Chapter Twenty-Five #2
Her quiet dignity tore through his mediocre defenses like a hot knife through butter.
“All day I’ve thought about you, about being with you this morning, and very little else.
I had thought—hoped—once we…” He swallowed and fisted his hand in the silk bedcovers to keep from reaching for her.
“I don’t want to want you like I do, but I can’t seem to stop myself.
I don’t want to beg for your favors, but I find myself precariously close to doing just that.
I want your hands on me, your body under mine, my body inside yours. I—”
“Shh, Gideon.” Sometime during his inelegant confession, she’d kneed her way across the invisible divide separating them. Now she placed her fingers over his mouth.
“You do not have to beg, Gideon. I very much want you to make love to me.” She smiled a slow, siren’s smile and he nearly whimpered against her silken touch. “In truth, I am looking forward to comparing venues.”
He blinked, as her final words penetrated, then laughed aloud, as exhilaration and amusement and arousal mingled inside him. The sound of her own tinkling laughter danced over his flesh like feathers spilling from a pillow on a summer breeze. This woman.
His amusement faded as abruptly as it came, overtaken by hunger. He reached for her, wrapping one arm around her slim waist to pull her across his lap.
With no hesitation, she twined her arms around his neck. She felt good. So good. Soft and warm and his.
He scooped one hand, fingers shaking, by God, around her nape, lowered his head, and kissed her.
Need exploded within him—to part his robe, lift the fine linen of her night shift and robe out of the way, and take her, now. But he held himself in check. He would make it good for her, by God, blotting out any memory of what had come before him and ruining her for any other man to follow.
He eased down onto his back, never letting her go, and not for one moment breaking the kiss.
Her lips were like sweet berries, soft and plump and ripe for the plunder, and he feasted on their exotic nectar like a starving man at his last meal.
“Touch me, Gwen, Please,” he growled against her mouth, almost whimpering when her cool fingers glided over his chest. She smoothed her hands down his belly, over his hip, between his legs. God’s blood. His hips bucked up and his body convulsed in a near miss.
On second thought. He reached down, capturing one of her wrists, then the other. He levered her hands over her head and flipped their positions.
She gazed up at him, her eyes wide and luminous in the dark chamber making him wish he’d taken the time to turn up the lone lamp. She was so beautiful, with an effortless sensuality that seemed to eke from her very pores.
He lowered his head and found one peaking nipple through her nightshift with his mouth. No. He needed to feel her, bare.
With a grunt of frustration he released her wrists. When she started to lower them, he said, “No. Stay just like that.”
She complied without a peep of protest.
He shrugged out of his robe, tossing it aside, enjoying the way she angled her head to get a better look at him. Then he went to work, ridding her of her clothing, shimmying the fabric up her legs, over her hips.
He hovered over the exposed pale thatch of curls, his mouth watering with desperate hunger.
Lowering his head, he nuzzled her apex and could not contain a wicked laugh when she gasped and shivered.
Promising himself he’d be back to explore her secrets, he continued his task, peeling the nightshift and robe higher to uncover her flat belly and the trim waist he’d suffered with the knowledge of from that first night, when she’d stood before the fire in his bedchamber, torturing him with the outline of her body.
He delved his tongue into the small cavity marking her belly button and gave in to the compulsion, the need, to slide his palm over her stomach, her hip, her curls.
She wriggled against his hand, hot and damp and so inviting.
Enough. He hoisted himself to his knees and, in one swift move, ripped her clothing up and off her body, tossing the garments aside, uncaring where they might land.
Finally, he feasted his eyes on her. Long and lean, svelte and supple, and all glorious female.
She gazed up at him, eyelids at half-mast, her lower lip caught between straight white teeth. Her body shifted with restless, sexual energy that made the blood sing in his veins.
“Can I…” She reached for him.
“No,” he answered, very sure. Gripping her wrists with one hand, he pressed her arms up to rest against the pillows.
He bent, slowly, bringing his mouth to one breast, his free hand to the other. He pulled one puckering nipple between his lips, rolling his tongue over the bud.
