A Masquerade in the Moonlight(133)

So this is love, she thought before she couldn’t think any more, but only react—before Donovan’s ministrations took her to the very edge of rational thought, and beyond.

Until she could not do anything less than raise her hips, dig her heels into his back, and allow him access to anything he wanted, any intimacy.

Until she felt his fingers inside her—everywhere probing her, learning her, filling her with a pressure that threatened to explode.

Until his mouth drew on her hotly, rapidly, his tongue flicking at her, urging her to even greater heights, aiding and abetting the flowering that was impossible to halt, the pulsing that began deep inside her and traveled downward, to explode in a wild throbbing that surely must kill her, for nothing could be this shatteringly wonderful and not prove fatal!

And then he was fully on top of her, and she reached up to him, needing an anchor, needing something solid to hold on to or else she would spin off the surface of this bed, of this earth. He slid into her, filling her yet again, and the spiraling and the breathtaking pulsing began anew, surprising her, nearly frightening her, because she hadn’t believed she could go any higher.

He moved inside her, his arms slipping around her back, his legs straight and powerfully muscled against her softness. He must have been feeling at least some of what she had felt, was still feeling, for his movements were suddenly swift, and deep, and gloriously urgent.

She helped him, raising her hips to hold him inside her, and felt his hardness swelling her, his body replacing his mouth against that special, mysteriously wonderful part of her.

And then, when she thought she could bear the ecstasy no longer, he pressed into her one last time, his manhood throbbing, gifting her with his seed as her own body convulsed yet a third time, endlessly, leaving her too spent to breathe.

“God, Marguerite, but I love you!” Donovan groaned at last, falling onto his back and dragging her against him, her head on his chest.

“And I love you—Thomas, “she said, her voice catching on a near sob as she buried her face in the mat of hair that delighted her so. She loved him so very, very much. She longed to show him how much.

Later, several glorious minutes later, he agreed to allow her to learn his body, increasing her knowledge a hundredfold, and with this new understanding she knew she had finally become a woman. Complete. Absolute. Controlled and controlling, so that there was no superior, no inferior. Just equals, attuned in mind and body. Two individuals who had become one perfect whole. For now. For tonight. Forever. This time it was for certain!

Later, several glorious hours later, just as a foggy dawn was creeping over the city, Donovan left her, pressing one last kiss against her forehead before tucking the covers around her chin and telling her to sleep—which he didn’t need to do, for she thought she could sleep forever. Or at least until it was dark once more and he came to her again.



Thomas felt his feet touch the flagway and let go of the drainpipe, sagging against the bricks for a few seconds as he took a deep breath of the early morning air. He was exhausted and had wanted nothing more than to curl up with Marguerite and sleep the day away.

His Marguerite. His aingeal. What a glorious woman! Each time he held her he felt her fire, was consumed by her heat, and then was born again, like the Phoenix rising from the ashes.

He smiled. All in all, it wasn’t a bad way to spend the next fifty or so years!

He located the knife where he’d left it behind a small bush, then, looking both up and down the street, he tapped his hat down more firmly on his head and began to walk, needing time to think before he met with Harewood at eight. Before he dealt with Harewood.

Thomas was not a killer, and he did not enjoy killing. But this was war—this was kill or be killed. Marco had understood immediately. Marguerite, Lord bless her and her inventive revenges, never would.

Thomas just wanted it to be over.

A closed coach passed by him in the Square, but he didn’t think about it more than to idly wonder how anyone would wish to stay out until dawn when he could be home, in bed with his loving wife.

More than an hour later, still munching on a pastry he’d bought from a hawker—he’d grown to appreciate the greasy delicacy—he turned onto the street where Harewood lived, and stopped. There was already a small carriage sitting outside Harewood’s lodgings, a rough-looking driver sitting up on the box.

Who could be visiting Harewood so early? Donovan walked slowly closer, watching as another rough looking fellow came out of the house, still talking to another man who could only be a servant.