Page 130 of The Trouble with Tigers
He propped himself on his elbows. She couldn’t make out his features of his face, but the moonlight seeping in through the window told her he gazed in her direction.
“I thought it was the best way,” he said, his voice gruff.
“The best way for what?”
“To keep my hands off you.”
Her heart beat so hard she thought she might crack a rib. “Maybe I don’t want you to,” she said, her face burning at her own audacity.
“Kitty, don’t play games with me. My restraint is already at its limit. Now close your eyes and go to sleep.” He dropped onto the floor with a thud and, if she wasn’t mistaken, rolled onto his side to face away from her.
She stared at his dark shape, wrestling with her conscience. He was right, of course. She should let sleeping dogs lie. But…
“I just want you to kiss me goodnight, Zeke. Because you’re here…”
Zeke threw off his blanket.
“…and I can’t think of anything but you lying there and…”
He reached her bedside before she finished her thought.
“That makes two of us,” he growled, cupping her face. His hands were warm against her cheeks, and if she wasn’t mistaken, shaking.
His mouth came down on hers, hot and demanding.
She made an urgent little sound, low in her throat, and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Oh, Zeke,” she breathed against his lips. “I thought you didn’t want to kiss me anymore.”
He gave a humorless laugh. His flesh was burning hot and slightly damp. “You little fool. Haven’t you heard a damned thing I’ve said?”
“Will you lie with me? Just for a little while?”
He groaned. “You may be the death of me, kitten. You know that?”
***
Lying atop the bedcovers, he reached for her. He pressed his face into the thicket of her lush hair, and breathed in the scent of her. Lavender. Rosemary. Kitty.
“You feel so good, sweetheart. So damned good.”
She felt so right in his arms, and the thought of someone else holding her, someone else kissing her tore him up inside. He had to make her see.
“Kitty,” he began, but lost the ability to speak when she twisted her body under the sheets to mold herself to him.
She rained tender kisses down his neck. When her lips reached his collar, she pushed it out of the way and nuzzled into the hollow at his throat.
He closed his eyes and reveled in her sweet ardor, in the weight of her breasts through the sheets and fabric of their clothing, firm and ripe against his chest.
She slid one sinewy leg up over both his. Knee bent, her thigh grazed the rigid length of his cock and he groaned.
His eyes flew open when he felt her fingers traveling down the front of his shirt, undoing buttons.
Whether or not she’d done it by accident, she had pushed the bedcovers to just below her waist. Thanks to the quick work of her wandering hands, nothing separated their upper torsos but the thin lawn of her gown, and chemise.
He swallowed. Her hips squirming against his, her leg sliding over his and, occasionally, over his erection, and now the absence of anything of substance separating them all conspired to push him past the point of desperation.Christ.
“I want to touch you,” she whispered, fueling the inferno of his need. Her breath feathered over his naked chest, sending a spray of gooseflesh over his entire body.
He reached for her hands, trapping them in one of his. “I don’t think…”
