Chasing Summer: Date with Destiny / Marooned with the Maverick / A Summer Wedding at Willowmere. Abigail Gordon

his hands masterful and dominating as they parted her thighs, his mouth insistently possessive as it moved over her in the ultimate intimacy.

      She was right. She couldn’t stand it, the blisteringly electric sensations making her cry out. He totally ignored her whimpering moans, her hands fluttering in feeble protest in his hair, and continued his devastating attentions with an expertise that was both telling and breathtakingly hypnotic. Here was a man who not only knew all there was to know about women, but who wasn’t prepared to take no for an answer, a man who could destroy her even more thoroughly than Ralph had.

      But there was no room for regrets or future concerns at such a moment. Salome was beyond that, caught up in a journey of erotic pleasure from which there was no turning back. Tighter and tighter her body felt, faster and faster her breathing, hotter and hotter her blood. She was being swept up a previously unknown mountain, racing towards a peak from which there could be only one way down. And, even though the prospect of experiencing what she had never experienced before was intoxicatingly compulsive, suddenly Salome knew she didn’t want it this way, couldn’t bear it this way. She wanted Mike inside her, needed Mike inside her.

      She moaned her frustration and frantically pushed him away, ‘No, no!’ she cried.

      He staggered back off the end of the bed, getting to his feet and staring down at her with eyes both wild and incredulous. ‘You must be mad! There’s no stopping now. No changing your mind. Look at me!’ And, with a single savage yank, he stripped off his pyjama-trousers, striking her speechless with the stark evidence of his desire.

      Salome had never looked quite so blatantly at an aroused man before, certainly not one as well-endowed as Mike. Colour burnt in her cheeks, her heart thudding beneath her breasts. ‘I haven’t changed my mind,’ she burst forth, then hesitated, finding it hard to find the words. ‘I was wanting you. You!’ she cried. ‘Not...anything less...’

      His groan was tortured, his eyes squeezing tightly shut for a second. But then he was shaking his head and sinking back down on top of her, the anger punching from his lungs in a ragged sigh. ‘Then why didn’t you say so? Dear God, I thought—’

      Again he groaned, then knelt upright to run shaking hands over her body, easing her thighs apart. Her eyes grew wide, her heart stopping as he scooped his hands under her buttocks and lifted her to meet him. She felt his flesh, hard against her softness, and then he was sinking into her, filling the aching void, taking her breath away. She moaned her pleasure as her body encompassed the entire length of him, her hands reaching up to drag him down to her waiting warmth.

      This was how making love was meant to feel, she cried silently, two people as one, man and woman as nature had intended.

      His mouth sought hers again as he began to move, slowly, rhythmically, deeply. Waves of pleasure—both emotional and physical—pervaded Salome’s body and senses, making her block out all thought of Mike being no more than a womaniser with no real caring for her. Right here, tonight, he was the man she wanted above all others; he was her man. He had just shown her how much he wanted her and, for now, it had to be enough.

      Tomorrow she would probably despair over what she was doing now. More than probably. Yet somehow she was unable to summon any regret at this moment. All she knew was how marvellous it felt to be joined with Mike like this. Marvellous and exciting and overwhelming.

      Finally he gasped away from her mouth and pressed hot lips to the smooth skin of her shoulder, the pulsating vein at the base of her throat, his hands running up and down the sides of her body. Her own hands were caressing the muscles in his back, but dug sharply inwards when he grabbed her hips, lifting them from the bed and thrusting even more deeply into her. Quite instinctively, her inner muscles squeezed tightly around his throbbing hardness, gripping and releasing him in a relentless rhythm. Any moment now...

      There was a split second when she seemed to balance on a sharp edge, when her breathing stopped, and every muscle in her body strained to an aching stop. She heard him gasp for breath, felt his hands tightening around her. Then, with one final surge, he set them both free, and their mutual cries of release echoed in the night.

      Salome was stunned, not only by the intensity of her physical feelings, but also by her emotional ones. She hugged Mike’s shuddering body to her till it stilled, unable to stop a crazed litany from tumbling through her mind.

      I love him...I love him...I love him...

      She grimaced in denial of it, knowing in her brain that it wasn’t true, and hating herself for the way her heart kept wanting to embrace the idea. This was lust, not love. Sexual satisfaction, not spiritual bonding. A one-night stand, not their wedding night.

      But try as she might to dampen her joy with ruthless reasoning, she couldn’t. She felt wonderfully at peace, and very, very happy.

      ‘Oh, Mike,’ she sighed, raining kisses across his chest. ‘I want to stay like this forever.’

      Sensual black eyes stared down at her, a languorous smile coming to his mouth. Salome wondered if her own lips looked as wonderfully ravaged as his. ‘Happy to oblige,’ he drawled. ‘When are you going to move in with me?’

      She gasped her surprise. Of all things, she wasn’t expecting this. ‘You...you want me to live with you?’

      ‘Either that or you give me a key to your place. I certainly want to spend my nights with you.’ He leaned on both elbows either side of her. ‘I want you, Salome,’ he said with a strange undercurrent of urgency. ‘Not just for one night. I need much more of you than that.’

      Her mind whirled. She could hardly think rationally, not with her body still joined to his, her senses still dazed with pleasure. ‘No, Mike, I can’t!’ she cried, before the insidious temptation to say yes overcame her.

      ‘Don’t put crazy arguments in the way!’ he cut in, his hands intimidating as they captured her face. ‘Your marriage to Ralph Diamond is past! Over! He doesn’t want you any more. This is here...now. I want you and you want me.’

      His eyes flashed angrily, his body quivering with suppressed rage as he tried to control himself. ‘Why do you keep finding ways to deny me what you’ve given others? Hell, Salome, you’ve been driving me mad for years. I’ve thought of nothing else but having you, possessing you. I’m mad about you, woman, can’t you see that?’

      His kiss was savage, yet oddly desperate. And it was the desperation that moved Salome more than the seductive skill of his lips and tongue.

      ‘Say you’ll be mine,’ he urged when the kiss was over and he had successfully reduced her to a panting, mindless mass.

      ‘Yes,’ she said, breathlessly, blindly. ‘Yes...’

      ‘You won’t say no to me ever again,’ he rasped, his eyes glittering with triumph. His mouth descended once more, his hands hard and exciting on her body, sweeping Salome along with his rapidly renewed passion.

      His words were prophetic, at least where the next few hours were concerned. He made love to Salome in ways she had never been made love to before, demanding things she had never freely given before, each experience showing her there were sexual horizons still to be explored, plateaus of pleasure not yet reached, surrenders she had never even envisaged.

      * * *

      Sunlight filtered through the curtains behind the bed, landing in Salome’s eyes and stirring her to semi-consciousness. She sighed and rolled over, one limp arm encountering a wall of warm flesh. She froze, then pulled her arm back as instant memories of the night before flooded in, startling her to full awareness. Her eyes flew open.

      Mike lay naked on his stomach, his face turned away from her, his legs sprawled, his breathing deep and even. She swallowed as her eyes followed the line of his spine, down between the well-honed muscles of his back, down to where she could see the red marks her nails had made on his buttocks. Horrified, she glanced down at her own nudity, green eyes widening at the beginnings of bruises on her hips and thighs. Her fingers trembled as they lifted to feel her raw, puffy lips. Her tongue darted out to