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  “He didn’t make sure I had those things because it might have made me happy, but because my father thought it befit his daughter to have the outward trappings of wealth.” His hand curved around the hollow of her throat, slowly caressing. It seemed to help somehow. Amanda’s eyes almost fluttered shut. “The two things I wanted, that my mother and I both wanted, he couldn’t give.” She sighed. “His approval and his love.”

  “And Whitney gave you both?”

  She nodded. “Unconditionally.” She remembered how much she looked forward to his visits, first as an eager adolescent, then as a young girl with unfulfilled fantasies. “When things got really bad at home, Whitney always seemed to be around to help me glue together the pieces, like a loving uncle. And he made my mother laugh.” Amanda would always be grateful to him for that. “If I have any self-esteem at all, it’s because of him.”

  Pierce didn’t believe that. She wasn’t a puppet whose strings could be pulled by anyone. “You would have developed that on your own, Mandy. You’re too strong a person to have just been plowed under by an overbearing father.”

  Strong. She had been strong for so long now. There had been no other option open to her.

  Amanda sighed. “Maybe I don’t want to be strong anymore.” She knew it was the champagne talking. Or maybe the champagne was just allowing her to finally speak the truth.

  He slid his arms around her shoulders and drew her closer to him.

  “Then let’s forget you’re Amanda Foster for a while.” He cupped his hand around her cheek. “Let’s forget you’re the thorn in Grimsley’s fat side, Christopher’s mother, Henry Foster’s daughter, and Whitney Granger’s PR representative.”

  He was drugging her, causing pulses she hadn’t known existed to leap within her. “What does that leave?’

  “A hell of a desirable woman.” Pierce brought his mouth down to hers, setting them on a journey that could have only one ending.

  The road was rimmed with fire on both sides.

  Amanda felt herself falling into the flames from the first touch of his mouth on hers. Any inhibitions she’d had, any arguments against this, had all been blotted out by the champagne. It made her blood rush through her veins at a blinding speed.

  Or maybe it was Pierce causing that to happen.

  It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that it was happening.

  Amanda dove her fingers through his hair, fastening her mouth to his as he hungrily took what she offered.

  He had no control over the situation.

  He’d always been in control before, but now, he felt as if someone had tripped a switch and the roller coaster was off and plummeting down a five-mile incline on its own. The realization was exhilarating and frightening as hell. All he knew was that he had to hang on.

  The ride of his life was before him.

  Amanda melded against him, seeking his warmth, seeking his reassuring heat. Her body ached for a release. She hadn’t been with a man since Jeff. She’d begun to believe that it didn’t matter, that she didn’t need this mating ritual between a man and a woman. That it was all meaningless.

  And at the time, maybe she’d been right.

  But she needed this.

  She needed what Pierce could give her, she needed the mindless salvation of having a man want her. She wanted to savor every moment of his lovemaking. She wanted it to last an eternity.

  She wanted him to take her now, this instant, before she exploded.

  Thoughts swirled, collided, twining with such raw, thundering emotions that Amanda was certain she was going crazy.

  Pierce’s first introduction to sex had been at fourteen. The road from the backwoods of Georgia to the highly visible position in Dallas had been long and strewn with willing women. He’d been with women who possessed ravenous sexual appetites; he’d even been with women who needed to be coaxed into exploding into passion. Yet what was happening here tonight belonged in a completely different realm.

  He’d never been needed as a person before. It was as if Amanda was spiritually destitute, seeking someone who could just hold her. It placed everything in a different perspective.

  It should have been enough to frighten him off.

  If he could have formed a coherent thought.

  But he couldn’t think for more than a second or two at a time. Beyond that, he was thrown into turmoil, lost at sea, as he raked his hands over her, touching, savoring, needing.

  He felt her skin. It was hot beneath the flimsy fabric.

  He knew if he wasn’t careful, he’d wind up tearing her dress. Slow, it had to be slow.

