Not a moment too soon. Keeping himself back as she attained her peak tested his limits. He retreated, the wondrous friction threatening to blow his head off. Then with a mighty roar, he plunged forward and gave everything he was into her keeping.
***
Emily still soared in the dizzying heights, when she felt the hot spurt of Hamish’s seed. Their joining had already spun an intimacy between them that left her reeling. But this moment, when she received his essence, was the most intimate act of all.
He exhaled audibly and rolled to the side. Overwhelmed by all that had happened tonight, she remained flat on her back staring up at the beams on the ceiling. Gradually her breathing eased, her heart steadied, and her mind wafted back to earth after wandering out among the stars. She became aware that she was still naked. So was Hamish. His arm lay along hers, a physical connection to remind her of the more profound physical connection they’d just shared.
The long night drew to an end. A bird started to sing outside. The dawn came early here in Scotland. Already sunlight edged the curtains to compete with the lamplight.
Lying here beside Hamish without a stitch to cover her, she started to feel awkward. She shifted to find the sheet.
"Not yet," Hamish said, his voice more subterranean than she’d ever heard it.
"I thought…" she began, then forgot what she meant to say when he caught her hand in his and brought it to his lips.
"Just lie with me."
She shifted until she could see his profile. The straight, commanding nose and determined chin gave little away. "If you wish."
Then her fleeting unease evaporated as he drew her into his arms, until she lay with her head on his chest and her legs tangled with his. Immediately the closeness returned. She’d feared it might belong purely to the marital act.
"Thank you, Emily." Drowsiness thickened the words, as he dropped a kiss on the crown of her head.
"Thank you, Hamish." I love you, Hamish.
She felt tired and stretched and on edge. She wanted to dance and jump and run. She wanted to stay just where she was, resting in her husband’s arms in the sweet aftermath. Her body felt strange, as if it didn’t belong to her anymore. There was a stickiness between her legs, and her neck and breasts stung where the beginnings of his beard had chafed her skin.
Her mind inevitably drifted back to that explosion of ecstasy. It had been like her earlier climax – thank goodness Hamish had given her a word to describe that flaring moment. But the experience had been longer and more powerful when he’d been inside her. At the end, her pleasure had risen so high, surely she must have rattled the gates of heaven.
She cuddled closer to Hamish and winced as strained muscles made themselves felt when she moved. A climax was a marvelous thing. She hoped Hamish meant to give her another before too long.
And if a climax was a wonderful thing, she began to think a skillful lover for a husband might be even better.
Chapter 25
They stayed in the peel tower for a week, enjoying a long-delayed honeymoon. Emily became used to plundering Hamish’s wardrobe, although the wicked truth was that she spent much more time naked in his bed than she spent dressed in his shirts.
"You’ve turned me into a lazy sensualist," she said to her husband now as they rode back to Lyon House.
They were making their way along a narrow defile. From her first trip to the tower, she remembered that this track led to a ridge overlooking Lyon House in its pretty valley. She’d ridden up to the tower only seven days ago, yet the Emily who retraced this route was a completely new person.
Hamish turned back in the saddle to give her the flashing smile that sweetened her blood to honey. "You’re surely not blaming me."
"I surely am."
"Then I cry unfair. There I was, dedicating every waking hour to the cause of science, when a wild and wanton woman landed on my doorstep and demanded I abandon my studies and put myself at her service."
"That’s not how I remember it."
"Damn this pass. It’s too narrow."
"What?" She’d drifted into a reverie, reliving some of the decadent things Hamish had done in her service. "Are we in danger?"
He faced forward, his low chuckle carrying back to her. "The only danger is that I want to get off this horse and kiss you."
"That doesn’t sound too dangerous."
"It is, if you want to reach Lyon House before nightfall."