If he didn’t touch her soon, she was going to die. If he touched her, she was going to die. Either way she was going to explode.

She whimpered deep in her throat. “Joe, please.”

He rewarded her by stroking his thumb in a circular motion while sliding his middle finger just inside the mouth of her pussy. She went rigid, her mouth opening in a silent cry. He grew bolder, exerting more pressure on her clit and sliding his fingers deeper inside her, stroking her walls as she clutched greedily at them, clenching and spasming as he increased the speed and intensity of his movements.

His head lifted from her breast, and for a moment, he fondled her and playfully teased her with only his fingers as he watched her every reaction.

“God, you’re so beautiful,” he said, pressing a kiss to her navel as he slowed the rhythm of his fingers.

She was so on edge, so close to the edge, that if he so much as breathed on her in just the right place, she’d see fireworks. And yet at the same time, she didn’t want it to end. She wanted to prolong it until she was crazy with anticipation. Who was she kidding? She was already mindless with an insane need for completion.

She gazed at him with heavy-lidded eyes, loving the absolute focus she saw in his. Focus on her and her pleasure. She lifted her hand and slid it through his short cropped hair, stroking, allowing her fingers to drift down the chiseled line of his jaw. He captured her index finger with his lips, sucking it and laving his tongue over the tip.

“I need you now,” she whispered huskily.

His hand eased from her pussy as his body slid sensuously up hers until his mouth aligned perfectly with hers. He kissed her deeply, thoroughly, outlining the bow of her lips before pulling away to stare intently at her.

“Let me get a condom, sweetheart.”

She watched in a dreamlike state as he leaned over her body to open the drawer of his nightstand. He pulled out a packet and tore open the foil, for now leaving the condom still in the opened wrapper. Then he returned to kissing her with renewed vigor, his body moving to position himself above her, his knee nudging her thighs apart.

He reexplored his earlier route down her body with his mouth, this time teasing her with his hand at the same time, pushing gently inward, stretching her in preparation for his possession.

She grew restless, writhing beneath him, her legs moving wider apart, her ankles hooking over the backs of his calves, silently urging him to take her. Holding his weight off her with one hand, he reached with the other for the condom and deftly rolled it over his straining erection. Then he grasped the base and rubbed the tip up and down her cleft, circling her clitoris before easing downward to circle her opening repeatedly.

She was nearly to the point of mindless begging when he finally, finally positioned the broad tip at the mouth of her entrance and pushed barely inside, stilling as he stared down at her, watching intently for any sign of discomfort.

Her response was to tighten her ankles around his legs, urging him downward as her hands flew to his shoulders, her nails digging into his flesh, marking and branding him in the same way he’d marked her repeatedly the entire time with his mouth.

He inched forward, and she sighed as she stretched and re-formed around him to accommodate his size. Every centimeter of flesh he touched was highly sensitized and it was like receiving an electric shock each time he moved the slightest bit.

She clutched at him, desperate for release and yet wanting it to last forever. His name was a litany on her lips and it seemed to make him more dominant, more forceful and possessive. He levered his body lower until it was flush with hers and put his elbows down on either side of her head so she didn’t bear his full weight and then he fused his mouth to hers as he began surging deeper, harder, faster.

Her eyes fluttered shut but he nipped at her chin, and when she opened her eyes, he was staring at her with an intensity that set her ablaze.

“Keep your eyes open, baby. I want to see you when you come.”

The words were demanding—not a request but a command—and only heightened her desire and added a sharper edge to the building inferno deep within her. She did as he asked and locked her gaze with his, fascinated by the fierce pleasure burning so brightly in his eyes, surely a mirror to her own.

“Want you with me,” he said with a ragged breath. “Come with me, baby. Let’s go together.”

To ensure the outcome he desired, he slid one hand between them just as he increased the speed and force of his thrusts. His fingers performed a tight circle around and over her clitoris and she gasped for breath as the storm blew out of control.

“Joe, I can’t—I can’t . . .”

“Breathe, honey. Ride the wave with me. See how beautiful we are together.” He smoothed her hair from her forehead and then pressed his lips in a line across her brow as his face creased in an expression of sweet agony. “Now,” he whispered. “Now, Zoe. Let go. Step off and let yourself fall.”

The tender words so filled with genuine emotion and need as urgent as her own catapulted her into free fall. She spiraled downward like a leaf in autumn, spinning crazily until she was dizzy and so filled with pleasure that she feared bursting with it. The edge grew sharper and sharper still until she could no longer bear the strain. Every muscle in her body tensed and coiled to the point of delicious pain.

And then the world exploded around her and she lost all sense of time and space. She tried valiantly to obey Joe’s command to keep her eyes open, but they were so weighted down that it was a struggle to keep them even half lidded. He didn’t chasten or rebuke her. He seemed to understand—and share—her experience. He kissed each eyelid sweetly and reverently as he tensed inside her, his body shaking uncontrollably.