Win slid a bashful glance at the heavy protrusion straining behind his trousers. 'Rather too substantial for a thorn. I should have thought they would use a more fitting word. But I suppose-' She inhaled sharply as his hand moved downward. 'I suppose if one wants roses, one must'-his finger had slipped inside her again-'bear the occasional thorn.'
'Very philosophical.' He gently stroked and teased the clenching interior of her body.
Her toes curled into the quilt as wicked tension coiled low in her belly. 'Kev, what should I do?'
'Nothing. Only let me please you.'
All her life, she had hungered for this without quite knowing what it was, this slow, astonishing merging with him, this sweet dissolution of self. This mutual surrender. There was no doubt that he was in control, and yet he browsed over her with absolute wonder. She felt herself soaking up sensation, her body infused with color and heat.
Merripen wouldn't let her hide any part of herself from him… He took what he wanted, turning and lifting her body, rolling her this way and that, always with care, and yet with passionate insistence. He kissed beneath her arms and along her sides and all over her, running his tongue along every curve and humid crease. Gradually the accumulating pleasure shaped into something dark and raw, and she moaned from the pain of acute need.
The drive of her heartbeat reverberated everywhere, in her breasts and limbs and stomach, even at the tips of her fingers and toes. It was too much, this wildness he had aroused. She begged him for a moment's respite.
'Not yet,' he told her between ragged breaths, his tone rough with a triumph she didn't yet understand. 'Please, Kev-'
'You're so close, I can feel it. Oh God-' He took her head in his hands, kissed her ravenously, and said against her lips, 'You don't want me to stop yet. Let me show you why.'
A whimper escaped her as he slid low between her thighs, his head bending to the swollen place he had been tormenting with his fingers. He put his mouth on her, licking along the delicate salty strait, spreading her with his thumbs. She tried to sit bolt-upright, but fell back against the pillows as he found what he wanted, his tongue strong and wet.
She was spread beneath him like a pagan sacrifice, illuminated by the daylight that now flooded the room. Merripen worshipped her with hot, glassy licks, savoring the taste of her pleasured flesh. Moaning, she closed her legs around his head, and he turned deliberately to nibble and lick at one pale inner thigh, then the other. Feasting on her. Wanting everything.
Win curled her fingers desperately in his hair, lost to shame as she guided him back, her body arching wordlessly… here, please, more, more, now… and she groaned as he fastened his mouth over her with a fast, flicking rhythm. Pleasure seized her, wrenching an astonished cry from her, holding her stiff and paralyzed for excruciating seconds. Every movement and measure and pulse of the universe had distilled to the compelling, slippery heat, riveted there on that crucial place, and then it all released, the feeling and tension shattering exquisitely, and she was racked with hard, blissful shudders.
Win relaxed helplessly as the spasms faded. She was filled with glowing weariness, a sense of peace too pervasive to allow movement. Merripen let go of her just long enough to undress completely. Naked and aroused, he came back to her. He gathered her up with brute masculine need, settling over her.
She lifted her arms to him with a drowsy murmur. His back was tough and sleek beneath her fingers, the muscles twitching eagerly at her touch. His head descended, his shaven cheek rasping against hers. She met his power with utter surrender, flexing her knees and tilting her hips to cradle him.
He pushed gently at first. The innocent flesh resisted, smarting at the intrusion. He thrust more strongly, and Win caught her breath at the burning pain of his entrance. Too much of him, too hard, too deep. She writhed in reaction, and he buried himself heavily and pinned her down, gasping for her to be still, telling her to wait, he wouldn't move, it would be better. They both stilled, breathing hard.
'Should I stop?' Merripen whispered raggedly, his face taut.
Even now in this flash point of need, he was concerned for her. Understanding what it had cost him to ask, how much he needed her, Win was overwhelmed with love. 'Don't even think of stopping now,' she whispered back. Reaching down to his lean flanks, she stroked him in shy encouragement. He groaned and began to move, his entire body trembling as he pressed within her.
Although every thrust caused a sharp burn where they were joined, Win tried to pull him even deeper. The feeling of having him inside her went far beyond pain or pleasure. It was necessary.
Merripen stared down at her, his eyes brilliant in his flushed face. He looked fierce and ravenous and even a bit disoriented, as if he were experiencing something beyond the scope of ordinary men. Only now did Win grasp the enormity of his passion for her, the years it had accumulated despite all his efforts to smother it. How hard he had fought against their fate, for reasons she still didn't fully understand. But now he possessed her body with a reverence and intensity that eclipsed all other feeling.
And yet he loved her as a woman, not some ethereal creature. His feelings for her were full-blooded, lusty, elemental. Exactly as she had wanted.
She took him, and took him, wrapping him in her slender legs, burying her face in his throat and shoulder. She loved the sounds he made, the soft grunts and growls, the harsh flow of his breath. And the power of him around her and inside her. Tenderly she stroked his back and sides and pressed kisses on his neck. He seemed electrified by her attentions, his movements quickening, his eyes closing tightly. And then he thrust upward and held, and shook all over as if he were dying.
'Win,' he groaned, burying his face against her. 'Win.' The single syllable contained the faith and passion of a thousand prayers.
Minutes passed before either of them spoke. They stayed wrapped together, fused and damp and unwilling to part.
Win smiled as she felt Merripen's lips drift over her face. When he reached her chin, he gave it a little nip. 'Not a pedestal,' he said gruffly.
'Hmmn?' She stirred, raising her hand to the shaven bristle of his cheek. 'What do you mean?'
'You said I put you on a pedestal… remember?'
'Yes.'
'It was never that. I've always carried you in my heart. Always. I thought that would have to be enough.'
Moved, Win kissed him gently. 'What happened, Kev? Why did you change your mind?'
Chapter Eighteen
Kev didn't intend to answer that until he had taken care of her. He left the bed and went to the small kitchen, which had been fitted with a cookstove with a brass water reservoir and pipes leading through the firebox to provide hot water instantly. Filling a hot-water can, he brought it to the bedroom along with a clean tea towel.
He paused at the sight of Win lying on her side, the flowing curves draped in white linen, her hair spilling over her shoulders in rivers of silvery gold. And best of all, the sated softness of her face and the swollen rosi-ness of lips he had kissed and kissed. It was an image from his deepest dreams, seeing her in bed like that. Waiting for him.
He dampened the toweling with hot water and peeled back the sheet, enchanted by her beauty. He would have wanted her no matter what, virgin or no… but he privately acknowledged his satisfaction in having been her first lover. No one but he would touch her, pleasure her, see her… except…
'Win,' he said, frowning as he washed her, pressing the steaming cloth between her thighs. 'At the clinic, did you ever wear less than your exercise costume? That is, did Harrow ever look at you?'
Her face was composed, but there was a glitter of amusement in her rich blue eyes. 'Are you asking if Julian ever saw me naked in a professional capacity?'
Kev was jealous, and they both knew it, but he couldn't stop from scowling. 'Yes.'
'No, he didn't,' she said primly. 'He was interested in my respiratory system, which, as you clearly know, is in a far different location than the reproductive organs.'
