The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae (23 page)

Behind those curls, she would be hot, swollen, and slick . . .

All concept of control fled his mind.

He shifted them both to the left, then tipped her, flipped her to her back. The covers remained tangled and twisted between them, but left her legs, her arms, and her breasts bared. He came down on top of her, his weight on his elbows so he didn't crush her; her thighs instinctively parted to cradle his hips.

Momentarily distracting him.

“Wait—get this off!”

She was still struggling with his shirt, trying to get it off his shoulders. Her focus wasn't where he wanted it to be; with a grumbled oath, he raised up enough to, with her assistance, peel the garment off. She flung it away and refocused on his chest.

Swooping, he trapped her lips in a kiss expressly designed to curl her toes, to wipe her mind of all thought, and send her wits whirling. To have her loosen her grip on the reins of this engagement and cede them wholly to him.

The kiss was all he'd intended it to be.

The result wasn't what he'd planned.

Instinctively recognizing the tussle of wits and wills, the battle of experience against sheer enthusiasm—the fight for dominance—Angelica fearlessly leapt into the fray. She kissed him back, met his thrusting tongue with her own, and with reckless and giddy abandon gave him back every iota of passion he poured into her.

This
was what she wanted—or at least the threshold of what she wanted. Them, together, rolling in the flames, and stoking said flames ever higher.

She reveled in the kiss, in the unrestrained mating of mouths it had become. Pulling her hands from their fascination with his chest—so wide, so hard, so warm—she slid one to his nape; she wanted—
needed
—to feel his chest against her tight, still aching breasts. She tugged; in response, he settled lower on his elbows, but his chest still hovered an inch above her breasts.

Her other hand had skated to his side, gripping the warm skin above his waist. Sending that hand roaming over his back, over all of him she could reach, she savored, almost purred through the ravenous, greedy kiss; his skin was smooth, pulled taut over rock-hard muscles and heavy bone.

And he radiated heat. A heat that beckoned and tempted her—nay, compelled her to rub her body against his, to tangle her naked limbs with his.

But no matter how she tugged, no matter the temptation she poured into the kiss, he wouldn't lower further—wouldn't give her the relief she sought.

So she brazenly took it. Using his rock-solid immobility as an anchor, she tightened her grip on his nape and arched upward against him, pressed her breasts to his chest, shifted and caressed.

Caught her breath at the sharp, lancing sensation, at the wave of intense pleasure that the black hair across his chest abrading her ruched nipples sent streaking through her.

Their lips were still locked, but she thought he'd gasped, too.

Then he stilled.

And she knew she'd won.

That she'd succeeded in convincing him to stop managing their reins and let them free.

The satisfaction had barely registered when he pounced.

One hard hand caught and held her face, then he kissed her—with an unrestrained ferocity that left her reeling.

Had she thought his kisses passionate before? This kiss laid her waste, left her with wits flown and her senses rioting.

Abruptly he broke the kiss and turned his attention to her breasts. His full, undivided, almost ruthless attention. Hard hands shaped and kneaded, weighed, seized, and claimed. His lips branded; his tongue savored and rasped, and drove her to ever greater desperation.

Then he took the tight bud of her nipple into his mouth, suckled hard, and drove her wild.

And she could no longer think, could only respond to the intimate pleasuring.

To every powerful suckle, every lick, every knowing squeeze.

The strength in his hands was undeniable, yet fear had no purchase in her brain. Anticipation did. Building inexorably, it licked her skin, lashed her flesh, shivered down her nerves.

Yes, yes, yes
.

More,
her body sang. She did everything she could to communicate that, to encourage and feed his desire, his passion, his urgency.

Until hers became his, his became hers, and want and need and passion and desire were one blazing conflagration.

Greedy and ravenous, aching and needy, addicted to the flames she undulated beneath him, savoring the alienness of his hardness against her softness, then she ran her hands down his back, down to slip her fingers beneath the back of his waistband, reaching further to stroke, to touch, to learn.

