"They were," he agreed as he let himself hold her for a few seconds. She was warm and soft and he couldn’t ever remember enjoying the feel of a woman more. After having her pressed up so close to him for the past thirty minutes, her legs and arms and hands holding him as tightly as she would if they were in bed together, all he could think about was sex...and wanting her to explode from the pleasure he could give her.
She yawned against his shoulder, and he made himself shift back. "You worked hard all day, not only on your chocolates but also on scrubbing down my house. I should let you get to bed now."
"I’d rather stay up with you."
He shook his head. "We both know what will happen if you do."
That little line came back between her eyebrows, and he had to press a kiss to it.
He felt the warm puff of breath fall from her lips at his touch just before she asked, "Tell me again why you think it’s so important that we wait?"
He knew it wasn’t a good idea, but he couldn’t stop himself from pulling her closer. "Because I care about you. And I want to make sure you have time to think about this. I would never forgive myself if we slept together in the heat of the moment and you woke up the next morning and decided it was a mistake."
She looked up at him, her mouth just inches from his. "Are you sure I’m the one you’re worried about?"
No, he wasn’t sure about a damned thing anymore. Only that he needed to kiss her more than he needed to take his next breath.
Her mouth met his halfway, her lips soft and cool from their ride. She tasted like red wine and cake and a sweetness that was entirely her own. He couldn’t get enough of her, couldn’t remember one single reason why they weren’t already in her bedroom, stripped down and having each other.
She kissed with the same innate sensuality with which she did everything else, from making truffles to splashing with him in the water to teasing him over dinner. He threaded his fingers into her soft hair and tilted her head back so that he could have full access to every corner of her mouth. He was starved for her, desperate for more even as he was taking everything he could...all the while sensing that he’d never be able to get enough of her.
He wanted so badly to do the right thing, but he was quickly coming to realize that where Brooke was concerned, he wasn’t even close to being a strong enough man to follow through on it.
"Brooke—"
She pressed her fingertips to his mouth. "The only reason I’m not inviting you into my bed tonight is because I don’t want you to think being with me is a mistake, either. Good night, Rafe." She went onto her tippy-toes to press one more soft, sweet kiss against his lips. "Sweet dreams."
As he watched her walk inside her house, the same question kept repeating in his head over and over: What the hell had he been thinking to insist on making them wait twenty-four hours to have each other?
But he knew the answer to that already. Brooke had said she could be casual about sex, but he knew better. It wasn’t who she was.
And yet, did he even have a prayer of resisting her, even with all the warning bells going off?
Knowing he wouldn’t be getting any more sleep tonight in the house with her than he had the night before, he grabbed a couple of thick blankets from one of the chairs on the porch and headed down to the beach. Lying back with one arm under his head and the blankets thrown over him, he stared up at the stars and worked to focus on the beauty of the clear night, the sound of the light breeze rustling through the leaves, the frogs calling back and forth to each other…but his head was spinning, reeling still with the taste of Brooke and his desperate need for more of her.
Only twenty hours to go...
Chapter Ten
The next morning, Brooke wasn’t surprised to wake up and find Rafe’s bedroom door open and the room empty. He wasn’t the kind of man who could ever be idle, especially not when he was trying to distract himself. Hopefully, she thought with a grin, he wouldn’t be too exhausted at the end of their twenty-four-hour wait. Because once he was finally in her bed, she wasn’t planning on letting him do much sleeping at all...
She hadn’t thought she’d be able to sleep a wink with all the anticipation shooting through her veins, especially not after a goodnight kiss that had completely rocked her world, but she’d ended up getting a fantastic night’s sleep. Probably because she wasn’t at all nervous about being with Rafe.
She was looking forward to making love with him as the best darn treat she’d ever have, better than the richest, most decadent truffle could ever be. Yes, there was a chance that he could change his mind and decide not to risk their friendship by throwing hot sex into the mix, but given the way he’d kissed her the night before—a shiver followed by a bolt of heat went through her just from thinking about his kiss—she figured the odds were pretty darn low that that would happen.
She’d intended to help him with his house again today, but she’d meant what she said about not wanting to rush him into being with her, either. Something told her that the two of them together in the same house, even with brooms and hammers in their hands, would have both of them quickly forgetting all about giving each other more time to think things through. And the truth was, she did have a great deal of work to do, especially since Rafe had gotten her insides so spun up last night that she’d completely forgotten to check out the pictures of the boutique space in Seattle that Cord had emailed her.
* * *
Ten hours later, she’d not only approved the Seattle storefront and transferred the funds to her partner, she had also finally gotten her Summer’s Pleasures recipe exactly right. Rafe might have distracted her from her work the night before, but today she’d felt so energized, so incredibly alive, that everything she touched had been right.
Making chocolate had always been such a wonderfully sensual, all-senses-involved process for her, but never more than it was now. With every saucepan of heavy cream she heated up, she thought of the way his body heated hers as he pulled her close. With every stroke of her whisk through the creamy chocolate ganache, she thought of the way Rafe had stroked across her skin with his big, slightly rough hands. And when she let a newly made truffle melt on her tongue, she thought of how delicious his mouth had been over hers...and how she couldn’t wait to taste the rest of him, too.
Still, even as she’d worked happily in her kitchen on her new batch of truffles, all day long she’d been looking at her watch.