"I wanted to finish Jack's room first. Then it made more sense to work on the kitchen and the living areas. I don't do anything but sleep here. Up till now."

A quick thrill spurted through her. She was the first woman he'd brought to this room, to this bed. "It's going to be lovely." She walked to him as she spoke, every pulse point hammering. "Will you use the fireplace in here?''

"I use it now. It's a good heat source. I thought about putting in an insert, for efficiency, but…" What the hell was he doing? Talking about heat sources and inserts when he had the most beautiful woman in the world in his bedroom?

"It wouldn't be as charming," she finished, and with her eyes on his began unbuttoning his shirt.

"No. Do you want me to start a fire?"

"Later. Yes, I think that would be lovely, later. But for now, I have a feeling we can generate enough heat on our own."

"Kate." He curled his fingers around her wrists, and wondered that the need pumping through him didn't burn through the tips and singe her flesh. "If

I fumble a little, blame it on this, okay?" He turned his injured hand. He was nervous, too, she realized. Good. That put them back on even ground. "I bet a man as clever with his hands as you can manage a zipper, no matter what the handicap." She turned, lifted her hair.

"Why don't we see?"

"Yeah. Why don't we?"

He drew it down slowly, exposing pale gold skin inch by inch. The curve of her neck and shoulder enticed him, so he lowered his head, brushed his lips just there. When she shivered, arched, he indulged himself, nibbling along her spine, her shoulder blades.

When he turned her to face him, her breath had already quickened.

His mouth cruised over hers, a long, luxurious savoring that liquefied the bones. And while he savored, his hands roamed lightly over her face, into her hair, down her back as if she were some exotic delicacy to be enjoyed slowly. Thoroughly.

She'd expected a repeat of the blast of passion that had exploded between them in her mother's kitchen. And was undone by the tenderness.

"Tell me…" He nibbled his way across her jaw. "If there's something you don't like." Her head fell back, inviting him to explore the exposed line of her throat. "I don't think that's going to be an issue."

His hands, strong, patient, skimmed up her sides to the shoulders of her dress. "I've imagined touching you. Driven myself crazy imagining it."

"You're doing a pretty good job of driving me crazy now." She pushed the flannel shirt aside, reached out to tug the thermal shirt he wore beneath it out of the waistband of his jeans, sliding over the hard muscles of his stomach.

But he eased her back. It had been a long time since he'd been with a woman. He had no intention of rushing it.

He brought her hands to his lips, kissed her fingers, her palms. And felt her pulse leap, then go thick.

"Let me do this," he murmured. He nudged the dress from her shoulders, watched it slide down her body to the floor.

She was so slender, so finely built a man could forget those tensile muscles beneath all that silky gold-dust skin. Her curves were subtle—a sleek female elegance that fascinatedand demanded his touch. Her breath snagged in her throat when he skimmed his fingertips along the curve of her breast, along the lace edging of her bra, then under it as if memorizing shape and texture. The hard pad of callus brushed her nipple and turned her knees to jelly.

Intrigued by her tremble, he shifted his gaze back to her face, watched her as his hands roamed down her torso, along her hips, stroked up her thighs.

"I think about your legs a lot," he told her, and flirted his fingertips along the top of her stocking.

"Ballerina legs, you know?"

"Just don't pay any attention to my feet. Dancers have incredibly unattractive feet."

"Strong," he corrected. "Strong's really sexy to me. Maybe you can show me some of the things you can do later, like you did for Rod that day. I nearly swallowed my tongue." Though she laughed, her hands were far from steady when she drew the shirt over his head, let her own fingers explore that tough wall of muscle. ''Sure. I can do even more interesting things." They both quivered when he lifted her and laid her on the bed.

If it had been a dance, she'd have called it a waltz. Slow, circling steps in a match rhythm. The kiss was long and deep, warming the body from the inside out. She sighed into it, into him, and her arms encircled. This, she thought, dreaming, this was something—someone—she wanted to hold. Love was a quiet miracle that bloomed in her like a rose. And loving, she would give.

Then his mouth was on the curve of her breast, rubbing along that edge of lace. Arousing, inciting, and bringing the first licks of heat toward the warmth. She moaned as his tongue slid over that swell of flesh, teasing the point then tugging on it through the thin barrier of lace. Her hips arched, and her fingers dug into his.

Waltz became tango, slow and hotly sexual. His mind was full of her, the scents, the textures, the sounds. All of it, all of her seemed to whirl inside his brain, making him dizzy and drunk. She was carved clean as a statue, the long, hot length of her beautifully erotic. He wanted to touch, to taste everything. All of her.

Absorbed with her, he did as he pleased while she rose and rolled and shuddered with him. And when he took her up the first time, when that lovely body tensed and her breath came and went on a sob, the thrill of it coursed through him like a drug.

More and still more. A little greedier, a little faster. He tugged away those barriers of lace. Now he wanted only flesh. Hot and wet and soft.

She matched him, step for step, rising to him, opening herself. Her mouth found his as they rolled over the quilt, diving heedlessly into the kiss while her hands pleased them both. As desperation increased, she tugged open the button of his jeans, dragged them impatiently down his hips. "Oh, I love your body. I love what you do to mine. Hurry, hurry. I want—" Her system erupted; her mind blanked. Even as she went limp, his fingers continued to stroke her. "I want to do more."

He used his mouth. Sliding down her, breast, torso, belly. She began to move again. And then to writhe while pleasure and need pounded together inside her. Her eyes were blind, her body quaking when he rose over her.

With his heart hammering, and his mind crowded with her, he filled her with one long stroke. With a low sound of pleasure he held himself there, sustaining the moment, letting the thrill of it batter his system. Her hips lifted, then fell away to draw him with her. Beat for beat they moved together, eyes locked, breath tangled and ragged. Her hands groped for his, gripped. The slide of flesh to flesh, slow and silky, the pulse of heart to heart, solid and real.