Page 39

S arah lay beneath him, stunned by what had just happened.

The little she had known about marital congress had in no way prepared her for this.

The throbbing pleasure she had experienced left her limp and dazed.

The invasion of her body by his, had been at once both painful and fulfilling, a contradiction she could not reconcile.

His weight on her ought to feel heavy and suffocating, instead it was comforting.

Her fragile heart swelled with warmth and longing and pride.

I have given him pleasure, yes? As a wife should?

She put her arms round him and stroked a hand down his sweaty back.

His body was perfection. She breathed in his musky, masculine scent and pressed a kiss to his shoulder, the only bit of him her mouth could reach.

His head was lying beside hers on the pillow.

She could feel his heart thudding slow and heavy like her own.

His breathing had returned to normal, a soft exhalation, warm against her ear, but his body was still limp and heavy on hers.

He stirred and lifted his head to gaze down at her, his expression as dazed as she felt. “Sarah,” he breathed her name as if it were a reverence and kissed her mouth with a soft, tender kiss. A contrast to the barrage of passionate, devouring kisses he had lavished on her before.

He cupped her face tenderly. “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she said with a tender smile. She felt open and vulnerable, all her shields down.

“Did I hurt you?”

She was about to say no when he moved, and a sharp stab of pain made her wince.

“I did!” He moved again, making her gasp as he extracted himself from her body.

He rolled onto his side and pulled her against him.

“I’m so sorry. I’m a selfish brute.” He kissed her hair and she subsided against him, her face buried in his chest, his tenderness a balm to her body and heart.

Can he care for me, truly? Is this how the bond is formed between husband and wife, through the physical connection of their bodies?

“It’s all right. I don’t mind.”

“I do!” he said, stroking a hand down her back. “I had hoped to avoid that.”

“You’re not pleased?” she asked, raising her head to look at him. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No. You did nothing wrong.”

“I don’t understand. How was it supposed to be then?” If this was to be avoided, what was supposed to happen?

“I should have held off longer until you reached your crisis again.”

“Oh.” She didn’t really understand what he meant but was afraid to ask more questions in case he thought she was unhappy.

“Did you experience any pleasure at all while we were joined?” he asked.

“A great deal,” she said softly, her cheeks flushing at the memory. “I can’t explain it, but it was pain and pleasure all at once...” Words failed her.

He hugged her. “Sweet Sarah. Next time we are joined, I hope you will spend with me.”

“Spend?”

“It’s a word to describe that explosive feeling of release. The pleasure you felt before we were joined? You should feel that also when our bodies are joined.”

“As you did?”

“Yes. Oh, yes. The most powerful, pleasurable experience of my life.”

She raised her eyebrows, and that warm feeling stole into her chest again.

“I completely lost control of myself at the end there,” he said ruefully. “The next time will be much better for you, I promise.”

“And when will the next time be?”

“When you have healed sufficiently that I do not hurt you.”

“Oh. How long will that be?”

“A few days—a week perhaps.”

“Oh.” She stroked a hand over his chest, enjoying the scratchy hairs that curled there in dark profusion, and rubbed her sticky thighs together. A pulse between them prompted her to say, “Do we really have to wait that long?”

He groaned. “Sarah, don’t tempt me.”

She leaned up daringly and kissed him. When he finally broke the kiss, he said, husky voiced, “I can pleasure you without us joining, as I did before.” He ran a hand down her back and squeezed her bottom.

“There are lots of ways to achieve orgasm, Sarah.” She squeaked at this treatment, and he grinned. “Let me demonstrate, Your Grace.”

She started at the term of address, but then as he rolled her onto her back and ran a hand down her belly, she hitched a breath. And when he touched her between her legs again, she sighed.

He then proceeded to stroke her between her legs while he made a meal of her breasts. She was getting hot and flustered, her hips behaving as if they had a mind of their own, when he moved farther down her body, tracing kisses as he went, until his head was level with the juncture of her thighs.

“What are you doing?” she asked, bewildered. He merely grinned and set his mouth on her, down there!

When his tongue speared her flesh and lapped at it, her hips jerked upward in shock. Holding her hips firmly and keeping her legs spread wide by his arms, then using only his mouth, he subjected her to some exquisite torture for the next several minutes.

Her flesh was quaking and aching by the time he raised his head and looked at her over the curve of her belly.

“I think,” he said softly, “you need a little more persuasion to come.”

