"No more rules," I murmured. "We're both consenting adults."
"I consent," Ford panted against my wet lips. "You can have me, Clarity. You can have all of me and there's not a single policy that can keep you from taking what you want."
His kisses, peppered hard and soft against me, dispelled my guilt more than his words. My mind raced back to the first moment we met when we were simply a man and a woman meeting at a party. The freedom of that thought felt like wings on my back. I lifted off the ground.
Ford sat back, fearful that I was getting up to leave. All I could do was shake my head. I reached a leg over his seated body and slid into a straddle across his lap.
"Oh, god, Clarity," Ford's whisper was rough with passion. His hands clasped around my waist.
I leaned forward, capturing his strong jaw between my hands as I kissed him with abandon. He answered by running his wide palms up my back, pressing every inch of me against his taut chest. When his hands reversed direction and ran down to the curve of my lower back, I whimpered with delight. He pressed me down against him and I felt the surging press of his desire.
Still, we were not close enough. I needed more of him. I sat up and slipped my shirt up and over my head. Ford's eyes seared my bare skin as he let me unbutton and tug loose his white shirt. When I yanked his undershirt up and over his head, he sat forward and captured my lips in another devouring kiss.
The press of our bare skin sent shockwaves of pleasure through my body. Ford's hands traced up and down the naked curves of my waist and back. Then his fingertips traced around the lace of my bra to tease the undersides of my breasts.
He broke the kiss and trailed his lips down my throat to the heated skin just above the lace. When his tongue ventured out and licked the press of my cleavage, I arched back against the coffee table. The shift rocked my hips against his hardened reaction, and once I started the electric friction, I couldn't stop.
Ford's breath came in hot bursts against my skin as his fingers reached behind my back and fumbled with the hook of my bra. The lacy scrap of fabric fell away and I gasped as my taut nipples tingled in the cool air. Then an absorbing heat pulled me to a new level of passion. Ford's mouth closed around one breast and his tongue rubbed ever-widening ripples of pleasure from me.
"The bedroom," he murmured and struggled to lift me from his throbbing lap.
I stood up and pulled him up. When Ford towered over me, I couldn't resist nuzzling my cheek against his muscled chest. The brush of my cheek undid him. Ford caught me up in his arms. I wrapped my arms around his neck as his arms scooped my legs up effortlessly. In mid-air, our lips met again and I felt like I'd broken free from the bounds of gravity.
Ford spun us around and laid me on the couch. The blaze in his dark-blue eyes burned away any thought of the bedroom as he slipped his body over mine. I arched up to welcome his weight and grasped the hard contours of his back.
"Are you sure," he whispered against my neck.
The fire crackled and the candles glowed. Somewhere far away, my phone buzzed on vibrate. The whole world was shut away and couldn't reach us. Ford and I were all alone, wrapped in each other's arms. I pressed up against every inch of his body and knew there was nowhere else I wanted to be.
"Yes," I said. My hands tangled in his hair and lifted his head so I could see his stormy eyes. "Yes, I'm sure. Please."
The 'please' was his finally undoing. With a guttural sound somewhere between a moan and a chuckle, Ford captured my lips again. His hand slipped between us and I helped him undo my buttons. When he pushed back to peel away my jeans, I let my eyes rove over his sculpted body.
Strong shoulders, a hard chest tempered by springy dark hair, and a tapered waist: Ford was more than I had ever hoped for. I plucked at his leather belt and he obliged with a burning look. Then he slipped back down over me and I welcomed the hot caress of his bare body against mine.
Ford's lips found mine and his kiss slowed to molten lava. I opened beneath him and he pushed into me with a volcanic heat. Our kiss was punctuated with panting cries as our bodies took over and the joining rhythm built up to a shared eruption. I quaked under him and Ford wrapped me tightly in his arms.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ford
Even without a buzzing alarm clock, my eyes flew open at 5:30 am. Formative years in the Army had embedded an early morning habit in me that was impossible to break, no matter what I had been doing the night before. I squeezed my eyes shut and chased the remnants of a very sweet dream.
Red wine spilled into kisses from Clarity's sweet, plum-soft lips. I dreamt about her body in candlelight, lit from a fire in my long unused fireplace.
Something wasn't right. The flashes of the dream held tactile memories so real I could still feel her soft skin under my fingertips. My hands flexed and my eyes flew open.
Clarity was curled up next to me in my bed. She murmured against the pillow and nestled farther under the covers. I moved my hand a scant millimeter and realized she was naked against me. The throbbing response of my body was nothing compared to the tsunami of images that flooded my brain.
Clarity straddling my lap, her back arched to let me taste her delicious breasts. Clarity's red hair brushing my bare chest as she pressed her cheek to my heart. Her moving beneath me, opening, as we fell together onto the sofa.
My hand stroked up and down the bare length of her thigh and my vision was unfocused by awe. I buried my face in the back of her neck and breathed her in. She was real and she was really there next to me. My heart pounded against her back and I closed my eyes to calm my racing pulse.
I remembered the exact moment Clarity had let go. I was still shocked at myself for admitting I would declare our relationship. The idea that I would go to the administration and declare my feelings for her had lifted all the doubt and worry from her deep green eyes. Clarity's quick mind had ran over all the possibilities and seen that the policies that held us at bay were flimsy excuses. Once she saw I would go above them and clear the way, she had let her passion ignite.
A molten wave passed through my body at the memory. Clarity had lit me up like no woman had ever done before. The awkward innocence of her moves combined with the searing hunger of her lips had burned me up completely.
I hadn't even been able to make it to the bedroom. The brush of her cheek against my chest, the tease of her taut nipples against my bare stomach, had been too much. I had never lost control so fast and she had welcomed every inch of my passion.