He released the first breast and turned to the other, tugging with his tongue as his thumb circled the wet flesh on the other side. She found her hips lifting, pressing up against his thigh with every drag and pull as she arched her back and chased the need that throbbed relentlessly through her.
Val shifted to kneel between her legs and then licked a long, sultry line through the valley of her breasts and down to her quivering belly button, raising his head only to murmur, “Lift for me.”
She didn’t hesitate to lift her hips as he wanted, and he slowly pulled her breeches down her legs, pausing to tug off her boots and then strip her completely, until she lay spread out in front of him, completely naked.
It didn’t occur to her to try and hide herself in any way. Not with Val looking at her as if she was his first sight of land after a year at sea.
He let out a long groan as he ran his rough hands up the insides of her legs, spreading her open, letting his thumbs linger on the tender flesh where her thigh met her body, his breath scalding over her aching folds, and she let her head drop back and closed her eyes. It wasn’t a dream. It was unbelievably, deliciously, real.
The first long lap of his tongue drove the air from her body in a shuddering whimper. Her thighs trembled as he held them open, tormenting her with circling flicks of his tongue on either side of her clit and through her folds again and again until she was completely mindless, her entire being focused on the overwhelming sensations he was building in her.
Just when she almost couldn’t bear it anymore, his hands left her thighs, one moving to hold her open as a big finger pushed inside her. He entered her in tiny increments, each timed with a swirl of his searing tongue around her clit, as she lifted her hips and tried to force him deeper, her hands fisting in the blankets beneath her.
He hummed against her, adding vibration to the wet heat, and slid his finger in a slow glide of penetration, in and out of her body, circling her entrance and then penetrating once more.
Her breath heaved in rough pants as she pushed against him, urgently seeking more as he took her higher and higher. And then, in time with his ravishing hand, he sucked her clit between his lips, and she exploded, whimpering and clenching as her body pulsed and trembled in a rush of ecstasy that she could never have imagined.
He stayed with her, holding her through her tremors and fluttering spasms until she lay flushed and melting beneath him. Then he moved up the bedroll and onto his side next to her. He pulled her into his arms, whispering reassurances about how beautiful she was and how much he adored her. How much he loved seeing her lose herself. How he would never let her go.
She cuddled into him, one leg thrown over his hip, nuzzling her face into his throat and dropping small, sleepy kisses on his salty skin. Relaxed and languid and floating. Half in a dream.
Val bent one elbow and rested his head in his hand as he tenderly pushed a lock of hair out of her face with his other hand. He was looking down at her with such warmth and something so utterly possessive, that her heart fluttered.
His usual deep furrow between his brows was smoothed away, and a wave of such elation filled her that she couldn’t help her throaty chuckle.
He grinned back, eyes wrinkling at the sides with the first true smile he’d given in so long that she almost wept. And she knew that she would fight to the end of her days to be worthy of it.
Chapter Twelve
She looked like a dream.Golden hair falling around them, the deep flush that had spread over her creamy skin just starting to fade, her eyes, green as deep pools, shining and filled with love as she looked up at him.
If it weren’t for how her hand rested on the harsh reminders of his imprisonment, marked across his abdomen forever, he would have been certain it was, in fact, a dream.
That, and the fact that her leg now rested over his breeches, against the part of his body that was aching and weeping for relief he wasn’t going to get.
Val trailed his fingers down her side, enjoying the shiver that followed his touch and the way her nose wrinkled as she watched him. There was no way he could hide how hard he was.
He groaned, closing his eyes as he held on to his control when she shifted her weight, rolling him fully onto his back and rubbing that slim leg against his rigid length. His breath caught, and she gave a low, pleased chuckle at the sound.
He opened his eyes as she lifted herself, propping her elbow so that she could balance her chin in one palm, mirroring the way he had looked down on her, and trailed her free hand down his belly, seeming not to notice the hard ridges and reddened weals of the scars she passed over.
He stretched up to kiss her softly on her mouth, losing himself in the sweetness of her kisses, relieved and thankful that she had accepted his scars so easily. Not because he was bothered by how it looked, but because he realized now that she felt responsible, and he never wanted that guilt between them. Never again.
“Um….” Her voice was soft as she toyed with the trail of hair below his belly, tugging with soft fingers just at the waistband of his breeches, and he groaned again as he captured her hand and lifted it to his mouth to press sultry kisses against each of her fingers before lowering it back to his chest, encased inside his own much bigger, rougher hand.
She looked down at him, frowning and biting her lip. “Don’t you want…?”
He chuckled but didn’t release her hand. “Yes, I do want. I always want you.”
“Then why are you holding my hand?” she demanded quietly, not quite meeting his eyes.
There was only one possible answer. He couldn’t bear for her to think that anything Ballanor had said to her had even the slightest degree of truth to it. And he knew just how easily she could be hurt.
He looked into her eyes and tried to show her that he meant what he said. “Because I love you.”
She frowned harder, and he smiled as he reached up to run his thumb down the furrows, wishing he could wipe them away. “I want you, Alanna. So much that I dream it every night. And most of the day. But I also want it to be perfect, not when you’re tired and vulnerable.”
She blinked at him, getting ready to argue, but he knew he was right, and he cut her off with another soft kiss. “Lanni, sweetheart, we have plenty of time. Please let me love you how you deserve. Give me this.”