Dominic bit back a curse; heat erupted, arousal geysering as her delicate fingers brushed the skin of his lower back—skin only a lover would be likely to touch.

He didn't need any further reminders of what role she was intent on filling; the brutal impulse to claim her was pounding through his skull, through every part of his body, demanding. He was riding the edge of passion in a way he never had before; never had the hunter within been so intent on taking absolute possession.

On owning. On claiming. On making his.

But she was, if not innocent, still a virgin; he couldn't simply take her.

Instinct and impulse had him sliding down the bed so that he could with his hands claim more of her, so he could rain openmouthed kisses over her taut belly, could lick and taste her skin there, too.

Her breathing grew harried. She could no longer reach his lower back. Her small hands roamed his shoulders, caressed his upper arms, every touch openly inciting.

Shifting lower yet, he dragged the covers from between them and shoved the folds aside, revealing her beauty, her bounty, baring all the feminine delights he fully intended to claim.

It was her turn to still. He heard her breath hitch, felt expectation grip her.

His body held one of her legs trapped; his shoulders had kept her thighs wedged wide, yet he closed one hand about her free knee and opened her wider still.

And looked down at her ultimate delight, the pink pouting lips glistening with arousal, the tip of her clitoris just visible behind the screening curls.

His mouth watered.

Tracking his gaze slowly up her body, he glanced at her face.

Caught her gaze. Watched her eyes widen, held the emerald and gold splendor while anticipation heightened and her hands gripped, nails sinking into his arms. Eyes locked with hers, he released her knee, ran the backs of his fingers down the quivering inner face of her thigh, set his hand to her flesh, and cupped her.

Her lips parted; he felt the sensual jolt that shook her, heard her smothered gasp. Relaxing his hand, he trailed his fingers through the scalding wetness, set them to the plump lips and traced. On a shuddering sigh, her lids fell, but he continued to watch her expression, watched as she registered the novel sensations, the blatant intimacy, then he looked down.

And explored.

Her harried, increasingly ragged breathing was music to his senses.

He stroked and caressed, but neither he nor she had much patience left. Aware of the tension rising in her, evident in the flickering muscles of her thighs, he tested her entrance with one blunt fingertip—and discovered just how tight she was.

Leaving that hand where it was, he pushed back up the bed; rejoicing in the slide of his chest, skin to skin, over her sumptuous body, he settled over her again and, ignoring her faint frown, her restless questing hands, dipped his head and covered her lips, took her mouth again, filled it with a demand too rapacious for her to resist. Once she was caught in the exchange, he eased one finger into her sheath.

Angelica lost her breath—suddenly discovered she could only breathe through the kiss, through him. She clung to the exchange, to its heat, to the lifeline it provided while her senses spun. While her mind was overwhelmed by the sensation of him slowly, carefully, sliding just one finger into her.

His fingers were large, but courtesy of her earlier endeavors she now knew just how large the pertinent rest of him was. If this was how one finger felt . . .

With that finger finally buried inside her, he stroked.

And something within her quaked.

She pulled back from the kiss and hauled in a huge breath. Head pressed back into the pillow, eyes closed, she followed every flexion of his hand between her thighs, every press, every pressure, every subtle, knowing, repetitive glide of his fingers.

Heat flared, even hotter, more hungry, than before. It flashed beneath her skin, raced down her veins, pooled, welled, and swelled low in her body.

Compelling. Demanding.

She shifted beneath him, restless and needy; his lips returned to hers in a gentler kiss. He drew back, murmured, his voice gravelly and grating, “One step at a time.”

If she'd had any doubt that he was as captured—as captive—as she was, his tone would have dispelled it. The harshness spoke of raw need, ruthlessly restrained, yet impossible to deny.

In her case, she couldn't—and saw no reason to—suppress her escalating need, but while she was determined to experience the full clamor of desire, his and hers, both unleashed, she could only be thankful that he retained sufficient wit and control to ease her through this, her first time.

