Sam’s Creed (13 page)

“They are
my
breasts.”

He glanced up at her from between the high mounds. “Tonight they’re mine.”

He kissed the underside of the sweet mound, lingered a minute before kissing his way up the convex arch, letting her feel the edge of his teeth as he skimmed the aureole.

Her nipple prodded his cheek. Turgid, hungry, it all but begged the caress of his tongue. He raked it once, twice, three times in a small tribute, before taking her into his mouth, relishing her soft moan, before closing his lips over the plump nub. He started out lightly, gentling her into the moment, sucking at a steady pressure, giving her an easy rhythm until she caught fire, arching beneath him. At the same time, her fingers sank into his hair and tugged. Hard.

He let her nipple slide out of his mouth in a slow gliding, lashing the tip one last time before it popped free.

When he glanced up, she was staring at him. Big brown eyes dark with more than a hint of worry. “You wouldn’t by any chance have something on your mind?”

Her lip came between her teeth. “I do not want you to think I am not eager.”

He slipped the support off her other breast. The mound flattened and spread in a wanton cry for attention, the nipple already peaked. The perfect topping to a sweet dessert. “I know.”

He reached for the waistband of her skirt.

“I need to know what will happen, what is allowed for me to do. I do not want to just lie here.”

He would love it if she just lay there, but that wasn’t Bella. Bella was joy in motion, always seeking control, always exploring. If he wanted her relaxed he had to give her something to do. And he had to make it seem like it was her idea, otherwise she’d worry on the other side of the equation, which would be—was she forcing him into something he didn’t want to do? “You serious?”

“Sí.”

He skimmed his lips up her neck, brushing his mouth over hers. Her lips parted immediately. He didn’t take advantage, just let the anticipation build. “You didn’t finish undressing.”

She blinked before looking down. “I am not undressed enough?”

“Not hardly.”

She reached for the waistband of her skirt. He shook his head. “Not here.”

“Where?”

“Over there by the fire.”

Understanding came in a bad-angel smile. “You wish for me to finish what I started?”

“Oh yeah.”

“And afterward you will make me pant?”

He guided her upright. “I’ll make you scream.”

Like a shot she was out of his lap and standing in front of the dwindling fire, clutching the front of her shirt closed, gaze speculative, her sense of challenge obviously coming to the fore. “But I am thinking maybe, my Sam, I will make
you
pant first.”

She walked around the fire, the sexy sway of her hips baiting him to follow. She reached the other side and spun around, coming to a stop with her hands on her hips and a challenging toss of her head that sent all that glorious hair flying around her shoulders and her blouse dropping open.

Firelight danced in an alternating pattern of light and shadow over that narrow strip of flesh, deepening her already impressive cleavage, hollowing out the center of his control.

She slipped her fingers beneath the shirt collar and eased the fabric off her shoulder, the sleeve sliding down her arm, while the front caught on her heavy breast, one breath away from full disclosure.

He tipped his hat back off his forehead, his mouth going dry, his libido prodding him to get up, cross over, and give that thin piece of material the push it needed.

Her whole face lit up with confident sensuality. “Ah, you like my breasts.”

“No,” he corrected, “I love your breasts.”

She reached for the other side, giving it a nudge. It followed the same path, getting caught on the same point.

One, two, three seconds and the damn thing didn’t fall. “Duchess, do you think you could bring yourself to take a deep breath?”

She shook her head. “If you want to see my breasts, you must show me your chest.”

“I could just walk over there and take what I want.” The hitch in her breathing showed how much she liked the thought of that. He leaned forward.

She shook her head. “But you will not.”

“I won’t?”

“No.”

She was a little too fond of giving him orders. “Why not?”

“Because you like teasing me as much as I like teasing you.”

So he did. “But you should know there’s a price for teasing me.”

“I will pay it.”

“You don’t even know what it is.”

“I do not need to. I trust you.”

His control was a frayed thread, ready to snap at the least increase in tension. He yanked his shirt free of his pants and stood. “You shouldn’t.”

She let her blouse drop the ground. “But I do.”

