Part 12 (2/2)

She eased herself lower, settling, and felt his c.o.c.k enter her, just barely. This was really quite nice. She could decide exactly how fast she could accept it. That would eliminate that awful dry, skewered feeling she remembered. Though dry didn't seem to be a problem at all. It might even mean she could encompa.s.s all of him if she did it slowly enough. And she could decide just how she wanted to give him his pleasure. It was a peculiar feeling-being in control during the s.e.xual act. Always before she had seemed... detached, a witness, a victim. But here he was, ceding her the direction of it. It was... equalizing.

She settled further. It felt quite satisfying to be filled. She wiggled her hips and pushed herself down. Ahhhh. That was nice. He sighed as she accepted him. And she wasn't torn at all. She pushed herself up, experimentally, and lowered. He lifted his hips to meet her. Yes, that was even better. She had all of him inside her now. His hands moved to her waist again. He lifted only when she began to raise herself. He a.s.sisted only. His hand went round to cup her b.u.t.tocks. She began to move just as the men had moved on top of her, slowly at first and then a little faster. He arched to meet her and lifted at her cue. It was effortless, really.

On a whim she stopped and just rocked a little as she sat. He groaned. She could feel his member pressing against the inside of her belly. He changed the angle just a little by s.h.i.+fting her weight, and... and the sensation inside her seemed to multiply. She tried rocking again. ”Oh!”

”Does that feel good?”

”Oh, oh, yes.” And what made it so special was that they were both feeling it. The pleasure was shared, and seemed to multiply as they pa.s.sed it back and forth between them.

It felt so good she... she thought the madness might come on again, what with her nether lips grinding against his groin and him rilling her so fully, and the tip of his shaft rubbing against the inside of her belly. And now she was raising and lowering herself faster, but he was helping her and her b.u.t.tocks were slapping against the soft mounds of his stones and the clenching muscle of his thighs and he was arching, a grimace on his face, of pleasure? Pain?

Impotence was not a problem. Gian was driven almost to madness by the sensation of Kate sliding up and down on his c.o.c.k.

And he was filled with satisfaction because he was a true man again, and he had given her a pleasure she had never known before, and he would give it to her again and again in short order, until she was sated and dazed. He lifted her as she moaned and grunted. His chest, his belly, his brain were all full to bursting with emotion.

Oh, G.o.d.Wasn't high emotion just the trigger for things around him to burst into flame?

He stilled her movement. She pressed herself down on his c.o.c.k until he gasped. Banish emotion! Maybe it was good he'd been denied o.r.g.a.s.m since he got back. Maybe he would have set fire to anyone around him at the climax. He licked his lips and tried to quiet his breathing.

She opened her eyes. They had a question in them. ”What's wrong?”

He managed a wobbly smile. ”Nothing. It's just... just that I want to pay more particular attention to your pleasure,” He lifted her off him. She knelt at his side.

Her brows knitted. ”I was having quite a bit of pleasure there. You weren't?”

She knew very well he'd had. ”Yes. Yes I was. But I'll... I'll just save myself for later.” He got up on one elbow and reached for her to draw her into his body where he could kiss her. His c.o.c.k was screaming its disappointment at him.

She stayed his hands, looking wary. ”I don't want this to be one-sided. I've only just realized how... good it is when two share sensations...” She sat back and glanced to his c.o.c.k, throbbing insistently against his belly. ”If you're worried about... about faltering, that really doesn't seem to be a problem.” She gave a roguish smile and reached for his erection.

That would be bad. He flinched away. And immediately saw the hurt in her eyes.

Her smile wavered and she turned her damaged cheek away. ”If you'd rather not...”

”G.o.d, Kate, no... it's not that.” He gathered her into his arms, though she had stiffened. She was trying to harden herself against the hurt. He swallowed. The only thing that might spare her pain was the truth. ”I... I didn't tell you everything about my condition.” He buried his head in her neck so he didn't have to look at her. Her soft scent a.s.sailed him. ”I think I started the fire in your rooms. I was angry at Elyta. My anger expressed itself in... flame. It's happened before. What if, at the climax now, I did something like that again? What if I burned you?”

”What?” Kate couldn't believe her ears. He thought he started fires with just his anger? And if he spilled his seed he might burn her? This was too wild.

”I create spontaneous combustion at times of high emotion.” His voice cracked.

She held him back from her. Even now the feel of his satin skin covering the hard muscles on his shoulders sent shrieks of sensation to her loins. She glanced to his engorged member. Even as he protested, he wanted to climax with her. He couldn't hide that. She examined his eyes. Pain, regret, determination. He believed what he said.

She didn't. No one could create flames from nothing. He was just nervous about ending a long bout of impotence. The pressure was too much... He was making excuses in order not to face it. There was no chance she'd let him give her pleasure without taking his own. That smacked of what she'd experienced with the marks so long ago. And she rather thought she'd been on the brink of some discovery when they'd stopped, some transformation that would change the rest of her life. ”How many women have you burned at... intimate moments?”