  But it was hard to remember when everything was rushing at him at once. Needs, desires, and the overwhelmingly sensual taste of her mouth, desperately urging him on.

  Amanda raced her mouth over his face, her arms tightly wound around his neck. Pierce felt the steely bands of self-control loosening.

  He rose, dragging her with him.

  With hands that seemed to have a mind of their own, he slid the zipper of her dress down her back. The dress slipped off, pooling to the floor like a cloud that had been swept away by the wind. Pierce filled his hands with her, his mouth savaging hers. As he murmured something unintelligible against her mouth, he could feel her heart pounding under his palm.

  Pounding because of him.

  Something reared up within him and broke free.

  Chapter Twenty One

  Tension vibrated through her fingers. With jerky movements, Amanda tugged Pierce’s shirt out of the waistband of his trousers. The buttons wouldn’t yield as she tried to work them free of their holes. Impatient, she yanked at them. One went flying over her shoulder, a casualty of her eagerness to free Pierce of the confining material, her eagerness to feel his skin against hers.

  Amanda’s head reeled. Nothing made sense, least of all what she was doing. But she couldn’t think, she could only feel. Somewhere, far beyond any coherent speculation she could form now, she knew that there were regrets waiting for her, like an army of militant protesters surrounding a bonfire.

  But not tonight.

  Tonight there was only this driving need to have him take her, to have him soothe this fevered ache burning in her loins.

  Soothe this fevered ache in her soul.

  Anxious, afraid that the feeling would flee before it ever reached a crescendo, Amanda yanked Pierce’s shirt off his shoulders. With a triumphant sigh, she pressed her flesh against his. She was faintly surprised that it didn’t sizzle.

  Her enthusiasm amused Pierce almost as much as it aroused him.

  Instinctively, without knowing why, he’d known that it would be different with her. But he hadn’t suspected the magnitude of the difference. As she poured like quicksilver through his hands, she made him forget who he was and what he was. She made him forget that to him, no woman mattered. She aroused such an unprecedented torrent of feelings within him that he wanted to hold her, to savor her, to protect her.

  To beg that this wouldn’t end.

  Fear made him want to pull back for his own safety. But he couldn’t.

  The technique that he was so proud of had deserted him. There were no tricks, no perfected movements. There was only him, stripped of everything but this raging need he had for her.

  His skilled hands were almost clumsy as they pulled away the last scrap of a barrier between them. Her panties fell to the floor, ripped and useless. Holding her to him with one hand, he dove his fingers in. Exploring, he reveled in the sudden wild look in her eyes.

  Amanda dug her fingers into his shoulders and clung to him, just barely holding on.

  Her sudden, startled gasp told him that he had driven her over a peak. There was no feeling of triumph to mark the passage, none of the self-satisfaction that always distanced him from the women he took to bed.

  Instead, there was a feeling of eminent pleasure. For both of them.

  The rapture he saw in her eyes washed over him, cleansing him.

  Her breasts heaving as
she struggled to fill her lungs with air, Amanda fumbled with his trousers. The button that stood in her way stubbornly refused to give.

  Pierce placed his hands over hers. “I’ll do it,” he murmured against the point of her chin. God, he couldn’t get enough of her, enough of that taste that seemed to be sprinkled all over her body. “You’ve already ripped off one button, and I don’t sew all that well.”

  Before she could regain the most elementary use of her tongue and find words to answer him, he was kissing her mouth again, blotting out everything else.

  Pierce smiled into her eyes as he undid the button. Amanda guided his trousers from his hips. The muscular ridges she felt made her heart hammer even harder. Captivated, Amanda tangled her fingers about his briefs.

  Sensations leaped and strained between them as she laid her hands on his taut buttocks and kneaded him against her. She could feel the blood pulsing through his organ.

  Bodies fused, they sank to their knees where they were, amid tangled clothes and tangled emotions. Then he pushed her gently back and scorched her skin with his mouth, suckling, teasing, branding.

