Her Favorite Duke (The 1797 Club #2)(67)
She stared at him, stunned both by his words and the strength with which he said them. For the first time in years, he looked at her with clear eyes, with his intentions written across his handsome face, with all his love out in the open for her to see and embrace and adore.
And in that moment, it was enough. More than enough. It was everything.
She moved toward him, tears beginning to sting her eyes, and caught his hands. “I love you, Simon. I love you.”
He didn’t answer her with words, but drew her against him, dropping his mouth to hers for a kiss. For the first time, there was no desperation to the kiss. No feeling that it might be their last. There was only tenderness, desire and love. She melted against him, hardly noticing as he steered her into the bedroom, untying her robe as they stumbled together.
He stripped the fabric away and tossed it aside. When his hands trembled, she smiled. “It isn’t as if you haven’t seen me like this before.”
He nodded. “I have. But until this moment, I’ve never fully accepted that you were mine.”
She caught her breath. “Well, I am yours. And you are mine.”
“Forever,” he whispered, that word a vow to her that meant more than any they had said in the chapel. Tonight it was a surrender, a gift of faith, a promise of a future.
And she reached for him, tangling her arms around his neck as she lifted her mouth to his and returned that promise with her body. With her everything.
He helped her onto the bed and quickly stripped out of his clothing. She opened her arms to him as he joined her on the bed, his heated gaze branding her in a way it never had before. This was full surrender and she bathed in the glow of it.
His mouth came down on her throat, and he began to slowly kiss and caress his way along the length of her body. She gasped as he pleasured her tight nipples, sucking hard and laving each with his tongue until her vision blurred and wet heat soaked the inside of her thighs.
Then he dragged his mouth lower, licking her stomach, her hip, and finally he settled between her legs, opening her wide so that he could lavish her sex with long strokes of his tongue. She rose up against him, thrashing her head against the pillows as pleasure arced from and spread through every nerve in her body. She fisted the coverlet, gasping out his name as she reached for release.
He smiled up her body and then she felt his fingers slide inside her slick sheath. He curled them gently, finding some spot inside of her that sang in tune to his touch. He flicked her clitoris with his tongue and her entire body erupted with pleasure unlike anything she’d ever known.
She jolted against him, her cries uncontrollable, her body shaking almost off the bed with the force of her orgasm. He stroked her through it, pressing pleasure right to the edge of pain as she begged him for more and begged him to stop all in one ragged breath.
At last, her body relaxed, the tremors softening, and only then did he slide back up her body, opening her legs with his thighs and thrusting into her as his mouth crushed hers. She tasted her own essence on his tongue, the sweet flavor of her release, and it awakened pleasure in her all the more.
His thrusts were heavy and hard and she lifted into every one of them, reveling in the joining of their bodies, the union that could be defined or seen by no one but themselves. She felt his body tensing as he neared release, and ground her hips against him to hasten him to pleasure.
Of course, it brought her back to the edge to do so, and as her orgasm tore through her again, he gasped out her name and together they found release. When it was over, he collapsed over her, taking great breaths as she smoothed her hands over his shoulders, his back. The weight of him was everything she’d ever wanted and when he rolled away from her, she whimpered her dissatisfaction.
He chuckled. “I only don’t want to crush you.”
She curled into his side, wrapping her arm around him as she tucked her head into his shoulder. “It would be the way I’d choose to go.”
He shook his head as he pressed a kiss to her temple. “No, you must stay forever. I have too much planned for us, for our future. That is, if you’ll allow it.”
She glanced up at him, surprised that his expression was actually still taut with worry. She cupped his chin and whispered, “Have I not made myself clear? I love you, Simon. And I see what lengths you’ve gone to to make it clear that you love me. That you chose me. I love you and my future is bound to yours, just as it always has been. But it’s a future we haven’t discussed much as we’ve worked through the tangled mess of our past.”
“You want to know what our future holds?” he asked.
She nodded. “I do.”
“We return to London,” he said. “And we live our life. I never again hide that I love you and that I am proud to be your husband.”
She shut her eyes, swelling with joy at that statement. “And what of Graham? Or those who would judge us for how we got to this place?”
He sighed. “I can’t pretend that I haven’t betrayed Graham. I did, and I must live with the consequences. But my life with you has nothing to do with that. One day he may not be so angry; one day he may be able to forgive me. But if that day never comes…” He shrugged. “So be it. I love you. And I am not sorry that you’re mine.”
She rolled over, covering his body with hers, feeling his muscles tighten as his arms came around her. She stared down into his face, all the joy and hope she hadn’t allowed herself to feel washing over her.