Page 9 of Modern Romance September 2025 5-8

With that uppermost in his mind, he’d resolved to keep his eyes on her face and off her body.

But her features were so exquisite—how he could ever have considered her ‘passably attractive’ he had no idea—he’d had to avert his gaze just to stop himself staring at her like a drooling adolescent.

As if magnetised, his eyes had automatically landed on the rest of her, lingering on her lush curves and intriguing dips, and that hadn’t helped his resolve at all.

She, on the other hand, simply admired his character .

His integrity, honour and his sense of duty and responsibility.

Which piqued his vanity, and that annoyed him because he hadn’t thought he had any.

If he’d been asked, he’d have said that character trumped looks any day of the week.

But now, frustratingly, he found himself wondering what was wrong with him physically.

Of even further irritation was the fact that the equanimity she also lauded seemed to be so under threat he’d actually—for the first time in his life—fished for a compliment.

For reassurance. And all that had come on top of, not only the realisation that once again he’d found himself delaying the inevitable by asking her about her parents but also the strangely fierce and faintly disturbing surge of primitive satisfaction he’d experienced when she’d observed that this would be the first time she’d have sex as a wife. His wife.

This evening was not going as he’d anticipated. He didn’t recognise himself and he didn’t like it. He was rapidly reaching the end of his tether, and now, to add insult to injury, she wanted the consummation ‘over and done with’ as quickly as possible.

Were those really her feelings on the subject?

Was this simply a chore to be borne?

Well, he wasn’t having that, he thought, his pulse thudding hard and fast as she climbed beneath the covers and pulled them up to her chin.

Forget that he too had once considered what was about to happen in those terms. He’d changed his mind.

This would no longer be a purely perfunctory coupling.

He was going all in. He would do his utmost to reduce her to a puddle of need within minutes.

He’d dispel her nerves and shatter her cool and she’d be writhing and panting in his arms, gasping his name when she came, way before midnight.

And then, after the clock struck twelve, he’d do it all over again, only slower.

And again and again, until dawn. Ruthlessly.

Dispassionately. Not for himself. Never for himself.

But to secure the line of succession. To ensure stability.

For the sake of the monarchy, he would have her at his mercy, crying out with pleasure and begging for release while he remained totally in control—unmoved, focused, invincible.

Relieved beyond belief to be finally back on track by deploying the pragmatic approach he swore by, Ivo shed his dressing gown and stalked to the bed.

With every step he took, Sofia’s eyes dropped a little bit lower and widened a little bit more.

A flush hit her cheeks and he thought he caught the sound of soft gasp, which meant she was not immune to him, and his integrity and sense of duty weren’t the only things she admired about him, thank God.

He didn’t repulse her at all, and he could work with that.

She would find this no chore, he swore to himself as he threw back the covers and stretched out beside her.

By the time he was done with her she’d be limp, sated and boneless with satisfaction.

He might not have played the field all that much over the years but he’d always valued quality over quantity and he’d make sure this was an experience she’d never forget.

‘Could you turn off the lights?’ she said breathlessly as he ran his gaze over the stunning length of her and assessed where he was going to start.

‘No.’

‘You promised to minimise the ordeal.’

‘I know,’ he said, rolling over to spear his fingers through her hair and setting his mouth to the soft, warm, fragrant skin of her neck. ‘But I lied.’

Sofia’s fifteen minutes of torment had started the second Ivo dispensed with his robe.

She’d often fantasised about the body beneath the suits but her imagination had been woefully inadequate on that front.

He belonged in a museum. She’d never seen such perfect proportions.

And where on earth he found the time to keep all those muscles in such good shape she had no idea.

But whether or not she’d be able to accommodate his impressive erection, which lent a whole new meaning to the word upstanding , wasn’t what had set alarm bells off in her head.

That would have been the determination etched into his expression and the wolfish gleam in his eyes, which had given her the impression that he intended to gobble her up.

And she’d been right to be alarmed by that because he’d lied ?

What did he mean by that? What in God’s name did he intend to do to her?

‘You’re very tense,’ he murmured, his warm breath feathering over her feverish skin and leaving a rash of goose bumps in its wake.

Well, of course she was tense, she thought, closing her eyes in the hope that not looking at him might make this easier to bear.

She hadn’t been near a gym in years. She had cellulite.

The faint trace of alcohol on his breath suggested he’d needed fortification to go through with this.

Plus, he was all over her and not responding to his electrifying touch was taking every drop of self-control she possessed. ‘It’s been a long day.’

