Her body hadn’t yet softened, hadn’t yet recovered from the shock. In another minute or two it would, and her ability to cope with his invasion, and the possession to come, would increase.
She was content to wait. One small hand lay, fingers spread, on his chest. He covered it with his hand, then lifted it to his lips and kissed each fingertip, drawing each into his mouth before releasing it.
He had her attention. Bending his head, he kissed her, gently at first, then increasingly passionately as she responded, as her body softened and heated anew, reacting to the caress of his hands, then the more intimate caress of his body as he rocked her.
Then she started to move, and it was he who was rocked. She’d reached up and framed his face, her forearms braced on his chest as her tongue whispered over his with promises of surrender, of the heated spoils of conquest. Using her knees on the slippery satin but even more the contact of her thighs with his, she undulated upon him. She didn’t lift and slide down as untutored ladies did. She used her whole body in a sinuous, heart-stopping, mind-numbing, senses-stealing movement that caressed him from rock-hard thighs to his lips and beyond.
She captured him, his mind, his body, his senses-all were hers to command. And command she did. He had no idea how long he simply held her, his hands splayed, one on her back, one below her waist, and took in all she lavished on him. Drank as he hadn’t drunk in years.
The movement started from her hips. She pressed down, taking him all, her inner thighs, the softness of her caressing his groin. The wave started from there and traveled her spine in a slow, controlled roll, pressing her stomach, her waist, then her chest, and finally her sumptumous breasts along his body. At the last, her mouth would press to his, open and inviting, luring him deep, then the wave would recede, slowly falling back in an even more enticing caress as she softened, body beckoning. And then it would start again.
His mind was reeling when he lifted his head and drew in a shuddering breath. Shifting one hand to the back of her head, he fisted it in her hair and drew her back so he could look into her face.
Eyes more deeply green, more intense than any emerald glinted up at him from under heavy lids.
“How did you know?” His question-the one for which he could not conceive of an answer. She’d been as innocent, as virginal, as he’d suspected, yet… she could love him like this-like a concubine from some sultan’s seraglio, skilled and practiced in the sensual arts.
He didn’t need to elaborate; her lips curved into a widening smile. “My parents.”
Dumfounded, he stared at her. “They taught you?”
She laughed, breathlessly, yet he felt the sound go through him like a shot of the finest brandy, searing straight to his gut, then sliding and pooling lower, fuel for his fire. He released her hair and she pressed to him once more. “No. I watched.” She caught his eye, her lips languidly curved. “I was an only child.” Her words were little more than a whisper, her body restless on his. “When I was young, my bedroom connected to theirs. They always left the door open, so they would hear if I called. I used to wake and go in… sometimes they didn’t… notice. After a while, I’d go back to my bed. I didn’t understand, not until later, but I remember.”
As the memories rolled through her, Francesca gave mute thanks. Without her loving parents, without their love for each other, she would never have had a chance for this. For now-for the experience of having a man like her husband at her mercy, caught by the splendor of her body, held by the promise of all she could give him. It was a heady thought, one small victory amid the defeats. One thing for which she would remember her wedding night.
Spearing her fingers through the wiry hair on his chest, she searched, then ducked her head and licked. Nipped.
His arms closed about her like the steel cage she knew they could be. He nudged her, and she lifted her head. He swooped and captured her mouth in a kiss that blazed.
One arm shifted to lock her hips to him, and she was suddenly more aware than she had been for some time of the hard, ridged strength buried inside her, of the latent power in the body she had, until then, held captive. The discovery rolled through her as he plundered her mouth, then he lifted his head, and breathed against her swollen lips, “Second act.”
She’d seen it before, but never felt it. Never been the woman at center stage. Tonight, she was-all that was done was done to her, to her flesh, to her body, to her senses. Since seating himself within her, he’d barely moved, letting her use her body to caress him. That changed. His hold on her was restricting, but she could still move upon him, and did, but her reason was no longer to please him, but to assuage the hunger, the need that flowered and grew within her-the need he expertly fed.
He moved with her, within her; he now controlled their dance. As he surged deep inside her, filling her, impaling her, only to retreat and do it again, she tried to cling to sanity, and failed. The unnameable need blossomed within her-she could deny it no more than she could deny him. The slickness of her body, her movements upon him an uninhibited encouragement, she strove to appease that need. And him.
She lost her rhythm and instead found his, then he held her hips down and filled her more deeply. Each thrust seemed to push farther, to penetrate her more intimately, to touch a place he’d not touched before.
Fire consumed her. It came from him. He pressed it into her, pushed it deep until she went up in flames. All but sobbing, she clung to him, willing and wanton as her body became his, his to fill and plunder and take as he wished. No matter the times she’d witnessed the heat, the staggering, exhausting glory, it had never occurred to her that it would be like this-that it involved such a giving.
She pulled back from their kiss gasping, blind with need.
He changed his grip, bent her back over one arm, then his head swooped and she felt the scalding heat of his mouth at her breast.
He suckled fiercely and she shrieked. Her body tightened, tightened again as he suckled more, and thrust deeply, hotly, inside her.
The fire imploded.
And she was no longer there, but yet she could feel. Feel the sensations, excruciatingly sharp, that lanced through her, spreading outward from her core, tensed, coiled, incandescent, locked about him. The bright rapture subsided in waves, spreading under her skin, leaving it glowing. Like ripples on her sensual pond, they fanned out, then gradually faded, leaving her floating, at peace.
Waiting.
She wasn’t capable of thinking, yet she knew. Knew there was more, that she wanted still more.
She wanted him. Not just inside her but with her.
He’d stilled, quieted; now he drew her upright and against him once more, holding her there, his hands moving over her, molding her to him.
Then his hands closed over her hips and he lifted her from him.
She made some sound-a whimper of disapproval. He answered with a harsh, very gravelly laugh.
“I want you beneath me.”
He wanted to feel her supple and pliant under him as he took her. Wanted to hear every little gasp, every moan. Wanted to know she was open and willing, her ripe body his to fill. A primitive, elemental want. A driving, almost-desperate desire. Gyles laid her down on the emerald satin, following her down, spreading her thighs wide and settling between. He filled her with a single powerful thrust, watched her body rock, watched her arch as he pressed deeper still, and she tilted her hips to take him in.
She reached for him, drawing him down to her. He went readily, hungry for the sensation of her body under his. He moved within her, upon her, and she clutched, and drew his face to hers. He met her lips, met the fire still glowing within her and stoked it back to flame.
Into an inferno.
The blaze cindered every last veil, every last vestige of his civilized facade. He plunged into her, into her mouth, into her body, with a greedy, ravenous need. He wanted, he took, and she gave. He knew when she yielded, when she surrendered completely to the moment, to the flames, to the glory, and he exulted in his victory. She opened to him, wrapped him in her arms and welcomed him in, not just into her body but into that citadel he had wanted, needed, to claim.