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firmly on hers.
    It was like the assuagement of some pain: relief, comfort, pleasure.
    She trembled against him, as though she were feeling the very same thing, and fisted her hands in his sweater.
    Roy moaned and pressed closer. Power and powerlessness. He'd never felt the two sensations at the same time. He was definitely in the driver's seat here, the guy calling the shots, but her sweet, tentative response made his brain spin.
    "More," he murmured against her lips. "Just a little bit more." Some remote part of his mind remembered he wasn't supposed to be coming on to her. Meanwhile his hands locked on her back, holding her close while the universe spun on its axis.
    For Roy the abstract world had always been part and parcel with the physical world. Numbers and the games they could play looked like physical blocks and waves and patterns in his mind.
    Now on the pool deck of Paris, he felt the abstract world of thought and emotion meld with the physical world of flesh and sensation. His mouth on hers was a physical manifestation of the desire he'd had all evening to find whatever was inside of her that spoke so to him. When his hand went under the hem of her shirt, it was only to pursue the closure of their souls. There was no low or base motivation; it was simply part of the whole, necessary thing.
    Closer, closer still, his fingers stretched over her breast. His gut clenched at the scratchy promise of the lace on her bra, at the catch of her breath, at the beckoning light of closer, and yet closer —
    She gasped and brought her hands down abruptly. Her elbow dislodged his hand from its happy spot on her breast.
    It felt as if someone pulled a plug, disorienting Roy. "I'm sorry," he said, automatically. Somehow he'd misstepped, even in the midst of all that wonder.
    "No, no. It's just..." She heaved a sigh and laid her forehead against his chest. "I realized as soon as we walked out here, we have quite an audience."
    "Huh?" In reflex Roy looked up, and saw she was exactly right. Two sides of the hotel tower, punched with windows, looked down at their position on the pool deck. Wry laughter rumbled in his chest. "I see your point."
    Damn. He was painfully in want of her. He needed to touch, to explore, to fall in. Hell . The words were on his tongue, a suggestion to go back with him to his rooms at the Mandalay.
    But he couldn't do it. He'd promised he wasn't going to come on to her. If he went back on that and talked her into anything, she'd probably agree, and tomorrow morning they'd both feel like hell.
    He didn't want to make her feel like hell. His hand smoothed over her hair. Goodbye . He had to say it.
    Goodbye. Before he ruined it all.
    "Roy?" She interrupted his intention with a choked voice.
    He stopped.
    Her gaze rose to his. In a soft voice, she claimed, "I think I'm going to die if you don't kiss me."
    His hand froze on her head. "But...our audience."
    Her palms pressed against his chest. "My room is on the fifteenth floor. It looks down on the pool deck, actually."
    Roy was sure his heart stopped beating then. She was asking him up to her room. She was suggesting it, for him to be with her, to do this.
    Well! She was asking... That made all the difference in the world! His fingers tangled in her hair. If she was doing the asking, he wasn't going back on his word. There would be no regrets or repercussions.
    His body began to hum again. Blood tingled in all extremities. And something else, some deeper, less defined part of him, poised for fulfillment.
    "Is that...? Do you want to come up?" Her voice cracked.
    A short laugh escaped him. He set his hands on either side of her face and looked down into her anxious eyes. "Yes," he said, his own voice unexpectedly hoarse. "Yes, I want to come up." He paused, feeling the want, the desire rise up in him like a tidal wave. "Thank you," he whispered. "Thank you."
     

CHAPTER THREE

     
    Thank you, he'd said. So earnestly. Valerie closed her eyes as they went up in the