He was moving his hips under her, a slow surge up and down, rubbing his penis along the oh-so-sensitive lips of her sex. Her tissues were so sensitive she could feel everything about him—the large, bulbous tip, the smooth, thick column, the dark wiry hairs at the base. She felt it all as he moved himself slowly along her. A ball of heat rose from between her legs, banishing the chill she’d felt, banishing even the thought of cold.

His eyes were so dark, so deep. She couldn’t look away from them. She was trapped by those dark eyes, those strong hands holding her hips, the powerful body moving sensuously beneath her. She was trapped, with no desire to escape.

“The first time I saw your work, I was in a car. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I got out and doubled back to the gallery, thinking to buy a few paintings, not having any idea who the artist was and not caring. And then—and then you walked in. You brought in sunlight and beauty, duschka. I could barely keep my eyes off you, but I knew I had to, for your sake.”

His voice was tuning in and out, she was finding it hard to follow him through the blossoming heat and wetness between her legs.

She looked down, mesmerized by the sight of his penis emerging from between her thighs. The enormous head, a dark plum color, already weeping at the tip, appeared, followed by the massive shaft. The semen showed how excited he was, though there was no sense of him losing control. His movements were regular, calculated for maximum stimulation. Oh God, he’d positioned himself so that each stroke rubbed against her clitoris in a long, slow, lingering slide that made her skin prickle and her vagina clench. They weren’t even technically making love and she was a hair’s breadth from a climax.

Those dark eyes were burning. “Bend down to me,” he growled. “Give me your breast.”

It didn’t occur to her to do anything but obey. She didn’t even have to exert any effort, those huge hands on her sides just brought her to him, held her still for him.

His mouth on her burned. He nibbled at her breast for a moment, then opened his mouth to suckle at her nipple in long, liquid pulls. She felt the pulls down to her loins, clenching in time to his mouth.

She drew in a shuddering breath, completely concentrating on what was happening between her legs, held up by his hands because her muscles had turned to water.

He suckled hard and her inner muscles clamped down on his penis. She was so wet and slick his back and forth movements made little sucking noises in the quiet of the room. He swelled even larger under her. Grace braced herself on his iron biceps, head down, hair forming a little curtain of privacy around them as she shook.

His movements speeded up, not so controlled now, his hands pulling her down on him. The sensations magnified, ballooning with heat and friction, Drake moving so fast the huge bed beat hard against the wall.

Grace began that long freefall into orgasm, like jumping out of an airplane, stomach swooping with the absence of gravity. Usually, it lasted only a second before she climaxed, but there was something about this that prolonged it, kept her hovering on the edge for long minutes, as she hung above him, shaking, barely breathing…

Her entire body went ballistic, shaking, shuddering as an electric line of pleasure ran from the top of her head to her toes, centering on her loins, where she clenched strongly around Drake’s penis.

It set him off, too. With a low moan, he bucked strongly under her, swelled, and started spurting all over his stomach, a hard shudder accompanying each spurt. His teeth were clenched, hands hard at her hips, groaning as his hips moved wildly under her, completely out of control.

He was sweating all over, the short dark hair turning black with sweat. His head fell back against the pillows, strong neck arched, eyes slitted with pleasure, jaw muscles bunching. He looked in pain, but if he felt anything like what Grace had felt, it wasn’t pain. It was pleasure on an almost unimaginable scale.

Grace collapsed onto Drake’s chest, panting, wiped out, still shaking with the force of the orgasm. They lay there a moment, breathing heavily, eyes closed, creatures of their bodies.

After a moment, Drake’s arms went around her, one big hand cradling the back of her head, the other wrapped around her waist, the way he always held her. She was surrounded by hard man, utterly safe.

Feeling safe was a mistake. Intellectually, she knew that. There was nothing safe about the situation at all. Hard men were gunning for Drake and, by extension, for her. Drake himself was an extremely dangerous man, not at all the kind of man you thought of as “safe.”

And yet she’d never felt safer in her life than right now, because she knew beyond a shadow of doubt that he would fight to the death for her.

There had never been anyone to defend her, ever. Her father had skipped out with all the family’s money when she was nine years old, and even before that, he hadn’t been much of a father. Her mother had been wrapped up in her father and, after his abandonment, in her own misery, with no time or thought to her daughter. There had been no aunts or uncles or cousins to form a loving layer of protection around her.

Grace had never had a protective boyfriend. Her lovers had been few and far between and the affairs never lasted more than a couple of weeks, often less. She’d been a passing fancy in their lives. By some twisted turn of fate or maybe by some twist in her psyche, the men she’d been with had been obsessed with their careers or their bank accounts, or often, both. Grace Larsen never figured very highly in their lives. She was there and then she wasn’t, and they didn’t much notice the difference.

The closest she’d felt to being special to someone had been with Harold. It had been a lovely feeling, but knowing that this charming, elderly man had her best interests at heart in the art world wasn’t the same as having someone as strong as Drake solidly on her side in all things.

Like now.

Grace let herself lay on Drake, draped over him, knowing in some deep recess of her mind that, somehow, she was precious to him. That he felt something strong for her and that it was real.

The sharp smell of sex was in the air, a compound of her arousal and the semen that had jetted all over his stomach and that now glued her to him. Her head had fallen to his hard shoulder, nose against his neck. She barely had the energy to open her eyes. Through slitted eyes, she could see about four square inches of his skin, even this small patch of him beautiful and intriguing.

Golden-brown skin, corded muscles so pronounced they cast shadows, even here sleek and strong. With her nose so close to her skin she could smell the essence of him above the keen smell of sex—a dark, fragrant spicy scent, redolent of musk, unlike anything she had ever smelled before in her life.

In a dark, crowded room full of men, she would be able to pick him out blindfolded, by scent alone.

And certainly by touch. No other man she’d ever seen had his deeply muscled physique. One brush of her fingers and she’d know him. No other man on earth could feel like that.

He reached over and punched a button. With a gentle whir, the curtains started sliding open.

It took her a minute to find the strength to turn her head toward the window. By the time she did, the curtains had opened all the way, letting the morning and New York come into the bedroom.

It was still snowing. Not a storm like last night, just gentle flakes hovering in the air more than falling out of the sky. Clouds hung so low over the city they hid the tops of many of the skyscrapers. This high up, it looked like the sky was close enough to touch.

“It’s still snowing,” she said dreamily, turning her head back into his neck, one hand over his heart.