Page 470 of Wicked Highland Heroes

He rose and shucked his shirt and trousers, then knelt on the bed beside her again. Her gaze fixed on his engorged cock and her mouth parted in a silent gasp. Nicholas didn’t bother denying the satisfaction her response elicited in him. She wanted him. No other man mattered.

She shifted and Nick froze when she reached out a hand and tentatively touched him. Sight of her slim fingers, pale against the darker skin of his rod, sent the blood pumping through him with a madness he feared would shove aside any noble notions he harbored of making gentle love to her. He wanted to drive into her until she exploded around him.

He intended to shove her hand away. Instead, he watched as she brushed her fingertips along his rigid cock. Lust tightened his bollocks in pleasurable pain as she slowly wrap her fingers around him. When her grip tightened, he thrust in her grasp. His member glided upward until her fingers encircled him at the base and her palm edge bumped against his bollocks. Pleasure streaked through him, but he eased downward, not stopping until the crown disappeared into her fist. She squeezed, clearly thinking she would lose her grasp, and he jerked.

Her eyes flew to his face. “I hurt you.”

Nick gave a hoarse laugh. “The most pleasant of pain. Please, do no’ stop.”

Her brow furrowed in uncertainty, but she shifted her gaze to his cock and he held his breath as she slid her hand downward until her palm edge once again bumped his bollocks, pulling the skin so tight he feared he would spew his seed on her hand. This was not how he wanted her to remember the first time she brought him to climax. But he couldn’t pull away until she had once more slid her hand upward and squeezed the moist tip of his cock. He would never grow tired of this. With a slow release of breath, he grasped her hand and pulled free.

“You don’t like that?” she asked.

“I like it too much,” he said. “But that would please only me.”

Gently, he pulled her dress downward. She lifted her hips and he tugged the dress down her legs and dropped it, his gaze fixed on the light curls that hid her secrets. Heart pounding, he came down on her, covering her mouth with his. She entwined her arms around his neck and held on as if she would never let him go. For an instant, he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t believe she was at last in his arms as he’d always imagined. This was how it was supposed to be between them.

Nicholas eased her legs apart and nudged inside. His heart pounded in his ears. He couldn’t think. All that mattered was her, and being inside her. In one mighty thrust, he drove hilt deep. Her cry ripped through the haze, and he stilled, the truth crashing down on him like carriage plummeting down a ravine.

“Josephine?”

She lay motionless beneath him.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

Still no answer.

He lifted up on his elbows and looked down at her. “Where were you tonight?”

She hesitated, and for an instant he wondered what else she could possibly be hiding, then she said, “I went to the chapel to pray.”

Nicholas stared, startled by the admission and the forlorn note in her voice. Had he really driven her to such depths of unhappiness? Guilt crashed down around him. He’d thought she had betrayed him with another man, a true lover. Instead, she had been on her knees seeking answers. Or had she been seeking comfort? Nick closed his eyes. What a fool he was.

“I’m sorry, Jo.”

“Sorry?”

He opened his eyes. She stared up at him, brow creased in uncertainty. She shifted beneath him and a jolt of pleasure reminded him that he hadn’t finished what he’d started.

“I would have been so much gentler,” he murmured.

“I am all right. Is that everything?”

He gave a strangled laugh. “Not by half.” Carefully, he pulled back, then thrust gently.

“Oh,” Jo murmured.

“Oh, indeed,” he agreed.

Nicholas began a slow rhythm, and when she wound her arms around his back, he prayed the questions that had driven her to the chapel were forgotten. She slid her hands down his back and over his buttocks, then squeezed the hard muscle. A jolt of pleasure centered on his cock. Jo soon began meeting his thrusts with a lift of her hips and he strained to keep a steady rhythm until her breath came in short pants.

To his satisfaction, she lifted one leg and angled her hips slightly to the left to give him better access. He increased his speed, gritting his teeth against the intense need to drive so deep he touched her womb with his climax. He became aware of his own heavy breathing sawing in and out of his chest, and nearly exploded. Then, thankfully, he heard her cry of release as her fingers dug into the flesh of his buttocks. At last, he gave in to his climax in one great spasm that shook his body with a shudder unlike any he’d ever experienced.