Dare Me: Red Hot Weekend Read online

  He moaned again, dragging his hands up her arms, over her shoulders to tangle in her hair. “I love your hair, Doc,” he whispered against her lips, shifting his legs until he’d placed one thigh between hers.

  She sucked in a swift breath, a shard of wicked pleasure spearing into her sex as the top of his thigh ground against her clit.

  Rob moved his leg again, stroking her pussy with the hard length of his thigh. She groaned, small darts of pleasure sinking into her core. Her clit throbbed and she rolled her hips, rubbing her sex harder against his leg. He deepened the kiss, his tongue mimicking the stroking torture of his knee. Oh God, she wanted this. So badly. Another groan escaped her and she shuddered, the rising tension between her thighs making her head swim.

  “Damn,” Rob murmured against her lips, his hands roaming her body—up and down her arms, over her ribcage, up to her breasts. “You have no idea how many times I’ve imagined doing this to you. I couldn’t get you out of my head, no matter how hard I tried.”

  She closed her eyes, his confession sending spirals of wicked heat into the core of her being. Robert hadn’t stopped thinking about her? Damn it, she hadn’t stopped thinking about him. Not since the very moment he walked into the medical centre. “Please…” she whispered, pushing her pussy against his leg. “Please…”

  “I want to hear you whimper, Emily,” Rob said, returning his lips to her throat. “I want to hear you lose control for me.” He nibbled on her ear, flicking his tongue into its shallow shell as he stroked her sex harder with his leg. His quadriceps muscle was lean and steely, a corded length of warm pressure. Emily moaned again, the nub of her clit—shielded by her now sodden knickers—aching so much she wanted to cry. She raked her hands up his arms, over his shoulders, clinging to him as a wave of rising tension rolled through her sex. She was going to come. If he didn’t stop soon, she was going to come. Out here. Against a tree. Under the stars.

  And what’s wrong with that?

  She couldn’t think of an argument. “I want you,” she whispered, rolling her head to the side as Rob’s searing lips explored her throat. “I want this more than you know.”

  “Fucking hell, woman,” Rob groaned, thrusting his hips forward. His thigh scraped harder against her clit and she gasped, a shard of concentrated tension stabbing into her centre. “Say it again. Please, say it again. I need to hear it.”

  The raw urgency in Rob’s voice sent fresh blood flooding into Emily’s already swollen sex. She squirmed, feeling her orgasm approaching. Fast.

  “Say it again,” Rob ground out, dragging one hand up her torso until his fingers found her breast. He cupped its weight, worshipping its form through the soft fabric of her dress.

  She gasped again, arching her back. “I want you,” she panted, the sensations his fingers on her breast created almost stealing her ability to speak. “I want you. I have from the very—”

  He didn’t let her finish. His lips claimed hers, his hand squeezing and massaging her breast as his tongue plundered her mouth. He pinched her nipple with hungry force, his tongue matching the ferocity of the caress. Her body burned with pleasure at his feverish actions, the undeniable desire each stoke of his tongue, each flick of his fingers wrought on her body pushing her closer and closer to eruption.

  He rubbed his thigh harder against her pussy, an exquisite torment she willingly surrendered to. She’d never felt so…so…

  Uninhibited.

  The thrilling word whispered through her head just as Rob’s fingers hooked the deep V of her neckline and tugged it aside.

  Cool, night air kissed her exposed breast a mere heartbeat before Rob captured her puckered nipple through the lace of her bra. Ribbons of constricting heat unfurled through her core and she ground her sex to his leg with desperate need. God, she was so close to coming. So close.

  She opened her eyes, staring with pleasure-clouded wonder at the foreign stars above her. She was really here. In Australia. In Robert Thorton’s arms. Drowning in the pleasure he’d awakened in her all those days and months ago.

  For eight months she’d gone home from work with only Rob on her mind—admiring his tenacious determination to beat the insidious tumour devouring his right cerebral hemisphere, attracted to the laconic humour of his larger-than-life personality, aching for the utterly male sensuality she saw smouldering beneath it all. Eight months of holding herself at bay. Torn between the desire she felt and the ethical demands of her position. Doing everything she could to convince herself it was just her concern for a patient. Disgusted and terrified when she realised it wasn’t.

