Another nod.
“Do you have… limitations?”
He twisted his head once more, and he wore a grin, playful and wicked. “You’re about to discover the answer to that. But we can continue the conversation if you wish. Should I call for tea?”
“No tea. I’d like to feast on you.”
His grin slipped away, and his eyes flashed wicked. “Me first.” He kissed his way from the inside of her calf straight up to her inner thigh, then paused to kiss that aching spot between her legs. So long since she’d been touched there.
And she needed more.
He licked lower, his thumb finding the buzzing pearl at her center and circling.
And still, she needed more.
His tongue slipped into her, and he sucked and sipped until her hand clenched the sheets and her back arched off the bed, but still she needed more. Not because his touch did not destroy her. Then create her again in the same stroke, the same breath. But because she could not have his touch and not want more, not want all.
Still, he worked her higher. Just as she thought she might fly to pieces, he lifted, shifted a bit, and his warm breath washed across her belly. His strong hands wrapped around her waist. He kissed her navel.
She reached for him, her fingers claws on his shoulders, in his hair, urging him upward. His hands sank into her hair as his body settled over her, and by the time his lips found hers once more, his gentle touch had become hard, demanding.
She had demands, too. She’d freed him, after all, and his shaft pressed hard and thick against her center. What a pity it would be to forget that work, to leave him unexplored, unpleasured. Down the avenue of his torso, following the crisp trail of hair that started at his navel, she smoothed her hand until she found the length of him, and wrapped her hand aroundhim. He hissed as she squeezed, rubbing the pad of her thumb over the wet tip of his shaft.
“’Tis an excellent thing I am not delicate,” she said. “The size of you might scare me otherwise.”
“You? Scared?” His laughter a huff of warm breath across her cheek. “I refuse to believe it.”
Not scared. Not with him. In this very moment. She squeezed again, drew her hand up and down his shaft. And he snapped. His body moved like water rushing through a flooded stream, all at once and unstoppable, as he straddled her hips and placed the heavy head of his shaft at her opening.
“I can’t wait anymore.” He groaned, every muscle tight and shaking.
“Neither can I,” she begged of him with nails scratching across the muscle of his back. “Neither can I.” She grabbed the hard muscle of his backside and pulled him against her as she arched her hips up. A delicious collision. “Neither can I.” One more final, breathy plea.
And then he thrust into her. His forearms rested on the bed on either side of her head, and he never looked away from her. She could not look away either. Did not wish to lose sight of this man who could still claim to be a stranger to her. Yes, a stranger. Yet something inside her knew him, trusted him. Some frantic part of her saw the frantic part of him. And together, bodies claiming one another, they could release that panic in a flurry of pleasure. They could soothe one another with each touch and kiss.
Folly, all of this. Likely. But it felt like bliss. So she’d call herself a fool and love it.
No more room for thought. Only him, stroking in and out of her body. Only his gaze, heavy and sweet on her. Only his hand fisted tightly in her hair. Only the sheen of sweat on his skinas she clutched at him everywhere she could. No agreement, no pretending. Only two real bodies needing and giving.
He filled her entirely, her body and her mind. Nothing but him and the pleasure growing rapidly, spreading from where he stoked it between her legs to her breasts to the moan escaping her lips and carrying like a melody across the room. His hand on her breast, squeezing, teasing, and?—
Pleasure shuddered through her body so hard and fast she cried out, dug her nails into his back, clinging, reaching for more. Finding it. He kissed her hard as she fell apart, melted into the mattress. And he thrust harder, faster. Then his hand tightened in her hair, his body jerked out of her, and he stole her breath with a kiss as he spilled his seed onto her belly.
Her consciousness drifted lazy and sated into the soft bed around them. She nuzzled his chest, pressed tiny kisses to it, and he stroked his fingers through her hair, untangling the knots his pleasure had made there before dropping a kiss to her forehead and leaving her entirely.
She had not the strength to see where he went, but he returned soon enough with a wet cloth he used to clean her belly. She opened her eyes and watched as he tended to her. When he’d finished, he settled next to her and gathered her into his arms.
He’d kept his promise to guard her from conceiving a child. Even in this, he’d protected her.
She pulled her knees to her chest. Her stockings had fallen around her ankles, rumpled and sad. She tried to pull them back up and fasten them as she spoke. “When you leave, where will you go?”
“The Continent. And… I cannot say when I’ll return.”
“How long will you stay away?”
“I don’t know. As long as it takes.”
She’d known. He’d told her he would leave, and she’d agreed to marry him anyway because she did not want him. She wantedthe marriage, the family, the protection, his name a shield for Alfie to hide behind.
