“I still shouldn’t—”
“Oh, please.” Alexis rolled her eyes. “Stop it. You were man enough to reach out to me last night. Just accept that I am woman enough to want to grasp hold of you, to be there for you. I don’t do anything I don’t want to, Raoul. Or anyone. So get over it.”
Wrapping her bravado around her like a shield, Alexis walked away from him and found her nightgown on the floor. She dragged it on over her head and all but ran back to her room and into the en suite bathroom. She flipped on the shower and fought to take in a leveling breath as the water warmed. It was still early, at least another hour until sunrise and Ruby’s usual time for waking, but there was little point in going back to bed. No way would she get any more sleep now. She stripped off her nightgown and stepped into the luxuriously tiled shower stall and closed her eyes against the stream of water, blindly reaching for the bar of soap she’d put there yesterday. Her eyes flew open when she encountered warm wet male instead.
Raoul’s gaze was intense, his jaw a rigid line and his lips pressed firmly together as he stood there, water from the dual jets cascading over his hair and down his neck and shoulders.
He reached for the bar of soap and lathered it up in his hands before gently turning her around to face the shower wall. His hands were firm as he began to massage her shoulders with the scented foam, his thumbs working into knots she didn’t know she had. He worked his way down the center of her spine, easing away any residual stiffness she had from her unaccustomed sleeping position during the night.
By the time his hands caressed her buttocks she was all but melting. Her breasts felt full and heavy, aching for his touch, her nipples ruched into tight nubs. She squeezed her thighs together to relieve some of the pressure that built at their apex but it only served to increase her hunger for more of his touch.
His hands left her for a minute, only to return, relathered and on a determined path around her body. She felt his erection pressing against her buttocks as he reached around her, cupping her breasts and gently massaging them. One hand began to track down her body, pressing her back against him. She widened her legs, felt him bend his knees and position himself at her aching center. She waited for his possession but he seemed comfortable just biding his time while his fingers teased and played with her, coaxing her flesh a little wider, grazing her clitoris with firm sweeps of his thumb.
Alexis’s legs trembled as she felt her orgasm begin to build and build, the pressure almost too much to bear. When he finally slid inside her, he touched off something deep within. Something with more intensity, more complexity than anything she’d felt before.
She rose to the tips of her toes as Raoul drove into her body. She could feel the roughness of the hair on his legs against the backs of her thighs, the firmness of his belly against her buttocks. When he came, he came hard and so did she. Pleasure didn’t just come in waves, it ricocheted through her again and again.
His head fell onto her shoulder and his arms wrapped around her until she didn’t know who was supporting whom to stay upright anymore. Eventually their breathing slowed and Alexis felt strength return to her limbs. Hot water still pounded them both as Raoul withdrew from her. He slicked a hand with soap and gently washed then rinsed her clean. She was glad of the attention as, while she was regaining control of her limbs, her consciousness was still under question.
“Keep taking your pill,” Raoul said in the shell of her ear, and then he was gone.
By the time she looked around, he’d swiped one of the towels from the heated rail and had left the bathroom. Steam filled the air, leaving her to almost wonder if she hadn’t just dreamed the entire sequence of events. The racing of her heart, and the tendrils of satisfaction that still ebbed and flowed through her, confirmed it had been very, very real. She thought about what he’d said, as well as what she’d told him about being on the Pill.
Technically, she was, but since she’d been here she’d been less than fully careful about taking the contraceptive. In the past, she’d always been a stickler for taking her tablet on time, but with the adjustment to a whole new routine this past month she’d been a little lax. That was something that was going to have to change if they were going to continue with this...this...whatever it was. Clearly he had reached some personal decision about the two of them. One that involved their mutual pleasure, if nothing else.
She turned off the showerheads and stepped from the stall, drying her sensitized skin with a large bath sheet. Could she settle for that? The pursuit of physical release with none of the messy emotional stuff that usually came with it?