"Liberty...you're beautiful...so beautiful..." I felt his ragged murmurs against my throat, my chest, telling me how much he wanted me, how hard I made him, how sweet the taste of my skin was. His lips dragged gently over the cushiony slope of my breast, opened over the peak, pulled it inside the wet fire of his mouth. My h*ps caught a high arch as he slipped his fingers beneath the top edge of my cotton panties. The place between my thighs was aching, but he didn't seem to understand where I needed him to touch me, he stroked all around without ever quite reaching it. I pushed upward in mute rhythmic pleading, / want.. .1 want.. .1 want.. .and he still didn't respond, and then I realized he was doing it on

purpose.

My eyes flew open: my lips parted...but Gage stared down into my face with a sort of amused challenge, daring me to complain. Somehow I managed to keep my mouth shut.

"Good girl." he murmured, stripping off my panties.

He settled me firmly into the mattress. I lay exactly as he arranged me, my body heavy as if sensation had acquired the weight of salt water. I was brimming and helpless. He moved over me, around me, until I was wild from stimulation and heat and teasing friction.

He slid lower. I couldn't even lift my head, it had become so heavy. His mouth strayed in a blind search, without design, crossing the small harbor between my thighs. I writhed as I felt his tongue in melting licks that separated and probed until my flesh was open, drenched. He gripped my hips, holding me secure for his mouth, for eager kisses, for slow marauding. My muscles contracted as it all began rolling up to me. I was about to come, I was almost crying in relief, when he pulled away.

Shivering, I begged don't stop but Gage said not yet and lowered his body over mine. He slipped two fingers inside me, kept them there while he kissed me. Passion had made his features severe in the lamp glow. My body tightened around the gentle thrust of his fingers, I arched to keep them, needing any part of him inside any part of me. His name rose to my lips again and again, I had no way to tell him I would have done anything for him, he was all I wanted, he was too much to be endured.

Gage reached for the nightstand, fumbled with his wallet. I snatched at the flashing foil

packet, so frantic to help that I ended up hindering his efforts, and I heard his smothered laugh. I didn't see the humor in anything, I was in a fever, I had been teased into madness.

I felt the temperature of Gage's body, cooler, harder, heavier than mine, rising to match my own internal blaze. He responded to every shiver and sound, his lips stealing secrets from my flesh, his hands gently trespassing until there was no part of me he hadn't claimed. He pushed my legs open and entered me in a deep-rooted thrust, taking my sobs into his mouth, whispering that's right sweet baby quiet quiet, and I took all of him, the pleasure thick and sweet, and with every nudge the wet silken hardness guided me closer to the edge. Oh God there yes please, I needed it faster but his discipline was absolute, he worked farther into me without altering the terrible slowness of his rhythm. His face nuzzled into the curve of my neck, and the scrape of his bristle was so good, I moaned as if in pain.

Blindly I reached over his flexing back, down to his backside, my fingers clamping over the taut muscle. Without pausing in his measured pace, he pulled my wrists up, one after the other, and deliberately pinned them to the mattress, and covered my mouth with his.

Only one rational thought flickered at the edge of my consciousness—there was something not right about the surrender he demanded—but the relief of it was unspeakable. And so I submitted, and my mind went dark and quiet. The moment I let go, the pleasure rushes started, each one more relentless than the last. My h*ps nearly lifted him from the bed. He countered with heavier drives, pushing me back down, letting the voluptuous clenching of my flesh draw out his own release. I came, and came, and came. It seemed impossible a person could survive it.

Usually when sex was over, the uncoupling was complete in every sense. Men rolled over and went to sleep, women dashed into the bathroom to freshen up and dispose of the evidence. But Gage held me for a long time, playing with my hair, whispering, brushing kisses on my face and br**sts. He washed me with a warm damp cloth. I should have felt drained, but instead I was like a live wire, a circuit of energy running through my body. I stayed in bed as long as I could, and then I jumped up and put my robe on.

'"So you're one of those." Gage said, looking amused as I gathered and folded our discarded clothes.

"One of what?" I paused to admire the sight of his long body barely covered by the white sheet, muscles bunching beneath his skin as he propped up on one elbow. I loved the disorder my hands had wrought in his hair, the relaxed curve of his mouth.

'"One of those women who gets revved up after sex."

"I've never gotten revved up by it before," I said, placing the folded clothes on a chair. A quick self-evaluation caused me to admit sheepishly. "But right now I feel like I could run ten miles."

Gage smiled. "I've got a few ideas about how to wear you out. Unfortunately, since I didn't know what would happen tonight. I only had one in-case-of-emergency condom."

I half sat on the edge of the bed. "Was I an emergency?"

He pulled me across his chest and rolled back until I sprawled over him. "Since the first moment I saw you."

I grinned and kissed him. "You do have more condoms," I told him. "I found some in the bathroom when I moved in. I hadn't planned on returning them to you. it would have been too embarrassing. So I left them where they were. We've been sharing the drawer."