The Princess and the Peer (21 page)

Her lashes fluttered open. “W-where?”

“Anywhere,” he told her, dappling her face and neck with kisses even as his fingers continued their luscious inner massage. “Everywhere. Just touch me.”

Raising her trembling hands, she laid them on the bare skin of his back. She felt his answering shudder, a low moan rising in his throat as she began to explore.

He was hard but smooth, his skin like satin yet tougher than her own. She roamed with an aimless, almost drugged curiosity, learning the shape of his form with its broad expanses of warm, sleek muscle and solid bone underneath.

Growing bolder, she traced the breath of his shoulders before gliding over the firm planes of his chest. Encountering the mat of short hair she’d seen earlier, she brushed her fingers over it, surprised by its soft, springy texture. Then she flicked one of his flat male nipples and drew a ragged groan from him.

“Again,” he ordered gruffly. “Do it again.”

She complied, enjoying the small quake that rippled through his muscles in reaction to her touch.

Her hands gripped him hard moments later as his fingers stroked with greater purpose within her. Breath thin, she panted as the heavenly pleasure built toward another peak. She hung on, needing it, needing him even more than she did her next breath.

Just another minute and she would claim that same sweet bliss, a little more and he would send her flying again.

Without warning, he suddenly withdrew, slipping his fingers out of her body to leave her stunned and aching.

She didn’t understand, her body protesting the loss.

Above her, he reached for the buttons on his falls and thumbed them open. His shaft sprang out, hard and heavy, as he pushed the cloth down his hips.

She stared, then stared some more, fascinated, yet suddenly, inexplicably afraid.

Surely he wasn’t going to try fit
that
inside her!

Catching hold of her chin, he tilted up her face so that she had no choice but to meet his eyes. “Don’t be scared,” he said tenderly. “You’ve liked everything so far, haven’t you?”

Numbly, she nodded.

“You’ll like this part too. I’ll make it good for you,” he promised. “Just trust me.”

And she did trust him. Even more, she loved him and whatever he wanted, she would give. The knowledge helped
her relax as he settled between her spread thighs and moved her knees apart to position her the way he wished.

Surrendering, she waited, her heart thundering so loudly she was surprised he couldn’t hear it too.

Leaning forward, he claimed her lips again, his kiss warm and ravenous, while below he began to claim her body.

He was large and she too small, or so she thought as he worked to fit himself inside. She gave no protest, letting him raise her legs higher so that her feet rested on top of his back.

Inch by inch, he pushed deeper, arms taut as he braced his weight above her, hips rolling as he worked. She squirmed a little, biting the corner of her lip so that she didn’t reveal the pain the stretching pressure of his flesh was causing her. She sensed he was being gentle—or as gentle as he could be. But still it hurt.

“Almost,” he whispered against her lips. “Nearly there.”

Then, with one quick, hard thrust, he was in, lodged farther than she would have dreamed he could go.

Panting again, she hoped it was over, hoped he was satisfied. After all, she did want him to be happy.

He didn’t move, apparently content to relax inside her as he brushed sultry kisses against her mouth. After a minute, she kissed him back, her body adjusting bit by bit to the intrusion below. She sighed and wound her fingers into his hair, melting into the kiss as she forgot the worst of her discomfort.

A few kisses later, he began to move again, withdrawing nearly all the way before plunging back inside, only to repeat the action in a steady, penetrating rhythm.

She gasped and tensed, waiting for a fresh stab of agony. But the hurt had dulled to little more than a minor ache now, one with an edge that was far more akin to pleasure than pain. Impossible as it might have seemed only a couple minutes before, his deep, sure strokes felt good.

More than good,
she thought, with dawning elation. Each movement was better than the last, every thrust harder, deeper, and more fulfilling than the one that had come before.

A raw hunger rose suddenly inside her like a fiery phoenix emerging from the ashes. Her muscles seemed to melt, turning warm and waxen. Strain gave way to glory as their bodies arched and tangled in an ardent, sinuous connection she could describe in no other way than beautiful.

There was no shame or sin in their union.

Only happiness.

Only love.

She would have given her life a thousand times over to know but a fraction of this joy. Yet here, in this moment, it was all hers for the taking.

She locked her legs tighter around his back and instinctively thrust her hips upward to meet his. Her hands roved over the sleek, fluid contours of his back, relishing the sensation of his muscles flexing and moving beneath her touch.

A rough groan rumbled from his throat, a shiver raking his frame.

Suddenly, he took her mouth in a frenzied mating as if he couldn’t get enough of her. Parting her lips, he found her tongue, darting in and out and around with his own in a way that seemed to imitate each gliding thrust of his shaft.

She quaked, rational thought fading beneath the onslaught of delirious rapture. His possession was complete, absolute, as if he’d reached in and stolen not just her heart and body but her very soul.

With no independent will of her own, she could only hold on, utterly consumed by the pleasure that lashed her body like an unbridled tempest.

