“What?” she asked.
He sucked in a sharp breath, cheeks fevered with sudden passion, “Iwantyou. I want to savor you. I want to pull you intothe dark and find out if you taste the way you’ve haunted my dreams every night since James stepped into that house. I am consumed by you, utterly and hopelessly. I am telling you this now because you asked. And because I am done pretending to possess control in front of you when you already know exactly what is under it.”
The east beds were dark behind her, the flower smell faint and persistent. She could feel the warmth radiating from his body. She did not step back.
He raised one hand and touched her face, his thumb slowly grazing her cheekbone.
“Annabelle,” he said. “Did you hear what I just said?”
“Yes,” she said, a shudder wracking her frame…
And Dominic’s control was shot straight to hell.
He kissed her.
His palm remained on her face, his mouth against hers with an unhurried certainty, as though he had arrived at his destination and had no intention of leaving.
When he pulled back, his eyes went to her mouth and stayed there.
“Turn around,” he said.
She turned, and his hands went to her shoulders, then to the back of her neck, just below where her hair was put up, and he pressed his mouth there, warm against her skin.
“Oh,” she moaned and gripped the back of the bench in front of her.
He pressed another kiss lower, moving patiently, and her eyes closed.
He drew her back from the bench, one hand settling at her waist, until her back met his chest. His mouth moved to her temple, then the corner of her jaw.
“I’ve been watching you all evening,” he said in her ear. His hand spread flat against her stomach. “Every man who spoke to you. Every time you laughed for them.” His mouth found the side of her neck. “Every note you played.”
“Dominic—” She moaned, and he shuddered, teeth locking as his entire body flushed hot.
“Tell me to stop.” He gritted out, desperate.
If he didn’t stop now…
But Annabelle turned her head, and he caught her mouth again, deeper now, all thoughts of stopping flying away momentarily. One hand moved to the silk of her skirt and gathered it in slow increments until the night air reached her calves, her knees, the bare skin above her stockings.
He pressed his palm flat against her thigh and held it there.
“Tell me, Annabelle.” he rasped.
Please.
“Don’t stop,” she said, and that was all he needed to hear.
He turned her gently and walked her two steps back to the garden wall. The stone was cold through her gown, a sharp shock against her sensitized skin. He looked at her once, his entire being bare before her, and then he went to his knees on the garden path.
His hands moved under the silk, a heavy, warm contrast to the night air, and he pressed his mouth to the inside of her knee. She went still against the wall, her back flat against the stone, her fingers finding his hair without her having decided to reach for it.
He pressed another kiss above the first, then higher, his breath hot against her skin.
“Let me,” he murmured, the words a low vibration against her thigh that made her shiver. “Let me have this. I’ve dreamed of nothing else.”
She was acutely, helplessly aware of every sound from the house: the violin, the voices, the entire ordinary evening proceeding ten yards away behind a pane of glass.
He reached the inside of her thigh, turning his face to press his jaw there, rough and warm. Her free hand went flat against the stone behind her, her knuckles white. He gripped her hips, anchoring her to him, and looked up through the dark.
