Part 8 (2/2)

”Let me do this. If I frighten you, I'll stop. I ask only for your trust.”

”Trust is a lot.”

His eyes were serious. ”I know.”

Strangely, she believed he did.

Elias placed one elegant hand against her cheek and pressed her head onto his shoulder. For a long while she lay, slipping back into that deep well of unconditional comfort.

She'd expected something more dynamic. More...overtly l.u.s.tful. This was like being a child, except that her father had never been a man to let his motherless daughter crawl onto his knee.

Gradually uncertainty ebbed, replaced with lazy pleasure. Her blood matched the slow pace of Elias's. Her breath eased to his deep rhythm. Her eyelids fluttered down. She glided into a radiant s.p.a.ce she'd never inhabited before.

When Elias began to ma.s.sage the back of her neck, at first she barely noticed. He tilted her chin and turned her face to his-with more of that calm sureness-and she realized he'd been caressing her for a long time. The thought of protest or resistance didn't arise as he feathered a kiss across her lips.

Automatically she arched closer, even as he broke the contact, leaving her lips tingling.

He placed his hand under her chin, one thumb lazily stroking her lower lip. The touch felt like another kiss. ”Open for me, sweeting.”

She let him kiss her intimately, the way he had before. What had seemed outlandish now set her heart racing with excitement. Before tonight she'd never known the hot, salty taste of a man. Now she thought she'd starve without Elias's kisses to feed her.

At her quick response, he caught her head between his hands, tangling his fingers in her hair and holding her still for his mouth. His earlier gentleness had lured her past caution into a fiery new world where pa.s.sion ruled. In this new world, she welcomed the languid slide of his hand down her throat and lower, until his hand slipped beneath her bodice to her breast.

Marianne made a m.u.f.fled sound of shock against his lips. His touch burned like a brand through her lawn s.h.i.+ft. Painful yearning hardened her nipples. A painful yearning that ignited into stark pleasure when he sc.r.a.ped his nail over one peak.

She s.n.a.t.c.hed a shallow breath. ”That's...strange.”

”Nice strange or awful strange?”

She abandoned reticence. ”Nice strange.”

”I'm glad,” he said with another of those incandescent smiles. He kissed her and she closed her eyes, yielding to his mouth and the play of his fingers on her nipple. The onslaught of sensation was so overwhelming, she only realized that he'd unlaced the back of her gown and tugged it down when his hand closed upon her naked breast.

With shaming reluctance, she pulled away. She stared down at the white flesh overflowing her drooping bodice and tried to summon a ladylike horror. What was most horrifying was how natural it seemed to allow Elias the freedom of her body. She'd never felt so alive.

”Please, Marianne, don't stop me,” he groaned, his arm firming around her back. ”You're so d.a.m.n beautiful, it breaks my heart.”

She bit her lip, unable to look away from that large brown hand splayed over her skin. She'd never felt beautiful, but something in the wanton abandon of the sight struck her as unutterably lovely. She looked up and met eyes bright with excitement. ”You shouldn't say such things if you don't mean them.”

”On my life, I mean it,” he grated, lifting and turning her toward him so he could draw a hard rosy nipple into his mouth. His touch had been like lightning. The hot, powerful suction of his lips was...more. Marianne pressed her wrist across her mouth to m.u.f.fle her cries as every muscle tensed on a shuddering thrill.

By the time he suckled her other breast, she was squirming on his lap. A powerful pulse throbbed between her legs and she whimpered for relief. He kissed and bit at her, each caress making the madness boil and sizzle until she felt ready to explode. She clawed blindly at the black superfine of his coat.

”Elias,” she choked out. Each beat of her blood slammed through her like a cannon. He'd promised pleasure, but the power of her response terrified her.

He raised his head and let her slump back against his legs. Only his arm at her back kept her from dissolving to the floor.

”Shall I stop?” His rough tone told her how grudgingly he posed the question. She read pa.s.sion in his face, although pa.s.sion was new to her.

”No,” she said, because when she looked closely, she saw more than pa.s.sion in his eyes. Elias had vowed that she could trust him and staring into that striking, austere face, she believed it. Odd to feel so safe with a man who held her breast in his hand, his thumb teasing the nipple as if he couldn't resist pleasuring her.

Regret dulled his beautiful black eyes. His hands fell away from her. ”It's your right to deny me.”

Oh, no, he'd misunderstood her. She'd been running from him so long, using coldness to keep him at a distance. No wonder he doubted her capitulation.

Forgetting inhibitions, she pressed closer, relis.h.i.+ng his s.h.i.+rt's soft friction against her skin. Her arms slid up to circle his neck.

”I'm not,” she choked out. She hardly remembered why she'd ever held herself apart from him. In case her consent wasn't clear, she went on. ”I'm not denying you, Elias.”

He gripped her hard around the waist. ”You looked frightened.”

The last of her mistrust evaporated. He'd told her she was safe and it seemed she was.

”All this is so new.” She swallowed. ”I like this. I like...you.”

”I like you, too,” he said with a quick change of mood. ”Very much. If only you'd thrust your bosom into my hands earlier, I'd have told you that long before tonight.”

Ridiculous to blush when she lay so brazenly in his arms. Ridiculous to recall a time when he'd said he loved her. But she refused to let painful memories spoil this moment. ”If I'd known what you could do with those hands, I might have.”

His soft laugh brushed across her skin like velvet. ”I don't believe it.”

How unexpected that humor built her pleasure. She was still laughing when he kissed her with a giddy mixture of elation and pa.s.sion. This time Marianne let herself tumble headlong into the deep lake of sensation that waited. At last, she felt bold enough to initiate her own exploration.

Tentatively, she ran her hands over his chest. He made a low sound of enjoyment. Encouraged, she tugged at his neck cloth to reveal the hot male skin beneath. Under her depredations, his s.h.i.+rt fell open. She discovered the fine black hair that covered Elias's chest. Her hand brushed his nipple and he started.

”Elias?”

He caught her hand and brought it to his lips. ”You tempt me beyond reason.”

She very much liked that he couldn't resist her. ”I need to touch you.”

She'd never imagined she'd caress a man, not even her husband, like this. And she'd barely started. Greed to know all of him, to see him without concealing clothes, rose like a wave. Control had been the guiding principle of her life. Control had no place in her ferocious need to follow this desire where it led.

Ruthlessness edged Elias's touch. Until she'd tugged at his clothing, he'd been gentle. Now he revealed unabashed hunger. And a possessiveness that should send her scrambling for safety, but instead set her blood rus.h.i.+ng. With sudden impatience, he tossed her skirts up and cupped her between the legs where need pounded most insistently.

Her body turned liquid. She bucked under this invasion and made a wordless complaint. This was like suffering a deathly fever. She shook with excitement and fear.

”Trust me,” he said in a guttural whisper, stroking her through her thin drawers.

”I can't...” She hardly knew what she said. His hand felt hot and dangerous, even as her secret muscles clamped painfully on emptiness.

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