Lord of Ice (31 page)

He ended the kiss, his eyes hazy with passion. His voice was hoarse as he whispered her name.
“Miranda.”
He dropped slowly to his knees and closed his long-lashed eyes, as beautiful as one of God’s warrior angels as he kissed her breast, taking her nipple into his warm, wet mouth. She moaned with desire, stroking his night-black hair as he suckled her. Somehow she refrained from confessing how badly she had yearned for this from that night in the hotel. He kneaded her backside in his large, strong—deadly—hands. But instead of fear, the thought of his dangerous power heightened her instinctual excitement for him. Her arousal climbed.

He pulled her night rail down lower on one side, exploring the curve of her hip; then his mouth left her breast, his lips swollen with kissing. He skimmed his lips, feather-lightly, across her chest to taste her other breast, petting her belly softly while his tongue licked her nipple to turgid arousal. His hands did not venture beneath her night rail, but he touched her mound of Venus through the thin cloth, lightly caressing her—so unlike Trick, who had always been in such a hurry. Breathless with want, scarely able to believe it was finally happening, she braced herself weakly against his massive shoulders, but did not allow him to sweep her away with pleasure. Not yet.

She cupped his jaw and pulled him again up to kiss her.

“Stay with me, Damien. I know exactly what you need,” she murmured. “Concentrate, just concentrate on my hands, my lips. On my touching you.”

His breathing deepened and his big body quivered as she kissed his tiny nipple. He touched her hair ever so lightly, pulling it back from her face so he could watch as she kissed her way down his belly, flicking her tongue into his navel. He leaned back weakly against the wall as she went down on her knees, unfastening his black trousers.

“Oh, God, Miranda,” he groaned.

“Are you still with me, Damien?” she whispered, freeing his enormous manhood.

“Yes,” he rasped. He was rock-solid as she wrapped her fingers around his wieldy silken shaft and stroked him. “Do I have your full attention?” she asked wickedly as she licked her lips in anticipation, glancing up at him.

“I . . .
unh
.” He didn’t finish the sentence, dropping his head back helplessly against the wall as she took him into her mouth.

She licked him slowly from base to tip, then stroked him for a moment. “Oh, you’ve needed this, haven’t you?” she whispered.

“Please,” he groaned.

She bent her head and obliged him. She held nothing back, taking pleasure in the pleasure she gave, loving him in ferocious tenderness with mouth and hands. She did not know how much time passed, as she reveled in his splendid body, caressing his throbbing shaft firmly and sucked on the smooth head of his cock. To steady himself, he wrapped his hand around one of the clothing pegs that jutted out from the wall above his head. She ran her other hand over the lean, athletic curve of his buttock and teased his tautened scrotum with her fingertips, opening her throat to receive him as he thrust more deeply into her mouth. He drew his breath in sharply when she raked his sculpted stomach with her nails. His groans clamped down into hard, primal grunts that came ever more quickly. Her jaw ached, thrust open wide by his frenzy. He ravished her lips. She could feel him pulsating against her tongue; she stroked him harder, faster with her hand as he swelled so large she could barely get her fingers around him.

“Miranda, oh, God, darling, you must stop,” he panted, but she ignored him, pressing his backside to keep him from pulling away. She was delirious with passion and could not be satisfied until he was spent; her greedy insistence drove him over the edge. He exploded in her mouth, a sumptuous feast of virility, his hot seed coursing down the back of her throat. Her body was afire. Spasms of pleasure heaved through her woman’s core as she drank him down with each mighty pulsation, consuming every salty, creamy drop of his warrior’s potency.

Drunk with him, she uncurled her hand from around his still-hard member and rested her forehead against his flat abdomen. He gripped her shoulders and bent down over her, trembling. He kissed the top of her head and draped his arms around her, encircling her. She nestled her face against his sleek body. “Oh, Damien, I’m so in love with you,” she panted, still shaking and breathless with passion. “I can’t help myself. I love you now and I always will.”

Racked by the exquisite pain of her love, she glanced up at his face, trying to read him. His beautiful mouth was slack, his eyes sensual and heavy-lidded, but the wildness had ebbed from their gray depths, and his gaze was tender.

Tilting her chin upward with his fingertips, Damien slowly kissed her eyelids and the tip of her nose, cuddling her a little; then he lifted her, sweeping her up in his powerful arms. He brushed the tip of his nose against her cheek, nuzzling her, as he carried her into his dimly-lit bedchamber. He placed her gently upon his high, chilly bed then turned and walked away. She reached toward him anxiously.

“Where are you going? Won’t you please say something?”

“Drink?” he offered softly, glancing over his shoulder at her from across the room as he poured two glasses of the sweet Madeira wine. He brought them over and gave her one, then clinked his goblet against hers with an intimate half smile. He lowered his lashes in knowing silence as she accepted the wine and took a sip, the honeyed flavor washing down the musky taste of him.

He sat down beside her and began stroking her hair, his gaze following his hand. Her heart thumped nervously in her chest as she sipped her wine and waited for him to say something, anything, in reply to her desperate confession.

“I owe you an apology,” he whispered. Lifting her hand from her lap, he kissed it.

“What for?” she asked in surprise.

“I was cruel to you in the stable in my effort to drive you away.”

Flinching slightly at the reminder, she looked away from his steady, penetrating stare. “You merely spoke the truth.”

He shook his head. “No, only a part of it.”

“You mean the fact that you hid it from me that you, too, were born on the wrong side of the blanket? I can hardly mind that. I know how embarrassing it is. I was angry when I first found out, but not anymore. I could never stay angry at you,” she whispered, melting as she stole a glance at him.