I
t took him two seconds to get to her side, to capture her against him. Her body flowed into his without a ripple of protest. She had no instinct for survival.

The depth of her cleavage drew his eye. The weight of her breasts dragged them down just a bit. Just enough to fit perfectly into the palm of his hand. His fingers curled in anticipation. Sam brought his hand up, offering the support he’d promised. She turned into his embrace. Her fingers went to the buttons on his shirt. A flush tinted the ledge of her cheekbones. “So it is fine for me to want to see you naked?”

“Better than fine.”

She glanced up at him through her lashes. “And if my nerves are overcome by so much masculinity?”

He chuckled and brushed his thumb over that intriguing blush. “I promise to wake you up pronto.”

Her laugh floated between them, bonding them in the moment, wrapping around them tighter than passion. “Thank you.”

He’d loved to laugh as a kid, and for sure he’d created plenty of opportunities to laugh as an adult, but those had often been black moments of dark humor and usually ended up with someone dead. But with Bella it was always laughter as it should be, for the sheer enjoyment of the moment.

He slid his hand across her waist, pulling her back into his body. Lowering his mouth to the delicate curve of her ear, he rubbed his tongue over the tip, a smile tugging at his desire as she immediately shivered in response. “I want you.”

She turned in his arms, folding hers across her chest, one eyebrow raised in question as she danced backward toward the bedroll. “Do I look like I resist?”

The woman probably didn’t have a clue how crossing her arms like that pushed those gorgeous breasts up and out, putting serious strain on the fabric of her shirt. He, however, couldn’t take his eyes off the miracle. He followed.

“Was that a challenge?”

Her gaze dipped to his mouth. She blinked, then dropped her gaze to his groin, where he knew damned well his hard-on was visible. Her eyes widened. Her breasts swelled with her indrawn breath, and she took a step to the side. That slight sting of amazement soothed the wild side of him. Anticipation hovered in his chest, blending with the heavy flow of desire. “Because I assure you, Bella,” he drawled as he followed her, “I can ride you for as hard and as long as you want.”

She took another step back. She was almost at the bedroll. “Talk is inexpensive.”

She was still staring at his cock. “Cheap. The phrase is talk is cheap.”

“Does it not mean the same thing?”

Another step and Sam was close enough to count the heartbeats in Bella’s throat. “It loses some of its punch.”

Her gaze met his.

Holding it, he took that last critical step, the one that brought him within reach of all the wonder that made her the woman she was. He rested his index finger on that frantically pounding pulse. “You’re not scared of me, are you?”

Her tongue lashed her lips, leaving them moist and trembling. “No.”

“Then why the backing up?”

She jumped, glanced behind her then back at him.

“You know I wouldn’t hurt you, Bella.”

Her palm on his chest was warm and soft, very feminine in the delicacy with which she claimed him. “I know this.”

He lifted her into his arms and knelt, taking them both to the softness of the bedroll, coming down over her, catching his weight on his forearms, smiling into her eyes. “So why the nerves?”

Her hands opened against his chest, not caressing, not pressing, just resting there as if she were measuring his response. “I want so much for tonight to be what you want.”

“This is just me, Bella, loving on you. Nothing big.”

She rolled her eyes. “You are the biggest thing I know, Sam.”

He moved a strand of hair off the corner of her mouth, tenderness welling. She wasn’t afraid of anything. “You can handle me.”

His reward was a return of the bad-angel smile. Her palms stroked his muscles and that smile he loved dimpled her cheeks as she arched in invitation. “Yes. I think I can.”

Gathering up her skirt, he tucked his hand beneath, finding shockingly bare skin, riding the discovery upward to the soft hair covering her mound. The springing curls immediately wrapped around his fingers. He gave a little tug. The pupils of her eyes dilated and her breath hitched in a sexy moan. He leaned in, catching the end of the soft sigh in his mouth.

“Sweet.”

Her lids drifted shut as her mouth flowered beneath his, opening slightly, teasing him with her flavor, daring him to take more. He did, bringing his hand up to her jaw, squeezing until she obeyed the command, holding her in that position, open and helpless until she moaned again, straining in his hands. Only then did he kiss her, tangling his tongue with hers, stroking the sides, teasing the sensitive inner lining of her lips before sucking her tongue into his mouth, drawing on her flesh, her spirit. Willing her to give in. She did with an inarticulate cry and a twisting of her torso.

