Courtney’s lashes lifted slightly, and she drank in his nudity, her cheeks flushed with newly discovered, escalating passion. “Slayde.” She opened her arms to him.
He covered her in a heartbeat, kissing her with a ferocity they both craved. “Your ribs…” he managed.
“I don’t feel them, just you,” she panted, wrapping her arms about him, exploring the muscled planes of his back. “There’s nothing but you.”
His gaze darkened to near-black. “Open for me. I need to be inside you.”
Instantly, she complied, parting her thighs until they cradled his hips. “Like this?”
“Yes,” he ground out, teeth clenched to retain a semblance of self-control. “Now wrap your legs around me. Oh…God.” A hard shudder wracked his body; sweat broke out on his brow.
“That feels so right,” she whispered, lifting her legs to hug his flanks, easing him into her tight, wet warmth.
“Courtney.” His mouth seized hers, his tongue delving deep in an overwhelming need to possess her everywhere at once. Slowly, his hips pressed forward, pausing, circling, readying her for his penetration. “Tell me if it hurts,” he commanded. “If it does…I’ll stop.” Even as he uttered the vow, he wondered if he’d be able to keep it. Already, he felt reason slipping away, lost in a roaring deluge of sensation. He was shaking, drenched in sweat, teetering on the brink of climax—and he was yet to be fully inside her.
“It doesn’t hurt,” Courtney soothed. “It feels—” She broke off, gasping as he pushed deeper, stretching and invading her as he reached the thin barrier of her, maidenhead.
Forcibly, Slayde raised his head, braced himself on his elbows. “Courtney?”
She drew his mouth back to hers. “I love you,” she whispered. “Don’t stop.”
It was too much.
With a hoarse growl of need, Slayde thrust forward, tearing the fragile membrane and burying himself to the hilt. He heard Courtney whimper, felt her tense, and his hands balled into fists, making deep indentations in the pillow as he battled for sanity. “Sweetheart?”
She didn’t answer at once and, in that instant, Slayde cursed himself a hundred times over for causing her pain. He was just about to withdraw—no matter what the cost to him—when she shifted, the tension easing from her delicate frame.
“Slayde.” She murmured his name reverently, and it was the most exquisite sound he’d ever heard. Like a precious flower, she opened to him, melted all around him, drew him deeper into her breath-taking warmth. “There’s no more pain,” she breathed. “Just…heaven.”
“Heaven is where miracles belong,” he said huskily, rocking slowly against her. “Move with me. Touch heaven in my arms.”
“I already have.”
Groaning softly, Slayde cupped her face, holding her gaze as he withdrew partway, then thrust back inside her—deeper this time—before beginning a heart-stopping rhythm that took their breath, their souls, creating a bottomless yearning that gnawed harder with each escalating stroke.
“Slayde…” Courtney’s eyes widened as her body responded on its own, undulating frantically as it sought relief from the welcome agony Slayde was lavishing upon it.
“Yes,” he whispered, quickening his thrusts, feeling her inner muscles tighten around him, clenching him in a way that made the climax he’d been fighting to suppress ignite in his loins. Warning bells sounded—and were silenced, drowned out by the roaring in his head, the shards of heat that streaked through him in scalding, relentless waves. “Courtney,” he rasped, taking her to the pinnacle with him, teetering at its excruciating edge. “Look at me. Let me watch your face when it happens.”
“Oh…God.” She arched wildly, her nails digging into his back, her body unraveling in a series of frenzied spasms that clasped at Slayde’s length, gripping him again and again—plummeting him into sensual oblivion.
“Courtney!” He shouted her name, lunging into her with all the urgency in his soul, erupting in a scorching, bottomless release, his seed exploding from his body, flooding hers.
They collapsed in a tangle of arms and legs, Slayde’s head dropping into the crook of Courtney’s shoulder, his entire being dazed from the magnitude of what had just occurred. He dragged air into his lungs, realizing—with whatever fragments of sanity he possessed—that his weight was too much for her—certainly too much for her ribs.
Summoning a modicum of strength, he shifted, only to feel the wetness of his seed inside her, a tangible reminder of his unprecedented loss of control—and its potential results.
He rolled away, gritting his teeth, all too aware of the dark cloud of guilt and trepidation that loomed ahead, poised and ready to engulf him, render its punishing aftermath.
But, God help him, that dark cloud hadn’t been enough. No curse, no vow, no iron will had managed to tear him away, to stop him from pouring his entire being into hers.
“Slayde?” Courtney moved beside him, a sleepy question in her voice.
“I’m here.” He reached for her, enfolded her against him, cradling her gently in his arms.
“Mmm.” She snuggled closer, already half asleep. “It was a miracle, wasn’t it?”