Ago tipped Victoria back on the bed and made short work of the flowing skirt she wore. He pushed it up and out of his way, then spread her legs before him so he could inhale, deeply, the scent of her arousal.
He growled in pleasure. Then he wasted no time in tearing the flimsy bit of lace she wore from between her legs, and, at last, bending his head to the scalding, sweet core of her desire.
Where he indulged himself, and drank deep.
And found that here, too, she was far more sensitive than she had been.
He had her writhing within seconds and screaming out his name shortly thereafter.
And so Ago entertained himself, because this was his wedding night and he did not intend to have another. He saw how many times he could build her up to the crest, then throw her over the side. He tested her sensitivity, reveling in it and pushing it, until she was gasping, sobbing, and calling out his name in such a way that he could not tell if she meant to bless or curse him.
He was happy enough with either. Made wild with it, in point of fact.
And it was only when he could take no more, when he had reached an edge inside himself he had never encountered before, that he pulled away. He stood, then shifted her on the bed so that her hips rested on the mattress and he could line himself up between her legs. He grabbed one of the pillows and put it beneath her bottom, raising her up to give him better access, and to make certain he was not tempted to lose himself in what he was doing and crush into her belly.
He worked at his trousers with a certain ferocity, as if he was not certain, even now, that he could contain himself long enough to get where he wished to go—
As if he was some randy adolescent. A stranger to his own control.
It was hard not to think of the last time he had brought the head of his sex to her molten core, and teased himself there, for just a moment. Six months ago, though he’d been lost in her, he’d not been too lost. Despite the driving urge inside him to simply toss aside the practice of a lifetime and surge deep inside her, skin to skin, he’d dug out protection and rolled it on.
And yet when he felt it break deep inside her, he had not been surprised. As if it made sense that with this woman who brought out sensations in him that he had never felt before in all his life, the protection he’d always relied on should fail him.
As if this had all been predestined all along.
Tonight there was no need whatsoever to worry about such things. All he needed to concern himself with was the heat of her. That scalding, deliriously inviting heat. And then, as he notched himself in her entrance, the way she groaned out his name and wrapped herself around him as best she could while he slowly, so very slowly, filled her with the hardest part of him.
With nothing between them this time, save the baby they’d made together.
Only to discover, when she broke all around him, that here, too, she was infinitely more sensitive.
Ago found himself laughing. Because never in all his dutiful days, always with staid and quiet women who never made a fuss even in bed, could he have dreamed of a woman like this. A woman like her. Before, it had been as if Victoria were specifically designed to enthrall him. To enchant him. To take everything he was, everything he wanted to be, and reduce him to nothing but this maddening, encompassing passion. This glorious need. The way her internal muscles gripped him, hard and sure. The way her heels dug into him with every thrust.
The way she came apart for him again and again, his writhing, glorious wonder of a woman—right and beautiful and entirely his.
He wanted to last forever. He wanted to lose himself, again and again.
Ago changed the pace, going harder, deeper. He threw her over the cliff one more time, and then, with a roar, let himself go last.
And when it was finished, when he could move again, he hauled her up into the center of the wide bed. Then he crawled across the mattress to lie beside her, not sure his heart was still safely inside his chest. So hard did it hammer at him. So wild did his own blood feel in his veins.
He had not had the opportunity to catch his breath. All he could seem to do was lie there, outside himself, not at all sure what just happened to him. But Victoria lay beside him, and he could feel the heat of her. He could feel the weight of her body next to his, pressing into the mattress.
And for a long while, it was enough.
Then when he returned to himself, Ago shifted. He propped himself up on one elbow, so he could take stock of the woman beside him.
The woman he had made his wife. The woman who would soon enough be the mother of his child.
Ago tried to muster up his usual outrage that he had been forced into this situation by his own heretofore unknown inability to control himself—an issue he only appeared to have around this one woman.
Hiswoman, that primitive part of him growled.
Victoria was disheveled in the best possible way. Her lips seemed faintly swollen from his and her eyes had fallen shut as if she had been as turned inside out by what had happened here, between them, as he was. Her skirt had settled back over her thighs, but her breasts were still bared to him and so he reached over to explore them. He traced their alluring shape, drawing tighter and tighter circles on each until the peaks grew rigid once more.
Her eyes fluttered open, and she regarded him with all of that sunny blue. “My body has changed,” she said, matter-of-factly. “Quite a bit.”
“And somehow, you’re more beautiful for it,” Ago replied, his voice low.