He wouldn’t let her. He bounced on the bed beside her. “Come along, love, the day is marching on.”
Love?
She opened one sleep-crusted eye in surprise. He was fully clothed, boots, jacket, and all. He even wore a dashingly knotted neck cloth.
He didn’t gaze at her how she’d imagined a lover would. This was not a moment of soul-wrenching fervor. No, he looked at her as if he was impatient for her to start moving, albeit with a smile on his face.
“I’m ready to eat,” he prodded, playfully walking the line of her shoulder with two fingers. She reacted to the tickle. “Wake up, Cass-an-dra,” he cooed. “The day is passing.”
She doubted his words and kept her eyes closed tight. In her dreams, when she received a declaration of love—a meaningful one, she corrected—she had always imagined herself in a lovely gown with rosettes and lace. She’d look absolutely perfect when he declared himself to her.
Instead, she smelled of her own body and of him and sex. Her hair probably looked as if she had been in a windstorm. It didn’t matter. She never appeared her best first thing in the morning, especially when she’d been sleeping hard.
He could not possibly find her attractive, and for that reason alone, it was best she stayed right where she was.
As if giving a lie to her thoughts, Soren whispered close to her ear, “You stay in that bed much longer looking as delectable as you are, you might be my breakfast.”
That brought her awake. She sat up, holding the sheet to cover her breasts and pushed the mass of her hair back. Why, there were grainy bits of sleep in her lashes. “Delectable?”
His smile turned knowing. “Deliciously so.”
“Soren, I look a fright.”
He raised himself up and kissed her. Whatever protests she might have offered evaporated. They knew how to kiss very well now. Their practice had perfected it.
And then he broke the kiss off. “You could use some tooth powder,” he murmured, the twinkle of jest in his eye.
Her response was to grab him by both ears and kiss him again. And he laughingly let her wrestle him to the bed, where their kisses began to take on heat.
“To the devil with breakfast,” he whispered in her ear, his hand going to her breast.
Cassandra derived great pleasure for pickingthatmoment to hop out of the other side of the bed. “I’m so sorry. I must use tooth powder,” she said airily, going to the washbasin and picking out her brush. The tooth powder was already sitting there. She was happy that Soren was a man who valued cleanliness—
His hands cupped her breasts. His body pressed against her as he nibbled that spot just below her ear that always weakened her resolve. “Your teeth are fine.”
She put the brush in her mouth and made a garbled sound.
His lips curled into a smile against her skin. His hand dipped lower down her belly to more responsive places. “I don’t need you to talk, Cass. I just need this.” His fingers slid intimately between her thighs and she forgot about her teeth. She wiped her mouth with a linen towel.
He was unbuttoning his breeches. He bent her forward and entered her. Her legs went weak from the pleasure. His hand around her waist held her up or else she would have fallen to her knees.
Who would have imagined this? She could barely breathe. She tried to talk but all she could whisper was “Please, Soren, more.”
And he gave her what she wanted. He always did.
The moment was heightened by glimpses of their reflections in the small looking glass over the basin. Her face was flushed. His was a study of concentration as if he offered all.
They both almost collapsed at the completion.
When she could find her voice, she admitted, “You’ve turned me wanton.”
“I’m a blessed man.” He sounded as if he’d been running a great distance.
Facing him, her hand went to his hard, flat belly, and she lightly rubbed the skin beneath his shirt. He kissed her forehead, her nose.
“We’ll have differences, Cass. That is the way of things, but as long as I can reach for you and you reach for me, there is nothing we can’t weather together.”
She thought of the jewels she’d kept hidden, and the intrusion of his first wife.
