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Something flared in his dark eyes. He lowered his mouth and she arched upwards as his lips brushed her neck, her collarbone, the curve of her breast.
Raising his head, he gently eased himself out of her. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Pulling the rumpled sheet up over her legs, she watched him walk into the bathroom, her breath catching in her throat. Earlier, she’d been too caught up with nerves and expectation and desire to take in his beauty, but he really was absolutely gorgeous, she thought, her eyes running down his spine to the muscular swell of his buttocks.
Rolling onto her side, she buried her face in the pillow, inhaling the faint trace of his aftershave. She felt stunned, happy, her body soft and loosened. She was suffused with a tranquillity very different from the sharp, sweet spasm of pleasure that had so recently swamped her, and she lay for a moment, trying to remember how she had felt before.
Did she feel different?
Her mind was still hazy from climaxing and it took a moment for her to bring order to her thoughts.
Yes and no.
Physically, she ached a little, but there had been no actual pain, just a sense of being stretched—and, frankly, her head had been spinning, her body rippling with other more urgent and pleasurable sensations for her to register the actual moment.
And yet she did feel different—though not because of some shift in status to ‘full womanhood’. Maybe she would have had that kind of transformative moment if she’d still been an adolescent, but for her this was not just about having sex for the first time...it was about what it felt like to surrender, truly surrender, to desire. It was about discovering a different side to herself—a passionate and fearless self so unlike the woman who had been living her life in the shadows for the last two years.
It had felt so right, beginning her sexual awakening with Basa. But not out of any lingering, sentimental attachment to her teenage fantasies—that fairy-tale prince of her dreams had never existed except in her imagination.
The man who was here with her now was not perfect at all. He was stubborn, and ruthless, but he was also loyal and caring and he had a deep-rooted sense of responsibility for his family, friends, and employees. Most importantly of all, he was real, and together the two of them had faced their shared past, here in this beautiful wilderness.
She glanced out of the window. The sun was shining, birds were singing—everything was carrying on without any thought of what had just happened in this room.
What would happen next?
Her breath swelled in her throat. It was stupid, really. She’d spent so many years dreaming about Basa and it was only now she realised that her fantasy had stopped at the moment of climax.
Her eyes darted towards the discarded clothes on the floor. Was he going to come out of the bathroom and just start getting dressed? She sat up. Should she be getting dressed?
Before she had a chance to move he walked back into the room and slid in beside her, gathering her against him.
Her heart rebounded inside her chest and she breathed in against a rush of emotions. But it was okay to feel a little emotional, she told herself. It was her first time, and the sex had been so good; Basa had made it good for her.
For a moment she lay listening to his breathing, savouring the heat and solidity of his body next to hers, and then she turned and looked up at him. ‘How about you? Was it okay for you?’
He stared at her for a moment. ‘It was a whole lot better than okay.’ His face softened, and he laughed. ‘Do you know, nobody has ever asked me that before?’
She laughed too. ‘There’s a first time for everything.’
‘Yes, there is.’ He touched her cheek gently, his face growing more serious. ‘Did you mean what you said about why you waited?’
When s
he nodded slowly, he dipped his head and kissed her, his hand hugging the curve of her hip.
‘I really am sorry, Mimi, for how that evening ended between us, and for leaving you up in my room like that.’
‘It doesn’t matter any more.’
‘But it did then,’ he persisted. ‘And I think it’s stayed with you.’
She was about to tell him it hadn’t, only she didn’t want to lie to him any more. ‘A bit,’ she confessed.
She hesitated, the impulse to make light of her feelings fighting with her need to be truthful.
‘But I can’t blame how I felt entirely on what happened at Fairbourne.’
A minute ticked by and then he frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
