Shadow Walker by Connie Mason Page B

from her breasts. “I meant it when I said you are beautiful.”
    Dawn’s eyes never left his face. “Thank you for lying. You make me feel beautiful.”
    “I want to make you feel so much more,” Cole whispered earnestly as he swept her from her feet and followed her down onto the bed. He searched her face in the dim light, then touched her cheek with his fingertip. “Your face is nearly healed and you’re as lovely as I knew you’d be.”
    “I’m not really lovely.”
    “To me you are. Is your back still sore? I’ll try not to hurt you. If I do anything you don’t like, you’ve only to tell me and I’ll stop. I want you to feel only pleasure this night.”
    “My back is nearly healed,” Dawn said, more than a little bemused by his words. She found it difficult to believe that a man could actually care about the pleasure and needs of the woman he bedded. It was a concept that boggled her mind after her experience with Billy.
    “I’m going to kiss you, Dawn,” Cole said, smiling into her eyes. “Open your lips for me.”
    He took her into his arms and lowered his face to hers. Dawn parted her lips, dimly aware that his chin and cheeks were shadowed with rust-colored stubble. His beard looked soft, not bristly like Billy’s unshaven jaw, and she ran her finger tentatively down one side of his face. She shivered with awareness. Touching him was pure magic.
    Cole’s mouth covered hers. Little tongues of fire licked at her flesh as his kiss deepened. She felt his hands on her body, cupping her breasts, his fingers plucking her nipples, making them hard. She groaned in disappointment when his hands left her breasts, then gasped as they moved lower, dancing teasingly across her skin, pausing to explore her navel, sending fingers of raw flame across the sensitive flesh of her stomach.
    For the first time in her life Dawn wanted to please a man, but she didn’t know how. She wanted to make him feel the same wonderful things she was feeling. Almost shyly she used her own small hands to caress Cole’s flesh, ringing his flat male nipples, running her fingers through the soft red hair on his chest. His body differed from hers in so many ways. His stomach was ridged with rippling muscles, and her exploring fingers discovered bulging tendons on his smooth back.
    Dawn knew she must be doing something right, for Cole lifted his mouth from hers and groaned. There was a rough note in his voice as he bent to kiss her breasts. “Oh, God, love, your touch drives me wild.”
    A thousand glittering sparks ignited inside her as his mouth tugged gently at her nipple. She closed her eyes, savoring the moment as Cole coaxed indescribable sensations from her body. She arched against him as his burnished head moved from one peak to the other, lavishing them with the rough wetness of his tongue.
    “Do you like that?” Cole asked as Dawn writhed beneath him.
    Heat enveloped her from head to toe. “Oh, yes, it feels … wonderful.”
    “There’s more, love, much more.”
    As if to prove his words, his hand slid lower down, into the thatch of dark curls at the juncture of her thighs. She stiffened, but relaxed again when he kissed her, letting the heat of his mouth soothe her fears. She had barely recovered from his kiss when she felt his finger slide inside her, traveling on the slickness of her desire. He pierced her so deeply she began to tremble all over. His mouth sucking vigorously at her breasts and his fingers moving inside her drove her mad with wanting.
    Firm, warm lips moved restlessly over her body, his mouth and tongue creating havoc wherever they touched. Her breath came in harsh, panting gasps. She could think of nothing but Cole and the wonderfully arousing things he was doing to her.
    “You’re hot and wet for me, sweetheart,” Cole whispered against her lips as his hands tested her hot center. He found a place she hadn’t known existed, a place where a single touch produced exquisite pleasure. She