  His health had to come first. It had to. And then, that last fatal night before he’d up and left, he’d closed his fingers around her ponytail and kissed her as she was about to perform one last ocular motility check and she’d lost all control. Giving herself over to the hungering desire she’d repressed for so long.

  Until her fingertips had brushed the knotted scar tissue slashed across the back of his head and what she was doing had slammed into her. She’d signed off from being his doctor on paper for all of about five minutes. It was too soon. Too unethical. She was taking advantage of a situation already too strung with heightened emotion. The shameful realisation had hit her hard, rocking her to the very core, and she’d left him.

  And then, he’d left six hours later and she’d never felt so torn apart. Bereft of purpose. Empty. So she came for him.

  “Whimper for me, Doc,” Rob rasped, dragging his thumb over the tip of her nipple. “Show me how out of control I make you.”

  Tight pleasure speared through her. Her sex contracted and her breath quickened. She didn’t feel empty now. Now she felt heavy with aching need. Mounting want. A soft cry sounded in the back of her throat—a strangled sigh of rising pleasure.

  Rob’s hand squeezed her breast, his lips journeyed her jaw line. “Yes, that’s it. That’s it.”

  She arched into his thigh, grinding herself on its solid length, another low cry escaping her as constricting tension pulsed through her core.

  “Fuck, I want to hear you come.” Rob caught her earlobe between his teeth, gave it a little nip before flicking his tongue in her ear. “I want to hear you lose control and know I’m the one that stripped it from you.” His thumb stroked her nipple again, his lips scoring a languid path over her jaw and throat once more. “Show me why you’re really here, Doc,” he whispered, rubbing his thigh against her pussy with increasing rhythm, “and I will show you it was worth the fucking trip.”

  The pit of her belly coiled. She gasped, her hips pumping back and forth as she rode his leg. She gripped his shoulders, her breath shallow, rapid. “Rob…” His name fell from her lips, barely audible above the pounding of her heart. “Oh God…Rob.”

  “Come for me, baby,” he murmured against her ear, cupping her breast as he pressed his thigh harder to her pussy. “Come for me.”

  He dipped his tongue into her ear at the very second he pinched her nipple between his knuckles and thrust his own hips forward, dragging his thigh in one long stroke against her folds.

  Liquid electricity detonated in her core. She cried out, the raw sound tearing from her throat as she clung to Rob’s shoulders. Her sex contracted, powerful pulses that made her buck and grind herself against his leg. Her nipples turned to rock-hard points, the soles of her feet tingled, her blood roared in her ears. “Oh, yes, oh, yes…”

  The words left her in rapid pants, her orgasm wringing each one from her as her pussy gushed with cream.

  He’d made her come. Standing outside, fully dressed, with the sounds of his best friend’s wedding reception the accompanying music to their pleasure. He’d made her come. Oh God, he’d made her come.

  It was exquisite.

  “Christ, that sounds so fucking hot, Doc.” His breath fanned her neck, and she felt the muscles in his body coil as he shifted his weight, pressing the length of his body against hers. “I wanna hear it again. I want to hear you come as I eat you out. I want to hea
r you come again and again as I fuck your pussy with my mouth. Right here, right now.”

  His proclamation sent new lust stabbing straight into Emily’s sex. She sucked in a sharp breath as he took a step backward, his eyes locked on hers, their blue depths burning.

  Eat you out.

  Fuck your pussy with my mouth.

  Right here, right now.

  She watched him take another minute step away, knowing what he was going to do, wanting it more than life its—

  He stumbled slightly to the left.

  Cold fear sheered through her and she grabbed for him, her fingers snaring around his arms. “Robert—” God, what had she been thinking? Letting him exert himself so much. She stepped toward him, running her hands up his arms, her heart slamming into her throat. “Your health…” she began, searching his face for signs of vertigo or extreme fatigue, “I shouldn’t have let you… This was a—”

  She slid her fingers to his neck, seeking his pulse, when Rob’s own fingers suddenly closed around her wrist and he pulled her hand away. Her stare snapped to his face and she frowned, the cold anger etched in his stony expression shocking her.