“See, that’s all you need to do, Bella, to make this perfect. Just let me see who you are, how I’m making you feel.”

“You make me feel so much.”

The sweet scent of her arousal drew his touch. She was wet and swollen. Eager. “Ah, duchess, this is one hungry little pussy.”

“What do you expect when you flaunt yourself before me for days?”

Another chuckle. “Not much else, I guess.”

He squeezed and she jumped. When her hips came back down he pressed up with the heel of his hand against the point of her pouting clit, rubbing gently as he tested the tightness of her sheath with one finger.

“Sam!”

“Right here.”

He pressed again and her head thrashed from side to side as her hips shoved up into the newness of the sensation. He kissed her cheek, the corner of her eye….

“Do that again.”

If he did it again she’d come and he wasn’t ready for her to come. “Not yet.”

Her fist collided with his back, dislodging a smile. “I cannot wait.”

“You will.”

Her hands waved in the air for a second, finally settling on his shoulder. The heat of her touch burned through his shirt. He wanted all that silken heat against him. He tugged on the waistband of her skirt. “Lift up.”

She did. He worked the skirt off her hips. Her thighs fell open. Pearls of moisture caught on her dark curls, reflecting the glow of the fire. Beyond, the swollen folds of her pussy beckoned with a different kind of fire. Holding her gaze, he parted her folds, settling two fingers into the well of her vagina. She shivered, her lips catching between her teeth.

“You’re beautiful, Bella.”

“So are you.”

“Men aren’t beautiful.”

Passion deepened the husk in her voice. “You are.”

Shifting his weight onto his forearm, Sam eased his fingers in, watching her soft pink flesh take him to the first knuckle, stopping when she gasped and clenched. “Easy.”

“I am too small.” It was almost a wail.

“No, you’re just new to this.” Her clit, sitting high and swollen, stretched toward him, begging for attention. Her scent surrounded him, clean and fresh like spring, full of potential just waiting to be unleashed.

Sam couldn’t wait to set her free. To feel all that passion raining down on him, breaking over his cock. He wanted her with nothing between them. Not the past. Not the future. Not her fears or anyone’s expectations. He wanted the way she always was, full of hope and positive thought. He wanted her to remember tonight with a smile.

He touched her clit with his tongue, just a bare whisper of sensation across the turgid tip. Just enough to taunt the fire that burned so brightly in her. Her high-pitched cry echoed around him. Pinning her hips with his forearm, he settled deeper between her thighs. “I’m going to taste you now, Bella….”

“I will come if you do.”

“No—” he lifted her right ankle over his shoulder “—you won’t.” Skimming his hand down the outside of her left leg, he lifted that ankle, too. “You’re going to enjoy what I do to you, but you won’t come. Not until I give you permission.”

“Who are you to tell me this?”

“Your lover.”

The declaration hung between them, ripe with implication. Testing her readiness with another pulse of his fingers, keeping her gaze locked to his, he suckled her clit lightly, a mere breeze of the caress he wanted to paint on her swollen flesh before kissing the tip, stroking her thighs when she jerked. She shoved her hand between her vulva and his mouth. Circling her wrists with his fingers, he slid his thumb between her mound and his palm. “Trust me, Bella.”

Tenderness suffused lust as she hesitated, a stutter in the trust she was giving him, but then she let him enfold her much smaller hand in his, her fingers weaving through his the same way her faith wove through the relentless tide of lust surging through him, gentling it to a manageable level that stayed just short of mindless.

He smiled and nipped her clit, holding her as the shock went through her in a wave of sensation mirrored in the undulating tensing and relaxing of her inner muscles. A fine sheen of sweat burnished her skin.

“Tell me what you want.”

The flush on her cheek intensified. He might be pushing her too hard, but then she shook her hair out of her eyes and rose to his challenge, meeting his gaze, his desire with her own. “I need your…cock in me. Please, Sam.”