He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, kissing her forehead. “I wasn’t speaking of that.” He paused, letting out a small sigh against her brow. “Ah, Miranda. Driving you away that night was the very last thing I wanted to do.”

Her lips trembled as she swept her lashes upward, looking into his eyes. “What did you want to do?”

“This.” He touched her face, staring into her eyes; then he tilted his head, and kissed her. The slow, caressing contact of his lips on hers dizzied her. Her heart hammered wildly as his tongue entered her mouth, exploring, stroking. She reached her arms around his neck, her body going soft and yielding as he laid her down gently on the bed and eased partly atop her.

When he pulled back a small space a few minutes later and gazed at her, there was a light shining in his eyes that she had never seen before, and a bemused smile on his lips.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Having you in my arms feels even better than I remembered. You’re so soft, so warm.”

“Oh, Damien,” she sighed, her toes curling with pleasure at his doting gaze, but then her expression sobered. “I can’t let you make love to me, you know. You’re not ready for that yet and if you’re not ready, I’m not ready. You weren’t expecting any of this and I want you to have choices, as you once said to me.”

“God, you are a sweet, lovely creature,” he murmured, searching her face with a rather love-struck gaze. “Very well, my darling.” He ran his hand down her body. “I shall merely have to pleasure you without the deflowering.”

“Mmm,” she purred, shifting restlessly under his gliding touch.

“Do you trust me?”

“Completely.”

“Spread your legs,” he whispered, his eyes turning a beautiful, mysterious color of smoky gray.

He helped her to obey his command, pressing her bent knees apart gently. Her breath caught with rising excitement and unsatisfied longing as he brushed the hem of her night rail up over her hips. He ran his hand along the inside of her thigh, up and down; his touch was so warm, so soothing. She licked her lips, feeling herself grow wet again with anticipation. As he stroked her legs, he gazed as though spellbound at her pink, dew-slicked womanhood. He slipped his thick, strong fingers into her wet passage for a moment, resting his thumb on her mound.

“I could never let another man have you, Miranda,” he whispered. “That is the truth of it. I would kill anyone who tried to take you from me.”

“Damien,” she gasped, shivering with want, dying for him, but he withdrew his hand and lifted it to his lips, slowly licking the taste of her from his finger.

She watched him in hazy-eyed longing. This was definitely not Trick’s way, she thought; then all recollection of her former beau dissolved as Damien lay down beside her and kissed her again and again, dizzying her senses and her heart with his tenderness. He began to move lower, but she held him around his neck to keep him near, moaning softly against his cheek, arching against him as he pleasured her with slow, deep caresses.

“Look at me,” he whispered as she neared her climax.

She dragged her eyes open. Panting and weak, enervated with the rising pleasure, she held his stormy stare as her control dissolved, letting him gaze into her eyes, into her very spirit as she surrendered to his touch. He must have seen her helpless adoration of him shining in her eyes, for anguished sweetness flitted over his face and he lowered his mouth to hers, capturing her gasps on his tongue.

“So beautiful, my wild, red rose,” he whispered as he gathered her into his arms. He sat against the headboard, holding her to him, stroking her hair. Lying, spent, against his bare chest, his muscled arms wrapped aroung her, Miranda gradually realized that the battlelike sounds in the distance had gone quiet. “I’m sorry you have suffered so, Damien,” she said pensively after a moment. “But now perhaps you’ll see that you don’t have to face the pain alone. It’s easier when there’s someone by your side who loves you and cares for you.”

He squeezed her more tightly and kissed her brow. “You’re very good for me, my girl,” he whispered. “Do you know that?”

“I am, aren’t I?” she agreed, pulling back to smile wryly at him, joy sparkling in her eyes.

“Rascal,” he scolded with a chuckle.

“You’re good for me, too, Damien,” she sighed, snuggling against him in contentment. “Maybe Uncle Jason knew we would be good for each other.”

“Maybe so , Miranda,” he echoed softly. “Maybe so.”

The next day, Damien took out the box of papers that Jason Sherbrooke had left behind among his personal effects and spent the whole afternoon, in the painstaking process of sorting through the major’s letters and bank receipts, creditors’ bills and gambling IOUs, trying to figure out exactly how Jason had spent Miranda’s inheritance money. Lucien had insisted on the importance of unearthing this piece of information. Lucien, meanwhile, was slowly but surely uncovering the identities of the Seven Dials’ landlords, though the process of doing so, he reported, was akin to a great shell game, one he was playing most delicately so that the guilty party would not find out that someone was making inquiries.

In the middle of checking the sum on the bill from Jason’s boot maker, Damien once more caught himself daydreaming. He cast the bill of sale aside, sighing to realize he’d have to do that one over. He took a short break, lifting his cup of coffee to his lips, then grimaced. It had gone cold. Lord, his mind must have wandered right out the window while he had been sitting here, he thought. That had been happening a lot since New Year’s Eve. . . .

Ah, but he had never been in love before. The thought of his luscious ward made his nerve-endings tingle with odd, quivery sensations and left him rather breathless, his heart racing with crazed joy. He was still a little shocked at what had happened last night, but he supposed he should have realized it was only a matter of time before Miranda splintered the barriers he had tried to raise between them. And when at last she had, bursting into his darkness like an angel of light to rescue him from his demons, he had been unable to resist her. Almost as if by magic, she had made everything all right. She had pleasured him until he was empty, then had sung him softly to sleep at the end of their glorious night together, sending him to dreamland with whispered lullabies and caresses on his hair. Her beautiful face was the last thing he had seen before he had drifted off, sated and peaceful down into his very soul. Now he wanted nothing but to surrender everything to her. He would marry her, of course. It was what he wanted as well as the only honorable thing to do.