His eyes widened at the gesture, and she felt him throb inside her again. Another demonstration of this strange, wonderful new intimacy.
“I want you to show me what pleasure means,” she whispered. “I want you, Sebastian.”
He moved, withdrawing, then thrusting back in, and the friction almost made her cry out. As it was, she moaned, arching her back against his chest. Her nipples were sensitive, and he bentto take one in his mouth. At the flick of his hot tongue—and the reminder of what he had already done—she shuddered.
“I want you to climax while I’m inside you,” he growled. “And if you feel you cannot from this alone, tell me, and I will help.”
“Help in what manner?”
He pushed up, bending her legs back over her torso as he placed a thumb against the sensitive bundle of nerves at her core. “Like this.”
Oh, shelikedthis. She had liked the way he pressed into her, but she enjoyed this too, looking up at the face and body of the man she had come to adore. How strange it was. Howdelightful.
And he could look down across her, the wife whom he had now taken to bed, and see all. She was fully bared to him.
She wondered if he were to look through her chest, if he would see her beating heart, offered to him.
“This,” she whispered, “I want this.”
“This it is.” He rolled his hips in a fluid motion that made her see stars—although perhaps that was the busy work of his hand. He touched her deliberately, intentionally, bringing her closer to the peak with every circle he drew.
Until finally, the inevitability came to a head, and her climax crashed over her, a slow rolling wave that built and built before it finally erupted. Rather than an explosion, it was a continuation, a heightening of the pleasure he had already caused.
And this time, when she squeezed, he was inside her, milking her pleasure for all he could receive.
His hands were on her face, in her hair, on her breasts—everywhere—and he was telling her that she was beautiful, that he loved seeing her in his bed, that he would never regret bringing her home so long as she came like this for him.
And she was on a sea of stars, drifting through the heavens, her bliss so certain and monumental that even when his own pleasure overtook him, she could barely gather herself to hold him in her arms and kiss him sweetly as he growled her name and thrust inside her so decisively, he almost breached that sweet place of pain once more.
She found she did not dislike the prospect of pain. Not when it came with the heavy, deep ache of pleasure.
He bent his head and kissed her, and she felt absurdlyhappy.
Sebastian knew, as she lay slumbering in his arms, that he ought to have told her about his plan to send her away once she conceived. She had looked at him as though he were herfuture, and that could not be the case. No matter what fondness he might have developed for her, he would never love her, and never be capable of giving her what she wanted.
Or really, what sheneeded. She was a woman who desired love above all things, and the one thing he could never give her was his heart.
Still, a lot might change between now and conceiving. He knew that some women took some time to do so, and it might be that the rose-colored spectacles fell from her eyes before then, and she sought a way to be free of him.
She stirred, turning against him and nuzzling her nose against his shoulder in her sleep. For a second, he brushed her hair from her face and wondered what their life would be like if he allowed her to stay. Could they continue in this? This was close to happiness as he had ever known in recent years, and he felt sated for the first time, in truth, since Catherine had died.
Perhaps before.
Was keeping her here so very bad?
She rolled over, taking the sheets with her, and he stared at the tangle of hair on the pillows for a long moment, though sleep called to him.
Yes, that would be bad.
He picked her up and carried her through to her bedchamber, depositing her gently on her bed, where she would sleep for the remainder of her time in his home. Otherwise, it might get too difficult to separate what he wanted from what he needed—and what he needed was to be alone.
Even so, he kissed her forehead tenderly before he left the room.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The next few days settled into a serene routine.
Sebastian would lie with her at night, and once she fell asleep, he would carry her back to her own bed, so when she woke, it would be alone. Although at first this made her sad, he gave her so little else to complain about—it felt almost petty to take offense. On the surface, everything seemed perfect, and Aurelia felt as though she had nothing in the world left to wish for.
