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All over again.
He pressed his lips to every new swath of skin he uncovered as he removed her clothes. He loved every part of her, and then again.
And he could not tell her what he felt, because he had no vocabulary for such things. And because tonight, there was only her name.
“Geraldine,” he whispered, making her name into whole songs.
When she was naked and pink and quivering, he slid his hands beneath her bottom and lifted her up like dessert. Then he sang his favorite song as he licked into her, deep, so it was her turn to scream and lose control completely.
And she was still shuddering when he crawled up the length of her body, still pressing kisses to that sweet, flushed, pink flesh.
He drew her onto his lap so that she knelt astride him, and he waited for her to look down and see where they were joined. Then to pull her lip between her teeth as she looked at him.
And then begin to smile, her eyes shining, as he let her take charge once again.
This time it was a slow, rolling explosion. She rocked against him, wrapping her arms around his neck so she could kiss him as she moved. And there was little he could do but wrap his hands over her hips and enjoy the bright-hot fire between them.
She fanned the flames so they danced higher and higher.
And then, as they both spun out there on the edge, Geraldine pulled her mouth from his and looked down, smoothing her palms over his cheeks to frame his jaw.
Her eyes were darker then. Storm-tossed emeralds, and all his.
“Lionel,” she whispered, and his name in her mouth made him thrust harder inside her, deeper and hotter, “I love you.”
The words echoed inside him.
I love you.
The words were like a bomb, too huge and too—
But then she bore down, squeezing him tight.
And she sent them both tumbling over the edge, soaring out to all the galaxies they’d made here between them, as if she hadn’t ruined everything.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
GERALDINEWOKEUPSLOWLY, found the sun in her face, and her first instinct was to smile.
But in the next moment she realized that if the sun was up, she must have missed Jules’s usual morning wake-up routine and so she sat up, frowning, and shoved her hair out of her face.
Only then did she see Lionel sitting in a chair by the fire, staring at her with a dark and brooding sort of look that made him look more like stone than he had in a long while.
It took a moment for the night to come back to her. And then it did, hard, and she knew exactly what this was.
You knew better, she told herself.
“Did you mean it?” he asked, with no preamble.
Geraldine did not pretend she wasn’t fully aware what he was asking.
“Te amo,”she said, because she’d been practicing. She’d been taking advantage of all the nannies at her disposal and giving herself workdays. She spent hours in the libraries up at the house, arranging things in preparation for the cataloging that she would only begin in earnest once she learned more Spanish, so she could read everything she found. Lucky for her, Lionel’s grandmother was proving to be an excellent and devoted tutor.“Te quiero. Te quiero con todo mi corazón.”
Because she did love him. With all of her heart.
“I don’t understand why you would take this and ruin it in this way,” he growled at her.
“What is ruined?” Geraldine asked lightly.
