her legs.
Chad.
Sure, there’d been other men in the four years since that single night. Some momentarily took her mind away from him, but generally not for long.
Chad.
Tonight would be the first time she’d seen him since she watched him board the plane to Uganda. Four years. Things changed. People changed. Had he? Had they?
No strings, remember?
Chapter 3
Vaughn wearily changed out of her fitted navy blue suit and hung it among the rows of other tailored suits and dresses that filled her walk-in closet. She pulled in a long breath. Somehow, she’d have to ease into the next gear and raise her energy level if she expected to play hostess.
Her day at her congressional office had been grueling at best. The phone rang nonstop from seven-thirty that morning with calls from reporters, her constituents and colleagues, all wanting to know how she felt about the latest instance of police shootings—and most of all, her feelings about her stepdaughter Samantha’s caustic statements.
Her head throbbed as she padded barefoot to the bathroom and popped two extra-strength Tylenols without water.
She gazed intently at her reflection in the goldframed mirror. An attractive, deep brown face confronted her. She could see the fatigue in the