His Royal Highness(77)

I shiver.

A smile lifts at the edge of his mouth and he continues his gentle exploration.

I finish with his shirt, pushing it off his broad shoulders. Once it’s on the floor, he steps forward to find the zipper on the back of my dress. An eye for an eye, I think.

He tugs and the only sounds in the room are our breaths and that zipper, peeling down my back.

My dress sags now that there’s nothing holding it up. My strapless bra is visible only for as long as it takes him to unclasp it, and then it’s falling too, off the bed, onto his shirt. In that instant, his hands slide up my ribs and cover my chest. I look down and watch him touch me. I feel beautiful with the way he’s reacting. It’s like someone’s been holding him back, keeping him away, and now that he’s finally touching me, he can’t get enough.

I try to reach for his belt, but just then, he bends down to take with his mouth what he’s already felt with his hands. My head falls back and a soft moan escapes as I feel his tongue lap over my breasts.

“Forty-five minutes isn’t that long,” I warn him as his hands tug the front of my dress down a little more. An inch. Two. I’m naked from the ribs up. His eyes eat me alive.

In response to my worry, he hauls me up and tosses me back onto the bed. I bounce a little.

His brown eyes are feral.

I scurry away from him, playfully.

He grabs my ankles and hauls me back toward the edge of the mattress.

His weight covers me and his hands are in my hair, holding my face angled up to him so when he kisses me, it’s unencumbered magic.

His groans match my own and his lips trail from my mouth to my chin, to the sensitive skin just underneath. He kisses me lower, spreading heat. I writhe and arch up with every new territory he conquers.

His hands are tugging my dress lower. My panties are silky smooth against his suit pants, but that’s not fair. I want access. I demand access.

Unfortunately, Derek doesn’t agree.

“You’re mine,” he whispers against my ear as his hand slides down the front of my panties. Lower. Parting.

My head tilts back and my mouth clamps shut. I don’t think the nice, imagined family staying next door needs to hear the dirty thoughts racing through my brain right now. Derek knows I’m having a hard time containing myself, though. His wicked smirk tells me so just before he slides a finger inside me. Pumps slowly. Adds another. His mouth finds my breast again and I groan his name, raking my nails down his back as he brings me close to an orgasm right before pulling back.

He isn’t intimidated by my distress.

He stands and takes two steps away from the bed. Towering over me as I lie on the sheets, perfectly exposed. My skin is on fire from his kerosene-soaked caresses. He stares, as self-assured as ever, while he tugs off his belt and unbuttons his pants. Dark boxer briefs are tugged low and my lips part before I wet my lips.

“Do you have a condom?” I ask, my voice pitched with need. “If not, I’ll call down to the concierge and demand one. Do they keep that sort of thing behind the desk?”

I’m already reaching for the phone when he tells me he has one in his suitcase. I turn, looking over my shoulder as he retrieves it and tears it open with confident ease, unrolling it while I stare.

I think my role in this scene is supposed to be Girl Waiting Patiently on Bed, but I can’t wait. I stand up and walk toward him, pushing him gently back toward the wall. He smiles and accepts my eager kiss before spinning us around, caging me in. The wallpaper is smooth as he hoists me up, guiding my legs around his waist.

“Here?” he asks, brushing his hand between my legs so he can taunt me with soft circles.

“Anywhere,” I tell him, sounding frenzied. “The wall. The floor. The bed. Just—”

That sentence is cut off sharply when he angles himself between us and pushes inside me in one hard thrust.

“Big,” is the word I choose to say.

It hangs between us and he actually laughs.

LAUGHS.

Then he pulls out of me slowly and thrusts back in again just as hard. Again. Our hips meet and I emit the most pitiful cry of “I’m dying.”

He covers me with kisses, finds my mouth, and keep us together as he moves inside me, doing the work. Every thrust keeps me pinned against the wall. Every little brush of his thumb sends me full-force toward the edge of existence.

He knows it. He knows how to grind against me, over and over, harder and harder and I’m telling him I love him. I don’t know when I started. It might have just been in my head at first, but it’s repeated over and over again until it comes to life between us, the words sealing us together.

“I love you,” I say again, right before my eyes pinch closed and my toes curl. My thighs grip his and my heels dig into his back and I’m lost to the waves racking through me.

“Whitney,” he moans, sounding as if he’s in pain.

I’m killing him. I am. He’s pumping so hard and his face is buried deep in my neck. His sweat clings to me and then I feel him come too. It’s so all-consuming I fear we’ve lost ourselves in it. We don’t exist anymore. At least not the way we did before tonight.

I kiss his cheek as he catches his breath. I comfort him like he’s comforted me so much this evening. My arms cling to his neck, and without a word, he carries us into the bathroom and turns on the shower. I’m set down on the bench and he leans over me, hands resting on either side of my hips.