Heat wave, by Sue Castle. All characters belong to
She should have known better. She really should have known better.
But she just couldn't help herself.
It had been another hot
Damn. He even perspired well.
He felt her eyes. The back of his neck flushed, defeating his act of
will. He felt his skin prickle when she swept her gaze over his back, seemingly
unconsciously across the width of his chest in the undershirt stretched over
his skin. Lashes swept down to hide his reaction, the desk a determined barrier
between them so that his untimely physical response to her perusal would not
embarrass both of them, voice held firmly professional -- all these defense
mechanisms were nothing to the warm tide of crimson sweeping under his skin.
He felt like he was on fire. She felt like she was on fire.
Silence lay between them like a wall.
So, of course, he had to work late. He and his friend Ray had cracked a
case the previous night, one which had been worrisome, frustrating, and difficult .... and which had left
him not at his best for the next day's paperwork. His work was as meticulous as
always, but an unaccustomed langour was making his
mind sluggish and causing his reports to take longer to complete than he would
have hoped.
She kept looking at him.
His concentration was shot.
"Do you need a ride home, Constable?" Lord. Was that her voice?
Meg shook herself slightly. Where had that offer come from? He was looking at
her. He had the thickest lashes she had ever seen. Normally they shaded the
thoughts behind those crystal blue eyes, leaving the world to see the bone-deep
courtesy and gentleness of the man, guarding the inner soul. Today those eyes
seemed sleepy, softer than usual. Vulnerable. She
tugged at her neckline again.
His eyes followed the movement of her fingers, lingered at the softness
of her throat, the sharp line of her jaw. The tightened lips,
the wide eyes. For a long, crazy moment he wished for unconscious
Mounties and speeding trains, explosives and potential nuclear catastrophe ...
he wanted to kiss her again. This time he wanted to hold her somewhere other
than atop a train, fear propelling their actions, someplace calm and simple and
sweet. No candles, just moonlight. Open windows. Dief in the other room. He
wanted her in his bedroll.
The warm tide of crimson washing up from her collar to her hairline
fascinated him. She couldn't believe he could cause her to blush like this with
no more than a look. His eyes finally met hers, and she read there a mirror
message to the one being urgently sent from her own nerve endings. Take this
man. Lock the door. Taste him. Touch him. Now.
Neither one of them could break that look.
"Please," he almost whispered.
The ride seemed to take forever, and not nearly
long enough. She had borrowed one of the smaller consulate cars, a nondescript
Japanese model that would blend in with the truly appalling neighborhood in
which he made his home. The choice had been subconscious, not deliberate, she
assured herself. The singing under the surface of her skin laughed at her. She
wasn't planning on going anywhere any time soon. She didn't care if the
hoodlums stripped the car to its bare frame. She was going to test the firmness
of that simple double bed she had had so much trouble tearing her eyes from the
first time she had ever seen his apartment. She risked a glance at his still
profile. He seemed paler than usual, eyes fixed firmly straight ahead, staring
through the windshield at the bustling traffic as if keeping sharp watch for mauraders at the gate of some distant fort. His lips were
drawn into a severe line, and he was unconsciously biting gently at his bottom
lip. She caught herself before moaning aloud. God, it was hot.
He hesitated when they arrived at his apartment, wondering if she would
like to be invited up, knowing his stark rooms were not up to her standard,
suddenly and fiercely wanting someplace nice, somewhere cool and soft and
beautiful to match her own beauty. Before he could untangle his thoughts enough
to make a decision about asking her in for a cool drink, he realized that she
was standing impatiently beside his closed door. He looked at her for a
startled moment, then hurriedly extracted himself from the car and followed her
outthrust arm into his building.
Silence sat between them, not calmly, but as if it had a life of its own,
writhing lazily in the short space between their bodies, feeding on the heat
and the tension between them.
Her eyes slid down the solid expanse of his back to rest on his firm
buttocks as she followed him up the rickety stairs. Her breath was coming in
increasingly short pants, and it had little to do with the physical exertion or
the ridiculous heat. Her mind's eye was imprinting another image over the
smooth play of muscles in front of her ... silky skin, gleaming with sweat, her
fingers digging in to the bunching muscles as he--
"Inspector?" His quizzical voice broked her concentration
and she realized they were standing outside his door. She had followed him to
his door, and now stood behind him, staring at his ass. Her eyes closed of
their own volition, and she faltered for the first time since she had decided,
back in her office, that she wasn't going to pretend any longer, because it
wasn't going to go away. Her throat felt incredibly dry. "Are you all
right, Sir?"
That did it. Sir. She was so damned tired of him
calling her sir. Her lashes swept up, and with one strong hand she pulled the
door open, threading her other arm between his elbow and his ribs, hooking his
waist and drawing him into the kitchen immediately inside the apartment,
balancing them both with one firm leg between his thighs, the other foot
kicking out swiftly to slam the door shut behind them. He barely had time to
close his mouth around the query before her lips were on his, her now free hand
thrusting through the thick hair at the back of his head to pull his face down
to hers, her arm around his waist pulling his hot, sweating, incredibly solid
and sweet body against her own.
It took all of four seconds before Fraser's body got over the shock of
suddenly finding his superior officer ravishing his mouth and he
enthusiastically joined the kiss. His mind was still frozen in shock, but his
arms, his mouth, his groin had been wanting this for
much too long to let this opportunity pass untaken. His tongue slid over hers,
then withdrew, and hers followed it eagerly into his mouth. He felt the blood
rush from his head to his belly, making it even harder to think than it had
been before. She felt the sudden stir of interest pushing insistently at her
stomach and moaned. Yes. She had him. And he tasted even better than she
remembered.
Neither was quite aware of how they got there, because there was no
sensation of moving, but he found himself with the backs of his knees against
the side of his bed, then the momentary dizziness of a short fall, the
delicious weight of her body landing atop his, her hair falling softly around
his face, He reached up to push it from where it had tangled, silky strands
catching on his lips, and she suddenly froze. He groaned at the cessation of
movement, and forced his head back far enough to see her face.
She looked horrified. She started to squirm down his body, exacerbating
his arousal, and he gripped her upper arms firmly.
"Oh, dear," he barely breathed.
She started to pull back, but he was having none of that. Running his
large, square hands over her hair, small soothing noises issuing from the back
of his throat, he held her against his chest until she subsided.
"What is it, Meg?" His voice was very soft, inviting
confidence, a dark undercurrent of passion lending a raspiness
to it that sent a shiver cascading through her.
"I ... I don't want you to think you have to-" she couldn't
quite finish the strangled explanation. He caught her meaning and a smile
curved his lips, although his eyes remained serious.
"You're not sexually harrassing me,
Margaret." He thrust up gently, but with enough force that she couldn't
mistake his meaning. She whimpered in response. "I want this," he
muttered hoarsely in her ear, reaching forward to nip lightly at the lobe. She
whimpered again, more loudly, and thrust her pelvis into his. "I want you."
She finally relaxed back into his grip. Ottowa
be damned. Rank be damned. It was just Benton Fraser
and Meg Thatcher and the heat wave that melted
Who needed a runaway train. They could generate
enough heat between the two of them to put any nuclear explosion to shame. And
Mounties were much more fun when they were conscious.
Which they proceeded to prove until neither one could move, or think, or
question.
Between them, the silence shimmered in the heat.
End