They had never made love in this position before, but Vivi couldn’t deny that she savored the sense of power it gave her. Power over him, over pleasure, both shared and her own. She grasped him, guiding him to her entrance, letting out a low moan of pleasure as the tip of him probed her.
“Court,” she moaned his name, beyond words, beyond anything other than feeling.
Pleasure and love were one, and she was happily burning in the flames.
“More,” he said.
And she understood, because she needed that too. She sank down on him, taking his cock deep. The new angle was exquisite.
“Hell yes,” he praised, his hands on her waist in a possessive hold she adored. “Now take me, sweetheart. Fuck me.”
Tentatively, she moved, rising until he had almost slid free of her body and then sinking down hard to take him deep again. He helped set the pace, meeting her thrust for thrust, leaning up to take one of her nipples in his mouth. A flood of wetness rushed through her as she ground down on his cock and he sucked.
“You’re perfect, Vivi,” he said. “Made just for me.”
She felt as if she were in that moment, her body so deliciously joined with his, the two of them seeking release together in unison. When he took her other nipple in his mouth, she rocked harder, impaling herself on his cock with greater determination. Once again, she was close. Everything inside her tightened to a beautiful, wild state of near-bliss.
His teeth grazed the peak of her breast, and his fingers found her swollen clitoris, rubbing persistent, delicious circles until it was too much. She cried out, coming hard, her release roaring through her as she continued to ride him, determined to make him lose control too.
“I’m going to come,” he choked out, his words somehow heightening her body’s reaction.
She wanted him to spend, to give her everything. Vivi clenched on his cock in response, her body knowing what it needed before her mind recognized it. Court stiffened beneath her, and she knew the hot spurt of his seed filling her up, the sensation sending a quivering series of miniature spasms through her.
Vivi collapsed atop him. He sifted a hand through her hair, stroking her back, his cock still throbbing inside her. Reverently, she kissed his chest just over his swiftly pounding heart, vowing to herself that, despite the looming house party and the anguish of the past, she would make that heart forever hers.
CHAPTER12
“Your Grace?”
“Not now,” Vivi muttered, waving a hand in the direction of Nelson’s voice, eyes still firmly closed.
After a night spent alternately lovemaking and sleeping with her husband—with the emphasis on lovemaking—she was thoroughly exhausted. And she had no wish to open her eyes to the impossibly bright light seeping through her eyelids just now.
“Close the curtains,” she added. “It’s far too bright in here.”
“Your Grace, the curtainsareclosed,” Nelson said, her voice sounding oddly strained.
And that was when it occurred to Vivi with sudden, embarrassing clarity, the reason for her lady’s maid’s discomfort. Court was still in her bed. He had been too tired to return to his chamber the night before, and she had welcomed the comfort of his presence, not thoroughly considering the morning consequences.
Dear heavens, was he covered?
Forcing her eyes open, Vivi sat up, holding the bedclothes over her naked breasts, only to find that her rumpled bed was empty, no husband to be found. She frowned as she took in Nelson next, standing halfway across the room, looking hesitant and distressed all at once. That was also when she discovered that her lady’s maid was correct. The curtains were indeed closed. The sun pouring through the edges of them had been the source of the intrusion of light.
“It’s exceedingly bright for seven o’clock in the morning,” she observed, frowning.
“That is because it is no longer morning, Your Grace,” Nelson informed her. “Forgive me for waking you, but—”
“No longer morning?” Vivi interrupted. “What in heaven’s name do you mean?”
It couldn’t be. Vivi woke at half past six each morning as a matter of habit, always long awake before Nelson arrived at one quarter past seven. She never overslept.
“Yes, Your Grace, it is half past one in the afternoon,” Nelson said. “And the guests have begun arriving, or else I wouldn’t have deigned to intrude on your slumber. I hope you don’t mind.”
“Guests? Half past one?” Alarm seized her. “They’re here? Which guests? Oh dear heavens, Nelson. This is an utter disaster.”
“Lady Charity Manners has arrived with her aunt, Lady Louise Manners. Miss Madeline Chartrand with her sister, Miss Lucy Chartrand, have come from the train station, and there is also Lady Edith Smythe and the Marchioness of Featherstone,” Nelson told her.
All her dearest friends. That was hardly a concern. One name, however, decidedly was.