Then he withdrew his finger; she sensed him glancing down. A protest forming in her brain, she clutched his shoulder, but then he replaced one finger with two, pushing both past her entrance, slowly yet deliberately working them deep and she forgot . . . everything else.

Forgot to breathe.

She remembered, and heard her shallow, ragged, desperate pants, but then he stroked again, more definitely, more heavily, and her senses expanded, then soared.

Her body grew hotter; tension coiled, tighter and tighter. She suddenly wanted something, needed relief. She arched beneath him, hips lifting, rising, riding the now regular, repetitive thrusts, reaching for something, searching for yet more—

Desperate, she reached for him, blindly caught his nape and pulled his lips back to hers and kissed him with wild abandon—with her own brand of command and demand; with her other hand she clutched his back and held tight, urged him closer.

Dominic kissed her back, met her and matched her, fought and battled for supremacy, for once a battle he couldn't seem to win.

She wanted, needed—so he gave.

Gave her what she—her body—was clamoring for.

With long, sure strokes, he brought her to the peak, to the point where her nails sank into his arm, her back arched and her sheath tightened inexorably about his fingers.

He broke the kiss, dipped his head, caught one of her nipples, took it deep into his mouth, simultaneously thrust his fingers deep. Suckled hard.

And she screamed.

And shattered. Shifting, his mouth still at her breast, he watched the glory flow across her expressive face—the wonder, the amazement, of her first climax.

Ripples of release washed through her; he stroked within her, prolonging the delicious pleasure, waiting until she eased.

Gradually, her body relaxed, all tension erased. The hand that had locked in his hair released, and slid to his shoulder.

He took advantage and shifted lower in the bed, settling his shoulders between her bent knees. He was hard and aching, but he had time for this. Had a need for this.

Splaying one hand over her belly, grasping her knee with the other and holding it wide, he bent his head and tasted her.

Licked, laved, and savored her.

Angelica came back to life on a shuddering gasp, on a shaft of intense, erotically intimate pleasure. For several seconds, her mind refused to accept what her senses were conveying—then she levered up her lids, glanced down her body, and watched him lap at her.

He felt her gaze, glanced up, and watched her watching him. His next long, slow, rasping lick shot pleasure so sharp through her that she gasped, eyes closing, spine bowing, as she rode the wave out.

But the wave didn't end. The pleasure built, and built.

Until she was writhing under his hand, her panting breaths just short of sobs, her head threshing, her hands fisted in the covers as he drove her relentlessly on.

This time the peak was higher.

Wielding an expertise that was little short of damning, he drove her straight to the pinnacle—then held her there.

Kept her there, her senses straining, her mind awash, nearly drowning in intimate sensation.

When he finally consented to thrust his tongue into her and let her fly, the soaring release propelled her so high she felt she'd touched some sensual sun.

For a moment, she knew nothing, could sense nothing beyond the blinding brilliance.

Dominic eased up from his position between her widespread thighs. For an instant, balanced on his knees, he looked down at her—at the sumptuous female flesh, rose-tinted with desire, spread before him like a feast. Well-pleasured and ready for the taking.

Her taste was on his tongue, fresh, tart, an undeniable lure.

One that had sunk barbs into his hunter's soul.

His fingers went to the buttons at his waist, slid them free. Seconds later, he'd wrestled his trousers off; he flung them away.

Returning to her, as he stretched over her, then lowered his body to hers, all he knew was a raw, driving, primitive urge to join with her.

To mate with her.

Courtesy of her actions and his reactions, passion now rode him so unforgivably he was close to blind with need. Close, very close, to losing all control. Desire was a raging torrent in his blood, more primal, more ravenous, more powerfully ungovernable than he'd ever known it. He had no option but to appease it, to sate the burning need.

Without haste yet with no hesitation, he wedged his hips between her thighs, set the blunt head of his erection at her entrance and, hanging over her, arms braced so he could watch her face, he pushed into her.

Slowly.

Her lids fluttered, then rose, and she looked up at him.