Page 103 of Ricardo

But I don't let up on the kiss. I deepen it. I pour more desire into it. Enough for both of us for a moment if that's what she needs. Until I feel her relax just a little.

Until her fingers loosen and fall away from the material and wrap around my neck.

Still, I don't pull the dress from her. I slide my hands around her waist, pulling her closer until her body is flush with mine, and I kiss her like I could spend hours doing just this.

I let my tongue explore her mouth. I let my hands drift up and down her back, tracing circles on her skin with the tip of my finger. Soft, lazy circles. And it's the laziness that is making her tremble. The casual, unhurried way I am touching her, as if I have all the time in the world.

I let her get used to the feeling of being touched by someone with no ulterior motive.

Someone with no agenda other than her pleasure.

Eventually, one of her hands leaves my neck and drifts down my chest, her fingers splaying wide over my heart as if to feel it beating against her palm.

It’s a trusting gesture.

It is the one I have been waiting for.

I take my lips from hers. She makes a soft, mewling protest that I answer with a low murmur of my own as I kiss my way down her jaw to her earlobe, which I take gently between my teeth and suck.

She arches against me, a soft moan escaping her lips.

"You are exquisite," I murmur, my lips now trailing along her jaw.

A full-body shudder goes through her. I can feel it from her thighs all the way to her breasts, which are now pressed firmly against my chest.

"Every single inch of you."

I am making love to her with my words as much as my hands, and she is responding to both with a raw, honest passion that is undoing me.

"Tell me," I breathe, my lips now on the sensitive skin of her throat, right over her pulse point. "Tell me what you're thinking."

"I-I'm not..." she stammers.

"Good," I say, and then I bite her gently.

She cries out, her nails digging into my shoulders.

"I want you to feel," I say, my tongue soothing the bite. "Just feel.”

Her hands move from my shoulders, sliding down my chest, her fingers tracing the lines of my abdomen. My muscles jump and clench under her touch.

"Like that," I say, my voice hoarse. "Just like that."

Slowly, I move my hands to the front of her dress. I don't pull it away. I simply let my fingers rest against the fabric, right above her navel.

Her breath catches.

"Is this okay?" I ask, my lips still against her throat.

She nods, a quick, jerky motion.

"Words, cuore mio," I murmur. "I want you to use your words."

"Yes," she breathes. "Yes, it's okay."

Only then do I gently peel the fabric away from her body, revealing inch by agonizing inch of her creamy soft skin. She is trembling, but this time, it's not from fear. Not entirely anyway. This is the shudder of a body coming alive under a lover's hands.

I stop when the dress is bunched around her hips.