She stretched, and sealed their mouths together.
Jake hesitated for only a heartbeat. And then his arms were around her waist and he was hauling her so close he thought it was a miracle that the soft promise of her body didn't melt right into him. Dammit, she was right. He couldn't fight this. He wasn't strong enough. Her flowery smell made his blood run hot. The touch of her body molding into his sent a bolt of desire sizzling through him. The second her lips touched his he was lost.
He kissed her ravenously, as though he couldn't taste enough of her. His hands scoured her back, her arms, her waist and bottom. That he should be tired of bedding this woman by now, that he should have by all rights worked her out of his system days ago, occurred to him only briefly. He wasn't tired of her. Not by a long shot. If anything, his appetite had been whetted, and now he was starved for her. His palms ached to feel her creamy white flesh. His tongue thirsted to taste parts of her that no man had ever tasted before. And that no man besides him ever would!
His woman. His woman!
Yes, when he held her like this, when she kissed him like this and moved her body so sweetly against him, Jake could almost believe that she was his. In her arms his life started and stopped. In her kisses there were no yesterday, no tomorrow, no pain or regret. There was only here and now. There was only desire—hot and raw and consuming—unlike anything he'd ever known in his life.
"You're mine," he growled against her kiss-swollen lips, as he bent and scooped her into his arms. He crossed to the bed, and laid her out atop the threadbare blankets. His hands shook with a deep longing that was almost incomprehensible as, one by one he peeled her buttons free.
In record time, he had them both naked.
Amanda's white skin glistened in the flickering lamplight. Jake's glowed a deep shade of sun-kissed copper. In his present mood, he thought the colors complimented each other perfectly.
His hands roamed her body, touching, igniting passion, making her groan his name aloud. But it wasn't enough. Touching her was never enough any more. He needed more, needed everything, and he needed it now. Fast and hard.
"Mine," he said as he spread himself out atop her. He buried his face in her neck, and his tongue tasted the sweet cream flavor of her throat, pressed against her thundering pulse. His left hand found her breast. Her nipple was already rigid; he teased it to an even more alert, more sensitive peak.
Then his hand drifted down, and he found the moist, burning heat of her. He fondled and stroked until she begged him to stop, begged him to fill her. Until his own body humbled itself and did a little begging of its own.
"Jake. Ah, Jake..." She arched beneath him, straining against him, filling his hand, filling his heart.
She was hot and moist and tight. She was ready for him. It took the very last of Jake's self-control to lift himself above her and not plunge into her the way he wanted so badly to do. He supported his weight on the elbows flanking her sides. His hips found the spot nature had carved just for him between her legs. He cupped her cheeks in his palms while his mouth hungered for another taste of her honey-sweet lips.
Gritting his teeth, and holding himself absolutely still, Jake perched on the very threshold of her. "Mine, Amanda Lennox, You are mine."
"Yes," she panted. "I'm yours. Now, Jake. Now."
His control splintered. He growled, thrust, and buried himself deeply inside of her.
He wasn't going to last. The second
he felt her warm and tight and hot around him, Jake knew he wasn't going to last. And he didn't care. It had been so long!
Amanda moaned low and deep, and arched to accept him. All of him. She moved in time to his beat, glorying in the violent tremors that came upon her almost instantaneously with his entry.
Fast, fast, the spasms of completion shook her and carried Jake right along in her wake.
"My woman, my woman," Jake murmured, the words timed to coincide with each piercing thrust and retreat. He couldn't hold back. She felt too damn good. And then she started to shudder around him, and he was thankful he didn't have to wait, because he couldn't. Not a second longer. "Mine," he gritted as he lost control, and toppled over the edge.
His climax was long and deep, and more intense than anything he'd ever felt before. This time when it came, he poured more than his hot, liquid fire into her; he filled Amanda Lennox with his heart and soul. His very life.
Jake collapsed atop her, sweaty and spent. Deep down he knew that without this woman—his woman—he would never be whole again.
The lamp had been extinguished.
Amanda awoke to a room flooded with pale moonlight. She scowled sleepily, her thoughts disoriented as her gaze swept her surroundings. Where was she? And who...?
Junction City. She was in a rented hotel room in a mining town called Junction—wherever that was... Idaho, still?
And she was with Jake Chandler. Ah, yes... Jake.
His solid weight, not the least bit burdensome, pinned her to the narrow, lumpy mattress. His face was against her neck, and she felt the warmth of his breath puff over her in steady waves. The upper part of his body rested mostly atop the bed, to keep from crushing her, but from the stomach down he blanketed her. His left hand rested loosely atop her right breast, as though even in sleep he was seeking to brand her with his touch.
The outside of his thighs felt warm and appealingly hard where they were nestled between the inside of hers. The muscles in his back quivered beneath the fingertips she only now realized she'd been stroking down his spine. She scanned the breadth of his shoulder with her palm, then tunneled her fingers into his sleek black hair.
Amanda sighed and closed her eyes. Nothing in her life had felt as good as waking up enfolded in Jake Chandler's arms. She was sure nothing would ever feel this good again.