The Danger of Desire (29 page)

“I didn’t—”

“You do now. I can see you. I can see what my touch—
my touch
—does to you and your body.”

“Please.” She was shaking her head, her whole body trembling under his hands.

He would ease her fear. He would replace it with longing. A longing as fierce and powerful as his own. “Oh, I will please you, Meggs. I will.” He rubbed his jaw along the slide of her cheek. “You’re already pleasing me. Open your legs wider for me so I can touch you. So I can begin to please you.”

Her chest was rising and falling erratically, but she opened, slowly inching her thighs apart. The moment she did so, he speared one long finger into her silken warmth. Her knees buckled as she made an inarticulate but unmistakable sound of surrender.

Her passage clenched around him, and his own blood thundered in his ears, the force of his arousal leaving him nearly shaking. He moved to stand in front of her, to tip her face up with one hand while he stroked her passage with the other.

Nothing was going to stop him from having her. But not like this. Not on any old piece of furniture that came to hand. Not in the middle of the room, where Mrs. Tupper or Jinks could come upon them. Not carelessly. Not this time.

He had waited years to have the right woman. This woman. No other. He wanted to take her fiercely, but with deliberation. “I want you upstairs. Privately. Behind a locked door. Face to face, so you know the man who’s making love to you. So you know it’s me inside you and no other.”

Hugh lofted her up against his chest and carried her up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time in his rush to get her up to his room. She hid her face against his neck and said nothing. But she did not protest.

He set her down and turned away to thumb the lock, surprised to find his hands shaking and fumbling at the task. But he had waited so very long, his body could no longer hold his desire in check.

When he turned back, she was standing halfway to the bed, her face turned to the window, pale and still. Unreadable. He tried to make his voice soft to hide the sharp, jagged edge of his need. “Meggs.”

She looked up at him, her eyes wide and dark in her pale face. So dark, trying to hide an ocean of fear. Making choices was always frightening.

“Are we going to do this? Together, of our own free will?”

“I ... Please do—” She stopped, struggling as if she couldn’t breathe.

“Please what? You have to tell me, Meggs.”

She stood before him, trembling, her breath rising and falling in audible agitation. But she looked him in the eye. “Promise you won’t leave me again. I couldn’t bear it if you leave.”

“Shh. Easy now.” He took her hands with his own and kissed each palm, then took her face in his hands and kissed away the salt tears until he found her exquisitely full lips. He opened his mouth to kiss her slowly. Gently, softly. “Sweet Meggie. Easy, love, easy.”

He pulled her tight into his embrace and held her there as if it were the most right thing that had ever happened to him, as if she belonged there, as if he never had to let her go. “I promise.”

Slowly, as if they had all the time in the world, so slowly he could savor each and every moment, each and every sensation and press it upon his memory, he kissed her. Slowly, so she could cry off and stop at any moment. Slowly, so she could choose to go each and every step of the way, he peeled off her clothes, one by one. He took his time, watching and feeling, seeking out each bit of newly bared skin with his eyes and his fingers.

Her body was finely made. Her skin under her clothes was white and pale, a contrast to the brown of her neck and her arms—testimony to a life lived out of doors, working, making a living. Just like him.

He had told her a man liked a pillowy body, but all he wanted was her, this sleek woman-girl. This lass, as slender as a lath, aroused him as nothing and no one ever had. He had said he would have changed her, made her different, but there was nothing he would change about her now.

He wanted to discover everything, to explore every part of her. Her hands—her fingers long and tapered, so quick and agile. So skilled, so erotic. Her scent—he slid his nose along her neck and into the blunt, fine silk of her hair, to inhale the intoxicating scent of her, of subtle roses—the soap he had purchased for her.

She was still afraid, her body quaking like a loose sail, even as she pressed herself to him, burrowing against him, and clasping her hands tight around his waist. So when he had her down to her shift, he picked her up and put her in the bed, under the covers, and set himself away from her to undress himself.

And he did this slowly as well to savor the way it felt to bare his body for her eyes, to know the next thing he would feel, after the air on his skin, was her body, soft and warm next to him. And when he was stripped, and his rampant erection jutted from his loins, he stood and let her look at him. Let her choose again.

