‘Oh,’ she mouthed, her eyes widening still more as he approached her with a pair of foaming glasses. She took the long flute gingerly as he proffered it to her.
‘I already drank wine over dinner,’ she said.
‘Champagne cannot make you drunk.’ Markos smiled. ‘It’s far too exquisite to have anything coarse in its effects.’
She looked at him uncertainly. Markos tilted his glass against hers a moment, then lifted his towards his lips.
‘To us, Vanessa,’ he said softly.
She did not drink. Only stood there, her hair like a living flame around her head, cascading over her shoulders in the simple pale green frock she wore, her eyes wide and lambent.
Nor did she speak, only gazed at him, her eyes as eloquent as her voice was not, telling him, as if he needed to know, that she was his—his for the touching, the taking, the possessing.
‘Taste the champagne, Vanessa,’ he said, even more softly.
Obediently, she raised the glass to her lips and took a small, hesitant mouthful, then lowered her glass again. She was still gazing at him helplessly, mutely.
‘And now taste me,’ he murmured, and as he spoke he lowered his head to her and at last, after so many days, did what he had wanted to do the first moment of seeing her.
Touch and taste the sweet honey of her lips.
He felt them tremble beneath his own as he grazed them softly, felt them ripen, it seemed, as with the merest tip of his tongue he touched them. She trembled again, in her whole body, the finest quiver shimmering through her, and he heard the softest sigh in her throat.
‘Vanessa,’ he breathed, and at the slight parting of his lips to say her name he parted hers as well, and tasted her finally—finally to the full.
His kiss was long and deep and leisurely. Exploring all the sweetness, all the nectar of her mouth. The moment was exquisite, and he savoured it.
Without her realising it he had deposited his champagne flute and then relieved her of hers, and now, hands untrammelled, he drew her soft, slender body against his.
He felt the quiver come again, vibrating through her as his arms slid around her, moulding her pliant body to him. The swell of her breasts against him shot its own tremor through him, and he felt his body surge.
His kiss deepened, turning from exploration to desire, quickening its own appetite.
He gave her no time to speak, no time to utter the bemusement he knew was sweeping through her as he swept her up into the plane of sensuous existence he was already occupying.
His hands slid up along her spine, spearing into the glorious tresses of her hair. He felt himself quicken, his sweet plunder of her mouth deepen. A low, soft moan escaped her, and he felt her lean more against him, the ripening swell of her breasts pressing him.
He was full and ready for her, but she, he knew, was not ready. He could tell from the bemused wideness of her eyes that she was bewildered by what was happening to her, that he was taking her to a place without her conscious realisation. Yet her body was taking her; each quivering reaction to his touch, his caress, was bringing her closer. Now all that was needed was to wake her to what was happening to her.
He drew back a little, easing from her, and gazed down at her. Her lips were parted, like sweet ripe strawberries, and her pupils distended and huge.
He drew a single finger down her cheek, feeling her quiver. She could not speak, was beyond speech, and it pleased him with a deep, primitive pleasure that this exquisite creature should be so helpless to his touch.
His finger drew across her mouth, feeling the gliding moistness he had aroused, and then continued down the tender line of her throat to graze the now straining swell of her breast, cupped in its simple bodice. He drew the material down with him, hearing the soft, shocked intake of her breath as her swelling breast was displayed for him.
A soft murmur of Greek escaped him, speaking of ripeness and sweetness and beauty. For a moment he simply looked at the exquisite bared breast, and then, his lashes sweeping down over his eyes, he lowered his head to her.
He felt the peak harden in his mouth as he drew on it. Heard again the low, shocked, helpless moan sound in her throat. Felt her hand lift and touch his hair, trembling. He drew again on the ripe succulence, teasing it between his lips, and felt her trembling increase, the low moan of shock and pleasure come again. His body hardened more, blood surging in him. His teeth closed over her, grazing at her, sending, he knew, shooting, sensual flares through her that made her moan again, made her fingers tremble in his hair…
When he released her, taking one last long caress of his tongue to do so, he did not hesitate. He swept her up into his arms, glorying in the closeness of her body cupped against him. Her arms wound about his neck as he carried her.
‘Markos—’ Her voice was low, and breathless, and her eyes were wide with bemusement still, but more than that—with a longing in them, a desire for him that she could no longer hide, but which feasted on him, gazing up at him.
And she continued to gaze helplessly up at him as he lowered her down on the silken covers of his bed, as he shrugged off with rapid, practised fingers the clothes that were now nothing more than an impediment, and then as he came to her where she lay, her hair a living flame, her body indenting the softness of the pillowed bed, one ripe, rounded breast displayed for him, the hem of her dress riding up over one thigh.
His breath caught even as his body surged. God, but she was exquisite, beautiful, the image of desire.
And yet not wanton. There was an innocence in her unconscious, helpless sensuousness that speared through him as she gazed up at him, the longing, the yearning, the bemusement rich in her gaze.