He kissed her, and this time she let him. Slow and gentle at first but growing steadily, no end in sight—only the pleasure of lips and tongue and teeth careening out of control.
“So fast,” she breathed when he released her mouth and set his own just beneath her jaw, sucking at sensitive skin. “It’s happening so fast.”
“Fast?” He tugged her earlobe between his teeth. “This has been happeningforever. It’s the slowest bloody courtship anyone has ever participatedin.”
He covered her nipple with his mouth, kissed it, teased it until it was hard and puckered.
“Perfect,” he muttered, cupping her breasts, squeezed them together, and licked the line of skin where they met.
The heat of his mouth was almost too much, but it didn’t last.
He slipped from the bed and studied her as if he were at a museum, considering a work of art, one hand cradling his elbow the other stroking along his jaw.
So very odd to be studied so openly and with such lust. “Return to me.”
“I want to see every inch of you first. In some ways, I know you as well as I know myself. In others, you are entirely new. I want to investigate all the new bits, discover your secrets. Like…” He grasped her hips and pulled her across the mattress until her backside was even with the edge. When she gave a little yelp, his grin turned wicked. “Like this little mole right here.” He pressed his thumb into the small brown circle right atop her hip bone.
The pressure made her lightheaded, but she remained firmly in the present, the better to discover his secrets.
Like the ridge of muscle down his torso and popping in his thighs. The dusting of hair across his abdomen, and the thick growth of it between his legs. The appendage rising there, long and thick. The candlelight flirted with his narrow waist, and the shadows draped around his broad shoulders. With him she could have both light and dark. With him she could have everything. Because he gave it.
“Oh!” She sat upright and reached for him, finally touching the warm silken skin above his ribs, the pale white scar glittering there. “Is this where you were injured in the archery accident?” She brushed her fingers against the sliver.
“Where I was injured duringyourarchery accident? Yes.” He sank hisfingers into her hair.
She kissed the scar over his ribs. “I didn’t mean to.”
“I needed stitches.”
She lifted her chin to find him staring at her with eyes hot and hopeful. “I apologize.”
“I like knowing you scored my body. But you can make up for it if you like.”
“How?” She kissed the scar again.
He inhaled sharply, a hiss of breath. “Do exactly what you’re doing now. No. Hell. I’m not done with you yet.”
“Done? We’re just—ack!”
He’d wrapped his hands around her waist and picked her up, flipped her and put her back on the bed on her hands and knees. Her arms gave out under the unexpected weight, and she found herself face-first in the mattress, her backside stuck straight up in the air.
“God, yes,” he groaned. “That’s perfect, too.” Then his hands were on her, massaging her backside, thumbs dipping between the sides, a teasing touch before he ran his fingertips up her spine and brushed her hair away from her neck.
The heat of his skin as he bent over her, nestling his shaft just so against her backside as he settled his chest against her back to kiss her neck. She bit her bottom lip, rolled her shoulder, moaned, and he kissed back down her spine, his hands caressing the flare of her ribs on each side, the dip of her waist, the curve of her rear once more before he flipped her back over.
He brushed her hair out of her eyes. “You’re a bold woman, aren’t you, Tess. I’m surprised.” He shrugged a single shoulder, muscle rippling beneath candle-loved skin. “And not.”
She propped herself up on her elbows behind her. “I’ve watched Lady Chattaway sleep her way across the Continent for the last six years. That’s plenty of time to imagine it for myself, even if I never acted on those fancies.”
His gaze traveled down her body, following the path of his hot hand, both of which seemed to waver constantly back to her breasts. “Did you want to?”
“Yes.”
A growl, low and feral. “I had no claim to you. I have?—”
She kissed him, not wanting to admit the truth. Not right now. “There is another reason I feel bold.”
He nudged the side of her nose, put one knee on the bed. “Oh?”
