The Wedding Party And Holiday Escapes Ultimate Collection. Кейт Хьюит

to sleep with Dillon. She was going to have sex with her ex-husband.

      She really was crazy.

      His breath was hot on her skin as he nibbled and kissed his way down her body. Touching, tasting. His fingers slipped inside the leg of her shorts, brushing against her panties…

      At that point things began to get fuzzy. One minute her shorts were on, the next they had mysteriously disappeared. The same thing happened to her panties. Then Dillon was touching her. Slow, steady pressure. Warm and slippery.

      She closed her eyes and gave herself permission to relax and enjoy. How could she have thought she didn’t need this? How had she gone so long without a man’s touch?

      And no man knew her body the way Dillon did. No one made her feel as good. And what the hell was wrong with feeling good every now and then? Who better than a man who needed no road map to please her, who would never expect or want more than a very brief physical relationship? A fling.

      Without warning Dillon pressed her thighs open, lowered his head and took her into his mouth. The sensation was so wickedly intense she cried out. Her hands fisted in his hair and she was making sounds, raspy and nonsensical. She didn’t seem to have any control left. She was flying on autopilot, and about to crash and burn.

      Her breath was coming hard and fast, and the room slipped in and out of focus. Each individual sensation merged and tangled and fused together like the wick on a stick of dynamite, then it sparked and ignited.

      The flame hissed and licked its way up, building and climbing. And when it reached her core, she blew apart, splintered into a million pieces.

      She hovered there, somewhere between pain and pleasure, conscious and unconscious.

      It seemed as though she melted back together, one little piece at a time, slowly, gradually, her pulse returning to normal. When she finally opened her eyes, Dillon was there, leaning over her. Watching. Waiting for her to return from the outer stratosphere. Then he leaned down and kissed her. So gently, so sweetly.

      “I’ll see you later, Ivy.”

      Wait. What?

      Later?

      She sat up, still dizzy and a little disoriented. “Where are you going?”

      “My room.”

      “But…” They had just gotten started.

      “I don’t understand,” she said. “Did I do something wrong?”

      He looked almost…sad. Which made no sense at all. “No. You did everything right.”

      “Then why are you leaving?”

      “You know where I’ll be if you need me.”

      Then he left, closing the door quietly behind him. For several minutes she was too stunned to process what had just happened. To make sense of it.

      Was this just another part of the game for him? Wasn’t it enough that she’d let him into her room? That she’d let him touch her?

      Apparently not.

      What did he want? For her to chase him? Would he settle for nothing less than total surrender?

      And wasn’t that just like him?

      She didn’t know if she should feel angry or hurt or disappointed, so she allowed herself all three. Was he honestly that arrogant? He had chased her relentlessly for days; now he was just going to turn his back on her?

      Unless…

      May be Dillon wasn’t as sure of himself, as self-confident, as she’d assumed. May be he needed her to come to him. May be, like her, he’d spent so long pushing people away, he had no idea how to let someone back inside.

      Was it possible that under that arrogant facade he was just as lost and confused as she was?

      And lonely.

      Very, very lonely.

      The idea was as sad as it was empowering.

      And she knew exactly what she needed to do.

      Ivy stepped into Dillon’s room. The light beside the bed was on, but he wasn’t lying there.

      Her eyes were drawn to the curtains blowing in the open French doors. Dillon stood on the balcony, his back to her, leaning on the edge. He wore nothing but a pair of loose silk pajama bottoms.

      She walked up behind him, and though she didn’t make a sound, he sensed her there.

      “You lost?” he asked, not turning around.

      Lost?

      She’d been lost for the last ten years and was only now beginning to realize it.

      “No,” she told him, hearing a quiver in her voice. Everything about him, about being close to him, both frightened and excited her. “For the first time in a long time I know exactly where I am.”

      He just stood there, facing the ocean. She knew what he was waiting for. He wanted her to make the first move. He needed that validation.

      The idea gave her an unfamiliar but exhilarating sense of power.

      She stepped up behind him and lightly touched his bare back. He didn’t tense, didn’t flinch, as though he’d been expecting it. She flattened her hands, smoothed her palms across warm skin, feeling only lean muscle underneath. His back rose and fell steadily as he breathed, while her own breath seemed to be coming faster. She could feel the steady beat of his pulse while her own fluctuated wildly, knocking around inside of her chest like a Mexican jumping bean.

      She slipped her hands around to rest over his solid abdomen just above his waistband, and felt the muscles contract. She pressed her cheek to his back, breathed in the scent of his skin, felt that rush of familiarity pour over her.

      His hands didn’t stray from their perch on the railing but he said, “You’re trembling.”

      “I’m scared,” she admitted and she let her hands wander higher, across his chest.

      “No reason to be scared.”

      She had every reason to be scared, to be terrified, even.

      She was falling for him again. She was falling for a man she knew she could never have. They were stuck in a hopeless situation. A vicious cycle of piss-poor timing.

      But she’d come too far to stop now. She was going through with this. She’d never wanted anything more.

      She undid the tie on her robe and let it fall to the balcony floor, then pressed the length of her naked body against him. He sucked in a breath and groaned somewhere deep inside. She could feel it rumble through him, through muscle and skin into her breasts and her fingers and the curve of her belly.

      They stood that way for several minutes, neither moving or making a sound. It was…nice, but she wasn’t looking for nice. She wanted fantastic. She wanted mind-blowing, rip-roaring ecstasy.

      She dragged her nails lightly down his chest, from his shoulders all the way to his waistband, felt him tense. He was trying to be strong, trying to milk this for all he could but she could feel him losing it. And she liked it. She liked being the one in control.

      She continued her exploration downward, just below his silky waistband, teased him there. “You told me you don’t wear pajamas.”

      His reply came out breathy and uneven. “I lied.”

      “I know you want me. Are you going to make me beg?”

      She could swear she felt him smile. “That’s not a problem, is it?”

      He turned abruptly, and before she knew it she was in his arms. Body to body, soul to soul. Then he was kissing her. And, oh, did he know how to kiss. He took control, possessed her. If he had wanted her to be the aggressor in this scenario, that moment had passed.

      And