Not wishing to talk, she applied herself to kissing whatever part of him she came into contact with. She ran her palms along the breadth of his shoulders. The power muscles beneath his skin drew her notice, and she traced them down his arms and up his chest. When she came to the tattoo of the North Star, she licked the artwork, pressed her lips to it before moving on in discovery. At one of his flat, pink nipples, she worried it with her index finger until it tightened into a bud. Was it as sensitive as hers?
As best she could, she took it into her mouth, teasing that nubbin with her tongue until he groaned. “Caroline, hold.”
But she didn’t want to. She’d married this man—twice—and now she wished to enjoy him to her heart’s content. Ignoring him, she drew a hand along his torso. Her fingers furrowed through the mat of hair on his chest. As she’d yearned to since seeing him shirtless that first time, she followed the line of hair as it thinned the farther south she went. Her palm skimmed over his nearly flat abdomen and finally, finally, she arrived at his impressively erect shaft.
How well she remembered the feeling of fullness when he employed that equipage, but right now, she wished him at her mercy so she could explore as much as she wished. Quickly, she peered into his eyes. Need had darkened those golden-brown depths and given them a green tinge. “May I?”
“Yes, but don’t be surprised if things escalate quickly after that. I haven’t had you nearly enough to control the impulse to claim you.”
Heat slapped at her cheeks. “I don’t mind.” It was one of the aspects of coitus she enjoyed the most—that heart-pounding, breath-catching pace and friction that swallowed her whole. Then she curled her fingers around the fat girth of him, and he groaned. Caroline smiled. The feeling of power such an action gave her was indeed heady. With a tiny moan of her own when he fondled her breast and squeezed her aching nipple, she stroked her curved hand up and down his shaft. He was so hard and hot and silky! The breath shuddered from her when she thought of that part of him being inside her moving, thrusting, pushing her closer and closer to that exhilarating edge…
“Caroline!”
She gasped as the first faint contractions fluttered through her core and he’d yet to touch her. “I you need me in now. Please.” Releasing his shaft, she looped her arms about his shoulders and crushed her mouth to his. She sought out his tongue, met his in a dance as old as time itself. Yes, perhaps it was insane how much she wanted this man but then, when had sanity ever been measured by just one ruler?
“Gladly.” He shifted his position, widening her legs with his knee until she was splayed open, vulnerable, waiting for him to claim her.
Love her.
And then the head of his member glanced along her wet channel to pause at her opening. He kissed her as if he had all the leisure time in the world, as if he wasn’t ushering in her demise by the flirting, teasing he enacted, and when she uttered a sound halfway between a whimper and a moan, he grinned, nipped her bottom lip, and then with a powerful flex of his hips, he thrust into her body, joining them, and he didn’t stop until he was fully seated.
She panted, squirmed beneath him to accept all of him more comfortably. “This is my favorite moment.” That initial joining when pleasure streaked through every nerve ending and he filled her so completely it brought tears to her eyes. “You are… You feel… I can’t…” There were simply no words.
“I understand.” John dropped a kiss to her forehead. “I love you and will count myself fortunate to have rendered assistance to you that day on the snow-covered lane when your coach broke a wheel. You’ve never been far from my mind since.”
“My hero. Always.” Caroline wrapped her legs about his waist and locked her ankles at the small of his back. “Want to fly, John.”
He apparently needed no other encouragement, for he slowly withdrew only to stroke back inside with the same tenderness as before. Then he gripped her hips in his large hands, lifted them slightly to an angle he preferred, and rising onto his knees, he proceeded to claim her body more thoroughly than he’d ever done before.
Over and over and over he drove into her, and just when Caroline thought she would shake apart from the hot pleasure playing through her body, the dear, wicked man changed his pace, slowed it so that he thrust into her gently, lovingly, but even then the angle of his penetration rubbed against the swollen nubbin at her center, and tingles fell down her spine.
“More!” She didn’t care if her voice was raised or if any servant passing along the hall could hear her. This was her man and her life, and she was finally enjoying every second of it. “I need more from you.”
“One second. You might like this.” When she assumed he would increase his rhythm, he slid out of her and then off the bed.
“What—”
“Come here, you wicked wanton of a wife.” John grabbed her ankles and pulled her toward where he stood by the side of the bed. As her tailbone balanced on the edge, he encouraged her to bend her legs at the knee, and while he held her hips in his big hands, he once more thrust into her passage with enough force and went so deep her moan blended with his. “Tell me how you like this.”
He stroked in and out, and the large length of him hit every sensitive spot she had. Wild, intense pleasure slammed into her, went through her, lifted her up so that she felt as if she weren’t on the bed any longer. Over and over, he worked, filling her with everything that he was and taking all that she was in return, until she was crying from need and wonder, and her breath came in quick bursts.
Terrible pressure built and stacked low in her belly. Oh, she wanted to fall over that edge, wished to fly into the brilliant light of the heavens, and while this coupling had nearly gotten her there, she still required a bit extra. Just like she’d touched her nipples earlier, when she slipped a hand between the frenzy of their bodies coming together and rubbed her fingers over the slippery pearl at her center, it was enough for that dam to break.
“John!” Her keening wail would no doubt make the servants talk, but she didn’t care. “Yes, yes, yes. Finish me!” The first twinges of contractions began deep in her core, and John thrust harder, went deeper, moved faster, his face a mask of concentration and exquisite pleasure. That’s when she broke. Knowing he enjoyed this act as much as she did sent her hurtling over that elusive edge, and then she was flying, free once more, gliding through a vast white nothing with tiny rainbows of light chasing around her and musical notes dancing all around through the storm.
Wild sensation still shivered through her being when John pushed again. He said her name and then a groan swallowed it up. His member pulsed and jerked, pulled hard, followed by that familiar warmth when he spent. He ground his pelvis into hers, presumably to prolong the pleasure, until finally, he collapsed on top of her with his head between her breasts. “Dear God, Caroline, you wear me out in the best possible way.”
His words, coupled with his fleeting breath over her nipple tugged a tired giggle from her. She cradled his head in her hands, stroked his hair back from his forehead, and sighed. “I rather enjoy doing this.”
“Good.” His chuckle reignited the fires in her blood he’d just put out by sending her flying. “I rather like seeing you undone. Perhaps we can do it again tonight.”
“Yes!” Her already flushed skin prickled with renewed anticipation. She shoved at his shoulders until he straightened and met her gaze. “Next time, I want to explore you—all of you—with my mouth.” Her attention dropped to his semi-flaccid length. “You will pleasure you like teach me how to that?”
Mottled red color engulfed his face, and it was the dearest thing she’d ever seen. “We shall do anything and everything you’ve ever dreamed of, sweeting. The world, as well as my regard, is at your feet, breathless for your notice.”
“So romantic.”
“Only with you.” He gave her that cheeky grin that never failed to make her smile. “I look forward to seeing what our life will be like, and I hope you’ll never cease to find the wonder in it all.”
“As long as you’re with me, I will always love everything.” Then she tugged on his hand until he joined her on the bed, and with a sigh of pure contentment, she snuggled into his side as his strong arms came around her. “Thank you for seeing past my storms to my truth.”
“Thank you for letting me.” He pressed a kiss into the top of her head. “There is no one way to see beauty, and the more of a mess it is, the more fulfilling it will be.”
Caroline smiled and let her eyes drift closed. A lifetime with this man would never be enough. But for the first time since she was a young girl, she couldn’t wait for each new day to begin.