“You did not hurt me,” she denied.Not with your hands, she added silently.But I understand. I understand you. Let me in.“Perhaps you do not wish for comfort from me, my lord. But you do want something else, do you not? You want what is yours.”
His breathing grew harsher, and she felt the exact moment what she had said settled upon him, for he grew hard and thick against her inner thigh. “It is too soon,” he said. “You must be sore.”
He had tended to her with a bowl and cloth at some point in the hazy aftermath of their lovemaking earlier, washing away the blood and soothing her swollen flesh. She felt bruised but in a delicious way. Even as he murmured the denial, he rocked against her, pressing that huge, demanding staff into her skin in a crude imitation of what he would do to her next.
And she did not know what was wrong with her, or if anything was wrong with her—indeed, perhaps it was only natural to feel this way toward one’s husband—but she wanted everything he would do to her. She wanted him to give himself to her, to enter her, to lose himself inside her once more.
But still, she sensed a hesitancy in him. Perhaps she could never erase the memories haunting him or the terror dogging him, but she did know she could give him one thing he wanted.
She could give him herself.
Gentlemen like to be touched.
Freddy’s advice echoed in her mind again as her left hand abandoned his hair in favor of sliding down his well-muscled body to touch him. Nothing could have prepared her for the first sensation of him in her hand, smooth and soft and hot, yet firm and beautifully formed. How impossible it seemed to think this thick length had been within her. Little wonder she was sore. Why, if she had felt how immense this part of him was before, she would have been fearful indeed.
But now, she ached for him again, the need pulsing within her, blossoming, blotting out the lingering pain. Instinct driving her, the combination of the darkness and the wildness of him, the danger still tingling through her veins, she gripped him hard. With her other hand, she tugged on his hair, grabbing a fistful.
“Tell me what you need, Searle,” she urged. Her voice was throaty. Not her own. Indeed, she scarcely recognized herself.
“You tell me, wife,” he said darkly, increasing the pressure on her until she was sure she would lose all control. “Tell me what I need.”
A long finger sank inside her before she could even say a word. This invasion was unexpected, but it was…oh, it was so very good. He worked that finger deeper, so deep inside her she was on edge, writhing against him, wanting him to stop and yet wanting him to go on forever at the same time.
“Me,” she whispered, tugging his head down to hers, rejoicing when he allowed it. When his lips were so close to hers, she could taste him. “You need me.”
But she had fooled herself if she had believed the Marquess of Searle would allow her a victory over him. “Not all of you.” A second finger joined the first, sliding in wetly, for she was ready for him. “Just your cunny. This is all I need from you. This cunny is mine, is it not, wife?”
His fingers curled within her, finding a place that was deliriously sensitive. She cried out, arching against that knowing hand. “Yes.”
“Say it, damn you.” His order was low, guttural, as if it emerged from some dark place inside him.
She knew it was the place where his fear dwelled. The place where his tortured memories lived. She rode his hand, and she stroked him, and her body arched up instinctively to meet and welcome his.
“My cunny is yours,” she told him at last, the indecent, improper words burning her tongue. But she said them because she knew it was what he wanted to hear. And because she wanted to please him. Because she was going to heal him. She was going to make this man whole again. And she wanted him. Oh, how she wanted him.
“Yes,” he said. “Are you certain you’re not sore?”
Not too sore for what she wanted. “Certain.”
That quickly, his fingers were gone, and in their place was the thick, solid length of him sliding home. Sliding deep.
He felt so good, so right. She kissed him, and he kissed her back, their tongues tangling. He thrust in, then out, then in again. This time was different than the last. He did not hold back. She suspected it was not just because she was no longer a virgin, but because he had lost his ability to control himself.
Because he needed her, and not in this one, simple sense as he claimed. No indeed, he needed all of her, her heart, her patience, her desire to understand him.
The yearning to love another, which had waned over the years, but which she had never been able to blot out completely, rose strong. If she had to fall in love with anyone, she thought as Morgan brought her once more to the heights of pleasure and she exploded into a fine, shimmery mist of stars, why not her husband? Why not this man? Why not the Marquess of Searle?
His kiss turned harder, almost bruising. When his fingers upon her bud set her free for the second time, he lost himself simultaneously, burying himself to the hilt, his seed pouring into her as her body convulsed all around him, welcoming him, embracing him.
And she knew, in that breathless moment in the darkness, awash in sensation, her husband’s body heavy atop hers…she knew she was home. That this man, flawed and dark and dangerous and bitter and scarred, was hers in the very same way she was his.
No realization had ever been more beautiful, nor more welcomed.
Yes, she was home.
The Marquess of Searle was hers.
*