  Amanda moaned as she twisted and turned against him, wanting to feel the length of his body against hers, wanting to feel him inside of her.

  Pierce wanted nothing more than to fill her, than to pour himself into her and feel that stunning relief. But he held himself back.

  Instead, his mouth was everywhere, working steadily downward as he sampled all the dusky tastes of her body, both tangy and tempting and all so powerfully intoxicating. The path was agonizingly slow for both of them as she bucked and arched against his mouth.

  The overwhelming heat that radiated from her drew him to her core.

  Amanda gasped as his tongue thrust in.

  Her eyes widened, she tried to wedge her hand in the way. “No, I—“

  It was too late for shyness, too late for barriers. They both knew that.

  “Shh,” he murmured softly, his breath hot on her thighs.

  She began to grind against him as his mouth claimed her. She gasped, her fingernails sinking into the rug as climax after thunderous climax rocked her body.

  She cried out his name in breathless gasps. Or maybe she only thought she did. Nothing Jeff had ever done came close to this.

  She was bordering on madness.

  Damp with her sweat, Pierce slid his body over her heaving torso until his eyes were level with hers.

  Watching them, watching the wildness she kept so carefully guarded suddenly set free, Pierce drove himself into her.

  Her cry as she reached yet another, stronger climax was muffled by his mouth and mingled with his own.

  An eternity later, Amanda opened her eyes and looked at him. His face was turned from her and she stared at the dark hair curling at the base of his neck. She was tempted to feather her fingers over it.

  But the regrets that had shimmered just beyond her reach took a step closer to her, their nebulousness converging into shapes she could almost recognize.

  “I—“ Her strength ran out as she spoke the single syllable.

  “Yes, you.”

  Pierce raised himself up on his elbow and smiled as he looked at her. She was a pool of dampness beneath him. The feeling of their mingled perspiration began to arouse him all over again.

  “You,” he breathed against her neck. He’d told himself that she would be like this—all heated desire, all keen fervor in his hands, overwhelming him with her passion—but he’d never really believed it. Now he did.

  The floor felt hard beneath Amanda as reality slowly broke through. “We never even made it to the bedroom.” She expected him to gloat.

  “No,” he agreed. “We didn’t.” Slowly, a lazy smile spread across his mouth. “I guess we’ll just have to do it all over again in there.”

  He saw the hesitation entering her eyes, that act of distancing that he’d come to know. Carefully, he smoothed her hair away from her face, unwilling to let things go just yet.

  “I think I’d better leave.” Her protest carried no conviction and lay stillborn on her lips.

  “And I think you shouldn’t.” He tempered his words so she wouldn’t think he was forcing her to stay. “It’s early, Mandy. The evening’s just begun.” He lowered his mouth to hers, savoring just the chastest of kisses. It sparked a desire for more. “Here, let me show you.”

  She hadn’t the strength to refuse him, or the will. Not when his mouth was plundering hers, making her mindless all over again, resurrecting the boundless joy.

  Without a preamble, her strength came charging back as he deepened the kiss. She felt his tongue in her mouth, searching for hers. She met it zealously. They tangled, and needs she had thought were satisfied forever were suddenly knocking at her door again.

  Enraptured, Amanda threw her arms around his neck, drawing him closer.

  She knew with a sadness she refused to recognize that he would never be close enough.

  They failed for a second time to reach the bedroom, making love there on the floor as time and the world came to a skidding stop once again.

  Losing himself within her, sheathing himself in not only her, but the innate, naive sweetness she carried within her despite everything she’d experienced, Pierce could almost believe that the world was a good place. He was unwilling to let this slim thread go, to release the tether and go plummeting back to reality.

  After a short respite, he rose, picking her up in his arms.

  “What are you doing?” Amanda asked breathlessly as she curved her hand around his neck for support and just for the very feel of him.