He could give her that. With a last swirl of his tongue over her pert little clit, he eased his fingers from her tight channel and positioned himself between her thighs. His shadow covered her, blocking the light from her eyes. “Put your arms around my neck and hold on.”

She did what he ordered without hesitating. Trusting him. Sam gritted his teeth against the need to take her hard to drive deep as she kicked off the remains of her skirt, almost unmanning him in the process, but then he was holding her, skin to skin, heartbeat to heartbeat. Emotion rolled over him in a stampede. All his life he’d denied himself this, and now it was here, and he’d allowed himself only this one night. This one night before Bella moved on to the life she should have. Heaven and hell wrapped up under one sky.

“Please, Sam.”

It was that second
please
that did him in. Isabella so rarely said please, it sounded almost like begging, reminding him that for all her talk and honesty, this was new to her and she was uncertain. He didn’t want her begging in his bed. He wanted her wild and hungry, but not begging.

“You can have whatever you want from me, Bella. No pleases. Just tell me what it is.”

I want you to love me.

Isabella froze.

Por Dios,
had she said that out loud? She hadn’t meant to. Hadn’t even known the stupid hope had lingered through all her efforts to bury it. Sam was still staring at her, his blue eyes deep with the passion so elemental to his personality. Still waiting for an answer.

She closed her eyes on a sigh of relief. She had only thought the revelation. Isabella twisted her grip tighter in Sam’s hair. “Make me feel good. Better than I’ve ever felt before.”

She didn’t expect him to be thrown off by the challenge, and he wasn’t. He laughed, kissed her and slid down, nibbling on her neck, her collarbone, the upper swell of her breast as he went, leaving a trail of flames in his wake, so many it felt as if her skin was on fire. She gasped as his lips skimmed the valley of her breast, the softness of her stomach, the point of her pubic bone, the top of her mound.

His eyes met hers, sharp, hot and intense as his tongue nestled under the lip of her vulva and curled around her clit. Heat, fire, shock flared through her system in a breath-stealing combination. Her channel clenched. She pushed her hips up into the press of his mouth, gasping breathlessly when he lashed her with his tongue, the totality of his possession pulling an invisible thread in her spine, arching her into an offering for more. More of his touch, his play. More of whatever he wanted.

She’d been primed for too long. Needed him too much. He might think she would find joy in a safe life, because he refused to see her, but she knew differently. He was what she’d always searched for, why she would never settle for the men and the life her parents pushed toward her. He was her nemesis. Her salvation. Her hope.

The delight of his tongue on her heated flesh was unparalleled, driving through the fear of surrendering, burning so deep it branded her anew. Sam’s. She was Sam’s. Her womb clenched on the bliss of his fingers parting the tight muscles of her sheath, clamped down on this moment, wanting to preserve it, not wanting it to end.

His purr of satisfaction ratcheted the knot tighter, the need higher.

“Sam?”

She needed release, needed to come, but just when she reached the edge, just when she was about to shatter in climax, he backed off, sprinkling tender sweet kisses across her pussy, surrounding her clit with warmth, tenderness and care, everything but what she needed—the hard touch that would send her hurtling over the edge.

“What?”

“I am going to kill you.”

His husky laugh was just one more incentive to carry through the threat.

“No, you’re not.” One long, lingering swipe of his tongue and he was kissing his way back up her body the same way he’d gone down. As if they had all the time in the world. “You’re going to come for me. Long and hard, all around my cock.”

He pressed his mouth so hard against her throat she could feel his teeth. Another shudder went through her. One more shift of those gorgeous muscles and he was covering her, his big body sheltering her from reality.

“Like I’ve dreamed of,” he finished on a growl of anticipation.

The blankets by her head rustled as he adjusted his weight on his forearm. Shadows swirled over the passion in his eyes as he kicked off his boots and his pants. Shadows she recognized because she lived with them herself. It was comforting to know he was also plagued with what-ifs.

“Tonight, if you dream with me…” She reached up, curled her palm over the hard muscle of his shoulder, her thumb settling into the indent of an old scar. So many wounds, so many scars, the new ones earned defending her. “You will be happy.”