Heiress for Hire (Cuttersville #2)(50)
Author: Erin McCarthy

Though a foolish voice in his head suggested that maybe Amanda could be talked into staying on the farm. She loved Piper, after all. Then sanity returned, and he pictured an ugly breakup when Amanda got tired of life down on the farm and took off for the city. He imagined his heartbreak, and Piper’s. Not a good road to travel.

He had nothing to offer Amanda except his heart, and he didn’t think that would be worth much at auction.

"What about you? Where will you be in five years?" He could guess. She’d be married to some pretty boy, giving dinner parties and taking European vacations. Maybe she’d have a child of her own, though the thought made him kind of sick. He hoped whatever it was, she’d be happy.

"I don’t know. I honestly have no idea." Her nails ran across his stomach idly. "If you had asked me that two months ago, I would have guessed I’d be doing the same thing at thirty that I was at twenty-five. Shopping, partying, traveling, being bored out of my mind. But I can’t do that. I just can’t go back to that. And I can’t do the opposite of that either."

He wasn’t sure what the opposite was, but it didn’t matter if she couldn’t do it.

"I have to find something in the middle, I guess. I have to find a career that I can enjoy. My cousin Stuart in New York has connections. He can get me a job. Maybe as an art buyer."

Something that was far away from Cuttersville, he guessed. He knew that. Had always known it. But he wanted to hold Amanda, keep her, love her. And ultimately that would stifle her.

"You’d be great at that." Whatever it was, exactly. But it sounded Amandalike.

"I really don’t know if that’s what I want though. I don’t know… I just don’t know." Amanda sat up, putting her arm on the opposite side of his chest, so she hovered over him, her br**sts touching his chest. "But I do know I’m so glad I met you."

"So I am." More than he could express with just words. He put his hand on the back of her head and guided her down to him.

When her mouth met his, she had already opened it for him, and Danny was grateful all over again.

Chapter 18

Danny Tucker had a way of making Amanda forget who she was. Or maybe he let her forget that she had to be anything but herself.

With Danny, it didn’t matter what she was wearing or how her hair looked, or if her makeup was au courant for the season. She didn’t have to name-drop and technology-flash and have the hottest ideas for entertainment.

She just had to be herself, and that after-school-special-sounding cliche was liberating.

He kissed with a kind of tender recklessness. It was hot and eager and filled with an intensity she had never felt, and didn’t understand. The way he held on to her back, moved across her mouth, was like he wanted to absorb her into him, hold on, make it last.

The effect on her inner thighs was exhilarating. Danny wanted her, and help her, she wanted him. She coveted him; she had to have him. A desperate part of her brain knew she would never meet another man quite as sweet as Danny, and she wanted to feel him inside her before he changed his mind.

She tangled her tongue with his, encouraging, grinding her hips onto his after she climbed up onto him. Her bare chest pressed into his hot, hard flesh as she wiggled her mound against his erection. Oh, yes, right there, it was nice and perfectly positioned, and she moaned, ripping her mouth off his.

"Take off your jeans." And to prove she was serious, she grappled with the zipper on them, finally getting it down. She dusted a kiss on his navel, running her nose over the soft blond hair there.

Danny was breathing heavy, eyes half closed, and he didn’t hesitate. He set her aside, undid his pants, and stripped them down his legs, giving hard little kicks until they fell off his feet. He sat up and reached for her, and she almost passed out.

Damn, he was so hot. He was like a sculpture with hair. Everything was hard and muscular and big. Everything. Yowsa, that fabric was stretched tight across his pelvis.

"Take off your boxers too," she said in a breathy voice straight out of the sorority house.

That freaked her out a little. She was tempted-to glance around the room and see who in the hell had said that. She didn’t demand men take off their underwear. She didn’t use a wispy, sex-kitten voice. And she didn’t lay on beds in her shorts topless with no sign of her hair extensions, and six weeks out from her last pedicure and bikini wax.

But she had never been with a man like Danny—brawny and earthy and unselfish.

Danny liked the bossy little slut voice. He gave her an arrogant grin. "If you insist."

His boxers went bye-bye and then he was lying next to her, moving in for the kill. He couldn’t do it fast enough to suit her. She was aroused in a painful, achy, desperate kind of way that was as baffling as it was exciting. She was squirming in her shorts, and he hadn’t even touched her yet.

When he did, it was only to strip her of her shorts, yanking them down until they were inside out. She gasped when the air hit her bare skin. He had taken the panties too.

"Thought I’d kill two birds with one stone."

"Good plan." And she would not be embarrassed. There was nothing wrong with her body. She wouldn’t lock her legs together. Danny desired her, wanted her, would never use her.

"Amanda…" He sucked in his breath.

She forced her eyes open, heart pounding and shoulders tight with tension, even as she knew she trusted him not to hurt her. "Yes?"

He dropped his finger onto her breast, traced the outline of her curve while goose bumps rose on her flesh. His eyes roamed over her. "God, you’re beautiful. I don’t have any better words for it than that… but it’s true. I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want you right now."

Something inside her swelled and burned, with hope, with tenderness, with desire.

She had laid herself out to Danny both literally and figuratively, and he took that and made it seem natural. He made her feel real.

"I want you too. And I don’t want to wait anymore." With hot, trembling fingers, she reached out and stroked him, squeezing a little up and down the length of him.

He shuddered. "Were we waiting? I didn’t think we were."

Reaching behind to the nightstand, he grabbed the box of condoms and shook one loose. Amanda reluctantly let go of his erection so he could sheath it. When he had it in place, he drew her leg over his hip, opening her up while they both stayed on their sides.

She liked facing him like this, both relaxed, their mouths close, shoulders even. It was comfortable and intimate, feelings she wasn’t sure she’d ever really shared with another man.

Amanda swallowed hard as he settled her leg higher, forcing her to come apart for him. The position had her spread wide, vulnerable, and he pressed against her wet heat with a finger. Gliding up and down over her clitoris and dipping inside her, his finger was teasing and torturous. Danny stared at her, the left side of his head resting on the pillow.