As if he’d willingly trade his soul for what she knew would happen next.
She reached for him as he reached for her.
Their lips met, and the flames roared.
She would have been frightened if he hadn’t been there, solid and real for her to hold on to, her anchor in the maelstrom that swirled through them, around them.
His hands slid down and around, closed over her bare bottom; he kneaded, and heat raced across her skin. Fever followed, a hot urgent ache that swelled and grew as he evocatively plundered her mouth, as he held her close, lifted her hips against him, and suggestively molded her softness to the rigid line of his erection.
She moaned, hot, hungry and wanting.
Wanton. Eager. Determined.
He hoisted her higher; instinctively she wrapped her arms about his shoulders, her long legs about his hips.
Their kiss turned incendiary.
He broke from it only to demand, “Come. Lie with me.”
She answered with a scorching kiss.
Tristan carried her to the side of the bed, and tumbled them both onto it. They bounced, and he angled over her, pressing her down, wedging one leg between hers.
Their lips locked, melded. He sank into the kiss, letting his wandering senses luxuriate in the heavenly delight of having her under him, naked and wanting. Some primitive, wholly male part of his soul rejoiced.
Wanted more.
He let his hands roam, shaping her breasts, then sliding lower, caressing her hips, then pressing beneath to cup her bottom and squeeze. He nudged her thighs wider, freed one hand, and placed it on her stomach.
Felt the feminine muscles beneath his palm jump, contract.
He slid his fingers lower, tangling in the dark curls at the apex of her thighs. Reaching through them, he stroked the soft, sweet flesh they concealed. Felt her shudder.
Easing her thighs wider he cupped her. Sensed the quick intake of her breath. He opened her mouth and kissed her more deeply, then eased back from the kiss, leaving their lips brushing, touching, letting her senses surface sufficiently for her to know and feel.
Their breaths mingled, heated and urgent; from beneath heavy lids, their eyes met, held.
Locked as he shifted his hand and touched her. Stroked, caressed, intimately traced. Her breasts rose and fell; her teeth closed on her lower lip as he opened her. As he teased, glorying in the slick heat of her body, then slowly, deliberately, slid one long finger into her.
Her breathing fractured; her eyes closed. Her body rose beneath his.
“Stay with me.” He stroked slowly, in, out, letting her grow accustomed to his touch, to the sensation.
Her breathing ragged, she forced open her eyes; gradually, her body unclenched.
Slowly, gradually, flowered for him.
He watched it happen, watched the sensual delight rise and sweep her away, watched her eyes darken, felt her fingers tense, nails sinking into his muscles.
Then her breathing broke. Spine bowing, head pressing back, she closed her eyes. “Kiss me.” A desperate plea. “Please—kiss me.” Her voice broke on a gasp as sensation built, coiled, tightened.
“No.” Eyes locked on her face, he pushed her on. “I want to watch you.”
She was fighting for breath, clinging to sanity.
“Lie back and let it happen. Let go.”
He caught a glimpse of brilliant blue from beneath her lashes. He slipped another finger in with the first, thrust deeper, faster.
And she fractured.
He watched her climax take her, listened to the soft cry that fell from her swollen lips, felt her sheath contract, powerful and tight, then relax, aftershocks rippling through the velvet heat.
His fingers still inside her, he leaned down, and kissed her.
Long, deep, giving her all he could, letting her taste his desire, see his wanting, then, step by step, drawing back.
When he withdrew his fingers, stroked them through her wet curls, then lifted his head, her fingers, tangled in the hair at his nape, closed, clutched. She opened her eyes, studied his, his face, read his decision.
He tried to ease back, to let her breathe; to his surprise, she tightened her grip, held him to her.
Held his gaze, then licked her lips. “You owe me a favor.” Her voice was a hoarse whisper; it strengthened with her next words. “Anything, you said. So promise you won’t stop.”
He blinked. “Leonora—”
“No. I want you with me. Don’t stop. Don’t pull away.”
He gritted his teeth. She’d blindsided him. Naked, spread beneath him, her body pliant in aftermath…and she was begging him to take her. “It’s not that I don’t want you—”
She shifted one sleek thigh.
He sucked in a breath.
Groaned. Shut his eyes. Couldn’t shut off his senses. Grimly resolved, he placed his palms on the bed and pushed up, away from her heat.
Opened his eyes.
And stopped.
Hers were swimming.
Tears?
She blinked hard, but didn’t shift her gaze from his. “Please. Don’t leave me.”
Her voice broke on the words.
Something inside him did, too.
His resolve, his certainty, shattered.
He wanted her so much he could barely think, yet the last thing he should do was sink into her soft heat, take her, claim her, like this, now. But he wasn’t proof against the need in her eyes, a need he couldn’t place, but knew he had to fill.
About them, the house was silent, still. Outside the window, night had fallen. They were alone, draped in shadows, naked on a wide bed.
And she wanted him inside her.
He drew a deep breath, bowed his head, then abruptly pulled back and sat up.
“All right.”
One part of his mind was bellowing: “Don’t do it!” The thunder in his blood, and even more a wave of emotional conviction drowned it out.