  “Let me get this straight,” he spoke lowly, his nostrils flaring. “After what we just did, after what I just did to you, you think I’m not well enough to do more? Sure, my head’s a little fuzzy, but you don’t think I can deal with it? I can. And you need to as well. One little stumble and you think I’m going to keel over and die?”

  Emily stared at him, her answer stuck in her throat. She’d never seen him so angry. So furious. Disgust boiled in his eyes. And yet his words…my head’s a little fuzzy… How fuzzy? Since when? And for how long? She needed to check his pulse, his eyes, his blood pressure. “Your head is fuzzy? Robert, you need to let me—”

  “I’m fucking cured, Dr. Knox.” His voice cut over hers, each word almost a growl. “I’m not going to die. You fucking said so yourself.”

  “Rob,” she began again, her heart thumping in her throat, her ears. She reached for him with her free hand, seeking his fingers with hers.

  “I don’t need to be coddled, Doc,” he snarled, stepping out of her reach as he all but threw her other hand away. “Not by you or anyone. And I’m not your patient anymore. The treatment finished when I walked out the door of the Centro de Medicinas Alternativas. So if that’s the real reason you came here, to be my doctor again, then I suggest you get back on a plane and go find your next victim to cure.”

  He glared at her, a long steady stare devoid of anything but hurt and rage. She parted her lips, wanting to ease both. Uncertain how to do so. What did she say? What did she do?

  With a snort and a slow shake of his head, Rob turned away from her, and before she could utter a word, he stormed through the shadows of the garden and was gone. Leaving her standing beneath the towering tree. Still lost for words, the fading pulse of her orgasm mocking her.

  Oh God, how had this gone so wrong?

  Rob held the squat crystal glass in his right hand, staring hard at the icy beads of water on its surface. Each drop clung to the glass, secure in the notion it was where it would be forever, safe, secure. Defying everything to just be there before the laws of physics shat on that foolish fucking notion and gravity sucked at that bead of water until it was nothing but a dry trickle down the cold, hard wall of existence.

  Jesus, Thorton, you need to get a grip.

  Pushing himself slightly away from the opulent bar, he lifted the glass to his lips and threw back his head, swallowing the ice-cold liquid and the Tylenol waiting on his tongue with a single mouthful.

  “Here’s to getting a grip,” he muttered, returning the glass to the bar. The dull ache behind his eyes had returned, but be damned if he was going to think about that. Thinking about it was as bad as admitting it was there. If he did that he may as well curl up in ball and wait for the Grim Reaper. Or Dr. Knox. Hell, she had him half in the grave already by the looks of it. A bloke gives her an orgasm and she wants to take his pulse? So much for moving beyond the doctor/patient relationship.

  Aren’t you overreacting a bit? You did get giddy out there with Emily. Your head did spin and your eyesight went blurry for a sec. You’re not as well as you pretend to be, whether you want to admit it or not and of everyone around you, Emily’s the one who’s going to notice that.

  Rob ground his teeth. No. He wasn’t overreacting. He was cured.

  But are you the same man you used to be?

  He ignored the unwanted question and waved at the stunning blonde in the very sexy uniform watching him from the other side of the bar. “Another please?”

  “You sure about that, mate?”

  Rob shot his best friend a quick sideward glance, noting the somewhat apprehensive expression on Joseph’s face as the man slid onto the bar stool beside him. “It’s only water,” he said, giving the bar keeper and her sexy uniform a sidewards grin as she placed another sweating glass before him. “Ta muchly, love.”

  The prickling sensation on the side of his head told him Joseph was fixing him with a steady stare. “Don’t you have anything better to do, Hudson?” he asked, raising his ice water to his lips. “Like oh, I dunno, go dance with your wife?”

  “My wife is dancing with Hugh Jackman at the moment, so no, not really.”

  Rob grunted. “Celebrity weddings. Is Brad Pitt going to walk through the door any time soon?”

  “Nah, but he’s joining us on our honeymoon so…”

  The unfinished sentence made Rob turn and look at his best friend. “Being married hasn’t improved your sense of humour. It still sucks.”

  Joseph raised his eyebrows, giving Rob an expectant look.

  The pit of Rob’s gut twisted and he turned back to his glass. He wasn’t in the mood for this.

