With her clamped to his side, Josh made a swift call to the kitchen to demand that dinner be delayed until further notice. Callie knew that on some level she should be embarrassed. He’d all but stated their intentions to the crew as to what they’d be doing, but instead all she could think of was that there would be some relief to the pounding ache that suffused her.
Josh led her through the interior of the boat and down a flight of stairs. At the bottom he turned and let her go only long enough to grip the gleaming brass handles on a pair of polished wooden doors and thrust the doors open.
The stateroom was sumptuous in its appointments. Light spilled in from the windows on either side, giving the impression that they were totally alone, afloat on the Waitemata Harbour in their own cocoon of luxury. Callie felt a thrill of anticipation ripple through her as she surveyed the massive bed sprawled in front of her. A thrill that was rapidly followed by a surge of fear.
What was she thinking? This was craziness personified. She’d worked for Josh two and a half weeks, had only met him once before that, and now she was going to bed with him? She’d never behaved so impulsively, nor wantonly, before. The dichotomy between her careful lifestyle over the past few years and what she was about to do slammed home.
“Josh?” she said, her voice betraying her hesitancy.
“Don’t think,” he said, taking her into his arms again and lowering his lips to hers. “Just feel.”
As he kissed her, she clung to reason for a fleeting second, then was swept away on a tide of want she’d never experienced so deeply before. Every nerve in her body, every thought in her head, focussed on Josh Tremont and the way he touched her.
Broad hands swept across her naked back, his fingers tangling in the trail of the ties of her halter. In seconds she felt the fabric of her dress begin to loosen, in a heartbeat she knew he held each tie in his hands. Josh straightened and looked at her.
“I’ve been wanting to do this all evening.”
Callie laughed softly, the sound unexpected in the taut atmosphere of the room. “So you haven’t been wanting to do it long then,” she teased.
But then all thought of humour fled as Josh smiled and lowered his hands, drawing the material in a sensuous slide across her sensitised skin. Breath shuddered through her lips as he bared her to his view, as his eyes darkened to indigo and his jaw clenched, his lips compressed in a straight line.
He said nothing, did absolutely nothing—but look. Uncertainty swept through her until he lifted his hands and gently cupped the pale globes of her breasts, his thumbs skimming the hardened, rose-tinted peaks, his touch drawing a cry of need from her mouth that echoed through her entire body. His fingers tightened more firmly on her and she pressed against his hands, suddenly eager for more.
Josh dipped his head and captured one distended nipple with his lips, nibbling gently at the pebbled tip until Callie thought her legs would buckle and send them both to the lushly carpeted floor.
“You like that,” he said, his breath a tantalising caress across the moisture on her skin.
“Oh, yes,” she groaned.
“You want more?”
“Please, more!”
As Josh laved her other nipple with the same attention, he found the zippered fastening of her dress. In an instant the fabric slithered down over her hips and down her legs to fall in folds of darkness onto the floor. Josh stepped away from her, his eyes raking over her near nakedness, the impressive bulge in the front of his trousers saying more loudly how she affected him than any word or gesture could.
Despite the fact that she was dressed solely in black lace panties and high-heeled sandals, Callie felt invulnerable. She wasn’t the only one lost on this wave of attraction. She wasn’t the only one to throw reason to the wind and to want to indulge entirely in sensation.
“One more thing,” Josh said, reaching for the clip that bound her hair.
As her locks cascaded down, he swept her up and off her feet, closing the distance between the door and the bed with two long strides. He ripped back the covers with one hand and tumbled her onto the crisp cotton sheets. Callie reached down to remove her sandals.
“Leave them,” Josh commanded as he tore at the buttons on his shirt and then unfastened his belt and trousers.
Callie heard the thud of his shoes as he dragged the shirt off his shoulders and pushed his trousers and underwear down in an economy of movement that spoke volumes about his need for her.
And then there he was, gloriously naked, his arousal proudly jutting from a nest of dark hair at his groin. Callie’s hands twisted in the sheets as her eyes roamed his body—the taut abdomen, the bunched muscles of his chest. She wanted to touch him. To lick and taste the golden planes of his skin, to cup his manhood in her palm and to stroke the swollen tip until he was near bursting. But Josh clearly had other plans.
He wrapped his fingers around her ankles and eased her legs apart, slowly easing his body between them. His hand skimmed down the length of one leg to the hollow at her groin where he pressed a hot wet kiss before stroking back down her thigh, her calf, until he held her foot in his hand. He bent her knee and hooked her foot around his waist before doing the same to her again on the other side.
