Saving Max by Antoinette van Heugten Read Free Book Online

go.” Her voice is flat.
    He leans closer and takes her hand. His touch is electric, synaptic. The air between them is dry powder hungry for the flame. Danielle can hardly breathe. His deep brown eyes are intent upon hers. When he speaks, his voice is hoarse. “Please don’t leave.”
    Danielle hesitates. She should walk away—before she can’t. Those eyes, his caress—they mesmerize and enthrall. Her whisper is a feather in the wind. “I…don’t know what to do.”
    He rises from his bar stool, still holding her hand. “Come with me.”
    There is no question where he wants her to go. Spellbound, she stands before him. He grasps her elbows and pulls her lightly toward him. As if her body already knows his, she leans forward into his embrace. As his arms envelop her, she does not question or falter. She is lost, yet found.
     
    The darkness is voluptuous velvet. Danielle hears the click of the lock and watches the smoky outline of his body make its way to the bed, where she lies under the sheets. As he removeshis clothes, the spicy ambrosia of his naked body reaches her before he does. As Victorian women swooned, Danielle reels from the essence of this man—unfamiliar, but known. There is no thought other than to have him touch her, know her, consume her. The moment that he lies next to her and their bodies cleave for the first time, she is aware only that she has never been so completely vulnerable, so friable. She simultaneously craves and fears.
    Danielle can barely see his eyes, but what she sees is intense and yearning. She moves her hands to his face and holds them there, the roughness of chin against her palms, the softness of cheeks against her fingertips. He whispers something and moves his lips to her neck, throat, breasts. She wants to remember him—every detail of his body, his smell, the feel of his hands on her.
    She runs her fingers down his body, shaken with a desire so strong it seems like molten silver streaming from her. His chest is covered with thick, fragrant hair. It is pure male, a luxurious field—all hers. She slides down farther, wanting to feel his pleasure and to have him feel her desire to please him. He stops her and lays her gently on her back. He lowers his mouth to the soft of her stomach. It continues its journey until he reaches the soft folds, the secret middle of her. She opens herself to him and closes her eyes, relinquishing all but the pulsing of her body and the sweetness of his tongue. It is a slow, maddening, upward spiral of sensation—an unbearable yearning and then a height, a reaching, an explosive burst at the pinnacle. She cries out, writhing and peaking, again and again.
    As if he can wait no longer, she feels the thrust of him inside her as she clings to him, moving in time to the ancient dance, a single pulse. At the moment of release, she rises—hips, mouth, arms, thighs—to meet his arching abandon witha fierce climax of her own. Afterward, they lie in each other’s arms. He holds her tightly to him, his breathing irregular, his heart beating strong against her own. As she meets his mouth, she tastes herself, him, them, on her lips. Something breaks inside her, and tears stream from her eyes. Her sobs are ragged, rough blows that rack her body. They are Max, her loneliness, her pain—her joy.
    “Shh, shh,” he whispers. “It’ll be all right.” His words are a balm, his arms strong and solid around her.
    “No, no, it won’t,” she whispers back, her voice thick, throttled.
    “Then hold on to me.” He squeezes her tighter.
    She clings to him as the dying cling to life.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Danielle awakens slowly. The room is dark, the curtains drawn. She groans as she thinks of the day ahead—the stultifying boredom whenever she isn’t with Max; her unsuccessful attempts to work; and the constant anxiety about what the assessment will ultimately reveal. Then her eyes fly wide open. She remembers—everything. After their incredible lovemaking, they