She was decadently round, all generous curves and softly luminous skin gilded by the flickering light from the flames.She made no move to cover herself, and Hal’s gaze devoured her in an instant, snagging on the thatch of dark curls at the juncture of her smooth thighs.His entire body came to attention while his mind was wiped clean of all rational thought.
“Do you know what would make me happy?”Gemma’s lovely mouth trembled, but her voice was steady.“To be in your arms tonight.”
Tonight.The word penetrated the fog of desire clouding Hal’s brain.One last night together, and then…she would leave his bed and walk into the arms of another man.
The pain of it was crippling, unthinkable—but even more impossible was the idea that he would let her walk out of his life right now, giving up this one chance to be together.
A single night.Then he’d do the noble thing, say goodbye, and send her back to the life she wanted.
His conscience kicked at him—was it right to do this, with Gemma still unaware of his true identity?—but it was easily crushed under the clamor of ravenous wanting that inhabited every limb.
Nothing good could come of telling her now, and soon she would be gone.She never needed to know.He could give her pleasure and take nothing for himself.Surely that would be alright.
Without another thought, Hal crossed the space between them and took Gemma’s lovely face in his hands to angle her mouth up for a kiss.The brush of her nakedness against his clothed front was the most erotic sensation he’d ever experienced.
Until he felt Gemma’s small, determined hands questing lower and lower down his body, searching for the hem of his shirt to slide underneath until they were skin to skin.
He broke the kiss only long enough to haul the shirt over his head and throw it on the floor.
“Take everything off,” Gemma demanded, her hands sweeping up and down his back as if she couldn’t get enough of the feel of him beneath her fingertips.
He knew how she felt.Hal rested his hands on her shoulders, then drew them down her arms and around to caress her back, the wings of her shoulder blades, the sweet, silken dip of her waist before the flare of her hips.He was dizzy, almost drunk, intoxicated by her.
But she’d said something.Right.It took a bit of coordination to remove his trousers without pulling away from her, but he managed it.They joined his shirt and the fluffy quilt he’d brought as her modesty shield on the floor, a nest soft enough to cushion them as he laid her down before the crackling fire.
One night.That was all he had.The thought swirled through Hal’s brain, paralyzing him with the abundance of choices and the lack of time to see them all through.
He wanted everything with this woman, a lifetime wouldn’t be enough—but all he had was tonight.
So he would make it count.
With meticulous attention to detail, Hal covered every inch of Gemma’s satiny skin with kisses.
Long, lush, open-mouthed kisses for the insides of her elbows and the backs of her knees; kisses with an edge of teeth for the bend of her neck, the quivering globes of her bottom; deep suckling kisses for her taut little nipples.Her breasts filled his hands, satiny smooth and heavy, perfectly round.He never wanted to stop touching her.
His mind was on fire.His body existed only to bring hers pleasure.He lost himself in the glory of her body and found himself in the sharpness of her sighs and the sweetness of her moans.
When the urgency of her cries increased, reaching a feverish pitch, he gave himself the treat he’d been saving.Nudging her thighs apart with his shoulders, he took a slow, savoring lick from her weeping center to the tight bud of passion nestled in its hood of flesh.
Her body bowed upward, so damned responsive, but Hal was ready.He clamped a steadying arm across the soft roundness of her stomach and took another lick.Silken folds parted under his tongue and the rich, heady flavor of her passion flooded his mouth.Time fell away from Hal as he dipped his head and concentrated on the tidy knot of nerves that he knew would bring Gemma to her climax.
He relished every moment of what was happening and did his best to commit it to memory.The way Gemma’s heels drummed against his back, digging in whenever he did something she especially liked.The arch of her spine, lifting off the blanket, graceful and unselfconscious as a cat stretching in a patch of sunlight.The ache of his cock against the hard wooden floor.The smell of her, the taste, briny and musky and slippery as everything got wetter and wetter until finally, she stiffened and all but tore his head away from as she convulsed with a shout.
Hal ran a hand over the wetness on his beard and felt an intense satisfaction at total odds with the rampant erection still straining for attention.
Gemma, whose head had dropped back into the blankets as she panted her way through her climax, lifted herself up on her elbows to give Hal a scorching look he knew he would have no trouble remembering for the rest of his life.
“Get up here,” she commanded, her voice raw and raspy from the volume of her cries in the midst of passion, and Hal wasted no time obeying her.He surged forward to kiss her, giving her the taste of herself on his lips.He’d been with women who didn’t like that or were embarrassed by it, but not his daring, dashing Gemma—she made ravenous noises and delved into his mouth as though she wanted to get inside him somehow.
Their bodies slotted together, her legs falling open naturally to cradle his hips, and Hal gritted his teeth against the urge to simply thrust into her.The iron bar of his prick found the damp, hot crease where her thigh joined her pelvis and he groaned like he was dying.
His hips worked, the sweet friction driving him mad.The way she lifted her legs and crossed her ankles behind his arse changed the angle of his driving motion and gave him more tightness and pressure.Sparks dazzled behind his closed eyelids.
Gemma mumbled something into his mouth, then broke away with a gasp to repeat it.
“Inside me.Now.”
Shaking his head, Hal reared back.That was the one thing he’d promised himself he would not do.He would not send her to another man needing to explain why her husband was not her first lover.
