Free Dearly Beloved by Jackie Ivie Page B

The moment it happened, he suffered a solid surge of primal arousal that sent his body into full rigidity. Dominick worked at controlling it, solidifying and tensing every muscle at his command, until it almost worked. He only hoped the moisture in his eyes wasn’t noticeable.
    She wasn’t unaffected. Or the quick slip of her tongue to her lower lip didn’t mean anything. Nor did the instant tremble of her entire body where it matched to his. Dominick tightened a bicep to lift her; thrilled at the contact, and then suffered another semi-seizure of reaction all the way through him.
    “I mean…uh…every time we’re together, the world is either exploding around us, or we’re in bed.”
    Color touched the tops of her cheeks, her blush sending liquid fury racing through his veins, elongating his teeth and making him shudder with containing it.
    Not yet
.
    “Together. Uh…without clothes. Again. It’s a real…problem.”
    “I do not see the problem.” His voice was lower, containing so much bass it reverberated through the chamber.
    “Of course you don’t. You’re a guy. Sex and explosions is probably “Guy Heaven.”
    “Guy Heaven.” He repeated.
    “Ok. We’ll go slower. We need to communicate. As in…have a conversation. Do you think we can do that without adding explosions?”
    Her breath was a curse of provocation, crippling him with every word as it slid across his chin, touched his chest, and then slithered inside to reach his heart. If he answered verbally, it might be a sob. He nodded.
    “Good. Now…let’s move on. Can we have some meaningful dialogue without sex mucking up the works?”
    “I do not know.”
    The words shook and sounded sobbed. Dom bit down and got pooled blood in his lower lip from his own fangs. She gulped. He didn’t see it or hear it, but as close as he held her, and as attuned as he was to every nuance of her, he easily felt it. That righted his world. Not completely, but enough.
    “Well…at least you’re honest.”
    The slight air from her words seemed to cut right through him. Everything on him reacted. He had her gripped in his arms, his legs about hers and worse. They were hovering above the mattress. If he remembered any appropriate curses, he’d have used them.
    “This…is not working. And you need…to let me go.”
    She panted through the words. Dominick stopped the rotation that would have wound the sheet about them. Let her go? Never.
    “I can’t even think…when I’m this close to you. And we still need to have a talk. Now. Please?”
    The plea filtered through somehow, worked its way through his senses and cooled what felt like raging flames. Dominick lowered back to the bed and loosened his limbs, and somehow kept from grabbing her back when she slithered away from him to the other side of the bed. She gathered her legs and a prodigious amount of bedding to her in order to sit, facing him.
    “Good. This might work. No. I think you’ll need to sit up, too. Come on, Dominick. It’s not like you’re a real Greek god, lying around, while you wait for a nymph or two to drop in.”
    Dom regarded her for another moment, and then sat. He ignored where the covers slid but could tell it truly bothered her. He watched her flick a glance to his lap and back, while a blush infused her cheeks. He sucked in on his cheeks and narrowed his eyes, and somehow kept the hunger at bay. Barely.
    “Wow. I mean. Wow. This is so patently unfair. You should come with some sort of warning label or something.”
    He lifted an eyebrow and waited.
    “Maybe we should get dressed first. It’s hard to think of words.”
    She licked her lips again. He pulsed in place. And then she sighed audibly.
    “I mean it’s all well and good to hear of vampire stuff, but when it’s in front of your face. Well. It’s really different, you know?”
    He waited a few moments while the sound of her words dispersed. He shook his head.
    “They’re very sexy. Vampires, I mean. What am I