Page 46

But Ivy knew something Edward did not. She learned it through her friendship with Millie.

Through her mentorship with Philippa. Through her time with the orphans.

Love was a wondrous thing. Much like powdered sugar.

Even when you thought you were only sprinkling it on others, you ended up covered in the sweetness yourself.

If Edward believed giving her love would stop him from receiving it, fine.

She would add it to the list of all the things he was wrong about.

Because in giving her love, he would inevitably receive it himself.

‘All right. Tell me what to do.’

Edward clenched his jaw, and she ached to run her fingers over the twitching muscles. But she would honour his request. For now.

In one violent tug, he pulled her nightgown and shift all the way down her body, helping her step free.

‘Put your hands behind your back.’ She did as he asked, crossing her wrists over each other and pressing them against the small of her back.

He gripped her hips and pushed her pelvis against the door, trapping her hands between her body and the wood. ‘Spread your legs.’

Heat washed over her at the illicit command, but she slowly moved her thighs apart.

Edward’s fingers traced over the blush rushing across her chest. His thumb brushed over her puckered nipple and Ivy moaned as her cunny began to weep.

He was watching her with such intensity, Ivy was sure he could count the scars upon her soul.

Brushing over her nipple again, his pupils dilated as she bit her lip.

‘So sensitive.’ He circled again, then dipped his head, taking the other into his mouth and sucking hard.

‘Damnation!’ An invisible cord linking her nipple to her clitoris pulled tight. Ivy saw stars. Teeth scraped over the sensitive tip of her breast, and she was quite certain something inside her shattered as intimate muscles clenched.

‘I need to taste you.’ Edward dropped to his knees, trailing kisses down her belly. Before Ivy could process his words, his nose nuzzled against the hair covering her mons.

‘I don’t think?—’

‘Exactly. Don’t think. Just feel, Ivy.’ He dipped his head lower.

When his tongue split her lips in a silky swipe of velvet heat, Ivy’s legs buckled.

But Edward was ready for her. Holding her hip against the door with one hand, he gripped her right thigh and pulled it over his left shoulder, then followed with her left leg over his right.

Dear heavens. I am sitting on Edward’s shoulders. And my quim is right in front of his mou…

Ivy lost focus as Edward gripped the globes of her bottom in his strong hands, kneading one, then other. He licked along her inner thigh, biting the sensitive skin and making her nearly jump out of his hands.

‘Don’t move.’

Easy for him to say. I’m not biting his…

His tongue delved into her cleft and Ivy may have screamed.

‘Cover your mouth with your hand.’

She pulled one hand free from where it pressed against the door and slapped it over her lips, moaning as his tongue flicked, his mouth sucked, his teeth scraped.

He left no part of her untouched. Nibbling the frilled edges, plunging his thick tongue into her aching channel, licking the cluster of nerves, but never long enough.

He was toying with her and Ivy was too lost to complain.

All she knew was she wanted more. She wanted everything.

‘I want you to…’ She had no words, but she tilted her pelvis, riding his face. ‘I want…’

‘Fly apart for me, Ivy. Let me taste your climax.’ His tongue circled her clit again, and again, and again. Then he caught the bud between his teeth and bit down just hard enough to shatter her world.

Ivy screamed his name into her hand as her body pulsed and her core flooded. He lapped her like a cat in cream. Slowly, the ecstasy ebbed to a lazy, liquid heat.

Putting one leg on the floor, then the other, Edward rose from the ground, kissing his way up her body until he pulled her hand away from her mouth and pressed his lips against hers.

She could taste herself on his tongue. An aftershock of pleasure rolled through her body.

Her core still ached in an empty echo of need.

I still want more.

Reaching between them, Ivy fumbled with his falls but couldn’t manage the buttons.

In desperation, she rubbed her flat palm over the bulging ridge.

‘I want…’ She squeezed, unsure how to make her need clear.

Wishing for better words. Never in her life had Ivy imagined she would want a man to plunder her body.

But never before had she imagined a man like Edward.

He wasn’t some faceless husband intent on taking his pleasure at the cost of Ivy’s control.

He wasn’t interested in forcing her to submit.

He was a man who devoted his life to justice.

Who punished himself for crimes he hadn’t committed.

Who chatted with her over coffee and laughed when she retold stories of the children’s antics.

He was her friend. And she wanted him to become her lover.

‘Do you want this…’ He put his hand over hers, rubbing her palm over his trapped cock, then let go and twisted his wrist, his fingers trailing through her still wet core, pushing one finger slowly inside her. ‘Here?’

Yes! Exactly. That is precisely where I want you.

Closing her eyes and focusing on the rough rasp of his finger pressing inside her body, Ivy nodded.

Stepping back, he took her hand and led her to the bed.

She started to climb up, but he tightened his grip.

‘Wait.’ Letting her hand go, Edward quickly undressed, and Ivy let her gaze wander unheeded over his beautiful body.

He climbed onto the bed, moving back so he sat against the headboard.

His cock jutted up from the nest of black curls, the tip weeping with a pearly bead that made Ivy’s mouth water.

He was like a feast laid out, waiting for her.

And she almost lost her nerve. ‘Come here.’

Why is it that his orders make this so much easier?

It was a question for another time. Ivy crawled on the bed totally nude and mostly confident. When she reached him, Edward took her thigh and eased it over his hip.

What is he doing?

She kept her knees tight to his sides because if she widened them, her pelvis would drop, and she risked impaling herself.

This wasn’t right. She was supposed to be on the bottom.

He would push her legs wide and thrust inside her and Ivy would lay still and let him. But this was nothing like that at all.

‘I’m not sure what…’

Gripping her hips, Edward slowly pulled her down. His cock slipped through her folds, not entering her, but dragging over her clitoris in a silky slide of sensation.

‘Oh. My. Heavens.’

‘Just like that, Ivy. Ride me until you find your rhythm.’

‘Are you not meant to, er… enter me?’ Though the idea of his large appendage fitting inside her body seemed impossible and the rubbing was shockingly pleasant.

‘Not until you’re ready.’

Of course. Not until I’m ready. How the blazes am I supposed to know when I’m ready?

‘Ride me.’

She did as he commanded, shifting her hips, changing the angle until each drag over his steel length grazed along her cluster of nerves.

She had always been a good horsewoman, and the motion was not dissimilar.

So she posted, cantered, and finally galloped, chasing another climax.

So close to the shining pinnacle but not. Quite. There.

Edward’s hands covered her breasts, pinching her nipples in tandem, kneading the delicate flesh until she screamed.

‘Now, Ivy.’ Edward gripped her hips, lifting her and tilting his pelvis until his blunt head pressed into her aching entrance. Slowly, he pulled her down over him, filling her. The sensation of being stretched to bursting overwhelmed her.

He reached a point and paused. ‘I’m sorry.’

Sorry for what? This is glorious.

Gripping her hips, Edward thrust up and sharp pain lanced through her.

‘He will spear you with his prick. You will scream, Ivy. But he won’t stop. He’ll never stop.’

An old panic reawakened. Her father’s insidious whisper filled her mind. Her lungs froze. The pleasure suffusing her body only moments before faded like mist and in its place was suffocating fear.

‘Stop!’