Immortal Sea (20 page)

The thought slid into his mind that she might in fact deserve much more, but the surge in his blood swept thought away. He was drowning in her, her eyes, her throat, her breasts.

He undid one button. Two. A third, his knuckles grazing the smooth skin above her waistband. She sucked in her stomach, her hands closing over his. To stop him? Or aid him?

“Let me,” he said again.

She lay half under him, unresisting, as he pulled her blouse free.

Her breasts gleamed in the shadows, full and pleasing, cupped by underwear that bound her narrow ribcage. He lowered his head, inhaling her scent, soap and Elizabeth. Lovely. He licked her, running his tongue over the top slope of her breasts. Her breath hitched. Nuzzling one cup aside, he found her pebbled nipple with his mouth and suckled her hard, arousing them both, pleased when she moaned.

He felt her fingers in his hair, scratching delicately against his scalp, and shivered under her touch like a dog. But this wasn’t about him, not only about him, not yet. He obeyed her silent tug on his hair, raising his head, covering her mouth with his. He kissed her above, deep, penetrating kisses, thrusting his tongue into her mouth while his hand played her below. He craved her taste, seasoned by wine and desire. He stroked down to her knees and up again, down and up, until her thighs loosened and she made a sound, pleading or approval, in the back of her throat. He cupped her, feeling her moist heat through the fabric, and caught her gasp in his mouth.

He dragged her pants open, worked his hand inside. She was hot, slick, wet.

Ready for him.

Fondling her with one hand, he raised his head. Even in the dusk, he could see her cheeks were flushed, her lips glazed and parted. She lay back against the webbing, watching him, her eyes dark and aware.

Not the gaze of a woman mindless with passion.

He frowned. Not that he wanted her mindless, exactly.

“It’s all right.” She raised her hand to the back of his head, toying with his hair. “Em’s asleep. No one can see us back here.”

He had not considered the possibility of an audience. But she had.

Morgan’s eyes narrowed. Despite the bloom on her skin, the lush wetness between her thighs, she was still thinking like a mother, like a doctor. Still conscious, still careful, still in control.

She thought too much. Worried too much. He wanted to plunge her into passion, drag her into the moment, away from the everyday concerns that swarmed like gnats around her head.

He pushed to his feet, making the hammock bounce like a boat in the waves. “Good. Then we won’t be interrupted.”

He yanked his sweater over his head, baring himself to the waist. His medallion swung against his chest. Elizabeth rolled to one elbow, reaching for him. Capturing her hands, he pressed them to the hammock. “Hold on.”

He stripped her pants and underwear away.

Beautiful. He took her with his eyes, letting his gaze roam where his hands had already gone. Beautiful and feminine and his.

“What are you . . . Oh.” Her voice trailed off as he crouched between her thighs. She tried to press her knees together, but his shoulders blocked the way. “You don’t have to . . .”

“Yes. I do. I want to eat you alive.” When her hips hitched, he shoved a pillow under her, cushioning her. She could not focus on pleasure with ropes chafing her skin. He wanted her to think only of this. Only of him.

He did not ask himself why. Reasons did not matter when she was spread wet and open in front of him. Leaning forward, he set his mouth on her most succulent flesh.

He lavished her with licks and nips, bites and kisses. She strained toward him and away, her fingers twisting in the webbing. Her response flooded them both, inflamed him like whiskey, warmed him like wine. Her smooth, firm legs tensed and stretched. Her toes flexed and curled against his knee, against his shoulder. She was helpless to stand or to stop him, at the mercy of his hands, his tongue, his teeth. He held her captive, his hard hands on her buttocks while he feasted. He was drunk on her, her scent, her cries, her soft, wet, luscious center.

Slowly, he thrust a finger inside her, then two, glorying in the slick, convulsive clench of her body. His blood pounded in his head, in his loins. His rod demanded release.
Now, now, now.
He fumbled with his clothing, desperate to take her.

Pressing her thighs wide, he braced his feet against the floor. He tipped the hammock, angling her just the way he wanted her.
There.
She arched. So hot. So wet. Taking himself in hand, he set himself to her, male to female, naked flesh to naked flesh.
Now.

“Wait,” she choked out.

His lips pulled back from his teeth. She could not be serious.

She jackknifed in the hammock, her head nearly clipping his chin.

He grabbed for her before she tumbled them both. “Easy.”

She groped on the porch around his feet, nearly upending the hammock in her eagerness. As she fumbled with her discarded pants, her smooth hair brushed his groin. He sucked in his breath.

“There.” She righted herself, face flushed, eyes sparkling. Between two fingers, she gripped a small square foil packet. “Now.”

His mouth compressed in distaste. “A sheath.”

“Condom.” She cleared her throat. “I got it while we were upstairs.”

When she disappeared into her room, he realized. She wanted this, had planned for it. He could not get any harder, but the thought sent another flood of warmth through his veins. But . . .

“It is not necessary,” he said.

“Yes, it is.”

“I will not make you sick.”

The immortal children of the sea were not subject to the diseases of humankind.

“You could get me pregnant.”

Again.
The unspoken word reverberated between them.

Under the circumstances, he did not think he could explain how unlikely that outcome was. Or how desirable. The finfolk population was declining. The begetting of children was an issue of practical and political survival.

Yet Elizabeth did not desire another baby, that was clear.

And at some point, her desires had begun to matter to him.

Her firm jaw set at his continued silence. “If we do this, we use protection.”

Morgan gritted his teeth, frustration pounding in his blood.