This time when he pressed his lips to her skin she thought she’d fly off the bed. Energy coiled in a tight knot at the apex of her thighs, begging for his touch, but still he held himself carefully away from her. She reached for the scrap of lace that lay between her and the freedom his touch promised but Josh grabbed her hands, holding them down at her sides.
“Not yet,” he murmured. “They’re the only thing keeping me under control right now.”
“But what if I don’t want control. What if I want you. Now.”
Callie lifted her hips in supplication, driven by a longing desperate to be assuaged.
“Like this?” he taunted as he leaned forward, and lowered his hips to hers.
Through her panties she felt the hot, hard length of him. She squirmed against him, locking her ankles together so he couldn’t immediately pull away, and relished the pressure of his hardness against her yearning flesh.
“Oh, yes,” she sighed.
“Soon. But first…”
Josh kept a firm hold on her hands as he lowered his chest to hers. She felt the solid heat of his body before he allowed himself to brush the tips of her breasts. She fought against his hold. She wanted to wrap her arms around him, to hold him to her, length for length, to absorb his heat, his desire. She strained upwards, her head tilting back, exposing the curve of her throat and he trailed hot sucking kisses along her skin, along the line of her collarbone and, finally, drawing each nipple in turn into his mouth, rolling its hardness with his tongue.
Jolts of electricity pulsed through her with each pull of his mouth. Damn, she was close. She’d never been so close without direct stimulation before. Callie flexed her hips, desperate to reach the pinnacle that loomed just on the horizon, but instead moaned in protest as Josh slowed his assault on her senses and began to work his way back down her body.
Finally, he let go her hands, replacing his hold on her hips instead, tilting her pelvis up. Callie let her legs drop from his waist and fall open. Her hands now gripping his shoulders as he covered her mound with his mouth, blowing hot air through her panties and against her most sensitive place, and just about launching her into orbit at the same time.
It didn’t matter what he did, where he touched, she ignited. Every particle in her body attuned to his actions, every sense in synch with his touch. Her mind focussed only on him.
He tugged at her panties, finally pulling them down off her body. Then, painstakingly slowly he took off her sandals, pressing kisses against her instep as he released each foot.
Callie never knew she had so many erogenous zones. One touch, one caress, was all it took and she was burning up. Rendered incapable of any thought other than what came next.
Vaguely, she became aware of Josh grabbing his trousers from the floor, extracting a square packet, before ripping it open and sheathing himself. Then he was back between her legs, his hair tickling her inner thighs as he bent to intimately kiss her. Soft at first, then stronger, punctuated by sweeps of his tongue swirling over the hypersensitive bundle of nerve endings at her core. When he closed his mouth around her protruding bud, and suckled, she swept over the edge of reason and into a wild conflagration—spiralling over and over as paroxysms of pleasure shook her body.
She’d barely begun to regain her senses when she felt the hard nub of his erection at her entrance. She opened for him, welcoming him into her body—into her very soul.
Aftershocks of satisfaction from her orgasm soon built into something stronger as he stroked his length in and out, grinding against her, watching her face as she changed from sated satisfaction to hunger all over again.
This time he built her up more quickly than before. The direct pressure of his body, his long deep strokes, culminating in waves of spreading fulfilment that swelled through her again and again. Every muscle in her body tightened, and she held him to her, pulling him deeper, until she lost complete track of where she ended and he began. And then, when she knew she could hold back the tide no longer, she felt the power surge through him as he climaxed. A raw growl of completion ripped from his throat as he pumped against her over and over, sending her into the true oblivion of sybaritic bliss.
Callie stirred, noting immediately the tightening of Josh’s arms around her as they lay sprawled together in abandon across the bed. The sun was lower now, and she could see streaks of purple and rich apricot across the sky through the window.
She lifted one hand to his abdomen and began to stroke, in long languid sweeps, with the tips of her fingers. Beneath her touch she felt goose bumps rise over his skin. She lowered her hand, tracing tiny patterns through the coarse hair at his groin until she reached the smooth length of him. She wrapped her fingers around him, sliding them gently up and down his shaft, squeezing ever so slightly more firmly as she reached his tip before beginning the same journey again.
Josh’s eyelids opened to half mast as she stroked him, the cerulean glitter his only betrayal of control. Callie slid down his body and drew up onto her knees.
She bent down and traced his tip with her tongue before opening her mouth to take him fully while keeping up the momentum of her hand on his shaft. Beneath her she felt the muscles in his thighs clench and she took him deeper, increasing her rhythm, relentlessly alternating pressure with her mouth, her tongue.
When he came it was with giant shudders that wracked his body and shook the bed, in total contrast to the taut control he’d held over his body as she’d ministered to him. And, as the last waves of pleasure washed over him, Callie knew a completion she’d never known before. She’d brought him to this. She’d given him the ultimate satisfaction.
