His forehead rests against mine, his grip a vise around my body as if he’ll lose me to the current. “It worked,” he says, breathless. “You’re cured. I cured you.”

He repeats this, over and over, relishing in his conquest over science. Then: “Wait. This isn’t right.”

A sprig of panic branches through me, and I try to stutter a response.

“This shouldn’t feel right, but nothing has ever felt so right before,” Alex says.

I swallow down the hard ache in my throat, my lips swollen and throbbing from the kiss. “Is it supposed to feel wrong?”

He pulls back to stare at me. “Oscar Wilde said, I can resist anything…except temptation. You are temptation, unadulterated and wrong in all the most alluring ways, and I’m too weak to resist you.”

I’m supposed to feel hurt or insulted. Maybe if I was born of flesh instead of stone I could feel the injury, but all I hear is the crack in his voice, the waning of his will. My opening to slip inside and take charge.

My fingers work the buttons of his shirt open and I shed the soaked material off his shoulders. “Wilde suffered for his conflict.” I lay my hands on his bare chest. He shivers at the intimate touch. “Don’t make me suffer, Alex. Not when we know how to cure our ailment.”

I glide my hand down his taut stomach, my fingers discovering the firm V of his abdomen, and undo the snap of his slacks. That one action decimates the tentative control holding him back.

With a low groan, Alex tears at the wet clothing separating us. He recklessly removes my shirt to bare my breasts to the elements. My nipples find heated friction against his chest as we move through the water, losing the remaining pieces of our clothing.

His mouth is on mine as we pass under the waterfall, the kiss tasting of river and mist. The intoxicating mix of icy water and our heated lips arouses something ravenous inside me, a starvation I sense in my flesh as I tangle myself around him.

As my back hits the rough surface of rock, Alex grasps my thighs and hoists me up against him, driving a needy ache deep inside. I moan against his mouth, the sound muffled by the kiss and the fall of water around us. He feels the need in it, though, because his tongue delves deeper as his fingers dig into my skin.

He’s hard and pushing at my entrance. I undulate against him, sliding my sex over his length and eliciting the sweetest growl. Alex is all strained muscle and heavy breaths as he grinds against me, working past the water to reach my wetness and, when he gets the satisfaction he’s seeking, exhales a fervent curse.