  “So,” Joseph went on, obviously deciding to ignore Rob’s subtle hint. “You gonna tell me what’s pissed you off so much you’re sulking over here at the bar?”

  “I’m not sulking.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “You right, are you, mate?” Rob placed his glass on the bar and twisted on his stool, giving Joseph an exasperated glare. “Bloody hell, a man only just survives brain cancer and his best friend’s giving him a hard time about not being the life of the party? Fair dinkum.”

  Much to Rob’s disgust, Joseph—the man he’d known since they were both six—burst out laughing. “Since when do you use cancer as an excuse for being pathetic, Robert Thorton?” Joseph shook his head, leaning forward enough to close his fingers around Rob’s glass of water before straightening back on his stool. “I think all this sulking has something to do with a certain English doctor standing near the wedding cake.”

  Rob reached out and plucked his glass from his Joseph’s loose grip. “Yeah, meant to say thanks for that, Joe. Real glad you invited her to your wedding. Onya.”

  Joseph chuckled, a low sound Rob recognised all too well. The man was enjoying himself.

  “Hey, she rang me. Something about a certain someone jumping a flight to Sydney before he was meant to. All I did was give her the directions to where she could find you.”

  Rob lifted his glass to his mouth. Damn it, why was his mouth so hard?

  Dry. Don’t you mean dry? Your mouth is dry. Your dick is—

  “All you did was bloody well invite her to your wedding. And now she’s here…” He petered off, unsure what the rest of the sentence was going to be.

  For fuck’s sake, Thorton. What the hell did the woman do to you? Steal your ability to think?

  “And now she’s here,” Joseph went on with an amused twist on his lips, glancing over Rob’s shoulder in the direction of a surreal creation of icing sugar and chocolate cake designed to look like the main mountain ridge of Wolf Creek, Colorado. “Currently being chatted up by my cousin Trevor.”

  Something cold and hard slammed into Rob’s gut and he spun on his stool, fixing his stare on the tall, lanky man who looked like a skinnier, blonder Joseph standing beside
the mountain side cake, leering at Emily over the butter-frosting snow.

  “What the fuck?” he muttered. “I thought Trevor was engaged?”

  For an answer, Joseph cocked an eyebrow. “Not anymore. The last I heard, Trev was on the hunt.”

  “Well, he can bloody well fuck off and hunt somewhere else. Emily’s—” Rob snapped his mouth shut, unprepared for where the statement was heading. Damn it, what was he doing? What the hell was he doing? The good Doctor was more concerned with him as a patient than she was as a man. She’d made that perfectly clear under the tree, and that meant whatever he thought was going to happen between them wasn’t. And that meant he had no bloody right getting jealous over Trevor I-can-touch-my-nose-with-my-tongue Turnball.

  Joseph however, wasn’t quite so prepared to leave it alone. Typical bloody Hudson. “Emily’s what, Rob?” he said, that expectant expression on his face again. “Too English? Too tall? Too smart? Too…yours?”

  Rob ignored him. Or tried to. It was a bit hard when the bloke wouldn’t shut the hell up. “You remember when you orchestrated that wonderful little trip to the Rockies last year?” Joseph continued. “Y’know the one? Where you had a helicopter drop us off on the side of a snow covered mountain without any idea of where we were going to stay and we almost died of exposure while we were wandering around that mountain side looking for a cabin?” He didn’t wait for an answer. He was after all, Time Australia’s Businessman of the Year. When Joseph Hudson was on a roll, he didn’t wait for the Prime Minister of the country. “Remember what happened that night?”

  A tight not stirred in the pit of Rob’s belly. Three things happened that night—Ranger Anna McCarthy came and rescued them, they had the most mind-blowing threesome he’d ever had in his life, and he’d told his best friend he was dying of brain cancer. He turned his head, giving Joseph a quick look before letting his gaze settle on Emily Knox, standing beside the wedding cake disguised as Knife Ridge. Her thick red hair fell about her shoulders in a glossy curtain, her pale skin almost luminescent in the warm light, her expression somewhere between confused anger and frustrated acceptance as she listened to whatever crap Trev Tongue-Man Turnball was carrying on with.