Chapter Fourteen #3
Then, he moved slowly in and out of her passage for the sheer pleasure of feeling that glide.
As if they’d known each other for a lifetime, they settled upon a rhythm that was much like dancing.
Evan gripped her hips, canting them at an angle he preferred and one that would give her the most pleasure.
She threw her head back, and with each new thrust, sounds of encouragement left her throat.
“This is…” She moaned then it blended into a gasp. “I’m afraid I am becoming all too accustomed to doing this with you.”
He didn’t answer.
This coupling was more than a quick joining that had no purpose other than to culminate in physical pleasure.
No, now he made love to her, the woman he’d kept in the back of his mind for years as the measure of perfection, the woman he would gladly pledge his life to if said life was different, the woman he feared he was coming to love even though there was no room in his existence for that sort of thing.
Not for the first time did he regret that he was to soon become a duke.
Then the pace of his thrusts changed as frantic need tingled through his stones and shaft.
Deeper still he plunged. Faster he worked his hips.
Harder he stroked in an effort to send her flying while denying himself the same satisfaction, if only for a moment.
Hannah strained beneath him, her back arching, the perfect globes of her breasts bouncing, her skin flushed with arousal, the freckles most endearing in the faint illumination.
As he switched his angle of penetration and the root of his shaft rubbed against her swollen nubbin, the first frantic cry broke the silence.
With gasps and words of approval, she fell into bliss so completely the contractions of her channel yanked him into a release immediately.
White light rushed up to meet him, and for a few moments he existed in a void where there was nothing except the rapid tattoo of his pulse and the labored sound of his breathing, while the warmth of her exhalations skated across his cheek.
As he murmured words that had no meaning or even structure, Evan collapsed on top of her, and she wrapped her arms around him. He kissed the side of her neck, her cheeks that were salty from tears, her closed eyelids, and finally her sweat-damp forehead.
“Thank you,” he whispered against her lips.
She uttered a tiny snort. “For what? Please don’t cheapen this and say sex.”
“No.” He brushed his lips against hers while holding her gaze. The fiery locks of her hair spilled over the pillows like lava. “For believing that I am more than I am.”
“Well, you are that, and forever will be. You will make a fine duke who will challenge society’s norms.”
“Ha.” He rolled onto his side and took her with him. Absolutely, he didn’t want to think of that right now. “How many men have you had in this chamber?”
“You are the first.”
“What?” Shock slammed into him.
“This is my private space. I have already refused to have clients here. That is what the two smaller rooms were for.” She nuzzled the crook of his neck, and his shaft tightened all over again. “You are different.”
As if that explained everything. Perhaps it did, and he was too thick to puzzle it out. “Thank you.” Something bloomed within his chest for her, but he refused to analyze it.
“Foxcroft is throwing a rout on All Hallow’s Eve. It is short notice, but would you come with me?” How much did he want to dance with her, show her off to society as his?
Well, his mistress. Everything else was forbidden.
Her eyes rounded. “Are you certain?”
“Yes.” As he slipped a hand over her hip, he grinned. “Do you have a ballgown?”
“Of course. I’m a mistress, not quite a country bumpkin,” she said with a wicked twinkle in her eyes.
“Wear something that will make every man there jealous that you didn’t choose them.” Damn, he was proud of her, and he rather suspected he was falling for her, more definitively than he had ten years ago. And in that realization, his thinking, his very goals, were starting to change.
What is happening to me?
“Instead, I shall wear something that makes you regret not coming home sooner.” When her chin trembled, his world crumbled. “I appreciate this distraction; I so needed this intimacy after revealing my terrible secret.”
“I’m glad you did, but I wish to take the letters with me, to read them over and over.”
“They belong to you and take the book… as long as you promise to give it back.”
God, this loss would forever scar him. “I will have one of the sketches. You can keep the rest, but I want to always look upon our babe’s face.” He pressed his lips against her temple. “Perhaps you will find a good man to wed and have another child in time.”
“Oh…” Though she didn’t physically pull away, he sensed she did mentally. “I am quite too old for all that and have been on my own too long to let a man have authority over me.”
“Not even if he has manacles on chains to tempt you?” he couldn’t help but ask in a barely there tone.
An inhalation of breath betrayed her shock. “That might skew my reasoning.”
He didn’t answer, only grinned. Damn, what a coil he’d landed in, and it required talking with some of his clubmates to sort out.