She made a helpless sound into his demanding mouth, and he growled in turn, deepening the kiss. Making it into something carnal and sinful. His body connected with hers as he lowered his weight onto her. She felt his rigid length through his dressinggown. He settled between her legs, and she moved instinctively to allow him there, feeling too late the remnants of her night rail give way.
The smooth fabric of his dressing gown glided along her intimate flesh, tantalizing her even as she tried to be scandalized by her lack of proper attire. It felt…good. And she wanted more of that friction, more of the pressure. She moved beneath him, arching her back, and he kissed her with increasing ardor. And it was different, so different. She had known his lips before, but now he kissed her in a way he had never kissed her previously.
It was dangerous, this new play of his mouth on hers. Gone was the attentive suitor who had swept her into a brief engagement and then a sudden wedding just before it had all fallen spectacularly apart. In his place was the rakehell, the practiced seducer. The outside world—the house party and revelers, the hurt and anguish of the last few months—ceased to matter. Instead, she was like the ember that sparked into roaring, crackling flame.
She lost her tenuous grip on control and surrendered to the pleasure. To the sweet luxury of his hands coasting over her body, one of them settling possessively on her hip, the other cupping a breast. To the torment of his mouth devouring hers, his tongue plundering, his teeth nipping.
The hand at her thigh moved, gliding toward her waiting center. His fingers skimmed over her folds, expertly finding her shameless wetness, circling the nub that was so very sensitive until her hips jumped and a low cry escaped her. Riverdale swallowed it with his kiss, feeding her his tongue.
Sybil could no longer cling to her principles, to her rage. Instead, she had the very real, solid male body of the man she’d married atop her, his hand between her legs, strumming over flesh she hadn’t realized was so deliciously responsive until now.
Her mother’s description of the marriage bed had been woefully inaccurate. Sybil had feared as much. And perhaps it had been that trepidation that had rendered her incapable of finding a lover. Certainly, it was better to believe that than to think she’d been unable to betray Riverdale for any other reason.
Especially not that he was the only man who had ever made her feel this way. The only man who could set her aflame, break her heart, make her helpless to resist him, cause her to melt at his caress…
He broke the kiss, his fingertips swirling over the bud of her sex. He had turned down the lamps, but not enough that they were enrobed in darkness. She could see the intricate shades of blue in his eyes as he lifted his head to stare down at her. A dark ring around the outer edge of his irises, then stunning pale blue within, as cold as a winter’s sky.
“I’m going to take off my dressing gown now,” he said, as if warning her.
Her heart sped into a gallop. “Is that perfectly necessary?”
She was breathless, her body equally restless. He kept up the pressure on her below, all whilst conversing as if he weren’t affected by what he was doing to her. It was madness. Torture.
“Shy, madam?” he taunted, giving her a cruel grin that only served to heighten his masculine beauty. “I shouldn’t think you would be affected, having already seen me unclothed on several occasions.”
He had her there. She could hardly protest. Sybil didn’t want the arrogant wretch to know the effect he had on her; even if he suspected, she would never willingly confirm it.
“I won’t be,” she lied. “Do what you must.”
The small smirk he gave her said he saw easily through her prevarication. But he worked at the fastening on his garment without comment, not stopping until he could shrug out of it and toss it to the side. She had a moment to drink in the sight of him.His bare chest was a wall of strength, dotted with dark hair, his shoulders sculpted, his stomach lean and flat.
And below that, she caught another glimpse of his erect staff, protruding, long, and thick. His fingers left her, and he gripped himself, guiding his massive cock to her center.
“Wait,” she gasped out, wriggling away from him.
He halted, stroking himself from base to tip, his expression frustrated, jaw rigid. “Sybil.”
She swallowed against a rush of uncertainty. Her body wanted his. Her mind, however, very much feared such a coupling was impossible. Riverdale wasimmense.
“It will never work,” she blurted. “You’re far too large.”
He laughed. “I can assure you that it will indeed work as planned.”
“Carry on with it then if you must,” she demanded. “I can only imagine you have practice aplenty with all the mistresses you’ve had.”
A muscle in Riverdale’s jaw twitched, his lips tightening. “There will be no talk of anyone else in our bed.”
Fair enough. She didn’t want to think about the endless string of lovers he had likely taken, the women he had kissed and touched. It made her heart feel as if it were about to crack and splinter into hundreds of jagged shards, and she couldn’t bear for that to happen. Not now. Not ever. She had to remain strong if she intended to get what she wanted.
Her freedom.If only the notion didn’t ring so blasted hollow.
“No one else,” she agreed.
And how easy it was, for there had never been anyone else for her. There had only ever been the Duke of Riverdale. What a ninny she was.
“Damn it,” he grumbled suddenly, frowning as he loomed over her, hand still wrapped around the part of him that was meant to go inside her.
“What’s amiss?” she hissed up at him, furious with herself for her inability to remain impervious to the devil she’d married.
