Page 446 of Wicked Highland Heroes

Chapter Two

For a long moment, they stood toe to toe, Josephine’s heart pounding wildly. Then Nick’s arm lashed around her and he yanked her to him. His mouth crashed down on hers. Her head whirled and she shoved at his chest, as much to stop him as to halt the torrent of emotion that rammed through her. But Nicholas remained as unmovable as a stone wall, her hands trapped between them, his chest rising and falling with each powerful thump of his heart. This was all wrong, wasn’t what she had planned, and would ruin her. Worse, would ruin him. But his mouth moved on hers, hungry, demanding, as was his way with everything. He would have what he wanted. And he wanted her. God help her, she was drawn to him like a moth to a flame.

He groaned, deep and ferocious, and her knees weakened.

“Jo,” he murmured against her lips.

She couldn’t stop herself from entwining her tongue with his. He sparred, then sucked her into his mouth. Her stomach did a flip. Her father would never allow Nicholas to cry off if she gave him her virginity. She had to stop this, stop him. His hand slid down her back and over the curve of her buttocks and he undulated his arousal against her abdomen.

Her head spun. What was that spell he cast over her? Her defenses—her resolve—had gone weak to the core. His fingers tightened on her derrière and he thrust against her again. In the next moment, he was backing her up. Her legs bumped into the couch and he lowered her onto the cushion. His body came down on hers, his weight pressing her down, one heavy thigh between her legs. This wasn’t the young man’s rise to passion as it had been when she’s been seventeen, and was well beyond the heart-stopping kiss they’d shared on the balcony a month ago. This raw male need demanded what had long been denied. What belonged to him.

His tongue thrust unhurriedly into her mouth while he slid a hand over the curve of her breast. Josephine shivered, all too aware of the hard ridge of his erection against her mons. He slid his mouth along her jaw, then her neck, and still lower. His lips grazed the rise of one breast and she gripped his shoulders. He teased, gently nipping at the flesh. When he levered himself up onto an elbow and grasped the first hook on her corset, panic shot through her.

“Nick,” she cried. “We can’t.”

But he silenced her with a kiss, and in seconds had undone the hooks on her corset. Her breasts sprang free, taut against her chemise. He came down fully on top of her, and kissed her again, hard and without mercy.

Through the muddle in her brain, she became aware of his warm palm covering a breast. The thin fabric of her chemise offered little protection against the heat of his flesh. He grazed a thumb over her nipple and a delicious sensation connected directly with the juncture between her legs. His fingers, long, warm, and strong kneaded the flesh, and she couldn’t bear the sensation. He thrust his rod against her mons and she suddenly understood the true danger was in the demand he was creating inside her, in that secret place that she had for so many years dreamed he might one day touch.

He broke the kiss and before she realized his intent, he sucked a nipple into his mouth and drew on the pink bud through the fabric. Pleasure shuddered through her. This was nothing at all like what Lord Beaumond had done to her. He’d pulled down her bodice and stared at the rise of her breasts above the corset as he unfastened his trousers. It had begun just as she’d hoped, quick and without emotion. Another moment and he would have taken her maidenhead without ceremony—and without any of the pleasure that was bombarding her senses now.

Nicholas shifted, then grasped her thigh. Cool air wafted across her legs and she realized he was pulling up her petticoats and skirt. She started when his fingers grazed the inside of her thigh. He stroked higher. A shiver rippled through her. A finger slid between the slit of her drawers and rubbed her lightly. Josephine gasped. Nick released her breast and kissed her again, this time gently. She shoved her hands beneath his coat and around his back. Muscle rippled beneath her fingertips. He groaned and eased his shaft along her thigh while still stroking the place between her legs.

Jo writhed beneath him, half desperate to break free of the overwhelming sensations and needing release so badly it hurt. But he caged her with the weight of his body, rubbing her a little quicker while flicking his tongue against her mouth. His breath came in short pants and Josephine vaguely realized that desire was heating his blood. Panic rose to the top. This mustn’t happen. She couldn’t bear to hurt him this way.

She turned her head aside, breaking the kiss. “Nicholas we mustn’t.”

“You would have with Beaumond,” he said in a savage voice. “You can with me. Did he make you feel this way?”

The demand startled her.

Nicholas eased a finger inside her and began an in and out motion that brought an onslaught of new sensations.

“I should have done this long ago,” he said, without faltering in his rhythm.

“No,” she choked, and was caught off guard by a wave of pleasure that crashed into her center.

Jo began to tremble. He stroked her sensitive nub with his thumb. Pleasure surged through. She rocked against his hand, unable to stop the blinding need that made her want him inside her, stretching her, taking what she longed to give him. She felt his warm breath in her cheek and tightened her arms around his back.

“I love you, Jo,” he whispered.

Then she fell over the edge.

“Nicholas,” she cried on a shudder.

Bliss, soul deep, ripped through her, and burst apart in her core. Her body tensed as pleasure reached clear to her toes and seemed to curl them. She arched into him and felt the rigid length of him against her thigh. Another climax rippled through her and she gulped air as if drowning. She was.

Ever so slowly, Nicholas stroked her as the waves swelled, then receded, and swelled again. He kissed her again, even more gently, until her surroundings at last came back into focus. She relaxed back onto the cushion to see that he was staring down at her.

“You didn’t…” Josephine let her voice trail off.

“I do not plan to bed you on a couch in someone else’s house,” he said.

“But you just—” She bit her lip.

“I came damn close,” he said. “I have no doubt had I taken your virginity that would put an end to your foolish actions this last month.”

Reality reasserted itself with jarring pain. “Then why didn’t you?” She tried to rise, but he kept her pinned with his heavy leg. “Get off me.”