His passion was restrained at first, sensuous and coaxing as he held her close to him and stroked and petted her, his lips covering her face in tiny burning kisses before moving to her throat and then her breasts, teasing their peaks into taut hardness with his mouth and tongue.
When he finally lifted her into his arms and carried her over to the huge four-poster bed she was trembling and moist, her hands roaming over the hard-muscled wall of his chest as he leant above her for a moment, his blue eyes open and loving as he allowed her to look into his soul. ‘I love you, my sweet wife,’ he whispered softly. ‘More than you could ever know.’
‘Oh, Conrad…’ She gripped his shoulders, pulling him down on her as she took his mouth with touchingly inexpert hunger.
‘Shush, my darling, slowly, slowly,’ he murmured with a faint touch of laughter in his voice. ‘This has to be right for you.’
And then he took her into a time of pure enchantment, his lips warm as they kissed every inch of her body and his tongue entering all the secret places until she was crying out with abandoned pleasure, her body surging against his hands and mouth as she arched and pleaded for the release only he could give.
But still his control held, even though his body was betraying the fact that his desire was white-hot, as he continued to bring her to the very brink of fulfilment time and time again, only to draw back at the crucial moment and then begin the passionate ritual again.
When he finally possessed her he had brought her to fever-pitch, and the feel of him inside her, the knowledge that she was joined body and body to the man she loved with all her heart, made the exquisite physical pleasure unbearable.
As she felt his body convulsing with hers in perfect unity Sephy found herself transported to the outer spaces of time, a place where there was no tomorrow and no past, just a consuming present that utterly possessed her.
It was much later when she stirred in his arms, turning her head to open heavy-lidded eyes as she looked at him. And the devastating blue eyes were waiting for her, his voice slightly uneven as he said, ‘Thank you, my darling. Thank you for giving yourself to me so completely.’
‘I never guessed it was so…’ She could find no words to describe the ecstasy. ‘Is it always like that?’ she asked dazedly.
‘Never before. Not for me,’ he whispered against the silky skin of her cheek before taking her mouth in a kiss that was tender beyond description. ‘But I promise you, my darling, it will be like that for both of us from this night on.’
And Conrad Quentin had never been a man to break a promise.