”Well, none,” he said as though that didn't matter. ”But I haven't... carried through in more than two years.”

”Oh. That's right. When you actually started fires, it occurred when you were angry.”

”Don't make fun of this. I... I started the fire when Elyta and I were struggling, and I set LaRoque's lodgings on fire when he was trying to kill me. And now that I look back on it, I started fires in Algiers, when I was fighting a war there.”

Kate suppressed a smile. The fires were all coincidence of course. Lamps overturned in struggles, coals from open fires in North Africa scattered. She'd never make him believe that. So she took another tack. ”Sounds to me like you start fires only when your life is in danger.”

She saw him cataloging the incidents, behind his eyes. ”It may be.” His eyes focused on her. ”But what if it's not?”

Now she let her smile show. ”I promise I will sing out at the first sensation of burning.”

”You don't know the danger...”

”I won't let you pleasure me if you won't join in,” Ultimatums were never fair, but really, he was being ridiculous.

A stubborn look came into his eyes. ”Are you really going to let this come between us, when you aren't certain?” His resolve flickered. ”You'll be a monk, and I...” She had to say it. ”I'll never experience what it's like to share that sensation together.”

”Don't say that.” He sat up and took her in his arms. She softened into his embrace. She'd won. She knew it if he didn't. ”Of course you will.”

”I don't think so. Don't deprive me, Gian.” It was his turn to hold her away from him. His eyes were filled and still uncertain. ”It will be well. You'll see.” She ran her hand along his jawline and he melted. He took her hand in both of his and kissed her palm.

His lips were soft. It made her almost shudder with desire. She pressed her body into his, and rubbed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s across his chest. Her hand strayed to his c.o.c.k and stroked it lightly. ”Now where were we?”

He kissed her neck, gently, just as he had caressed her palm. The brink that she was sure he had been on seemed distant now.

He'd try to hold himself back. Well, she wasn't going to let him. Her lips found his and she kissed him thoroughly. His c.o.c.k was throbbing in her hand. Satisfaction warred with desire in her. She pushed him back firmly onto the tangled bedclothes and straddled him again. Now it was he who must feel vulnerable. She took his eager c.o.c.k and tilted it up, then eased herself down over it. That made her breath come in hissing gasps. She reached around to caress his b.a.l.l.s. She raised herself and lowered. He was beginning to breathe heavily. That was good.

”Can you help me find the proper angle?” His eyes closed once before he nodded and held her bottom with both hands to adjust her. G.o.d. There it was. Sensation ramped up. She pressed her hands against his chest, thumbing his peaked nipples, to push up and lower herself. Now he was helping her again. His chest heaved. Was that a low moan? He bit his lip, but he didn't stop. She felt as though she was swelling around his erection. Each trip up and down his c.o.c.k increased her pleasure, but she kept careful track that he was coming along with her. She wouldn't let him hold back.

She knew he was near the edge when he tried to still her movement. ”No, no you don't,” she warned and pushed herself down again. She rocked against him and then thrust up. He groaned and sucked in breath. Sweat gleamed on his body in the lamplight.

He was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

She couldn't hold it back anymore. Inevitability washed over her. The world exploded a second time. This time she saved enough of herself to know she was contracting around him in rhythm to her shock waves, squeezing him, until he arched and grunted. Inside, she felt him spurting. That was familiar, though nothing else about this whole experience had been. He was trembling, his hips making small, fierce thrusts even at the maximum arch against her. It went on and on, much longer than the brief spurts she'd experienced with her former partners.

When at last he was done, they both collapsed together. He settled her in against his side. She looked up at him. ”Not a flame in sight.”

He smiled. It was the most tender expression she'd ever seen. ”Thank you for that.”

”I acted only in self-interest.” Not quite true, but near enough. ”Dear me, but you were tres puissant!” His smile grew. It looked a little smug. That was very well. If he had been that long deprived, he had a right to be satisfied with himself. Kate was satisfied with herself as well. She had done that to him. Even when he had tried to hold back.It occurred to her that in some ways he was the opposite of arrogant underneath the surface. He had been so unsure of himself tonight.

And what had happened to her? Had she tumbled over that brink at last and been transformed? She couldn't remember quite what the brink had been. Her imagination most likely. Still she had never realized such incredible sensation could be part of having a man's c.o.c.k inside you. Or maybe it was only Gian Vincenzo Urbano's c.o.c.k. She was glad she'd done it, even if it was over and done with forever. Even if he was gone when she woke. She settled in closer against him, drinking in his scent, and closed her eyes.

Chapter Eleven.

That was a disaster. Gian looked down on her where she slept in his arms. She'd hardly wakened when he'd lifted her and pulled back the covers to lay her on the sheets. Her dusky lashes swept her cheek, the one without the scar. Her black hair gleamed in the guttering candlelight. He pulled the coverlet up over her shoulders.

Two disasters were avoided. He hadn't set anything, including her, on fire. Or rather he'd set her ablaze only in the s.e.xual sense.

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