He unfastened his trousers, then stood to strip them off. Glanced back at her as he straightened, met her eyes. “Just remember this was your idea.”
She smiled a soft madonna’s smile, but her eyes remained wide, watchful. Waiting.
He looked at her, then looked around, stalked to where her clothes had fallen and swiped up her gown. Shaking it out, turning the skirts inside out, he returned to the bed. Dropping beside her, he scooped her hips up in one arm and spread the skirts beneath her.
Glanced at her face in time to see one delicate brow arch upward, but she made no comment, simply settled back again.
Met his eyes. Still waiting.
Read his thoughts as she often did. “I’m not going to change my mind.”
He felt his face harden. Felt desire rip through him. “So be it.”
Chapter
Nine
She had cooled; he hadn’t. He seriously doubted she had any idea of what she did to him, to what level she called to him, especially with them naked in the dappled dark, alone in an essentially empty house.
It was impossible to shake the aura of illicit danger; it was so much a part of him, he didn’t even try. She wanted this, knowingly. As he stretched beside her, propped on one elbow and reached for her, he didn’t try to hide anything, any part of him, from her.
Least of all the dark, primitive desire she evoked.
Their eyes had adjusted long ago; they could see each other’s faces and expressions, even, given they were so close, the emotions in each other’s eyes. He sensed the trepidation that quivered through her as he drew her to him. At the same time read the determination in her face, and didn’t pause.
He kissed her, not as he had before but as a lover who had been given free rein. He entered like a conqueror, laid claim as he wished, laid waste to her senses.
Initially passive, waiting to see, Leonora instinctively rose to his challenge. Her body stirred, came alive once more; she lifted one hand, and speared her fingers once more into his hair.
And clung t
ight as, once again, the flames erupted between them. This time, he made no effort to hold them, contain them; instead, he let them rage. Deliberately sent them raging with each possessive sweep of his hard palms as he shaped her body beneath his, as he claimed every inch of her softness, explored at will, even more intimately.
She shuddered, and let him. Let him sweep her into the fiery sea, the conflagration of desire, passion and simple, unavoidable need.
He touched her in ways she had never imagined, until she clung and sobbed. Until she was awash with heat and longing, with desire burning so fiercely she felt literally on fire. He shifted over her, spread her thighs, and settled between. In the deepening darkness, he was literally a god, powerful and intent as, braced above her, he looked down on her. Then he bent his head and took her mouth again, and his sheer vitality—the fact he was all hard muscle and bone, and hot, heated blood—captured her.
The crinkly roughness of his haired skin chafed, abraded, reminded her how soft her own skin was, how sensitive. Reminded her how vulnerable and defenseless she was against his strength.
He shifted, reached down, caught one of her knees, and lifted her leg to his hip. Set it there, then traced back with his palm, around, until he found her slick and swollen, hot and ready.
And then he was pressing into her, hard, hot, and much larger than she’d realized. Her lungs seized. She felt her body stretching. He pressed inexorably in.
She gasped, tried to pull away from the kiss.
He didn’t let her.
Instead, he held her down, held her trapped, and slowly, slowly filled her.
Her body arched as he did, bowed, tightened, tensed against his invasion. She felt the restriction, felt the pressure build, but he didn’t stop; he pressed deeper, deeper, until the barrier simply gave, and he surged through. And on.
Until she was so full of him she could barely breathe, until she felt him throbbing high and deep inside her. She felt her body give, surrender, then accept.
Only then did he stop, hold still, the solid reality of him buried deep within her.
He drew back from the kiss, opened his eyes, looked down into hers from two inches away. Their breaths, ragged and broken, hot and heated, mingled.
“Are you all right?”
The words reached her, deep and gravelly; she considered how she felt with the hot weight of him holding her down, his muscled hardness trapping her spread and so vulnerable beneath him. With his erection buried intimately within her.
She nodded. Her lips were hungry for his; she touched them to his, tasted him, then sent her tongue exploring, savoring the unique flavor. She felt more than heard him groan, then he moved within her.
At first just a little, rocking his hips against her.
But soon that wasn’t enough, not for either of them.
What followed was a journey of discovery. She hadn’t imagined intimacy would be this consuming, this demanding, this fulfilling. This hot, this sweaty, this involving. He didn’t speak again, didn’t ask what she thought, asked for no permission as he took her. As he filled her, sank into her body, sheathed himself in her heat.
Yet throughout, again and again his eyes touched hers, checking, reassuring, encouraging. They communicated without words, and she followed him eagerly. Wantonly.
Into a landscape of passion.
It rolled on, unfolding, scene upon scene, and she realized just how much the simple act of joining could be.
How enthralling. How fascinating.
How demanding. How addictive.
How, at the very end as they tumbled through space and she felt him with her, fulfilling.
Given his expertise, she’d expected him to withdraw from her before he spilled his seed. She didn’t want that; instinct drove her to sink her nails into his flexing buttocks and hold him to her.
He looked at her; almost blindly, their eyes met. Then he closed his eyes on a groan, and let it happen, let the last powerful surge take him even deeper into her, locking them together as he spent himself within her.
