Have Mercy: A Loveswept Contemporary Erotic Romance by Shelley Ann Clark Page B

so … right. The part that kept us playing until the hall director had to come into the lobby and threaten to write us up if we didn’t knock it off. I’d lost it for a long time. I feel like we’ve gotten that back lately. At least I have.”
    “I have, too,” Tom said.
    Emme turned to face him, full on. “You’ve done that for me. Lately, I’ve sung because that’s all I’m good at. But you’ve made me remember how much I enjoy it, too.”
    Tom felt his face turn warm. God, he was blushing like a teenager on a first date. “I’m honored,” he said, voice emerging dry and croaky. “You deserve to have joy. All the time.” He had to break their eye contact as he spoke, or he’d never get the words out, so he watched his hands, lying uselessly on his knees, instead.
    Then, from somewhere to his right, he heard a husky, feminine voice mutter something that sounded suspiciously like, “Oh, fuck it,” right before he caught an armful of Emme.
    It was like being in a car accident, just like when the van had veered off the road and into the ditch. His brain caught up with the sensations around him on a time delay. First he registered the warm weight of her atop him, then the
thunk
as the back of his head hit the ground. The scent of her fancy shampoo swamped his senses before he understood that she was kissing him.
    Oh
.
    Her mouth was soft and warm against his, her tongue slipping out to trace his bottom lip. It felt like a dare. Tom groaned and parted his lips, letting her delve into his mouth to explore.
    Emme lay stretched out on top of him, every part of her body connecting with his: breasts pressed to his chest through the thin fabric of her T-shirt, bellies expanding together when they breathed, her pelvis against his. Everywhere she touched him, he flared to life.
    Tom wasn’t sure how they got there, but somehow his hands were on her back, rubbing up and down the valley above her ass and the rise of her body up toward her neck. His fingertips caught on the soft, thin material of her shirt. She felt just as soft as he’d thought, but solid, her weight on him the beautiful pressure that kept his electrified body planted firmly on the earth.
    He thought he might drown in her kiss, the sinewy slide of her tongue against his, the taste of her in his mouth, her breath in his lungs. She tasted like Emme; there was no other way to describe her, whatever combination of soap and toothpaste and perfume and tea with honey and pheromones that made her uniquely
her
. Tom opened his mouth a little further, let his tongue touch hers just the slightestbit before backing away, but she followed him, sucking gently at his bottom lip.
    He reached up and found the elastic band that held her hair back in its ponytail. Gently, he tugged it free so that her hair fell around their faces, a fine blonde curtain of Emme surrounding him with her smell, her presence sheltering him from the outside world. He ran his hand along the back of her head, cupping her skull, callused fingers catching on the strands. She responded by smiling against his mouth, and Tom thought he might float clean away.
    “You smell so good,” he whispered against her lips. And he couldn’t even feel bad about it, because she responded with an even bigger smile.
    Her mouth left his, then, making a tour of his jaw, her tongue scraping across his stubble, her teeth nipping at his chin. Tom stroked his fingers through her hair down to the juncture where her neck met her shoulder and traced figure eights along the hollow of her collarbone, feeling her skin ripple into goose bumps at his touch.
    When her hand came up to cup his face, thumb tracing over his cheekbone, Tom sighed and turned his head toward her palm. He nuzzled into her hand, planting tiny sparking kisses along her fingertips, between her fingers, in the center of her palm.
    “You’re pretty,” she breathed in his ear, her voice wicked and teasing. “Such gorgeous eyes. Such long