Fantasy in Death - J. D. Robb [83]
Passion would come, she knew. It was a low fire always kindled between them. But for now he gave her what she reached for, could always reach for with him. He gave her comfort.
Did she know, could she know what it meant to him when she turned to him, when she opened herself to him like this? In absolute trust.
Her strength, her valor remained a constant wonder to him, as did her unrelenting determination to defend those who could no longer defend themselves. These moments, when she allowed her vulnerabilities, her doubts, her fears to tremble to the surface compelled him to take care. In these moments he could show her it wasn’t just the warrior he loved, he treasured, but the woman, the whole of her. The dark and the light.
Softly, softly, as if tending wounds, he stroked her skin, unknotted muscles tight from the day and the dream. And when she sighed, he laid his lips on her heart.
It beat for him.
In the blue wash of moonlight, she moved for him, rising up, another sigh, giving over. Giving.
Her fingers slid through his hair, glided down his back and up again. An easy rhythm even when her breath quickened and her sigh deepened to moan.
Lost in it, this quiet pleasure, she drew him closer, closer still. Body to body, mouth to mouth, thrilled with the weight of him, the shape of him. She drew in his scent like breath, and opened to take him in.
Smooth and slow and sweet, they moved together. As sensations shimmered through her like light, she cupped his face in the dark.
Not all magic was fantasy, she thought. There was magic here and she felt it glow in her body, in her mind and her heart.
“I love you. Roarke. I love you.”
Magic, she thought, watching his heart rise into his eyes.
“A grah.” My love. And with the word he lifted her home.
In the morning, Eve drank the first half of the first cup of coffee with the concentration of a woman focused on simple survival. Then she sighed with nearly the same easy pleasure as she had the night before under Roarke’s skilled hands.
No question, she admitted, and set the coffee aside long enough to jump in the shower: She’d gotten spoiled.
She didn’t know how she’d managed to get her ass in gear every day before Roarke—and real, honest-to-God coffee, black and strong and rich. Or how she’d lived with the stingy piss-trickle of the shower in her own apartment before she’d discovered the sheer wonder of hot multi-jets, on full, pummeling her awake.
Good things, little things, really, that she’d lived without all of her life—like the warm, clean-scented swirl of air in the drying tube. She’d gotten used to those good things, those little things, she realized, so that she rarely thought of them.
She stepped out of the tube and noted the robe hanging on the door. Short, soft, and boldly red—and probably new. She couldn’t be absolutely sure as her man had a habit of buying her pretty things—good things, little things—without mentioning it.
She put it on, picked up her coffee, and stepped back into the bedroom.
A typical morning scene in their household, she supposed. Roarke sipped his own coffee on the cushy sofa in the sitting area, stroking Galahad into a coma while he scanned the morning stock reports. Already dressed, she observed, and he’d probably dealt with at least one ’link conference or holo-meeting before she’d cracked her eyes open.
He’d nag her to eat breakfast, unless she came up with the idea on her own—and very likely let her know if whatever jacket she pulled out didn’t go with whatever pants she pulled on.
Good things, she thought yet again. Little things.
Their things.
While she’d come to rely on the routine, sometimes, she decided, you needed to shake it up.
“What’re you hungry for?” she asked him.
“Sorry?” He glanced over, obviously shifting his attention from screen to her.
“What do you want for breakfast?”