‘Relax.’

Relax? Had anyone in the history of the world ever relaxed simply because they’d been told to? Besides, she couldn’t afford to relax. She couldn’t afford to let her guard drop for a single second.

But, as he placed his hand on her waist and slid it up her ribcage to her breast, she could feel it slipping.

This was what she’d dreamed of for so long.

Was it any wonder she was melting like butter in the sun?

How on earth was she going to protect herself against him?

How was her armour to withstand such an assault?

The strategies she’d used in the past to block out feelings she’d rather not have didn’t seem to be working now.

Maybe the best form of defence was to go on the attack, she thought dazedly as he rubbed his thumb over her achingly tight nipple and she fought back a whimper.

Maybe if she focused on getting him to lose control, she’d hold on to her own.

It didn’t feel like the most robust of arguments, but with the imminent collapse of her brain it was all she had.

And she would not be passive in this, dammit.

She was his wife, the Queen, and contrary to her earlier concerns, he did seem to want her right now, which went some way to restore her battered self-esteem.

No doubt he thought he was in charge here—the lights were still on, after all—but he wasn’t. She simply couldn’t allow it.

Steeling herself, Sofia shifted into him, lifting a hand to his shoulder and wrapping a leg around his hips. She crushed her breasts to his rock-hard chest, pressed her pelvis into his and felt the tremor that gripped her rip through him too.

But if she thought such a move would give her the power she sought and the opportunity to explore his magnificent form, she was sorely mistaken.

It was as though she’d lit a wildfire. In a flash, she was once again on her back, pinned to the mattress by the heavy weight of his body, and she’d barely had time to catch her breath or gather her wits before his mouth crashed down on hers.

He kissed her as if he intended to imprint himself on her, and her head emptied of everything but him, because this surpassed her wildest dreams and they’d been pretty wild.

But while she’d frequently imagined the heat and skill of his tongue in her mouth, she’d never considered the specifics.

She’d never imagined that his lips would mould to hers as if they’d been designed to do so.

Or that he’d instinctively know how to make her writhe beneath him and sigh and gasp for more.

Which he gave her.

After wreaking devastation on her with his kisses, he turned his attention to her breasts, first with his hands, then his mouth, and she lost what was left of her reason.

When, precisely, she succumbed to the clamouring needs of her body she had no idea, but within moments she was so addled with desire that she barely noticed him removing her underwear.

It was only when he thrust his fingers into her slippery heat and she nearly jackknifed off the bed that she came to her senses.

What was she doing?

She was falling at the first hurdle. She ought to be switching positions—putting him on his back and her hands on him—not swooning in surrender. Yet she collapsed as if she had no strength in her limbs. She simply couldn’t help it.

Fixing her gaze on the ceiling and frantically trying to figure out which myth the fresco up there depicted, Sofia grappled for control.

But his fingers were too clever, his mouth tormenting everywhere it landed, and despairingly, she knew it was a battle she was losing.

She wanted him too much. Her defences lay in ruins.

She had no protection. She’d been na?ve to think she did.

She shattered beneath him with embarrassing speed, the pleasure spinning through her like the fireworks she’d imagined, only faster, higher, stronger.

Trembling, catching her breath as the stars behind her eyes faded, she filled with fury, directed at herself for being so weak and him for being so good.

And she vowed then that if she was going down, she was taking him with her.

So when, as the clock began to chime midnight, he pushed into her, filling her so fully she could feel him everywhere, she resisted his attempts to take charge of the situation by holding her still.

Just about managing to stave off both the stunning disbelief and the blissful delirium of actually having him inside her, she wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs round his hips, angling her pelvis to take him in deeper.

He emitted a harsh groan and began to move.

She ran her hands all over his shoulders, his back, his buttocks, pulling him in even further, and met every one of his powerful thrusts with demands of her own.

She needed him to lose control the way she had.

She had to level the playing field and prevent herself from confessing she loved him by focusing on the physical.

So she told him how good he felt and how good what he was doing to her was.

She did nothing to hold back the sighs and the moans that emerged instinctively from her mouth.

She kissed him as fiercely as he kissed her and clenched her inner muscles around him with all her strength, until his movements lost their restraint.

He pounded into her with increasing intensity.

He started to shake. His muscles strained.

There was a wildness about him, a sense of desperation that triggered in her a sharp surge of triumph and a wave of relief.

And then, as she flew headlong into heart-stopping oblivion once again, he let out a roar, buried himself as deep inside her as he could get and erupted.