She frowned at the mention of his mother, her mind turning to that horrible scene in the foyer once more. She’d never seen a parent so cruel to their own child. She had to wonder what had caused it.
He smiled slightly, but the expression was laced with sadness. “Please don’t ask me about her,” he whispered. “Not now.”
She shook her head slowly. “I won’t. Right now I want this…”
She trailed off as she moved to him, cupping his cheeks as she leaned up into him and pressed her lips to his. His arms came around her, pulling her up tightly against his chest. She melted at the warmth of him drawing her closer. Drawing her in, making her safe and whole.
He angled his head, slanting his mouth against hers, driving his tongue inside, tasting her and emptying her mind of every thought except for getting him into that bed.
She dropped her hands to his jacket and swiftly unfastened it. When he shrugged it off, she smiled, for the expression of pain that always accompanied the action was far weaker. He was healing and that made her heart soar.
But it was her body that took over when he slid his hands into her hair, his fingers bunching against her scalp as he threaded down the bun she had hurriedly made that morning. Hairpins scattered around their feet and she shivered at the intimate touch that was so innocent and so wicked all at once.
“I love your hair,” he murmured, pressing his face into the locks. “I love the look and the smell, I love how it feels on my skin. Like silk.”
She blushed and caught his hand, leading him back across the impossibly huge room toward the even more impossibly big bed on the back wall. He smiled, indulging her lead in this moment, though she saw in his eyes that he had no intention of letting her control continue.
She looked forward to the moment when he stole it from her at last.
As they reached the bed, he began to unbutton her gown. He did it slowly, holding her gaze as he looped each button through its hole and then gently parted the coarse fabric of her plain gown. His fingers brushed her collarbone, her chest, as he did so and she couldn’t hold back a small sigh of pleasure at the feel of skin on skin.
It had only been one night apart, but it had felt like an eternity. Andthiswas coming home.
He pushed the dress from her shoulders and down her arms, then stood back and looked at her. His eyes were wide, like he’d never seen her like this before. She blushed beneath the attention, turning her face away so that he wouldn’t see how much his regard moved her. Changed her. Made her want more than would ever be possible for her in this life.
“I am forever struck by you,” he said softly as he hooked his thumbs through the drooping fabric of her gown and pushed it away, leaving her in only her chemise. “Struck by how perfect you are in every way.”
She shook her head. “Not perfect, I assure you.”
“There is nothing but perfection here, Diana,” he whispered, cupping her chin and tilting her face toward his. His eyes were dark and intense, dilated with desire, but also focused in that heavy expression that he only had when he was focusing on something he wanted.
Today it was her.
She lifted on her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his. Words fell away then. His slow seduction ended and the kiss deepened with a sudden urgency and intensity. Want took over, need ruled, and she shivered as he stripped away her underthings with much more quickness and purpose than he had used on her gown.
“Get in my bed,” he ordered, suddenly the lord of the manor, suddenly the duke.
There was no denying that order, for itwasan order, not a request. She took her place on his pillows and watched through a hooded gaze as he undressed himself. It took longer than she thought he wanted it to, but he did it on his own and finally stood before her naked.
She stared as she always did. He was a specimen, that was something no one could deny. From his broad shoulders, marred by that terrible, misshapen, raised scar that was slowly healing, to his narrow hips to his strong thighs, scarred again by the horrors he’d been through. He was as perfect as he’d claimed she was. Perfect and delectable.
She wanted to taste him.
He smiled as she crooked her finger and beckoned him over. He took a place beside her and she immediately rolled over to cover him. He arched a brow. “You think you can control this?” he teased.
She reached between them and stroked his already hard cock. “I know I can.”
He shut his eyes and arched against her as she continued to stroke him. Over and over, gentle but firm. And as she did so, she slid down his length until she could lower her mouth and take him inside.
His eyes flew open and she met his wild gaze without hesitation as she sucked him.
“Diana,” he gasped, his hands coming down to her. She thought he might push her away, but as she took him deeper his fingers tangled in her hair instead and he let out a low, long curse.
She smiled against him and began to pump her mouth slowly, reveling in the hardness of his cock against her tongue. In the taste of him, the smell of him. The way his hips flexed against her, pushing himself farther into her throat. She added her hand to the torment, stroking the part of him she could not manage with her mouth as she began to establish a rhythm that would bring him to completion.
She wanted that. To taste that moment when she stole his control and claimed him in a way that could not be changed or forgotten, even when they were no longer together. She moved toward it with an increasing drive and felt him start to tense with the movements of her hand and mouth. His legs stiffened beneath her, his feet flexing as she sped up, rolling her tongue around his girth with every downward stroke.
He was close to release and she found herself grinding against the bed as she took him, her body set on fire by the power he was allowing her. By the feel of pleasuring him. By the taste of his body as he got closer and closer to completion.