She reached out one hand to the flesh covering his ribs, her touch light and tentative as if she could not quite believe he was real.

“I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “I don’t—”

“Shh.” Hugh climbed onto the bed and kissed her quiet, caressing her with his mouth and his hands, running his fingers down the bare skin of her arm and then back up to trace the delicate line of her collarbone. The taste of her was like a drug he had not known he craved, exotic and intoxicating.

“We’ll go slow, and wait for you to catch up.” He kissed the hollow at the base of her throat. “And I’ll tell you how beautiful you are. And how long I’ve wanted to kiss you.”

Meggs had no defense to such piercing sweetness. Something inside her eased, even as other parts shifted restlessly. “I don’t want to go slowly,” she whispered. “I just want you to want me.”

His mouth at first whispered across hers, his lips somehow both firm and soft against her skin, lulling her with their gentleness and, luring her into a new world of tender sensation.

“No. Please,” she heard herself beg. “I’ve been so lonely. I don’t want to be alone anymore.” She closed her eyes against the hot sting of tears and opened her mouth against the pulse of his neck. The beat was strong and hectic, and she nuzzled against his rough skin with her nose and mouth, smelling and tasting him, breathing in his warmth and strength. “Please.”

He cradled her jaw and kissed her more deeply, hungrily even, pulling her into him with strong, purposeful hands. “Show me,” he breathed. “Make me understand.”

How could she make him understand, when she didn’t understand herself? She felt as if she might shake apart with all the worry and need trapped inside, scratching and clawing its way out. But along with the fear was this overwhelming compulsion to bind him to her. Her hand was already fisting hard in his short hair, pulling it taut between her fingers, holding him tight so he had no choice but to stay.

His answer was a welcome growl. “God, yes, that’s it.”

She closed her eyes and concentrated on the welcome force of his kisses, on his firm mouth, moving insistently on hers.

“Open your mouth to me.” The dark promise of his low voice vibrated through her. Desire blossomed along her skin and began to melt into her bones. When he ran his fingers over her chemise, down the swell of her breast to pluck at the peaks hidden beneath the fabric, she made a fierce, needy sound. Her body arced into the rough friction of his hand, pressing her breasts against him to feel more of the drugging sensation. He tugged the shift down impatiently, molding his palms around her aching breasts. She gasped as his calloused fingers rasped against her sensitized flesh and sent hard darts of delight shooting through her. Then he gathered her nipples like ripe berries between his fingers, rolling them firmly until the pleasure went careening every which way inside her. When his mouth followed his hands, Meggs thought she would break into a hundred pieces at the exquisite contrast of his warm mouth and cool teeth.

She clutched at the strong, curving muscles of his upper arms, anchoring herself to him. His body was fiercely beautiful with its heavy covering of muscle over bone. His skin was warm and golden with a light sprinkling of golden hair across his chest. He was a marvel of heat and light, strength and power. She dragged her palms up over his shoulders and hard across the flat nipples.

He groaned at her touch, a deep sound of satisfaction, so she did it again, pressing her hands more deeply into his muscles, taking longer to trace the curve of his chest and the interesting ridges of his stomach.

When he rose over her like this and stroked her body, so fiercely, so intent in his need to give her pleasure, how could she not give herself to him? How could she not open her body and soul up to him? She wanted, she needed, to feel him next to her, skin to skin. She grasped the hem of her shift, and he sat up to help her peel the last barrier away from her body.

“Tell me you’re sure,” he ground out. “Tell me you want this. You want me.” His eyes, pale and molten, burned into her.

“Please.”

“Say it,” he insisted.

“I want this. I want you.”

His mouth crashed down hard, pressing her lips open and heating her from the inside, the blistering sensation of his tongue rough against hers. Pouring himself into her, filling her with his need. “Say my name.”

“Hugh,” she breathed into his mouth. “I want you, Hugh.”

