The Edge of Desire (31 page)

Head back against his shoulder, eyes tightly closed, she gasped.

He held her there, naked before him, her silk stockings sliding against his trousers, her bottom held against his thighs, his erection a heavy rod against her lower back—and made her writhe.

Although her eyes were closed, her mind still saw—saw herself in his arms, held trapped against him, her flushed
skin pearlescent in the steady moonlight, her hair tumbling from its pins, long tresses curling over her shoulders as she—her body—responded, helplessly surrendered to the simple blatant act of possession expertly executed.

She no longer had the will to resist. She was captured, not by him but by her fascination with this different side of him, this other lover who was him, yet not the him she’d once known.

The dark lover who held her before him, and pressed pleasure upon exquisite pleasure on her. He was not just older, but more experienced, a scarred warrior who’d lived through battles and had at last come home to claim…her.

His due, his reward. His bounty.

His without question.

That seemed to be the case, for he asked no permission, waited for no assent when, once the heat within her built, and the fever threatened to consume her, instead of allowing her to shatter and find relief, he withdrew his hand from between her thighs, set her on her feet, waited only a heartbeat to ensure she was steady, then grasped her hand and towed her toward the bed.

Thank God
, was her initial thought. She expected him to lay her down, strip off his clothes and join her.

Instead he led her to the nearest corner of the bed, to where the thick post of the four-poster bed was hung with heavy green damask curtains. He reached for the silk cord that held the curtains back, wrenched it free, with one hand pushed the curtains to either side, exposing the post.

Before she could blink, he had her backed against the post. He caught both her hands in one of his, drew them up, then looped the curtain cord about her wrists and lashed them high above her head.

Stunned, she could only stare. He stepped back, leaving her standing with her spine against the post, her arms raised but not stretched; there was enough play in the loop for her to curve her hands down and hang onto the cord. She did, testing, but his handiwork held; the lashing didn’t budge,
even under her full weight.

What…? She looked at him, intending to ask.

He met her gaze, his own dark and hard, simply said, “Wait.”

He turned away from her and started to undress.

She wriggled, glared, tested her bonds again. Glared at his broad back as he shrugged out of his shirt. Her body was on fire, the flames he’d stoked so deliberately still burning brightly, hungrily, greedily. All she could think about was having him inside her, having the thick rod of his erection moving within her to quench the flames.

But then he turned back, gloriously naked, fully aroused, and expectant relief flooded her. Heightened her readiness, her waiting, her wanting.

She needed him against her, skin-to-skin, more than she needed to breathe.

Then he halted before her—face-to-face, eye-to-eye.

And she suddenly remembered that this wasn’t the lover she’d known before, but a hardened warrior intent on claiming his due.

Her.

A shiver raced through her as she looked into his eyes—pure excitement laced with expectation, honed by a sense of dealing with the unknown.

He said nothing, simply raised his hands, framed her face, bent his head and kissed her—as if he would—was fully intending to—devour her.

Her every thought cindered beneath the heat in that kiss.

Her mind was awash with raw scalding need when he lifted his head. He looked down, following his hands as he ran them down her body, heavily, possessively, sculpting her curves, his prize, his reward. He reassessed, caressed, repossessed—then bent his head and set his mouth to her breast.

Treated her swollen flesh, as he had her lips and mouth, to a single-minded ravishment. One that had her hanging in her bonds, the fire within her escalating to an unbearable
degree.

She would have writhed but his hands held her steady. She sobbed as he released the nipple he’d tortured to throbbing hardness. Unrelenting, he bent and skated his lips lower, with wet, open-mouthed kisses, with his tongue and his teeth, possessed as he wished.

He went to his knees before her, placed hot kisses over her quivering belly, then set his lips to her curls…then he settled back, his knees wide, grasped her thighs, raised them and placed one over each broad shoulder, grasped her hips with both hands and held her, then set his lips to her core.

She swallowed a shriek, tensed against the bonds, spine arching, her thighs pressing down hard against his shoulders.

