Immediately there was that sensation of completion that became more profound with every union. He groaned her name and began to move. He wasn’t leisurely or gentle. She didn’t want him to be. There was something primitive and free about taking him like this as their carriage rattled along the wild Irish coast.
The vehicle’s jolting made his thrusts uncharacteristically clumsy but she didn’t care. She rose and fell with abandon, clenching handfuls of his coat. It was like riding a runaway horse. Exciting. Reckless. Dangerous.
Just like her husband.
As she shattered into climax, heat flooded her womb and he released a broken sigh. His hands gripped her waist with painful force. She closed around him, draining every last drop of love.
The tension leached from his body as she still quivered around him. She closed her eyes and crumpled upon his chest, feeling the uneven rise and fall as he fought for air.
“I love you,” she whispered, her hand resting over his heart with weary tenderness.
She felt him kiss the top of her head. With a satisfied sigh, he settled into the corner so she draped across him. She felt utterly safe and utterly loved.
How strange to think that less than a year ago, she’d been convinced she’d stand alone all her life. Fate had chosen a crooked path for her, a path fraught with unhappiness and difficulty, but she couldn’t argue with the final destination.
Nicholas was her heart and always would be.
She listened as his breathing slowed, relishing his strong embrace, drinking in the musky scent of their lovemaking. He rested his chin on her head. She was half asleep, somnolent with physical satiation. The days of traveling had exhausted her.
So far she’d escaped morning sickness, but her body made her aware it was changing. She’d also suffered broken nights, fretting about the meeting between Eloise and Nicholas. Today had been so tremendously important to him. She’d prayed when it was over, he’d find peace.
“When are you going to tell me?” he murmured so low she hardly heard over the carriage’s creak.
“Hmm?” She snuggled closer. He was so warm and with night approaching, the winter air grew colder.
Without releasing her, he reached across to open the blinds. Faint laughter edged his voice. “You heard me.”
Very reluctantly, she pushed herself up to see his face in the evening’s fading light. “Tell you what?” she asked sulkily although of course she knew.
He studied her with the same seriousness she devoted to him. “About the baby, of course.”
She stiffened. “You know,” she said flatly, placing one hand on his chest, partly for balance, partly because she needed to touch him at this moment when the secret new life inside her ceased to be a secret.
His lips quirked. “My darling, we’ve shared a bedroom for six months. Of course I know. I’m guessing we’ll christen a son or a daughter in six months or so.”
Relief flooded her that he didn’t sound angry. But did that mean he was pleased? Oh, dear God, let him be happy about the child.
Her hands fisted in his shirt and she spoke in an unsteady voice. “Why did you let me come on this trip, then?”
“Ah, that’s it.” His black eyes glinted with dawning comprehension. “Would you have stayed behind if I’d asked?”
“I promised to obey.”
He snorted derisively. “I’ve seen little indication you took that promise seriously.”
“If you’d insisted, I would . . .”
She paused at the skeptical lift of his eyebrow. “All right, if you’d insisted, I might have agreed.”
“Really?”
?
?No,” she admitted, and circled her palm in an apologetic caress, feeling the steady, powerful thud of his heart. “Do you mind?”
She caught the hint of a smile. “About the baby or about you accompanying me to Ireland?”
“Either.” She paused. “Both.”