She felt his warmth flood her.
Her lips curved in a satisfied smile, and she finally let go, and let oblivion take her.
Slumped across the bed, Tristan tried to make sense of what had happened.
Leonora lay across him, still intimately entwined. He felt no urge to disengage. She was half-asleep; he hoped she’d remain so until he found his mental feet.
He’d collapsed on top of her, sated literally out of his mind. A novel occurrence. Later, he’d roused enough to roll to the side, taking her with him. He’d pulled the coverlet over them to protect her cooling limbs from the chill invading the room.
It was full dark, but not that late. No one would be unduly worried by her absence, not yet. Experience suggested that despite what had seemed a journey to the stars, it would not even be six o’clock; he had time to consider where they were now, and how best to go forward.
He was too experienced not to understand that going forward usually meant understanding where one had been.
That was his problem. He was not at all sure he understood all that had just taken place.
She’d been attacked; he’d arrived in time to rescue her, and they’d come in here. All seemed straightforward to that point.
Then she’d wanted to thank him. He’d seen no reason not to let her.
It was after that that matters had become complicated.
He vaguely recalled thinking that indulging her was a perfectly sensible way of taking her mind off the attack. True enough, but her thanks, rendered in the manner she’d chosen, had both soothed and invoked a darker need of his own, a reaction to the incident, a compulsion to put his mark on her, to make her irrevocably his.
Put like that, it seemed a primitive, somewhat uncivilized response, yet he couldn’t deny that was what had driven him to strip her, to touch her, to know her intimately. He hadn’t understood enough to fight it, hadn’t seen the danger.
He glanced down at Leonora’s dark head, at her hair, tumbled and jumbled, warm against his shoulder.
He hadn’t intended this.
This, he now realized, increasingly so as his brain caught up with the ramifications, with the full extent of what all this now meant to him—this was a major complication in a plan that hadn’t been running all that smoothly to begin with.
He felt his face harden. His lips thinned. If he hadn’t been wary of waking her, he would have sworn.
It didn’t take much thinking to know that now there was only one way forward. No matter what options his strategist’s mind devised, his instinctive, deeply entrenched reaction never wavered.
She was his. Absolutely. In incontrovertible fact.
She was in danger, under threat.
There was only one option left.
Please…don’t leave me.
He hadn’t been able to resist that plea, knew he wouldn’t, even now, were she to make it again. There’d been some need so deep, so vulnerable in her eyes, it had been impossible for him to deny. Despite the upheaval it was going to cause, he couldn’t, didn’t, regret anything.
In reality, nothing had changed, only the relative timing.
What was required was a restructuring of his plan. On a significant scale, admittedly, but he was too much a tactician to waste time grumbling.
Reality seeped slowly into Leonora’s mind. She stirred, sighed, luxuriating in the warmth that surrounded her, enveloped her, engulfed her. Filled her.
Lashes fluttering, she opened her eyes, blinked. Realized what the source of all that comforting warmth was.
A blush—she prayed it was a blush—suffused her. She shifted enough to look up.
Trentham glanced down at her. A frown, rather vague, filled his eyes. “Just lie still.”
Beneath the covers, one large palm closed about her bottom and he shifted her, settled her more comfortably on him. About him.
“You’ll be sore. Just relax and let me think.”
She stared
at him, then looked down—at her hand spread on his naked chest. Relax, he said. They were naked, limbs tangled, and he was still inside her. No longer filling her as he had, but still definitely there…
She knew men were generally unaffected by their own nakedness, yet this seemed—
Dragging in a breath, she stopped thinking about it. If she did, if she started letting herself dwell on all she’d learned, all she’d experienced, stunned amazement and wonder would keep her here for hours.
And her aunts were coming to dinner.
She’d dwell on the magic later.
Lifting her head, she looked at Trentham. He was still vaguely frowning. “What are you thinking about?”
He glanced at her. “Do you know any bishops?”
“Bishops?”
“Hmm—we need a special license. I could apply to—”
She braced her hands on his chest, pushed up, and got his immediate attention. Eyes wide, she stared down at him. “Why do we need a special license?”
“Why…” He stared, bemusedly, back at her. Eventually said, “That’s the very last thing I expected you to say.”
She frowned at him. Clambered up and off him, twisting to sit in the coverlet. “Stop teasing.” She looked around. “Where are my clothes?”
Silence reigned for a heartbeat, then he said, “I’m not teasing.”
His tone had her looking, very quickly, back at him. Their eyes locked; what she saw in his set her heart thumping. “That’s not…funny.”
“I didn’t think any of this was ‘funny.’”
She sat and looked at him; her spurt of panic receded. Her brain started to function again. “I don’t expect you to marry me.”
His brows rose; she dragged in a breath. “I’m twenty-six. Past marriageable age. You don’t have to feel that because of this”—her wave encompassed the coverlet cocoon and all it contained—“you have to make any honorable sacrifice. You don’t need to feel you seduced me and so must make amends.”
“As I recall, you seduced me.”
She blushed. “Indeed. So there’s no reason you need to find a bishop.”