To no avail. He possessed her there as he had elsewhere, with slow, thorough deliberation. Reduced her to a state of breathless panting need, consumed by the fire he’d so mercilessly stoked.

She was his beyond doubt or question, his to do with as he wished…she shrieked as his tongue entered her, screamed as he thrust and her senses imploded.

Letting her legs slide from his shoulders, he surged up, grasped the backs of her thighs, lifted her up and to him, and entered her with one long, hard, relentlessly powerful thrust. Impaling her, filling her.

She screamed again, felt her body clamp hard about him, helplessly clutched her bonds, wound her legs about his hips as he withdrew and thrust heavily again—sobbed as he moved within her and the pleasure rolled on and on.

He possessed her utterly. Thoroughly. Entirely. He refused to let the flames fade, but held her hips and drove steadily into her, almost immediately stoking the blaze again.

Forcing the flames and her higher, then higher.

Then he bent his head and fastened his mouth about the peak of one breast and suckled fiercely.

She shattered into a million shards, so completely fragmented she wasn’t, for one bright shining instant in time,
sure she’d survived.

Then glory rushed through her, golden and welcome, filling her veins, swamping her nerves, pouring delight through her as he continued to fill her, thrusting long and hard, yet still ruthlessly in control.

She was open to him, completely given over to him.

Surrendered.

His.

Christian’s warrior self crowed, gloated, even as he tightened his reins and held himself back from the beckoning edge.

He wasn’t finished with her yet. She’d needed distraction; he’d needed her. The exchange was straightforward, but he hadn’t yet had his fill.

When the last ripples of her release faded, and she slumped, boneless against the bonds, her body softening deliciously about his, he reached up, yanked the cord free of the bedpost. Leaving it dangling from her wrist, he drew her against him. Lowering her arms, she draped them about his shoulders. His throbbing erection still buried in her scalding sheath, his hands beneath her bottom supporting her, he carried her to the side of the bed.

Juggling her, he drew down the covers, then withdrew from her and tumbled her onto the bed.

Swiftly he arranged her as he wished—stretched out on her stomach down the length of the bed, her head to one side, just off the pillows, her hands level with her head, one on either side. He’d positioned one plump pillow beneath her hips before he’d rolled her over. He drew her long legs down, her ankles only a little apart; she was so boneless she could barely raise her head, much less question his decrees.

He knelt at her feet and considered her, smiled at the sight of her legs still clad in her garters and stockings. Shifting, he caught a garter and worked it down, drawing the stocking off with it. He repeated the exercise on her other leg, stripping garter and stocking away, leaving her totally bare.

Then he stretched himself over her, eased himself down on her, sensed the slight tension that reinvested her limbs as
she took his weight, felt it pin her.

Half supported on one arm sunk in the bed beside her shoulder, he reached between her legs, positioned his aching erection at her entrance, and slid slowly home, eyes closing as he thrust slow and deep into the slick scalding haven of her sheath.

He nearly groaned.

She tightened just a little about him, but she didn’t have enough energy left to do anything other than lie beneath him and—as he’d warned her she would—let him have his way with her.

Greedily, hungrily, eager for the contact, he let himself fully down upon her, his chest to her back, his shoulders heavy across hers.

He’d taken her from behind before, but never like this. Not with her helpless beneath him, his body spread over hers, trapping her fully under him—giving her no option but to receive him as deeply and for as long as he wished.

Her body was a cushion of feminine curves and hollows against which his rubbed, another delicious friction as he settled to ride her with a slow, steady thrust and retreat.

He’d waited for this. He was going to extract every last ounce of pleasure from it, from her. Expose her to every last facet of his need of her.

And hope she understood. Hope she saw the raw need that drove him to have her as explicitly and as possessively as this for what it was—a symptom of complete and helpless devotion.

A need to have, to possess, that went beyond sinew and bone, that, as his spine flexed in its slow, rigidly controlled rhythm and he felt her instinctively soften, then tighten about him, welled and filled him.

Expanded, then coalesced and tightened within him.