She repeated his name over and over, like an incantation, as he came down hard on top of her, licking and sucking at her breasts. His body felt strange and immediate against her skin, sleek and sliding, and then rough and prickling as his legs intertwined and tangled with hers. His hands dove into her hair, turning and angling her head to his advantage. He kissed every part of her face—her eyebrows and her nose, her cheeks and the corner of her mouth—with a thorough desperation, as if he could not get enough of her taste.

Meggs kissed him back, loving the whiskey tang of his mouth, savoring the texture of his raspy skin abrading hers, and glorying in the weight of his body pressing her firmly into the mattress. She wanted to discover everything about him, experience every texture and taste. She loosened her grip on his hair, brushing it against her palms like newly mown wheat.

She wanted ... something to ease the fist of tension that was a pain deep inside her, between her legs. Every sensation that began somewhere else—her skin, her hands, her breasts—plummeted deep within and ricocheted back, spreading and radiating through her body. She was breathless with it, breathing in pants and gasps as if she had run a long way. But she was running toward something, not away. Toward Hugh. And with him, toward pleasure. Toward desire.

Her hips had begun to rock against him, sending sparks of urgency sizzling across her skin.

He watched her move with hunger stark in his eyes. “Look at you. You’re perfect.” He traced his hands down her flanks to her hips, skimming across her belly and spanning her pelvis with his large hand. He pulled the linen completely away. “I want to look at you. I want to see you. All of you.”

Heat like a wave roared across her skin and burned deep as his hand slipped lower, tangling his fingers in her curls and stroking her thighs, then pushing them apart. The unholy tightness within her reached such a pitch, she felt as if she were going to break apart, shattering into splinters of feelings.

“I’ve wanted for so long to touch you,” he whispered as he slid a single, long finger inside her.

This time, the sweet pain came from within her, from wanting more of this, more of the sweet, slippery friction. He moved his hand subtly, and the tension inside her grew tighter still. His hands drew across her like a bow upon a fiddle, and she felt undone. Her legs were open, she had opened them, and his knees were pushing them farther apart. And another finger joined the first inside her, pushing, stretching harder now. He turned his hand within her, and his thumb brushed lightly across her flesh.

She made a sound, part anguish and part demand, as her body bucked up of its own accord, seeking, demanding what it wanted. What he could give her.

He kissed her more roughly now, and she kissed him back, wanting the fierceness, wanting the strength and push and surfeit of feeling. His breath came harsh and ragged in her ear.

“I can’t. My God, Meggs, I need you. I want—”

“Yes.”

“Tell me you—”

She didn’t even wait for him to say the words. “Yes. Please. I want you—”

And he was pressing against the tight heat, pushing into her and filling her from the inside with sensation and weight, pinning her to the earth, and to her own body, so she wouldn’t fly away from herself. “God, Meggs.”

He looked hurt, almost anguished, as he rose above her, his hands sliding up to rest beside her head, tangling in her hair. She reached to him, to stroke his face, to ease his pain. He kissed her hand and began to move within her, tentatively at first, watching her face with those pale, hot eyes. She closed her eyes to the first hot rush of pleasure and smiled, letting the heat and the light that came from him wash over her. She was drowning in the pleasure he gave her.

“Yes.” When she whispered that word, just one simple word of encouragement, everything changed.

His body shuddered above her with some inexpressible emotion. The sound that tore out of him was one of barely contained savagery, a growl of hunger and unappeased need. And his body moved to follow, pushing and rocking into hers with a building force, making heat and need pound through her in a headlong rush.

She needed—she wanted. Her hands were clutching at him, her palms tingling with feeling that ran rampant through her body. Her legs were moving, pushing, helping her to rise to meet his thrusting hips. She planted her feet flat against the sheets and pushed up, and white heat blazed from the harsh, cataclysmic joining of their bodies.

He came up on his knees between her legs and reared back, clasping her roughly by the hips and pulling her straight into him. She must have cried out. She heard the keening sound echo around his chamber, but she was too lost to the fire of his body and the strength of the pleasure rocketing through her. Over and over, wave after wave of deepening bliss rolled through her, pushing her closer and closer, urging her higher.