She hummed in pleasure and arched her head back. The evidence of her arousal twisted his insides. His cock, already pulsing and erect, went painfully hard.
He wanted her. Wanted to bury himself inside her. But, he wanted her equally desperate.
He suckled, drawing his hand to her apex. At the discovery of slick moisture there, a whimper tore from his lungs. He parted her, found her opening, and pushed one finger into her.
So hot, so tight.
“Gideon, please,” she begged, rocking her hips.
“Patience, sweetheart,” he whispered hoarsely, easing himself higher to bring his mouth even with hers, to press his body over hers. “Part your legs for me, love,” he murmured against her lips.
On a choked gasp, she did. With his fingers and the tip of his cock, he played over her aroused flesh, heightening her desire, bringing her to the edge of climax, then easing back, again, and again, until she sobbed his name and tore her wrists free of his grasp.
She wrapped her arms around him, scoring his back with her nails, pulling him closer. Her entire body shivered with the force of her need. An answering shudder rolled through his.
He could wait no longer. “Come for me, beautiful. Come. Now.” Watching her face, he tipped her over the edge into ecstasy, then made it last, drawing out her pleasure ’til she lay limp.
Then he brought his hips to hers, guided his shaft to her core and plunged into her channel.
“Ho, God, yes,” he breathed, pumping himself in and out of her as her walls gripped him like a glove, as her channel squeezed him with the echoing ripples of her climax.
Again and again, he sank himself to the hilt, nearly delirious with the feel of her.
When she wrapped her legs around him, arching up as she attempted to hold him to her, he lost the ability to breathe.
When her body began to shudder beneath his and he realized her second release was upon her, his control shattered.
He convulsed above her, loosing a roar of pure male satisfaction and poured his hot seed into her.
He had no idea how much time passed with him lying atop her, still buried inside her, dazed from the state of sheer bliss making love with her had wrought within him.
Only when her gentle efforts to stir reminded him he was likely crushing her did he edge off of her and roll onto his back, Gwen in his arms. He was not ready to let her go. Not yet.
He huffed out a laugh as he noticed how much of her hair had found its way out of her braid.
Unable to resist, he withdrew the leather strip binding it and combed his fingers through the satiny smooth locks.
The fragrance of her shampoo, something floral and fresh, mingled with the scents of their lovemaking.
“Well, sweetheart?”
“Mmm?” She gazed up at him with a delightfully woozy expression on her face.
“Which did you prefer? The carriage, or the bed?”
A slow smile spread over her face and she dropped her forehead onto his chest. “I’m not sure. Perhaps we should try once more.”
To his astonishment, his shaft thickened. He laughed and twisted a fistful of her hair around his wrist before letting it sift through his fingers. “You wish to try out both arenas, or just this one?”
She lifted her head, laid one hand, palm down, on his chest to rest her chin atop it. He wondered if she noticed the heavy thump of his heart, the way, even now, it raced, just looking at her. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t natural—for him, at any rate.
Her dimple winked into view as she grinned up at him. “Both times were lovely, but it seems the more practice I get, the more practice I want.” She waggled her fair brows at him suggestively, then sobered, lowering her eyes.
She finger doodled on his bare chest. “I never knew the act of making love could be so beautiful. That it could make you feel so…” She shivered with mock zeal. “I thought it must always be rather uncomfortable.”
Gideon snorted. “If you’re trying to tell me your husband was more well-endowed than I, madam, kindly keep the information to yourself.”
“Ah…no. You are quite a bit larger, in point of fact.”
He saw no reason to staunch his satisfied grin. “In that case, do go on.”
She was quiet for so long, he thought she may have fallen asleep. Then her softly spoken words broke the silence. “This morning, you asked me why I married my husband, and I didn’t answer you.”
“Gwen, there’s no need—”
“I want to. It seems I want to tell you all my secrets.” She laid her cheek against his chest.
Everything in him clenched with…not lust—though, if his half-engorged cock was anything to go by, it would not take him long to be ready for a second round of lovemaking.
It was tenderness, he supposed, as unwelcome as it was poignant.
It bloody hurt. And yet, there was no place on this earth he’d rather be than right here, right now, with Gwen.
His wife.