Married By Morning (The Hathaways #4)(26)

She shouldn’t have gone to him. Any excuse she gave would sound false and ridiculous, because there was no rational reason to have bothered him.

Awkwardly she mumbled, “I … I came to see if…” Her voice died away.

She began to draw back but he caught her wrist with remarkable dexterity, considering that it was night and he was barely awake. They both went still as she was caught poised over him, her wrist imprisoned in his grip.

Leo exerted tension on her arm, forcing her to lean farther over him, farther, until her balance was compromised and she fell on him in a slow topple. Terrified of hurting him, she scrabbled to brace her hands on the mattress, and he used every movement to lever her more fully onto his body. She started as she encountered bare flesh tightly knit with muscle, his chest covered with a soft, crisp fleece.

“My lord,” she whispered, “I didn’t—”

His long hand curved around the back of her head, and he brought her mouth down to his.

It wasn’t a kiss, it was a possession. He took her fully, the heat of his tongue thrusting inside her, draining her of volition and thought. The masculine incense of his skin filled her nostrils. Erotic. Delicious. Too many sensations to take in at once … the hot silk of his mouth, the assured grip of his hands, the hard masculine contours of his body.

The world revolved slowly as Leo turned with her in his arms, half pinning her to the bed. His kisses were rough and sweet, kisses involving lips and teeth and tongue. Gasping, she reached around his neck and bandaged shoulder. He moved over her, big and dark, kissing her as if he wanted to devour her.

The folds of her dressing gown listed open, the hem of her nightgown rising to her knees. Leo’s mouth broke from hers to begin a luscious search of her throat, following tender nerve paths down to the place where her neck and shoulder met. His fingers worked at the front of her nightgown, unmooring tiny buttons, spreading the thin fabric.

His head lowered, his lips slowly ascending the trembling slope of her breast until he reached the tip. Taking her into his mouth, he warmed the cool bud with lambent strokes of his tongue. Ragged moans rose in her throat, mingling with the gusts of his breath. Leo settled more heavily between her thighs, giving her his weight until she felt the hard length of him press her intimately. He sought her other breast, closing his mouth over the peak and tugging wetly, creating waves of involuting pleasure.

With every movement, more sensation was uncovered, the soft edges of arousal wearing away to exquisite rawness. Leo took her mouth with long, drugging kisses, while lower down he had begun a subtle rhythm, nudging and sliding, using himself to arouse her. She twisted beneath him, desperately trying to follow that teasing hardness. Their bodies pressed together like the pages of a closed book, and it felt so right, so wildly pleasurable, that it frightened her.

“No,” she gasped, pushing at him. “Wait. Please—”

One of her hands pressed heedlessly against his injured shoulder, and Leo rolled off her with a curse.

“My lord?” She scrambled from the bed and stood there, shaking in every limb. “I’m sorry. Did I hurt you? What can I—”

“Go.”

“Yes, but—”

“Now, Marks.” His voice was low and guttural. “Or else come back to bed, and let me finish.”

She fled.

Chapter Eleven

After a wretched night, Catherine fumbled for her spectacles and realized she had lost them sometime during her visit to Leo’s room. Groaning, she sat at her dressing table and buried her face in her hands.

A stupid impulse, she thought dully. A moment of madness. She should never have given in to it.

There was no one to blame but herself.

What remarkable ammunition she had given to Leo. He would torture her with this. He would take every opportunity to humiliate her. She knew him well enough not to doubt it.

Catherine’s ill humor was not helped by the appearance of Dodger, who emerged from the slipper box by her bed. The ferret pushed the lid open with his head, clucked in cheerful greeting, and tugged her slipper out of the box. Heaven knew where he intended to take it.

“Stop that, Dodger,” she said wearily, laying her head on her arms as she watched him.

Everything was blurry. She needed her spectacles. And it was awfully difficult to go looking for something when you couldn’t see more than two feet in front of your face. Moreover, if one of the housemaids found the spectacles in Leo’s room, or God help her, in his bed, everyone would find out.

Abandoning the slipper, Dodger trotted to her and stood tall, bracing his long, slender body against her knee. He was shivering, which Beatrix had told her was normal for ferrets. A ferret’s temperature lowered when he was sleeping, and shivering was his way of warming himself upon awakening. Catherine reached down to stroke him. When he tried to climb into her lap, however, she nudged him away. “I don’t feel well,” she told the ferret woefully, although there was nothing wrong with her physically.

Chattering in annoyance at her rejection, Dodger turned and streaked out of the room.

Catherine continued to lie with her head on the table, feeling too dreary and ashamed to move.

She had slept late. She could hear the sounds of footsteps and muffled conversation coming from the lower floors. Had Leo gone down to breakfast?

She couldn’t possibly face him.

Her mind returned to those blistering minutes of the previous night. A fresh swell of desire rolled through her as she thought of the way he had kissed her, the feel of his mouth on the intimate places of her body.