He kissed the soft swell of her breast. “Would you tell him? Would you tell him that you have chosen me, and would you walk out those doors framed with gold and never return to this palace?”
She did not hesitate. “Yes.”
“I will do everything I can to provide for you, to protect you.” He swirled his tongue around her nipple. “But you must know that I am not a wealthy man, Tilly.”
Her back bowed from the bed, her fingernails scoring a path of fire down his back. He sucked the stiff peak into his mouth, earning a moan from her. The time for words was done for now. He had her promise, and he was determined to do everything in his power to do right by her.
“I do not need wealth,” she murmured, threading her fingers through his hair as he kissed a path down the velvet softness of her belly. “All I require is you. And I…oh.”
His tongue was on her clitoris now, long, steady licks designed to drive her wild. Then lower, dipping into her cunny where she was all but dripping for him. He sank his tongue deep, staking his claim where he would soon sink his cock. She was his, this woman, and as he had promised that day in the library, he meant to do everything in his power to break her free.
There were options for them.
Divorce had always been the best one.
Longleigh would not smile upon his duchess living in sin with another man, particularly when that man was his own bastard son whom he refused to acknowledge. There would be a certain vengeance in that, if Adrian were honest with himself, but that was not the reason why he wanted to take Tilly with him.
It was because she was rare and wonderful, and she was the cement for all the jagged pieces of him he had thought never to fit back together. Because he loved her, because she was a fire in his blood, a storm in his heart. Because there would never be another Tilly.
He licked into her gently, strumming over her pearl with his fingers as he fucked her with his tongue. She urged him on, her hips thrusting, seeking, and he was surrounded by her. Those milky thighs, the musk of her excitement in his nose, the taste of her sweet and delicious. He could never get enough. He licked her until she shuddered and cried out, and then he licked her some more, tending to her with little bites on her swollen bud and long, slow sucks as he buried his fingers to the hilt in her warm, wet recesses. She came a second time, moaning and arching, her fingers tightening on his hair in painful pleasure.
Still not enough. He wanted to claim her in every way. To brand every part of her flesh with his lips and tongue. He kissed her inner thighs, the hollows at the backs of her knees. Down her calves to her ankles, the regal arches of her feet, then up over her ankles and shins.
“Please.” She writhed beneath him.
Yes. God yes.
Adrian loved her surrender, the way she embraced her sensuality. Making love with her was not an appeasing of the ache inside him. Each time with her was a new revelation, as if he was seeing inside himself. Seeing inside her, too. How well they blended. How incredible that he could have found her, after years of emptiness, the one woman he should not want.
But he wanted her anyway.
He loved her anyway.
Adrian kissed her hip bone. “Beg me, Tilly. Beg me to make love to you.”
He wanted to build this moment, heighten both their desires. Wanted the night to be unforgettable, for there to be no doubts between them. This was the rawest, most brutal honesty he could give her. All he could give her, for now—himself, his body, his heart.
“I want you inside me,” she said. “Now.”
Her attempt at pleading was more a command. One he would happily obey.
He rose over her, guiding himself to her entrance. In one thrust, he was to the hilt inside her wet, tight heat. He sealed his mouth over hers, kissing her, showing her with his mouth and body what his words could not possibly convey.
I love you desperately.
I will love you always.
You are mine.
And she had chosen him.
He would not disappoint her. He would fight for her. Longleigh would have no choice but to accept that Tilly wanted her freedom, and that they were going to be married. Nothing could divide them.
He began a driving rhythm designed to make them both lose control. Hard and fast.
Mine.
Deep and slick.
