The Raven Prince (Princes #1)(79)

His breath whispered over her closed eyelids. “Look at me.”

She turned her head to the sound of his growl, her eyes still closed in bliss.

“Anna, look at me.”

She opened her eyes.

Edward loomed over her, his face flushed, his nostrils flared. “I am putting myself in you now.”

She could feel his erection nudging at her wet opening. The head began squeezing in, and her eyelids dropped in reaction.

“Anna, sweet Anna, look at me,” Edward crooned.

He was halfway in now, and she struggled to keep her eyes focused. He bent his head and licked the tip of her nose.

Her eyes widened.

And he drove all the way home.

She moaned and arched against him. So right. So perfect. He filled her as if they were both made for this. As if they were made for each other. She curved her thighs around his hips, cradling him with her pelvis, and looked into his face. His eyes were closed, his face stark with want. A strand of inky hair had plastered itself against his jaw.

He opened his eyes then and speared her with their black intensity. “I am in you, and you are holding me. There is no going back from this moment.”

She cried out at his words, and the breath within her chest seemed to tremble. His hips rocked. She wrapped her arms around him and held on as the slide of his penis shoving in and out of her drove all thought from her mind. He quickened his pace and groaned. His eyes were locked with hers; as if he was trying to communicate something unutterable. She touched the side of his face with one hand.

His big body seemed to break apart. He jerked against her hard. She began coming in waves, a joy so exquisite flooded her that she couldn’t contain it. She moaned her rapture. He threw back his head at the same time and bared his teeth in a shout of pleasure. Warmth flooded her womb, her heart, and her very soul.

His heavy body lay on hers, and she felt his heartbeat. Anna sighed. Then he lethargically rolled off her. She curled into a ball on her side, her limbs pleasantly achy. The last thing she felt before surrendering to oblivion was Edward’s hands on her stomach, pulling her back against his warmth.

Chapter Twenty

In the fifth year of her search, late on a rainy night, Aurea stumbled through a grim, dark wood. She wore thin rags that only just covered her body; her feet were bare and blistered, and she was lost and weary. A single crust of bread was the only food she had. In the gloom, she spied a flickering light. A tiny shack stood all alone in a clearing. At her knock, a toothless crone, bent nearly double by age, appeared at the door and beckoned her inside.

“Ah, dearie,” the old woman croaked. “ ’Tis a cold, wet night to be alone. Come share my fire, do. But I fear I’ve no victuals to offer you; my table is bare. Oh, but what I wouldn’t give for something to eat!”

Hearing this, Aurea took pity on the crone. She reached into her pocket and offered the old woman her last bit of bread….

—from The Raven Prince

A high, womanish scream jolted Edward from sleep the next morning. He lurched up, shocked, and stared toward the source of the awful noise. Davis, his gray locks straggling about his grizzled face, stared back in abject horror. Beside Edward, a feminine voice made a sleepy protest. Christ! He quickly threw the sheets over Anna.

“In the name of all that’s holy, Davis, what’s got into you now?” Edward bellowed even as he felt his face heating.

“It’s not enough that you’re always at them whorehouses; now you’ve brought home a-a…” The valet’s mouth worked.

“Woman,” Edward finished the sentence. “But not the kind you’re thinking of. This is my fiancée.”

The bedsheets began to heave. He placed a hand on the upper edge, trapping the occupant within.

“Fiancée! I may be old, but I’m not stoopid. That’s not Miss Gerard.”

The bedcovers muttered ominously.

“Fetch the maid to start the fire,” Edward ordered in desperation.

“But—”

“Go now.”

Too late.

Anna had worked her way to the top of the bedclothes, and her head now emerged. Her hair was delightfully tousled, her mouth sinfully swollen. Edward felt a part of his own anatomy swell. She and Davis regarded each other. Their eyes narrowed simultaneously.

Edward groaned and dropped his head into his hands.

“You’re Lord Swartingham’s valet?” Never had a naked woman caught in a compromising position sounded so prim.

“ ’Course I am. And you’re—”

Edward shot a glare at Davis that held the promise of dismemberment, mayhem, and the apocalypse.

Davis stopped and continued more cautiously. “M’lord’s uh, lady.”

“Quite.” She cleared her throat and withdrew one arm from the covers to push back her hair.

Edward scowled and tucked the sheets more firmly around her shoulders. He needn’t have bothered. Davis was carefully studying the ceiling.

“Perhaps,” Anna said, “you could bring up his lordship’s tea and send the maid to tend the fire?”

Davis jumped at this novel idea. “Right away, mum.”

He was actually backing out the doorway when Edward’s voice stopped him. “In another hour.”

The valet looked scandalized but didn’t say a word, a first in Edward’s experience. The door shut behind Davis. Edward leaped from the bed, strode to the door, and turned the key in the lock. He flung it across the room where it clanged against the wall. He was back in the bed before Anna had time to sit up.