His kind were legendary for their sexual allure. With the slightest exertion of magic, he could overwhelm her resistance, make her so wild for him she would let him do whatever he wanted to her without brake or barrier. But he would not violate her will in such a way. He respected her too much. He . . . liked her, he realized, with a vague feeling of discomfort. He wanted her not only willing but
with
him, in body and mind. Not any woman, but Elizabeth.

If that meant he must sheath himself, so be it.

“I suppose that is your usual practice,” he said stiffly.

She folded her arms across her naked breasts. “My usual practice?”

Had he said something to offend her?

“With your other partners,” he clarified.

Human partners. “
I can have sex with whomever I want, whenever I want,
” she had said.

Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t have other partners.”

“Do you not?” he asked softly.

And why in the name of God and all the angels should he be concerned about whom she slept with or when? He was not bound by the silly strictures of human behavior. The children of the sea were free to follow the lusts and whims of the moment, their passions as powerful and changeable as the ocean which gave them being.

“That condom is almost four years old. I had to check the damn expiration date before I took it out of the box.”

Morgan felt his face go blank with shock. Four years. Her husband had been dead three. Did that mean . . . Surely that did not mean . . .

“There must have been others,” he said.

She did not answer.

Ah.

No others since her husband, then. And given the timing of her pregnancy and marriage, likely few before.

Only him.

The thought was humbling and strangely arousing. She was not simply hungry for sex, Morgan realized. For whatever reason, she wanted
him
. She had chosen
him
.

Which meant there was more involved here than a moment’s comfort or the easing of lust. The act took on weight, substance, significance.

Morgan felt a flicker of panic. For the first time, he doubted his ability to give her what she needed. He only knew he felt compelled to try.

She raised her chin another notch. “If you’ve changed your mind . . .”

“Do I look,” he demanded, “as though I have changed my mind?”

Her gaze fell to his ruddy cock, jutting proudly from between his thighs. “No,” she admitted.

“Perhaps,” he suggested, only half joking, “I am simply intimidated by your trust in me.”

She smiled wryly. “You don’t appear particularly intimidated either.”

Indeed, under her gaze, he was swelling, hardening further.

“Not on the outside,” he acknowledged. “But how lowering if you concluded, after so long a wait, that your patience was not adequately rewarded.”

With relief, he watched the light spring back into her eyes. “Maybe—after so long a wait—I won’t be very picky. Either way, it’s my choice.”

He really did like her, he thought. Even now, she took responsibility for her actions and reactions on her own shoulders. It made them equal in a way they had not been sixteen years ago.

“Shall we put it to the test, then?” he asked.

Wordlessly, she held up the condom.

He had never acquiesced to a partner’s demands or desires before. But Elizabeth was not like any other partner. For the first time, sex was not about taking what he wanted, but about giving what she needed. He could do this for her. He could give her one less thing to worry about tonight.

He took the foil packet from her hand.

Of course, being Elizabeth, she was not passive. As soon as he opened the packet, her hands were there. Her head bent gravely to her task, her smooth hair sliding forward. Her fingers stroked and encircled his aching shaft, pushing the sheath firmly to its base. When she was done, she cupped his stones gently in her hand, scraped her nails lightly over him. Exquisite sensation shot from his balls to his brain.

He clenched his fists in near agony. “I promised to make your wait worthwhile. I’ll have no chance at all if you do that.”

She shook back her hair and smiled up at him, her eyes gleaming in the dark. “Maybe I’m tired of waiting.”

She was tired of waiting, tired of thinking. She wanted to feel something besides responsible and alone.

Maybe Morgan wouldn’t give her what she needed in the long run. But he was exactly what she wanted tonight.

She was no longer a naïve twenty-one-year-old dreaming of adventure, no longer a hopeful bride dreaming of forever. She was done with dreams.

Tonight, she would take what she could get: tenderness, trust, companionship, sex.

Her heart hammered. And Morgan could give them to her.

With her fingertips, she explored him, learning his textures. Sleek and then rough, cool and then hot, silky smooth and unyielding as stone. She rubbed her cheek against his stomach. She loved the way he smelled, musky and male.

Expelling a harsh breath, he caught her wrists and pulled her hands away from his body.

Startled, she looked up. She couldn’t see well. Only his body, smooth and strong and pale against the night, the gleam of his eyes, the glint of the medal on his chest.

It was Copenhagen all over again.

She pushed the thought away. No, it wasn’t. She knew what she was doing this time. She knew him.

“I want you.” His low voice resonated through her.

She quivered like a violin string in the dark. Deliberately, she smiled. “Then take me.”

He swooped. The sky swung and her world tilted as the hammock dipped and climbed like a skiff in a storm. His hands, his mouth, streaked everywhere, fast and hot and even a little rough. Pummeled by sensation, saturated with pleasure, she could do nothing but hold on and respond.

She heard herself cry out as the whirlpool dragged her under. Her body arched, her fingers tangled in the webbing. A quickening pulse beat in her blood.

She felt him at the entrance to her body, heat to her heat, hard to her soft. Her eyes slid closed.

“With me,” he demanded. “Elizabeth.”

His command recalled her from the depths. She opened her drowned eyes and saw him above her, the moonlight on his shoulders, his face a dark blur, her fantasy lover made flesh, pushing inside her, plunging inside her. Real. Here. Now.

The shock contracted her stomach, flung her to another peak. Her short nails gripped his sides as he worked her, as she met him, thrust for thrust, stroke for stroke. His feet braced on the deck, his hard hands bruising her hips, he pounded into her, strong and relentless as the sea. She was drenched, battered, swept away.