Unmasking Kelsey by Kay Hooper Page A

know,” he said in a quieter voice. “I know that. But you have to give us time and plenty of room to work.”
    She laughed, the sound almost a sob. “You? The Lone Ranger? Where’s Tonto?”
    “Back there keeping an eye on the place,” he growled.
    “And waiting! I’m tired of waiting, tired of expecting somebody to do something!
I’m
somebody! Dammit, let go of my arm.”
    Kelsey cursed, then jerked her body against him, both his arms enclosing her powerfully.“Shut up,” he said thickly. “Stop doing this to me. Oh, lord, Elizabeth.”
    She had opened her mouth to voice an instant protest, but the searing heat of his kiss trapped the sound somewhere in the back of her throat. Her fingers, curled into angry fists against his broad chest, straightened themselves slowly as her arms crept up around his neck.
    A wave of dizziness swept over her and she could feel the flush heating her skin. In a split second, anger had become something else, and she was powerless to fight it.
    The kiss was wild, hot, frantic. She could feel his arms pulling her closer, holding her tighter, and one of her hands locked in his thick hair while the other stroked the side of his face compulsively. A pulse in his temple throbbed violently beneath her fingertips, and she felt the shudder of his big body echoing her own tremors. His tongue stroked hers and his mouth was hard, demanding, taking something from her that she fought desperately not to give up.
    But he was taking it, stealing it with a forcebeyond anything she’d ever known, and she could hear the silent scream of protest from somewhere deep inside her. Then that inner voice was silenced by the power of him, and she melted against him bonelessly with an anguished moan.
    Her breasts were swelling against his chest, aching; her lips throbbed from the hungry, demanding pressure of his. She wanted to be closer to him, naked against him, wanted to feel his hands and lips on her body. She wanted him with an intensity that shook her to her soul.
    She wasn’t even aware of her tears.
    But Kelsey was. He didn’t know, even then, if he could stop. His need for her tortured him, knotting the muscles of his belly, aching in him with a pain he had never known before. But her tears hurt him more, the salt of them burning him, and he drew back at last with a rasping breath.
    “Don’t,” he ordered, harsh, pained. His hands were shaking, but he gently brushed the tears from her cheeks. “Don’t do that. I can’t take it.”
    She was staring at him in the dimness, lipsparted, eyes gleaming darkly. “What?” she whispered, still unaware of the wetness of her tears.
    “Cry. Don’t cry. God, Elizabeth.”
    She drew a shaky breath. “Something broke,” she said huskily, her voice puzzled. “I don’t know what it was.”
    He groaned and drew her back into his arms, just holding her this time. She could feel his heart thundering, his chest moving as though he had run some terrible race. One of her hands rested on his flat stomach, and she could feel the knotted tension there; his entire body was taut, rock-hard.
    The heavy material of his black sweatshirt frustrated her; she wanted to feel his flesh, and her fingers probed compulsively to search out the hard ridges of muscle.
    Kelsey caught her hand tightly in one of his. “Don’t do that,” he said roughly.
    She rubbed her cheek against his shoulder, hardly aware of the gesture. “I want to.”
    “You don’t know what you’re saying.” His voice was as hard as his body. The pain of his desire made him sweat and shake, and holdingher was almost more than he could stand. But there was that tremor of warning inside him again, the sensation that something at the very core of him was swaying unsteadily on its foundations.
    “I do know what I’m doing.” And she did. He had been right; she
did
belong to him. On some deep level, in some part of herself she hadn’t even known existed, he had already taken her. The force of him, the