Destiny's Hand

“No, no,” he said and smiled brightly at her, belying the fear rapping against his skull. “Tonight is all about you.”

“What?” She blinked, her eyes glazed with lust.

“Let me take you somewhere you’ve never been,” he said. “Let me spoil you.”

She looked at him, surprised, but then she nodded. “Okay.”

He let out a pent-up breath of relief, guided her to the bed and helped her wriggle out of her pajamas.

She was breathing hard and staring into his eyes as if he was the most wonderful thing she’d ever seen. That reverential look made him feel even lousier.

Suddenly he felt inept and unsure of himself.

Dreamily, she closed her eyes, waiting for him to deliver on his promise. He eased onto the bed from the footboard up. He lowered his head to plant kisses over her toes. She reclined against the pillows, exhaling on adorable, kittenlike purrs.

He took his time, marking a slow pilgrimage up her legs with his tongue. First kissing the pulse point at the back of one knee and then laving his mouth over the outer curve of the other. Inching upward toward her smooth, satiny thighs.

When he was almost there, she quivered and arched her back, thrusting her breasts toward the ceiling, the ivory skin pulling taut against her chest muscles. Such beautiful breasts, sleek and riveting in their economy. Her nipples were hard little pebbles, knotting tightly in the center of her breasts.

How he loved this woman.

So why don’t you make more time for her?

Because there were only so many hours in the day and you had to make choices.

Your priorities are so skewed. Remember what Jacobbi said about paying big prices for success?

She murmured something and he turned his head to listen, waiting for direction, but she wasn’t saying anything in particular, just emitting little sounds of pleasure.

He loved what his touch was doing to her, whisking her away on a sea of sensation. She was so responsive to everything he did. Adam’s ego would have soared except for the fact that there was still nothing going on inside his pants.

But in spite of his inadequacy—or maybe even because of it—he felt tied to her in a new and different way, bound by an enigmatic force beyond time and space.

Closer, ever closer, he tiptoed his fingers up between her thighs to the secret place that lay treasured there.

She tossed her head from side to side like a restless mare searching for her stallion. “Come on, come on, take off your pants,” she urged, sitting up to reach for him. “I’ve just got to touch you.”

“Not yet,” he repeated and trailed his fingertips over her smooth, taut belly. “Lie back. Relax.”

She did as he asked, moaning softly, and fell back against the pillows. “That feels so good, Adam.”

He skated his palm over her upper thigh, feeling it transform beneath him, going from soft to hard as her muscles contracted, shifting as if from a liquid to a solid, a lake glazing over but with something hot instead of ice.

The old surge of passion and intense love for his wife arrowed from Adam’s heart into his abdomen as he remembered the first time he’d seen her naked.

They had sneaked upstairs during an end-of-semester party their economics professor had thrown at his house, inviting only his A students. The sight of her bare skin had taken his breath.

He hadn’t had a lot of girlfriends before Morgan, even though women had chased him hot and heavy. His priority had been his career; there hadn’t been much time for romance.

That is, until Morgan had gotten naked with him in Professor Frye’s guest bedroom. That night he’d been reborn.

One thing stood out in his memory above everything else: the sound of Morgan whispering softly, “I can’t believe I’m here with you…it’s magic…you’re magic…we’re magic.”

Morgan’s voice had filled his entire consciousness, flooding his chest, infusing his body with the very magic of which she spoke. He had felt like the luckiest man on earth.

In that moment, Adam had known he was going to marry her.

He was touching her now as he had touched her then. As if she were the most precious commodity in the world and he’d been entrusted with her safekeeping.

“I’m wet for you,” she murmured. “So wet.”

“Yes, you are.”

He looked her in the eyes and his heart turned over. She was his world. But the expression on her face told him she wasn’t in the mood for tenderness. She wanted passion. She wanted hard, physical sex. She wanted him inside her, but no matter how he wished it was so, he could not give her what she wanted. He could not join her.

Not tonight.

Take care of her needs and she doesn’t have to know, his fragile ego whispered.

Dipping his head, he gently kissed her straining breasts, first one and then the other. She shuddered against the pressure of his mouth. He trailed his fingers over her skin and gently nibbled first one stiff nipple and then the other, just the way she liked it.

He felt every quiver of her body, every ragged breath. With excruciating slowness he moved his hand to cover the triangle of hair between her legs.

Morgan moaned her pleasure as his hand cupped her gently.

Delicately, he inserted one thick finger inside her dewy, swollen folds. His fingertip came to rest on the secret spot he knew so well.

“Oh, Adam. Oh, baby, yes.”

Her feminine energy swirled up through his hand until his whole universe spun dizzily. Her stark reaction was such a powerful thing to behold. He felt awed and blown away by her responsiveness.

“Oooh.” She breathed and he felt the first ripples of a building orgasm.

Seeing that she was edging toward ecstasy, Adam adroitly vibrated his finger against her straining cleft the way he knew she loved it.

The orgasm teased her, elusive but near. He could feel it inside her. Pressing…pressing…pressing. Closer and closer. Lifting, soaring, ready to converge in an exquisite explosion.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” Adam cooed. “Let yourself go.”

Her eyes closed.

A dark, husky cry escaped from her lips as Adam moved down the mattress, kissing her body as he went and ending his journey by pressing his mouth against her wet, moist womanhood. She tasted so incredible.

He licked her, gently suckling her veiled hood. He ached to be inside her. To feel her pulse around him. He wanted to join her, to fly to the stars with her, but he could not.