Suddenly, he let out a strangled gasp and drew away, tugging his boots and breeches off in haste before turning back to lie beside her – nude and seeking.
A faint sense of alarm ran through her. Lucaswasa giant of a man and the brief sight of his jutting virility made her finally realise what he always worried about. Shewassmaller than he. Lucas must have felt her body tense, as he lifted her chin and tenderly kissed her lips.
“I’ll be gentle, Rosalind. But we fit in every other way, so…”
His smile was warm, but there was a slight furrow to his brow, and she realised that his words of reassurance were not just for her. But with his tender consideration, her own worry and trepidation floated away.
“I want you, Lucas. All of you. I don’t want gen–”
With a groan, he smothered her words, kissing her deeply and fiercely. Hands pushed her thighs wider and he rolled atop, resting his weight on strong forearms.
She liked it: the graze of his chest against her breasts, the hair-roughened legs twined with hers, the press of his hardness.
Lucas began moving his hips with an agonisingly slow rhythm – retreating, pressing, nudging. But this time, it was different. She could feel the heat, the slow push, and the slight fullness. She could tell he was still trying to be tender as perspiration broke upon his brow, his teeth gritted in restraint.
But she no longer wanted tender and slow.
Arching her body, she pulled her legs up to gain leverage and kissed the tanned throat that hovered above her. His Adam’s apple bobbed at the movement.
“Rosalind, slowl–”
The rest ended in a strangled gasp as she grazed her teeth against his neck and earlobe, whispering, “Now, Lucas.”
He obeyed her command with a growl, dragging her leg high up his hip and thrusting hard.
It stung, as she supposed it would. She looked to Lucas, but his eyes were shut tight and his whole body, although stilled, quivered like a taut bow.
She wiggled, wringing forth a low male grunt. The pain had diminished to be replaced by an aching fullness – strange but fairly pleasant. She wiggled again and he slipped in deeper, making her breath catch.
That was better than pleasant.
Her thigh was still clutched in his hand and so she pulled the other up, encircling his hips and experimentally swaying against him. He opened his eyes. The grey pupils stared fiercely down, slivers of silver gleaming in the candlelight.
“Are you teasing me, Miss Trewent?” he whispered.
She tried to answer but it was impossible. Long, slow thrusts took words from her mouth and thoughts from her head. As if that wasn’t bad enough, his fingers returned to her breast, bluntly rubbing, and in all that time he never took his eyes from her.
That need, that burning hunger built within her again. But this time it was deeper. He seemed to not only fill her femininity but to possess her whole body.
It was all Lucas – sound, scent and vision – his silver eyes, the smell of mint, and the rough groan that was drawn from him every time he plunged down.
His thrusts were controlled and Rosalind knew he was holding back, afraid to frighten or hurt her. She had no such qualms and so with only instinct and yearning to guide her, she hooked her legs tighter around Lucas’s hips and tugged his head down. She kissed him with wild ferocity and felt his pelvis buck hard. Better. She scraped her fingernails over his buttocks and heard a strangled grunt. Good. She whispered words into his ear…and all control was lost. Intoxicating.
One hand went to her backside, either to hold her or to pull her tight – she didn’t care which. The other clenched around the delicate headboard as he hauled himself away from her touch and began a fierce pounding pace.
His hips slammed down, his insistent girth demanding full acceptance. He brushed something deep within that made her teeth numb and her toes curl, but her cry was smothered by devouring lips. No longer was he the tender, noble soldier but a demanding and potent lover. She revelled in it.
Pushing again, he ground against her, and she cried out as ecstasy engulfed her once more. This time it was brutal and intense – a sweeping pleasure that took as much as it gave.
“Yes, Rosalind. God, yes.” His words were hardly recognisable – gruff and pained – and she opened her eyes to see Lucas now strained up on his forearms, head flung back as he attained his release with a guttural roar, body shuddering and his hips jerking in erratic, fierce surges, until he finally fell upon her.
His languid frame pressed hotly, laboured breaths struggled to escape, and occasionally a lazy jolt of hips made her gasp in continued pleasure – this closeness almost feeling more intimate than the act itself.
She knew not how long they lay like this, his head nestled beside hers on the pillow, his lips at her ear, but slowly she began to realise that he was, in fact, very, very heavy.
“Lucas,” she whispered and nudged his ribs. A drowsy moan reverberated in her ear.
“Sleep, my love.”
