Page 64 of The Duke and the Darkness

Peyton wrapped her arms around his shoulders and held on tightly, shaking uncontrollably as each plunge and retreat of his body into hers brought her both new pleasure and new anguish.She knew what he wanted from her was total capitulation, and not only physically but emotionally. He wanted her to free herself from the past, but she couldn’t. What he was asking of her—what he was begging of her with his body—she simplycouldn’tgive him that.

“Devlin,” she whispered and buried her face against his neck, his name a plea for mercy.

“Let yourself live again,” he murmured hotly into her hair.

“I can’t!” She clung tighter to him and summoned all her strength to keep from falling over the edge. “I don’t…know how.”

“Then trust me to show you.”

But she refused this last surrender, with all her body, heart, and soul. What would she be if she let go of the only things that had sustained her since she lost her parents? What would she cling to then to simply keep living?

Not leaving her tight warmth, he wrapped his arms around her and carefully lowered her away from the wall. The red rug beneath her back softened the floor as he laid her down, then spread his tall body over hers.

The soft kerseymere of his breeches brushed against her inner thighs as he moved inside her. His hips teased at hers with deliberate circles of motion that spiraled raw need through her and left her teetering breathlessly on the edge. Once again, he was in control and carefully measuring each delicious plunge and retreat—for now. He was equally as gentle as he’d been fierce before, and he paused in his rhythm only to kiss her so tenderly that she feared a tear might slip down her cheek.

“Let the past go, Peyton,” he murmured as he rocked into her. His rhythm increased, his thrusts growing harder.

The rising tide of pleasure inside her began to lick at the backs of her knees, and she knew he could feel her trembling around him, just as she could feel the shaking of his tensemuscles in hard-fought restraint to keep from losing himself inside her.

“Let go.” He nuzzled her ear with affection. “Send the past away and accept what’s here for you now.”

He shifted his hips and rubbed his pelvis against her already sensitized clit, eliciting a plaintive whimper from her.

“Take this moment, Peyton,” he rasped. “With me.”

He rubbed his hips against her again, and a jolt of electricity shot through her. She bucked beneath him, arching herself hard off the floor as the wave of release broke through her. She cried out, and he kissed her, drinking in the sound, even as he continued to swirl his hips against her to prolong her pleasure as long as possible, to keep the flashes of light dancing before her closed eyes.

Then his movements changed. She could do nothing more than cling to him as her pulse raced and try to catch back her breath at this wonderful melding of bodies and souls as his thrusts came fast and fierce. Just as his body tensed, every muscle hard and shaking, he suddenly pulled out of her warmth and squeezed his length between their bodies. With a groan, his buttocks clenched, and he released himself against her bare flesh just above her feminine curls, then collapsed against the floor beside her, gasping for breath. Completely spent.

Devlin gathered her into his arms and pressed her against him. When his lips lovingly caressed her temple, a single tear slipped from her eye. The terrible mix of pleasure and torture she found in his arms was nearly unbearable. Sheer joy tingled out from her fingers and toes, but it was tempered by overwhelming guilt—that she hadn’t yet found her parents’ killer, that she should have realized earlier the truth about the attack…that she should take such joy in being alive at that moment with Devlin when her parents were in their graves.

“Peyton?” Concern thickened his voice as he gently brushed away her tear with his thumb. He caressed her cheek. “Is something wrong?”

Everything.Yet she couldn’t bring herself to utter that aloud. Instead, she gave a jerky shake of her head and buried her face against his neck where it curved so perfectly into his shoulder.

Silently, they lay together, their limbs entwined, with the heat of him still pulsating deliciously inside her and her scent now covering him. Yet in her heart, she knew they remained in separate worlds—and ten years apart.

Chapter Sixteen

Devlin held hisbreath and carefully gauged his mother’s reaction as she and his two sisters sat on the settee across the tea table from him and Peyton at Dartmoor House. Both her mouth and Meg’s had fallen open, their eyes growing wide as saucers.

Then his mother rasped out, “Pardon?”

“I’m Peyton Chandler,” Peyton repeated, pulling in a deep and steadying breath. “I’m not dead.”

The two women continued to stare at her, saying nothing in their shock. Devlin readied himself to dart forward to grab their cups of tea to keep them from spilling onto the rug.

Beside them, Theodora blinked in confusion. “Well, of course not! We can see that—”

“Hush,” Margaret chastised. Both she and the duchess stared as if they were seeing a ghost.

But then, he supposed, that was exactly what they were seeing.

“But I don’t understand,” Teddy complained. “If you’re here…then who’s in your grave?”

“Hush!” Without taking her eyes off Peyton, the duchess slapped her hand gently against Theodora’s leg.

“It’s all right,” Peyton assured them quietly. “I’m certain you all have many questions for me, and you have the right to ask them.” She sat forward on the edge of the settee next toDevlin and leaned toward Theodora. “No one is in that grave. The casket is empty. You see, ten years ago, I was traveling home from Dartmoor House with my parents when our carriage was attacked, and they were killed.” Devlin was beyond grateful that she omitted the more gruesome details. Teddy didn’t need to know any of that. “I let everyone believe that I had been killed, too, because I feared the attackers would come after me again if they knew I’d survived. I left England and only recently returned.”