Intimate Touch

By LeeAnna

Tracy stared at the screen of her computer, unable to come up with another word for her column. It was difficult to concentrate with all the turmoil going on in her head. Had she finally told Antonio her feelings, or was it all just an illusion. All she wanted was for him to notice her, and maybe for the man she lived with to love her.

"Notice you?" he repeated incredulously. "You've got to be joking! there's not a damn thing about you that I don't notice!" He told her.

She hadn't taken two steps before she felt Antonio's hand gripping the bare skin of her upper arm. A moment later he had stepped in front of her and was watching the uncertainty play over her flustered features. He'd never seen her look that way before. Antonio stared down at her. And the seconds ticked away one by one.

With each passing second, she could see the strain melting from his face, the beginnings of a smile softening the hard line of his lips.

The pressure of his hand on her arm increased almost imperceptibly, repeating the frisson of tremors that had raced to the tips of her fingers only moments before. His hand raised slowly, her throat tightening when his knuckles grazed her cheek. Mesmerized by the transformation taking place before her, she had to make a concerted effort to breathe when his thumb smoothed the tension from her mouth.

"Do you have any idea how hard it's been for me to keep my hands off of you?" He inched closer. "How many times I've wanted to take you in my arms in the morning and kiss the sleep from your eyes? To just be able to feel you against me?" The tip of his finger pressed her bottom lip, coaxing it to part, and he continued tracing its inviting texture. "I kept telling myself that we'd be better off to just leave things the way they are. That there was no sense in complicating what we've got. I can't fight both of us anymore, Princess." He didn't need to say anything else. It was all there in his beautiful brown eyes.

She could feel his breath on her forehead, its rhythm heavy. Almost as erratic as her own. "It won't complicate anything," she promised, loving the feel of his fingers as they wended through her hair. "We'll just make it better."

His thumbs stroked her temples. "It's already better."

His words were a verbal caress, as seductive as the feel of his hands as he gently pulled the pins from her hair and smoothed the long, flaxen tresses over her back.

"I do want you, Tracy," he breathed, his hand delving beneath the white gold veil to press into the small of her back. "I do want you." His last words were spoken against her lips, their faint vibration lost in the hunger that burst through him in a quiet explosion of need. There was nothing now but the feel of her body, warm and pliant and trembling against his own.

And the feel of his body, hard and demanding against hers. Tracy clung to him, needing his strength to stabilize the spinning in her head, the weakness in her legs.

She followed his lead. Her tongue imitating his motions when it flicked over the slick membrane behind his lower lip. Plunging again to taste his warmth. Gently nipping at his tongue before giving up that teasing play to seek more urgently.

Tracy's soft moan was suppressed against his chest as he bent forward to lift her. His hand slid beneath the hem of her dress, his palm hot against her thigh. Then his arm was under her knees and his other tightened around her back. She could hear the strong thud of his heart beating twice for every step he took while he carried her down the hall.

She was floating. Lost in a misty world of longing that held only enough room for her and the man whose kisses turned her blood into warm, thick honey. The man who was going to have to teach her how to create that same drugging sensation in him.

Antonio's lips followed the path of his hands, and her dress fell to the floor. Wanting, needing, to touch him as he had her, she repeated his actions. Tremulous kisses were rained over his chest as she removed his shirt, and the rest of his clothes joined hers on the floor.

Driven nearly beyond control by the beautiful, natural way she sought to entice him as he had her, he pushed her down to his circular bed. He tasted the pouting tips of her breasts, the smooth skin of her stomach, the firm flesh of her thighs. Tracy rolled him over, returning his caresses, his kisses, with her own.

To Antonio, she was making an erotic game of their lovemaking. A sensual game of follow the leader. Her hands felt like satin. Her lips like hot silk. She was a nymph who toyed with him, taunted him with her sometimes tentative, sometimes bold touches. A woman who knew how to please.

A woman who was being led by her heart. And the man she loved.

Antonio pinned her back to the soft blue sheets and began nibbling moist kisses down her throat, seeking the gentle swell of her breast. As he teased the hard nipple with his teeth, his tongue, she felt his hand moving down to stroke the inside of her legs. Every sensation he had evoked in her dreams paled next to those he was eliciting now. His hand cupped the curls between her thighs, his fingers gently probing. She stiffened involuntarily, her fingers digging into his back.

"You're so tight, honey," he rasped, soothing her with slow, deliberate motions. "So tight and so ready for me."

"Please, Antonio." Her words were a faint whisper. If he didn't stop this exquisite torture soon, she would die with wanting him. "Please," she repeated, and his lips claimed hers again.

Still he didn't stop. She shifted restlessly, gripping the tensed muscles in his shoulders. She wanted to feel his weight on her. To have him teach her where this odd, escalating heat-throbbing where he stroked so boldly would lead.

Antonio knew that she was close. And he couldn't wait any longer.

Sliding his hand beneath her hips, he moved over her. She felt his knees nudging her legs apart as he aligned her femininity to him. She arched upward, instinct guiding her where experience could not, and he sought to fulfill the desires raging within them.

Her gasp was muffled against his mouth. She had tried to silence it, but Antonio heard it anyway. And he knew that it wasn't a groan of pleasure. His body grew rigid, his mind not wanting to comprehend what suddenly became quite apparent. She had felt tight. Too tight. And now...

He started to pull back.

Both his own desires and Tracy's hands stopped him.

"No," she pleaded. "Don't stop. Not now."

This time it was Antonio who moaned.

He couldn't have stopped if he'd wanted to.

Clamping his mouth over hers in an effort to drink the pain he knew she was feeling, he broke that last resistance and buried himself in her warmth.

He forced himself not to move. To try and ignore the insistent demands of his body. "Are you all right?" There was more than concern revealed in his deep velvet voice.

She nodded. Already the pain was subsiding, giving way to infinitely more pleasurable feelings. "Help me, Antonio?"

The innocence in her question was astounding. Just as incredible as the gift of innocence she had just given him.

"I will, princess," he promised. He kissed her cheek, her eyes. "I will." His hand slid down to her hip. "Wrap your legs around mine, and move with me. That's it. Easy. Nice and...easy."

Gently he coaxed her. Guided her. And through the night he taught her the wonderful mysteries of her body. The perfect oneness that is created in that inexplicable moment when conscious thought gives way to an implosion of feeling so intense that nothing else exists. And she learned how to please him.

Tracy fought the return of consciousness and snuggled into the warm curve of Antonio's arm. She didn't want to wake up yet. This was a wonderful dream.

"You going to stay home today?"

"Mmmm," she murmured, curling her fingers against his chest. His chest? Her eyes flew open and she focused on the dark curls visible between her fingers. She wasn't dreaming!

Memories of the beautiful night they had shared shattered her lassitude. Everything was very real. Antonio was here, holding her. She could feel the strong beat of his heart beneath her hand. The feel of denim against her legs.

Denim? Maybe she wasn't quite awake yet.

The little shocks darting inward from where he was kneading the curve of her hip told her that she was most definitely awake now. Being conscious was one thing. Being articulate when she first woke up was another. So she couldn't tell him that she felt exactly like a child-one who had just received the present she'd been waiting for all of her life.

He propped himself up on his elbow and pushed her hair back from her face. "I could stay right here with you forever!"