Josh pulled her into his arms, aligning her body over his, his hands stroking lazy circles across her back as she nuzzled against his chest.
“I suppose we should put the chef out of his misery and have dinner,” he eventually said.
Callie’s stomach growled in response, eliciting a hearty chuckle from Josh.
“That settles it.”
He reached a lazy arm out and lifted a phone from the bedside cabinet. His instructions were brief and to the point. They’d serve themselves in the salon on the main deck and they didn’t want to be disturbed.
Callie rose from the bed and stretched before reaching for her clothes. Josh came up behind her, his hands arresting her actions.
“Don’t bother with those. There are robes in the en suite. I like the idea of sitting opposite you, knowing you’re not wearing anything else.”
“I wasn’t wearing much else before,” Callie commented but walked through to the bathroom.
“I know,” Josh’s voice followed her. “It drove me nuts.”
“And this won’t?” she answered, stepping back through to the bedroom and tying the sash on a rich emerald satin robe.
The fabric slithered over her skin, its touch triggering tiny ripples of sensation that brought an immediate response and saw her nipples peak in clearly defined outlines. Josh’s eyes riveted on them. Unbelievably, she felt them tighten even more.
“Oh, yeah, it’ll drive me nuts.”
Callie handed him the large black towelling robe she’d chosen for him. “You’d better put this on then. We can torment each other.”
She shoved her hands deep into her pockets as Josh pulled on his robe.
“Shall we?” he said, reaching for her hand.
It felt like the most natural thing in the world to have her hand in his. His fingers laced with hers and the warmth of his palm scorched against her skin, fusing them together.
In the main salon an intimate table for two had been set, a fresh bottle of champagne languished in an ice bucket to one side and the subdued lighting was enhanced by a myriad of squat candles scattered about.
By the time they’d dined on smoked salmon filo parcels, drizzled with a sweet chilli sauce, and a medley of seasonal roasted vegetables, Callie was on tenterhooks. The enticing glimpses she caught of Josh’s bare chest as he leaned forward at the table distracted her from the flavoursome meal before them, and she was all too aware of the tension building up deep inside.
Tension that saw her shift every so often on her seat to alleviate the insistent throb at the juncture of her thighs. Tension that made her all too aware of the movement of the muscles in Josh’s throat as he swallowed. Of the play of veins on his hands as he deftly sectioned his filo parcel and brought each bite to his mouth. He was as methodical in this as he was in everything else he did.
But she knew now exactly what it took to make him lose that fabled control and as the sash on her robe began to slide loose, she made no attempt to halt the gape of fabric.
Dessert was soon forgotten as by mutual assent they rose from the table. The distance between the main deck and their room passed in a blur of motion as their appetites for one another coalesced into a melding of bodies, sensation and gratification.
They were ensconced in the private confines of the back of a limousine, fingers still entwined. It was as if, having had a taste of one another, neither could bear to break the link between them. It was past midnight and while she was physically exhausted, Callie had never felt more mentally energised before.
They’d ended their harbour cruise standing by the aft railing on the main deck, Josh’s arms wrapped around her from behind, her body fully supported by his strength. There was a bitter sweetness to the knowledge that the evening was drawing to a close, but even perfection had its boundaries. Their return to reality was as reluctant as it was necessary.
As Josh had said, a car was waiting for them at the Westhaven Marina as the boat drew in. Now that car was headed to Callie’s town house.
The rumble of Josh’s voice in the gloom of the car interior surprised her.
“You want me to stay at your place?”
Her heart leaped at the opportunity, but her head urged caution.
“You don’t want to?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Good, it’s settled then. You can leave your car at work on Friday and we’ll drive home together.”
“Won’t people notice?”
“Does that bother you?” Josh lifted her hand to his lips and drew her forefinger into his mouth. “I want more than just mind-blowing sex from you, Callie.”
She gasped as his lips closed around the tip and the wet warmth of his tongue stroked against her skin.
“Wouldn’t you like to explore this further?” he coaxed.
“Y-yes.”
A shudder ran through her. She wouldn’t have believed it possible, but she wanted him again. She’d thought her body was too tired, too sated, to want more. She’d been wrong. But hard on the heels of the desire that threatened to swamp her consciousness was the reminder that, all pleasure aside, she was supposed to be exploring him. Josh Tremont, the man.
“Yes,” she replied again, this time more firmly. “I would.”
“Excellent. You won’t regret it.”
But as the limousine pulled up outside her home and Josh walked her to her front door, Callie experienced a deep sense of foreboding that she most definitely would.