  “Showing you how it can be,” was all he said, the words gruff, the sentiment gentle.

  And then, in the bedroom, amid the soft, seductive sounds of the man-made waterfall that was just beyond his window, Pierce showed her a tenderness Amanda hadn’t thought him capable of.

  This gentler lovemaking brought forth another wave of passion from her, draining her even as it swept through her veins with the force and speed of a flash flood.

  His lovemaking, whether breathtakingly passionate or achingly tender, made her wild and reckless.

  His lovemaking made her free.

  Amanda stirred. She was reluctant to open her eyes and give up the last vestiges of the joy and peacefulness she had experienced as she had drifted off to sleep in Pierce’s arms.

  But sleep receded on light, padded feet, like a cat silently slinking away into the shadows. In its place came the steely grip of panic laced with horror.

  Oh God, what had she done?

  Her heart pounding, Amanda slowly turned in the king-sized bed to face the warm body next to hers.

  Pierce was sleeping soundly. The brooding expression was gone. His features were softened. A totally unfamiliar, contented smile was on his face.

  Sure he was content. She’d become another notch for him.

  Amanda felt regret stab the point of its dagger into her heart, then twist it. Worse than that, she’d almost raped him, she thought, remembering how she’d yanked his shirt from him, how she’d fumbled with his trousers, with his underwear.

  Her face grew hot. She’d undoubtedly fed his ego and given him something to crow about.

  Hot tears gathered in her eyes and threatened to clog her throat. She blinked them away, furious with herself and this sudden display of weakness on top of the huge, glaring mistake she had made last night.

  She didn’t have time for tears. She had to get out of here before Pierce woke up.

  Holding her breath, Amanda watched Pierce’s face for any signs that he was waking up as she eased slowly out of the bed.

  He didn’t even stir.

  The only light in the room came in from the full moon through the window. It highlighted Pierce’s face and made him almost impossibly good-looking. Amanda stared at him for just a beat, momentarily wishing that things were different, that he was the man she wished him to be, the man she’d pretended he was during their lovemaking. Someone k
ind, who could love.

  If she could buy into that she thought ruefully, she’d be the most gullible woman in the world, and she’d already paid her dues in that department.

  With a sense of urgency throbbing through her, Amanda looked around for her clothes and then remembered that they were all in a heap on the floor in the other room.

  Silently, she made her escape. Then, as a precaution, she softly closed the door behind her.

  Fumbling, cursing her own weakness, Amanda quickly slipped her dress on and zipped it. When she picked up her panties from the floor, she realized that they were torn and useless. She felt naked and vulnerable without underwear, but she couldn’t stay here either. She couldn’t bring herself to face Pierce.

  Swallowing another curse, Amanda picked up his undershorts and pulled them on. The briefs were loose around her hips and felt really awkward, but if she didn’t move too fast, they’d do.

  She checked her purse for the change that she’d need to call a cab. With a quarter burning in the palm of her hand, Amanda snuck out of Pierce’s apartment.

  Like a prostitute, slinking away in the night, she thought bitterly.

  Amanda hoped Carla wouldn’t wake up when she arrived home. She didn’t feel like explaining anything to the woman.

  She didn’t even want to think about it herself.

  Chapter Twenty Two

  By the time Amanda undressed and climbed into her own bed, there wasn’t much of the night left. What there was of it, she spent tossing restlessly, sleeping in tiny snatches.

  She couldn’t remember the details of anything she dreamed, only that she felt haunted.

  Each time she shut her eyes, she could see Pierce’s face, his eyes and his mouth mocking her. She’d let her guard down and he had slipped past, like a thief in the night.

  No, that wasn’t accurate. She was rationalizing the situation. He might be a thief, but last night, she had given him the key.

  Given? She’d all but thrown it to him.

  Subconsciously, she had wanted last night to happen. Logically, she had known she’d regret it, but still, she had wanted it to happen.