“What does that mean?” she panted, her flesh twitching. “You kept telling me to come before. I didn’t know what you meant.”

“Another one of those words for spend,” he said, wiping his face with the sheet.

“Oh. How will you persuade me?” she asked. “I feel quite ready,” she added, flushing at her boldness.

“Oh, Sarah!” he groaned and returned to his assault on her flesh with his tongue.

This time he moved lower and began lapping at the entrance to her body, wriggling his tongue and pushing it inside her.

It was soft and gentle, yet teasing. At the same time, his fingers played with that most sensitive spot that she noted seemed to be the place of most intense pleasure.

Her breathing became completely erratic, and the sensations began to build alarmingly.

This was more intense than the last two times.

The sensation of his tongue invading her body, where his.

.. member had been, combined with whatever he was doing with his fingers, was sharply pleasurable, and it was making her heart race and her breath come short.

She grabbed at the sheets and strained her legs wider to take more of his tongue, quite longing for his member to stretch and fill her again.

She really didn’t want to wait another week for that.

“Robert!” She grabbed at his head. “Robert, I want you, please!”

He raised his head, “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t!” she panted. “Please, I want you now! Inside me!”

He blinked and rose over her. She was pleased to see he was erect and hard again. He hesitated a moment. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure. Please, Robert.”

“Oh God, Sarah, no man could say no to that!” He pressed forward, guiding himself into her, slowly.

There was a slight pinch, but she ignored it because the deeper ache inside her was begging for his full length.

He moved agonizingly slowly, and she pulled at him, wrapping her legs around him in an attempt to speed things up. But it seemed he wouldn’t be hurried.

When he was finally fully seated, he looked down at her. “Are you sure this doesn’t hurt?”

She nodded. “I want it. I want you,” she said more boldly than she would have thought possible mere hours ago. The events of the past hour had changed her into a woman she didn’t recognize. Her earlier anxiety seemed absurd now.

He began to move. Slowly at first, then gradually he built up speed, as he had done before.

He was still being careful with her, and it wasn’t enough.

As if he sensed that, he shifted to take his weight on one arm and reached between them to stroke her rapidly at that place where the sensations were sharpest and most exquisite.

He was breathing quite quickly, but it was clear he wasn’t in the same state of frenzy he had been before.

She on the other hand, was fast approaching a condition in which she was becoming completely swamped by desire.

Her body clenched on his frantically, and the sounds that she uttered she would have been embarrassed about if she were in her right mind, which she wasn’t.

Her hips thrust up into his, and she twisted and moaned and trembled as the crisis barreled toward her like a runaway carriage. She arched and flung her head back and groaned loudly, her body contracting as he thrust deep and held still, while her world truly came apart.

The explosion of pleasure was so intense her breath stopped, and she hung in a state of suspended bliss for several seconds when everything went blank and nothing existed except the intense pleasure coruscating through her trembling, pulsing body.

She collapsed back onto the bed in a panting heap, her body going completely limp as a state of lassitude filled her, and she closed her eyes, floating on a warm tide of bliss.

She vaguely registered that he continued to stroke within her.

A moan from him and a harsh gasp made her open her eyes to the sight of his face twisted in a grimace of desire.

He groaned again and again as he closed his eyes, and she felt that rush of heat within her as his body jerked and he filled her with his seed in a series of violent spurts.

He collapsed forward onto her body.

It hit her then that the act which they had just performed (twice) meant that she could soon be with child. She was well enough acquainted with the mechanics to know that it only took once. If she was as fertile as her mother... She swallowed, her heart giving a flutter.

He lifted his head and looked up at her with a half-smile. “And that is what I should have done the first time.” He withdrew from her slowly and flopped onto his back. Groping with his hand, he found hers and raised it to lips. “Thank you, that was so good! For me. I hope you enjoyed it?”

“Yes, it was wonderful,” She rolled onto her side toward him, rubbing her thighs together. “I think I’m leaking,” she said with an embarrassed smile.

He smiled and stroked her cheek. “I’ll get a cloth.” And before she could protest at his waiting on her, he was off the bed and back with a damp cloth. Which he used to clean her up, wiping gently between her legs before climbing back into the bed and pulling her into his arms for a cuddle.

His gentleness and consideration were pummeling her heart into a mush.

I love him so much! But can he ever love me?

She settled into his arms, curling in and hoping against hope that he could, for if he couldn’t, she was destined to die of a broken heart.