He couldn’t help it. He snorted with mirth. “May I help ye with it?”
Astria nodded, and he climbed out of bed and walked over to her side. Astria could immediately see that he was naked, his entire pelvic region, including his flaccid manhood, exposed in her full view. Startled, she looked up at the ceiling again as he pulled the coverlet down to her knees, took hold of her arm, and pulled her into sitting position.
God help her, this put his manhood right about eye level at this point, and she was trying desperately not to look at it. It was wagging in her face! He grasped both of her arms, pulled them straight up, and made her hold them there. Then he grabbed thesides of her shift and lifted it up, over her head, nearly lifting her off the bed in the process. She gasped in surprise as the shift was yanked off her body and then placed neatly on the stool. As she sat up in the bed, naked from the waist up and her arms covering her breasts, he pushed her down by the shoulders so she was lying down again and then climbed back into the bed, resuming his spot beside her.
“May I begin?” he asked huskily.
Nervously, Astria nodded.
“Ye’re afraid because ye dunna know what is about tae happen,” he whispered, his gaze moving over her lovely face. “Do ye feel my body up against yers?”
Astria’s heart was pounding so hard in her chest that she could hear it pulsing through her ears. But she could feel his heat against her right side, his skin warm against hers. When Armand had made love to her the one and only time, he’d kept his nightshirt on. He’d only lifted it up to his waist, so consequently, anything she felt was fabric and old-man body in her nether regions. Even when he’d penetrated her, it had been cold and uncomfortable and very, very brief. Everything about the encounter had been cold and detached.
But this…
It was all shades of hot.
Astria had never had a man this intimately close to her, and of all the things she had imagined it would be, pleasant hadn’t been among them. But his flesh was against hers and the contact between them, of his body against her right side, caused her palms to sweat. She was trembling, but not from fear.
It was a giddy and overwhelming reaction.
“I… I feel you,” she murmured.
Payne had a smile on his lips, amused and pleased by her reaction to him. Very carefully, he brought up his enormousarms and wrapped them around her slender body, hearing her gasp as he did so. He squeezed, but not too hard.
Just hard enough to feel her against him for the first time.
“Have ye ever been embraced like this?” he whispered in her right ear.
Astria was very quickly collapsing. Everything was collapsing—her fear, her resistance, her ability to think clearly.
“Not like this,” she managed to mutter.
His smile grew. Then he dipped his head and planted a tender kiss her cheek, then her shoulder. Tremors of desire coursed through Astria so strongly that she emitted what sounded like a groan.
“That is a kiss,” he murmured, kissing her shoulder again. “Has a man ever kissed ye?”
Astria groaned again, this time for real, and her eyes rolled up into her head. “God… nay,” she breathed. “Never.”
He kissed her upper arm, gently. “Good,” he said. “I’ll be the first and last man tae ever do it. Is that clear?”
She couldn’t even open her eyes, spiraling with a sensation as simple as a kiss. “It is.”
Payne believed her. He kept his left arm around her as his right arm loosened and his hand went to her belly, and he ran it carefully across her velvety skin.
“This is my touch,” he said softly. “Does it frighten ye?”
“Nay,” she whispered.
He leaned forward, burying his face in her hair and inhaling deeply. It smelled of lavender and musk.Hermusk. It was quite enticing.
“Yer husband’s touch is nothing tae be feared, lass,” he whispered. “I’m sorry that the old man never showed ye that, but I will. My touch will always be tender upon ye. Ye’ll never know it in anger, I swear it.”
Astria’s eyes were closed as he continued to caress the skin of her stomach. But then his hand moved to hers, squeezing it, before he brought her fingers up to his mouth. He kissed every finger gently before taking her index finger and suckling on it. That brought a gasp from her, and the moment she did so, he slanted his mouth over hers, kissing her with all of the arousal that he felt. He simply couldn’t help it.
His passion took flight.
His big body rolled onto her, covering her, and Astria gasped as he suckled her delicious lips. Payne’s big arms went around her, holding her against his nude flesh. When his tongue gently probed her lips, she had no idea how to respond until he managed to push it into her mouth. Then it was as if the flame of passion finally ignited and her instincts took flight.
