Behind the Palace Walls (11 page)

Alexei pushed her legs open, teased her with hot kisses along the insides of her thighs—but when he spread her wide and touched her with his tongue, Paige couldn’t suppress the little scream that escaped. She thought she would literally fly apart.

Her entire body was on fire. Her hair tingled. And Alexei’s mouth did things to her that no man had ever done. She wanted it to last forever—

But it was over in a matter of seconds as her body reached an impossibly high peak, and then dove into a free fall. Paige cried out, gasping and sobbing for breath during the long journey to the bottom.

The experience was intense, amazing, far more than she’d ever dreamed.

Yet still it wasn’t over.

She thought Alexei would enter her body now, but he brought her to the peak once more with his mouth, and, when she thought she couldn’t possibly take any more, he did it a third time.

She was wrung-out, sated, her body quivering with pleasure—and still she craved more.

“Please, Alexei,” she said as he moved away from her. “Don’t go.”

His laugh was deep, sexy. “I’m not leaving, Paige. Not for a long time.”

He reached into the table beside the bed, and then he was rolling on a condom and settling himself over top of her. She wrapped her legs around him, knowing instinctively that this was what she was supposed to do. He kissed her sweetly while he entered her body, moving forward on a long, slow glide that made her moan.

The pleasure took her breath away, even while the size and feel of him was almost too much. There was a moment of pain, a sharp sensation of tearing—and then he was inside her fully, his body throbbing in the very core of her.

“You should have told me,” he gasped out.

When she opened her eyes, the expression on his face tore her heart in two. He looked lost, alone—confused, as if he’d expected one thing and gotten another.

Paige’s heart dropped. “Told you what? Have I done something wrong?”

“You’re a virgin.” He seemed angry, intense.

Shock momentarily stole her voice. “I can’t be.”

He groaned as she moved beneath him. “Trust me, you are. Were.”

“I’ve been with one man. He, um…” She could feel her face turning red as she struggled to say it. “He barely started before he was finished.”

Meaning he’d started to enter her body, and then stiffened as his climax hit him. Her first sexual experience had been over before it ever really began. Which meant he’d not taken her virginity as she’d always thought. He’d only started the job. Alexei had just now completed it.

Alexei’s expression changed, grew fierce suddenly. But it wasn’t the kind of fierce that scared her. Or at least not in a bad way. No, it was an intense, possessive, determined kind of look that said he wasn’t about to quit until they were completely, thoroughly finished.

“My God, Paige,” he said. “Just when I think you cannot surprise me any more than you already have.”

His mouth came down on hers, hot, possessive. She relaxed into his kiss for only a moment before he set her body on fire with his own. He was gloriously hard, moving, his body showing no signs of being done.

Her heart soared. This was really happening, they were really making love—it wasn’t going to end with him apologizing, grabbing his clothes, leaving her alone and wondering what the hell had just happened.

She couldn’t think of anything but him as the wave caught her and tossed her higher than she’d ever been.

She learned very quickly how to shift her hips up to meet him, how to open herself to him, and how to prolong her pleasure and stave off the inevitable—but only for so long, because Alexei was relentless, driving her toward a completion more intense than any she’d experienced before now.

When her orgasm hit her this time, she couldn’t hold back the scream that had pooled at the base of her throat. Vaguely she was aware that he followed her over the edge. Moments later he rolled over, taking her with him until she was lying on top of him, his body still buried deep inside hers.

Instinctively she knew that nothing would ever be the same again.

CHAPTER SEVEN

NOTHING HAD GONE the way he’d expected. Alexei lay beneath her, wondering what in the hell had just happened to him. Everything had spiraled out of control the instant he’d kissed her in the sleigh. He had not meant to move so fast.

He’d intended a slower seduction, perhaps unfolding over the next few days. And he’d intended to get inside her head, to have her open up to him and trust him before they went to bed.

He’d intended, bastard that he was, to make her think he was falling for her. Paige Barnes was the kind of woman who should be eating out of his hand.

And yet she was not. Nor did she seem likely to.

Which, paradoxically, might explain this intense attraction he felt toward her. She was so much more than he’d expected, and every moment he spent with her only increased his fascination.

My God, she’d still been a virgin. He hadn’t counted on that at all. Guilt stabbed him in the gut. She’d trusted him enough to give him her virginity, and all he’d intended was to take advantage of her.

But how could he have known? He’d entered her so easily that he’d barely noticed the slight resistance until he’d broken through it. Then he’d been blown away.

She’d turned the tables on him with her sweet innocence and earthy sexuality. The contrast between the two fascinated him. Compelled him. Even before he’d known she was still a virgin, he’d wanted her like he couldn’t remember ever wanting another woman in recent memory.

Or ever?

Alexei closed his eyes. No, of course not. He must have wanted another woman this badly. What about Fermina, the supermodel? She’d had the longest legs he’d ever seen.

But, no. She’d been delightful, not compelling.

He ran through a succession of women in his head. None conjured up more than pleasant memories. None conjured up violent need that spiraled out of his control.

Perhaps it was the excitement of making love to Chad Russell’s secretary, of taking something from under his cousin’s nose that the man had been too ignorant to see for himself.

But, no, it wasn’t that, either.

Paige’s warm body was limp, her breathing even, and he knew she’d fallen asleep. He wanted to sleep as well, but he could not. He was still inside her, still hard, but he needed to withdraw while the condom was still tight.

Except that he didn’t want to move. He wanted to lie here, sated and content, and enjoy the warm woman in his bed. He wanted to enjoy the companionship with her, however brief.

Paige knew what it was like to lose family too soon. It was a connection they shared. Another reason everything about this night seemed so strange to him. He didn’t usually share details about his family with the women he dated.

Hell, he didn’t usually share details of his life and family with anyone. He’d learned that life wasn’t fair, and that you couldn’t trust another soul with the burdens of yours. No one was what he or she seemed. Everyone had an agenda of some sort.

And his was to destroy the Russells.

Not that he’d told her much, but he’d said more than he usually did. In the instant when he’d told her that his family was in the crypt, he’d felt a wall of loneliness pushing down on him that he hadn’t experienced in a very long time. Somehow, she’d recognized it. He’d wanted to open up to her even more in that moment, but he’d stopped himself from doing so.

She did something to him, something he did not like. She made him long for things he’d forgotten, and feel remorse for things he could not help if he were to avenge his family. He had no room for sentimentality, no room for tender feelings of any kind.

A glance at the bedside clock told him it was nearly ten. A few more minutes, and he would wake her—though part of him wanted to keep her in his bed all night, to slide into her body in the dark hours before dawn, to lose himself.

But he would not. The sooner he returned her to Moscow, the better.

The sharp, insistent ringing of a cell phone startled Paige into wakefulness. Beside her, Alexei whipped back the covers and shot from the bed. His phone was still clipped onto his trousers, but he managed to grab it before it stopped ringing.