Chapter 11 #2
The sound was his undoing. With a groan, he grabbed her waist and hauled her onto his lap.
She gasped as she landed on his abdomen.
Her arms quickly wrapped around his shoulders.
It was instinct, but Adrian would take it.
But her next move must have been all her.
She buried her face against his neck, as he brushed the loose strands of golden hair away from her face.
She could not be hiding again. Not now.
“That is a very bold move for a duchess, especially one so obsessed with propriety. You just called your husband by his first name in your bedchambers, Daphne,” he murmured teasingly against her ear.
“I shall have to teach you more things if you keep on being so bold. Of course, I will make sure they are not at all appropriate.”
Daphne lifted her face from his neck, muttering something about decorum. It also seemed like she cared about what the servants would say. Her face was so red, he had to chuckle.
What did she really think a man and his wife did in their bedchambers? He wanted to teach her more things. He caressed her hair and followed a trail down her shoulder with his hands, letting his touch linger on her arms and down. Then, he lowered his head so that their foreheads touched.
“If you do not want me, tell me to stop, Daphne. Say the word, and I will walk out that door and we will never speak of this again.”
To his shuddering relief, she said nothing.
Instead, her body responded for her, trembling against his touch. His mouth found hers with ease.
They had kissed before, but he wanted more from her. This time, it was absolute surrender. Both seemed hungry for each other. When he probed her mouth with his, she opened it. He slipped his tongue in to taste her. She moaned, shifting over him, making him hard. Oh, so hard.
They further deepened the kiss. The meek, obedient duchess pulled at his hair to draw him closer. No, he was not going to leave her this time. When he stood, he lifted her effortlessly with him, their mouths still tangled together in a kiss that made him see stars.
He’d bedded many women through the years, but none had been like Daphne, and he had not even felt himself inside her.
Adrian laid her down on the large bed, her hair loose like a fan over her head.
Tonight, she would know what it was like to be worshipped.
He moved over her, with reverence which shocked even himself.
He slipped the gown upward until its fabric bunched around her waist. He sucked in a breath when he saw the exposed skin of her creamy thighs. His rough hands traced a path up her inner leg until he reached her damp, aching heat.
Daphne gasped when he let a finger trace her wet seam. She arched against his touch, pure instinct and desire driving her.
Her eyes widened when she saw him lower his head between her legs.
“A-Adrian?”
There were no more words from her when his tongue flicked at her bud, circling around the bundle of nerves over and over. Then, he withdrew only to lick her seam again.
“So sweet. So beautiful. My Daphne,” he praised, even as he slipped a finger into her wet heat.
She moaned, her whole body tense as he doubled his efforts by licking her nub again. Slowly. Deliberately. Then, he increased the pace while a second finger slipped in to stretch her. He was so hard, ready to burst, but tonight was all about her.
Every flick of his tongue and every thrust of his fingers made her gasp and cry, to his absolute satisfaction. The sounds she made would haunt his dreams. They were like music.
Hungry for her, the licks became suckles. He sucked hard at her most sensitive spot as if eating fruit. Sweet fruit. Slowly, again at first. Then, in a frenzy. This time, he let the tension build and build as he pumped his fingers into her over and over as he licked her nectar greedily.
“Mine. Look at you, burning wild. Who would have thought?”
He did not rush her, even as her hips met the movement of his fingers. He wondered what it was like if it was his manhood inside that heat. It must feel so divine. With that in his thoughts, he crooked his fingers inside her and pumped some more.
And there she was.
Daphne finally found her peak, as she clenched around his fingers, lost to physical ecstasy.
“So tight around me,” he praised.
She cried out as her entire body shook upon reaching a magnificent climax. He had not seen anything like it before.
Adrian slipped his fingers out and licked them. Even as her body still trembled beneath him, Daphne’s small, involuntary moan made something coil deep in his chest.
Pride, possession, and something darker he barely allowed himself to name.
He had given her the intensity of his desire; shown her a glimpse of the hidden part of himself.
And yet, in that same instant, clarity struck him. By letting himself lose control, by allowing even this single night of passion, he had risked leading her on and drawing her into a world she might not be prepared to enter.
She was too pure, too unspoiled for the darkness he carried within him. He could feel the edges of his own brokenness, the parts of himself that were untrustworthy, violent, and merciless.
She deserved better.
The wound above Adrian’s eye throbbed, a reminder that he was not entirely good soul. Unlike his wife, he did not have a clear conscience and so he could not truly be all she needed him to be.
He gnashed his teeth as he pulled himself to his feet. An awful sense of despair tore through him as he recognized that he had acted on impulse. Daphne had shown him tender love and care, and he had repaid her kindness by… by…
Adrian was disgusted with his own behavior.
He had acted like a wild animal, merely taking what he wanted and telling himself he was doing as much because he meant to pleasure his wife.
But that was not what he wanted at all—not really.
He wanted more from Daphne but giving into those desires would be irresponsible.
He could not allow her to be ensnared by him. Not by his need, not by his hunger, not by the dangerous pull he felt whenever she was near.
Protecting her meant restraint, even now, even after everything they had shared.
Adrian shifted slightly, creating space between them, careful to maintain his composure.
He did not speak. To speak would risk revealing his turmoil, his fractured self, and that was not something she should ever see.
She needed distance, even as every instinct in him urged him to stay.
His eyes lingered on her, not with desire this time, but with something heavier: the weight of a promise, of a protection he would uphold.
Even if it meant tormenting himself.