Bending his head, his chest tight, his breath gasping, he pressed his lips gently to her shoulder.

Closed his eyes and let her take him.

Let her have and know all he was. All that he wanted and
needed.

Her senses swamped with glorious warmth, Letitia felt his strength all around her, surrounding her, enveloping her, holding her. Rocking her, pressing into her, stroking inside her.

He lay like a cloak over her, possessive unquestionably, yet there was more to it than that. Even with her mind floating in hazed pleasure, in the golden aftermath that courtesy of his body moving on and within hers seemed to be stretching endlessly, she felt the connection—the forging of something new, blending and strengthening what had previously been, what had in the past linked them.

Pleasured to her toes, as his fingers found hers and tangled, and he rode her, unrelentingly slow and deep, to completion, she sensed in her bones that he was giving her more—not just in the physical sense, but more of him. Sharing more of him, aspects of himself he usually kept hidden.

Her cheek pressed to the pillow, she felt her lips curve. Welcomed the escalation as he thrust harder, deeper, nudging her up the bed even though he held her beneath him. The fluctuating pressure of his groin against her bottom, never quite leaving her, a continuous tactile impression mirroring his deeper possession, struck her as frankly erotic.

She’d always loved the sensation of being skin-to-skin with him. Of being naked, no barriers of any sort, with him.

Feeling the telltale rising tension invest and harden his limbs, tighten the steely muscles holding her down even more, her smile deepened and she let her senses expand—to her surprise felt her own body stir, respond, rise again to his beat.

He thrust still harder, once, twice, then a long groan ripped from his chest as his hips slammed hard against her bottom. Pressed in as he pumped into her, his release washing through him—triggering hers.

Amazed—she hadn’t thought it possible—she felt the golden tide rise and sweep through her once again, this time
gentler, yet longer and more pervasive, an extended moment of exquisite pleasure that had her gasping, struggling for breath. Deep within, she felt her womb contract, felt her body clutch and hold him.

Satiation came in hard and swift, rolling over her, claiming what was left of her mind, disconnecting her senses and setting them free. In the instant before she surrendered to the glorious drugging bliss, she wondered if her body knew more than she.

Tie her up fast.

Lying slumped over Letitia, his head cradled on her breast, her fingers moving slowly, caressingly through his hair, Christian recalled his aunt’s words. Hoped he’d managed, over the past hours, to fashion a loop or two with which to reel his elusive lady in.

He’d eventually summoned enough strength to disengage and lift off her. He’d rolled her over and settled them more conventionally in the bed, but had yet to pull the covers over their cooling bodies.

He liked lying on her, their limbs damp and tangled in aftermath, and she didn’t seem to mind in the least.

Her fingers slowed. From above him, her voice drifted through the darkness. “What are you doing here, in my bed, in my arms?”

An easy enough question to turn aside with some jocular remark, yet…“I’m waiting for you to open your eyes and see me. Here. In your bed, in your arms.”

She snorted softly. “I know you’re here.” She shifted beneath him. “That’s no news.”

“No.” He lifted his head and looked up at her face. “But what you need to see is that I’m not leaving. Not this time.”

A long moment passed while she looked into his eyes. Her expression was serene, madonnalike, unreadable, then, her eyes still locked with his, she raised her brows. “Is that so?” Her tone cast the question as rhetorical. After another moment of considering him—studying what she could see—
she quietly said, “You don’t own me, Christian.”

“No.” If he’d failed to grasp that before, he knew it now. “I never did.”

But as he in turn looked into her green-gold eyes, he had to wonder if, perhaps, he had owned a part of her all along, and simply hadn’t understood.

She wasn’t sure of his current tack—of him; her uncertainty showed in her eyes. “So…what do you want from me?”

The easiest question of all. “The same thing I’ve wanted from you from the first. You, as my wife.”

“Your wife?” She let another moment tick past, then asked, her tone cooler, “And what of your revenge, your strategy to pay me back for not waiting for you and marrying Randall instead?”