He wanted to shout with joy. Instead he cupped her cheeks with exquisite tenderness, fingers moving over her face, into her hair, down her neck. He would never get enough of touching her.
“You can’t imagine what you do to me.”
“I know what you do to me,” she said softly, watching him. “Is it the same?”
The sound he made was half groan, half laugh. “God, I hope so.”
And he kissed her, his tongue parting her lips to plunge inside, his chest settling over hers. When she lifted her arms to wrap around him, he caught them, spreading them out wide, twining his fingers with hers to hold them there. She couldn’t move, but she could feel, and what she felt was his chest moving across her nipples, back and forth, electrifying the hard little nubs with just the barest sensual touch.
Next he lowered himself to take one sensitive breast into his mouth, gently suckling, or slowly circling his tongue around it. But he wouldn’t release her hands, and she felt she would go mad with the need to hold him, caress him.
The moan came from deep in her throat. He paused, grinning up at her.
“You’re a devil,” she told him, seeing his wicked delight.
“I know.” And he licked at her other nipple. “Don’t you like it?”
“Don’t I like it?” she repeated, as if she had never heard such a ridiculous question. “What I’d like is to be touching you as well. Will you let go?”
“No.”
“No?”
“Later you can touch me to your heart’s content. Right now I don’t think I could bear it.”
“Oh.” She sighed. “Well, as to that, I canna bear much more either.”
He buried his head between her breasts, groaning. “Sweetheart, if you don’t hush, you’ll have me behaving like an inexperienced boy.”
Roslynn chuckled, and the throaty sound was Anthony’s undoing. He whipped off his trousers but fortunately recalled himself before literally pouncing on her. There were still her stockings and shoes to remove, and he saw to them in quick order. Desire was riding him hard now, his previous unhurried pace at an end.
It was the dirk falling out of her shoe that returned a measure of control to him. He grinned inwardly, amazed. She was full of surprises, his little Scot. Marriage to her would be not only extremely pleasurable but interesting as well, and he was suddenly looking forward to it, all previous doubts forgotten.
He hefted the dagger in his hand. “Do you actually know how to use this?”
“Aye, and I did when one of Geordie’s hirelings tried to snatch me off the street.”
Anthony tossed the dirk aside, his smile meant to reassure her. “That’s one worry you won’t have after tonight, sweetheart.”
Roslynn had her doubts about that but kept them to herself. Nothing was settled. He still wasn’t the type of man she could enter into a marriage with, no matter how much she wished it were otherwise. He was a lover, and as such she could readily accept him. What did she need with her virginity anyway, since recent events assured her that her marriage,when it came about, would now be no more than a business arrangement?
But tomorrow’s decisions were a long way off, and Anthony’s hands were gliding up her legs, parting them, and making it impossible for her to think of anything else. He bent to kiss the inside of her thigh as he moved up as well, her hip, dipped his tongue into her belly button. Hot flames curled her toes, made her squirm. She clasped his head, pulling on him, but he still stopped to pay homage to her breasts again, lathing each sensitized peak until she was mindless with wanting. Her back arched, molding her belly to his chest, demanding the contact. It wasn’t enough. She didn’t know exactly what was needed but understood instinctively there had to be some purpose to the fires ravaging her senses.
She pulled on him frantically now, but he was unmovable, fully in control. Not until he was ready did he slide up a little more, assaulting her neck with lips that were now scorching, moving toward her ear. When his tongue slipped inside, the jolt was so powerful her body bucked, nearly dislodging him, and then settled into a delicious trembling that made her want to curl into him.
Her loins were aching, an inferno of moist heat, and when she felt something touching there for the first time, her body instinctively closed around it, hungering for the pressure in that burning region. And it managed to fill her, a glorious, welcoming fullness that she pushed against, locking her legs around him so she wouldn’t lose it, finally feeling she had gained a measure of control. She wouldn’t let go, and the pressure built in her, grew, until it seemed to pop, opening a new channel of feelingdeep inside her that brought a certain relief of the tension, but not enough relief to last.
He was kissing her again, deeply, with a fierce hunger that matched her own, his arms locked on both sides of her like iron bars, his fingers threaded in her hair, holding her, controlling her. And his body was moving against her with a kind of urgency that she responded to, felt also, as the tension grew again, pulsed, and then finally exploded into blissful oblivion.
Moments later Anthony collapsed on her, his own climax draining him so completely that for a while he was too weak to even lift his head. Never had he experienced anything like it, and he was about to tell her so when he realized she was out cold. Whether she had fallen into exhausted slumber or had fainted, he didn’t know. He smiled, though, smoothing back the hair from her cheeks, inordinately pleased with himself and her.
He had the consuming urge to wake her, to start all over again, but he tamped it down, recalling the barrier he had felt that marked her a virgin. Reggie had said she was. Roslynn’s passionate responses disclaimed it. The truth filled him with an inexplicable pleasure. And although she hadn’t even seemed to notice the breach of her maidenhead, the loss demanded recovery. There was the morning. There was the rest of his life.
He shook his head, bemused. When had he become so bloody chivalrous?
Carefully he left the bed, drawing the covers up over her. Her languorous stretch and sigh made him smile. God, she was beautiful, and so alluring she made a man ache with wanting to know every inch of her. He promised himself he would. But for themoment, he donned his robe, gathered up her clothes, and quietly left the room. There was her driver to dismiss, arrangements to be made—the lady wasn’t going anywhere.
Chapter Nineteen
