his mouth over her nipple and introducing her to the use of a skilled tongue on a very sensitive part of a lady’s body. When he finally drew on her, Leah heard a small, helpless moan escape her throat and knew the urge to clutch at him—his hair, his head, his shoulders,
He shifted again on the bed, crouching over her, and Leah found that helped her growing sense of restless unease. When he used his mouth on her breasts, it stirred feelings beneath the pit of her stomach.
And they weren’t comfortable feelings, either. This was arousal; she didn’t have a lot of experience with it, but recognized it, and both marveled and cringed at its intensity.
But twining through the arousal was something darker, an empty ache, a forlorn, homesick quality that was anxious, needy, and unwelcome. Having Nick once again over her, surrounding her with his weight and scent and muscle, helped with that hollow ache.
She arched up again, wanting to be closer to him. The hard length of his arousal, clearly evident through his breeches, brushed against her stomach before Nick could crouch back out of range.
“Don’t do that,” she muttered, her fingers going to his falls. “Let yourself touch me.”
“I want to lose these breeches, but you mustn’t look,” Nick admonished, humor warring with sternness in his voice. “Promise me, Leah.”
“You are worrying for nothing, Nicholas,” Leah said, her fingers stroking over his hair. “I am not a virgin, and you have assured me we will not copulate, in any case. But if it’s important to you,” Leah whispered in his ear, “then I will not press you on this, particularly when my interest in lengthy discussions is not now at its greatest.” She kissed his cheek, and Nick let out a sigh.
“You are hairy,” she went on, her lips pressed to his throat. “Like a golden lion. I like that you are different from me.”
And she wasn’t done with him. He wanted intimacy, and by heavens, she’d oblige him.
“But your chest is smooth, with only a little hair on your stomach. I wonder”—Leah’s tone became teasing —“if your body is as sensitive as mine.” She recalled her previous interest in his nipples, only this time, she angled her body so she could get her mouth over one of his.
“I am your willing servant.” No lazy seduction warmed his words. They sounded tight, bitten off.
“Take your breeches off, Nicholas. Please.” Leah planted one hand on the small of his back and eased it under his waistband, a suggestion of the pleasure he’d feel were her hands anchored on his muscular fundament.
“No peeking,” he admonished.
She peeked as he rolled to his back, unfastened about half the buttons on his falls, and jerked the last of his clothes from his body. They joined Leah’s nightclothes at the foot of the bed, and then Nick was positioned back over her, giving her no opportunity to inspect what he was so intent on keeping from her view, the dratted man.
She would not suffer him to frustrate her curiosity entirely. “Closer, Nicholas, let me feel you.”
Tentatively, he gave her contact with his chest then wrapped his arms around her and held her to him, a sort of static body caress that let his tremendous heat seep into Leah’s joints and bones.
It helped, to be this close to him, and it tormented to know he would not join with her. The greater torment was Leah’s sense that Nick hadn’t been honest with her regarding his reasons for his self-enforced limits.
“So is this what you wanted?” Leah asked when Nick eased his hold and shifted off to her side. “Is this what we’ll share besides a passing nod on the dance floor?”
“Not quite,” Nick murmured, shifting to his side. “There’s a bit more.”
Leah yawned, slid a hand down over his buttocks. She didn’t come right out and tell him to be about it, though she gently squeezed a handful of taut male muscle.
“You trust me?” Nick asked, brushing the hair back from her forehead.
To break her heart and keep her safe while he did it. She squeezed him again. “In bed, I trust you.”
“Spread your legs a little,” Nick suggested, his hand stroking the center of her chest. “You’ll be more comfortable, and please recall”—he pressed a kiss to each of her closed eyes in turn—“you are to relax and not peek and trust me.”
He covered her mouth with his, and while his tongue teased at hers and slipped over the heat of her mouth, that hand shifted to gently caress each breast. He palmed the weight of each one, glided his fingers teasingly over her nipples, and gave her just the weight of his hand resting over her. Leah arched up, trying to inspire him to greater activity, but he growled a warning and let his hand drift down over her ribs, then her stomach.
He stroked his fingers over her navel, evoking surprising sensations from a place on her body Leah had never really considered, and again he paused, while Leah experienced the warm weight of his hand on her naked belly.
“Nicholas, must you be so…?”
“Tender?” he suggested. “Careful… deliberate… enthralled… enchanted…?”
“Aggravating.” Leah landed on the word with relish, because Nick was wandering about her body as if the growing restlessness inside her were pleasurable, and to Leah, it was increasingly bothersome. Aaron had not left her feeling like this, had not taken more than a few minutes of kissing, poking, and apologizing, then grunting and making the bed creak.
“Can’t have my lady aggravated.” Nick brushed the backs of his fingers over the down on Leah’s mons, and her breath escaped on a gasp.
“Eyes closed.” Nick bent his head over her breast. “Legs spread a little.” He settled his mouth over her nipple just as his hand began to stroke her thighs, and this time when he suckled, it was Leah growling. Her eyes were closed, and behind her eyelids, colors were dancing and surging, and her body felt the same way. Full of heat and color and odd, novel sensations.
When she felt him trace up the crease of her sex with a single finger, Leah’s hands found Nick’s shoulders and gripped hard.
“Easy, lovey,” Nick murmured between kisses. “Move if you want to, against me.”
He pushed gently against her mons, and she pushed back, slowly but not so gently. The undulation of her body eased her and made things worse, too, but she was helpless to stop it as Nick’s deft fingers delved gently into her folds.
“You are growing eager,” Nick whispered as his fingers slipped higher. “Your body grows slick in anticipation of your pleasure.”
“God above,
“What was what?” Nick didn’t remove his hand.
“You touched me, and it felt like I rapped my elbow, but much, much worse.”
“You’ll grow accustomed to such sensations,” Nick said, his words laced with amusement, “and they’ll become more pleasurable if you’ll be patient with them.” He moved his hand again, with her fingers still circling his wrist, but this time he used a more definite pressure on the apex of her sex.
“Ye gracious gods…” Her grip loosened as her eyes fluttered closed, but still she didn’t let him go.
In silence, he touched her for long, fraught moments only there, letting her focus on that one source of sensation until she was breathing heavily and moving against his hand in slow, powerful surges of her hips.
“Nicholas…?” She wet her lips with her tongue, her arousal and bewilderment ringing in his name.
“Trust me,” Nick reminded her, dipping his head to brush his lips over her nipple. “Trust me and take your pleasure, Leah.”
Pleasure took
“Too much…” she panted, and then Nick drew on her nipple, and the too much redoubled to be more than too much for long, shuddering moments.
When it passed, she lay on her back, body slack, mind slack, her only thought gratitude for the comfort of Nick’s hand, still pressed firmly against her sex. If he moved, if he moved even one inch, she was going to dissolve into fairy dust and drift away up the chimney.
He did move, but not that hand. Instead, Leah felt Nick’s other arm burrow under her neck and wrap her against his chest. That brought comfort, but not as much as when Leah shifted herself more closely still, hiking a
