Always a Maiden (The Belles of Beak Street #5)(62)

And, oh heavens, her breasts weren’t even big enough to fill his hands, but they were so responsive. He wanted to “toy” with them the rest of the night. However, it wouldn’t do to let a lady get too impatient. So for one last time, he licked and nipped at her cerise nipples, which had started a much paler pink, and then trailed kisses lower. He forged a path along her stomach. She trembled and moaned a protest.

He grinned as he tongued the indentation of her navel.

“I can’t reach you,” she muttered as she started to sit.

“Later you can touch me.” He planted his hand in the middle of her chest and pushed her back into the pillows. He kissed lower, inside the edge of her hip.

She tensed and went very still. He’d touched the petals of her sex some, very lightly only giving her tiny snippets of what was to come, partly because she would flush and go tense with uncertainty. But she was ready. Her folds were slick and swollen. Even if she wasn’t certain, he knew what she needed. He knew what he wanted to give to her.

He nipped at her slender thigh, marveling at how well formed she was. A pocket Venus. Or at least one to him. He kissed down to her knee and started up the other side. He was too impatient to go all the way to her toes this time. This time. There may only be this time. His throat tightened.

He couldn’t think about that now. He needed to think about her pleasure and nothing beyond it. And the way she was pressing her knees together amused him and made his feelings even more tender. He nipped the inside of her hip and then brushed his mouth across her belly just under her navel. “Open your legs for me, darling.”

Screwing her eyes shut, she let her legs fall apart just enough he could shoulder them open the rest of the way.

He wanted to take his time and look at her hidden treasure, but he was mindful of her maidenly sensibilities. No doubt, this was a lot for her to take in. He opened her with his fingers and then gave a couple of gentle nips. When he hit the right spot, her hips bucked.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Her thin whisper was squeaky.

He lifted up reaching for a pillow. “I’m not. Do it again.”

She stared at him with eyes he’d swear really were lavender. Her mouth rounded.

He spent one minute leaning toward her face. “You’re beautiful, my love. Your response is amazing. I love…it.”

Bloody hell. He’d nearly told her he loved her. His chest ached at the thought that she might not want his love any more than she’d wanted his proposal.

She clutched at his shoulders and didn’t look away. There was a bit of panic in her eyes, but passion, too. “I feel as if I am coming apart.”

“You are supposed to,” he soothed her. “Just let it happen for me. I’ll catch you. Trust me, sweetheart.”

“But you…”

“I am enjoying every second of being with you, darling.” Hell, his release had never been in doubt from the moment her slender fingers touched his cock. It wouldn’t take much more of her experimentation to see to that.

So he tucked the pillow under her hips and slid lower on the bed. By all that was holy, he loved her. Loved the taste of her, loved the way she responded to him, and he loved the way that she was concerned about his pleasure. The words I love you pounded in his body, in his head, and in his heart. He loved her. It was as simple and as complicated as that.

But even if she loved him, she no doubt valued duty more. But he would make her come apart so that every day she would think of him and that the cost of duty was too dear.

Her release came with her startled cry.

And he wanted her. His own release was too long held. He knew it was knavish of him, but while she was still in the throes of her orgasm, he gave her a last chance to stay him. Instead of saying him nay, she opened her arms to him and said, “Please go on before I float away.”

“You’re not floating away,” he said with a husky laugh.

“Are you certain?” she asked and opened her pale eyes. They were most certainly lavender. She smiled a real smile, combined with sleepy looking eyelids. Need slammed into him.

She wiggled her hips, and he drew in a sharp breath, desire cascading through him.

His control was broken and he was shaking as he tried to go gently. Her flesh was slick and so warm and she was still in such a state of ease that her body’s resistance was easily breached. She gave a tiny mew. His effort to assess her well-being was thwarted by the insistent pressure of her slim fingers on his backside, drawing him deeper. Then she found a sensitive spot in the small of his back. She curled her still quivering legs around his buttocks and wrapped her limp arms around him.

He tried to find a slow, steady pace, but he was undone. And she was magnificent. Her little gasps and moans piled onto his need to claim her and make her his. Then she was shivering and straining against him, her core tightening around his cock and driving him to madness. He tried to hold back and give her enough time to climax. Then she was shuddering and gasping, her inner muscles squeezing rhythmically.

His orgasm came over him like a tidal wave, roaring and pounding down on him. It was like drowning, dying, and tasting sunlight at the same time. A mass of swirling sensations and ecstasy flooded through every fiber of his being. Through it all, she was everything; his anchor and his buoy, his hope and his despair, his other half, his lady love.

For long seconds there was only the rasp of their harsh breathing. He had to look at her, to see her. He forced his body that didn’t want to move up onto his elbows. Her swollen lips were parted as the air moved in and out. He pressed kisses to her closed eyelids. Then one to the corner of her mouth. She turned toward his kiss, but he moved back, all the while stroking her hair back from her face.