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“You say we have a child and yet you deliberately neglected to inform me of the fact, keeping me from watching my son and heir grow. Whatever have I done to make you hate me so, Angele?” His words cracked with pain.
Distressed, she leapt to her feet. “Mais non, Gabriel, môn amour,doyou have any idea how much I love you? Have always loved you? I thought to leave you unencumbered by the damaged hag you see before you now.” She spread her hands.
Gabriel grabbed her by her shoulders and shook her roughly, shocking her.
“Hag be damned! You are as beautiful as ever. I cannot believe that is the real reason you could be so cruel,” he snarled.
She laughed bitterly. “And here I was grateful when I saw no revulsion fill your eyes when you removed my veil. Believe me when I say that others have not been so kind.”
He kept hold of her shoulders; his thumbs dug painfully either side of her collarbones. “We were as one. You knew I would love you regardless of any kind of disfigurement, and in truth the scar barely detracts from your beauty. I know that you would love me no less, had the tables been reversed. I do not accept that is the only reason you have kept yourself a secret from me.”
She hung her head in shame. “Perhaps so, but I feared you would keep me beside you in pity. Had you taken a mistress, I could not have borne to stay and watch as we drifted apart, not after the life we’d shared, the passion, the completeness of our union. Please understand that I wanted you to remember me as I was; I wanted you to move on with your own life as you were about to.”
“What of our child,our son?”
“I-I suppose that I selfishly wanted to keep a part of you for myself. A piece of your love forever by my side… Can you honestly blame me for that?”
“Yes, I can—I do! In fact, I blame you for every moment,every secondof those lost years.” His blazing eyes held hers in thrall.
Lifting her chin defiantly, she steadfastly returned his smouldering gaze.
He grasped her chin, his eyes narrowed. “You know the forfeit for such defiance, my love.”
She swallowed as his eyes glinted with steely resolve, the look in them exciting her. Without warning, he yanked her forward to press his mouth hard against hers in a punishing kiss. She gave as good as he, and with grunts and several clashes of teeth, they duelled brutally with their tongues. Each drank thirstily from the other, the drought over. The monsoon had come; they danced in the rain.
He ended the impasse by pulling free of her. They stood facing one another, panting. His cheek twitched, and his mouth tightened. She pressed her palm below her breast in an attempt to calm the rapid tattoo thundering beneath her ribs.
Without warning, he seated himself upon the bed, yanking her facedown across his hard thighs. She gave a squeal of surprise and thrashed her legs, but there was no real fight in her, only the thrill of anticipation and the exhilaration of feeling she was coming alive again for the first time in five long, dreary, lonely years.
He pulled up her black gown and petticoats. The silk dress would be ruined by so much manhandling, yet she did not care as he shoved the mass of material roughly aside. The cool air of the dank little chamber chilled the nether regions of her flesh.
The first spank shocked her—had his blows always stung this much? Gasping for breath, she shuddered. His hard smacks rained down upon her quivering bottom.
She moaned.
“Settle, Angele, for there will be worse to come for such treason. To leave me alone in darkness and sorrow while you were alive was cruel and unreasonable in the extreme. I swear I shall punish you every day for the rest of our lives as retribution for your wickedness. No longer my angel then but fallen like Amy, the president of all fallen angels.”
A glow in her heart swelled at his endearment, his own pet name for her,Angel.He loved her still -that much was obvious. Nothing else mattered. She would willingly submit to being thrashed every morn, noon, and night if he so chose. What did she care now that she was with him? Being back where she belonged in her beloved’s embrace was all she was concerned with—well, that and their son.
“Perhaps I shall call you Amy from now onwards.”
“Non, please, Gabriel, allow me prove to you that I can be your Angel once more,” she cried, distressed.
His answer seemed to be to increase the intensity of her punishment. Reason fled as pain from his chastisement wiped away all coherent thought. She wailed apologies, churning her hips. The burn across her buttocks intensified, yet she relished him reestablishing his mastery over her. She had missed his dominance, his self-assurance and his protection, but most of all, she had missed his love.
She’d pined for his magnificent body, especially that male part of him that had given her so much carnal pleasure during their regular mating, the loving act that had created Christopher.
The spanking hurt, but the apex of her thighs clenched with frissons of lust, releasing her excitement in fluid form. She knew she was slick, wet, just as she’d always been when laid across his sturdy thigh. She had never quite come to terms with this strange anomaly, although Gabriel had been delighted to discover her base reaction to his chastening palm.
As it was, instead of lifting his hand again, he slid his palm over her scalding buttock, down betwixt her thighs, and chuckled, the sound warming her heart. She had missed the deep resonance of his laughter, rare as a hen’s tooth and just as precious.
“My fallen angel; so wet and ready for your Master. My God, how I have missed you, my darling.”
She found herself flipped upright and embraced. She burrowed into the hollow between his neck and shoulder, breathing in his scent.
I am home!The intoxicating thought thrilled her.
“I have missed you more than anything, my lord. It tore my heart into tiny shreds to stay away, but I did not wish to hinder—”