He thrust faster, stealing her breath on one stroke, then sending her tumbling over the edge on the next. The world spiraled around her with a dizzy abandon, so that she didn’t know which way was up and which down.

But she didn’t care, her body engulfed in a crashing ecstasy that erased everything but the bliss from her mind. Nick ceased to be separate from her, as if they were bound together inextricably and for all time. Her thoughts went temporarily blank, her mind opaque with profound, rapturous joy.

When she returned to herself, she wondered if she had actually swooned for an instant. But only an instant, she realized, aware of Nick still lodged deeply inside her, his thrusts quick and powerful and nearly relentless.

Suddenly, he stiffened above her and gave a violent, rippling shiver, a harsh moan that sounded almost like a growl rolling from his lips.

She held him, dizzy and drowsy with pleasure, as he collapsed against her. He was heavy and still lodged deep, but she didn’t mind, content to caress his damp skin with wandering palms, savoring their closeness.

“I must be crushing you,” he said after a long minute, starting to shift away.

But she refused to let him go, coiling herself more tightly against him. “No,” she said, holding hard. “Not yet.”

Not ever,
she whispered in her head.

He indulged her for another minute before rolling the pair of them onto their sides. Brushing her hair from her face, he touched his lips tenderly to hers. “You must be tired,” he murmured, running his fingertips over her face as if he couldn’t bear to stop touching her. “When you’re ready, we’ll go upstairs.”

But I will never be ready
, she thought, pain twisting like a knot in her chest.
I don’t want to leave you.

Gooseflesh rose across her skin, an icy chill erasing all the happiness on to which she was trying so desperately to hold. Some of her emotions must have shown on her face.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she lied.

He rested a finger beneath her chin and compelled her to look at him. “You are worrying and there is no need. Do you think after tonight that I have any intention of letting you go? Because I don’t. You gave your innocence to me and I do not take that lightly. From this time forward, Emma White, you belong to me and only me.”

Capturing her mouth, he gave her a slow, deep kiss that was both a pledge and an act of possession. Her senses spun
anew, and she melted as she always did when he touched her, knowing he was right.

She did belong to him. Now and forever.

At length, he eased away. “I would talk now, but it’s late and you need to sleep. We’ll settle everything in the morning, I promise. For now, you are to have no worries or fears, since there is no reason for either.”

But he was wrong. There was a great deal to fear, the worst being how she was ever going to find the strength to leave him. He’d said they would settle everything between them in the morning. What did he mean? Could he possibly be intending to ask her to marry him?

Her heart gave a squeeze of bittersweet pain and joy, longing to hear the question to which she could never allow herself to say yes. For even if she were not already promised to another, a marriage between her and Nick was impossible. Her family would never approve. As a royal, she was expected to marry another royal; they would never allow her to become the wife of an Englishman, even if he did happen to be a wealthy peer of the realm.

No, she would have to leave him. She didn’t want to imagine how hard it was going to be, like ripping her heart straight out of her chest. But it must be done no matter how difficult or agonizing.

But how?

She knew that talking to him in the morning would not work. All he would need to do was kiss her, whisper a few persuasive words, and she would bend to his will, as pliable as a willow tree.

Which left only one choice—she would have to run.

Tears burned her eyes, but she blinked them away so he would not see. “You’re right,” she said in a voice that sounded dead to her own ears. “I am tired and need to sleep.”

But there would be no sleep tonight for her—only impending anguish.

Forcing a wooden smile, she let him help put her to rights. Heat rose into her face when he wiped a wide smear of blood
off her thighs with a handkerchief he pulled from his trousers’ pocket. But in spite of the trouble her lack of innocence might cause later, she did not regret giving herself to Nick. She was glad, fiercely so, that he had been her first.

Her first lover.

Her first—and only—love.

He pulled her nightgown over her legs, then fit her back into her robe, tying the sash closed with a gentle tug.

She watched, drinking in the sight of him as he shrugged into his shirt and fastened his trousers. With a smile, he held out a hand. “Come. Let’s go upstairs. I believe you’ll find my bed far more comfortable than this sofa.”

His bed!

She trembled with delight at the idea, but she couldn’t risk it. She had to leave—and this morning, before anyone was awake, would be her only real opportunity to make good her escape.

“I can’t,” she said.

He arched a brow. “Why? Don’t you trust me to let you sleep?”

She stared for a moment; she hadn’t even thought of that. Quickly, she shook her head. “No, I trust you. And I do want to stay with you”—
God knows I do
—“it’s just that with your aunt in residence I think we should make some attempt to observe the proprieties.”

His lips twitched. “Observe the proprieties? Seems a bit late for that.”

“Just because we are lovers now doesn’t mean we need to flaunt that fact. Besides, if I’m discovered in your bed, the servants will be telling everyone they know.”

His humor faded. “My servants are more discreet than that. But still, I suppose you have a point. I could always sneak you back to your room at dawn.”

He could, she thought, longing for a couple more hours in his arms. But it would be cutting matters far too close for her to stay with him, and if he were awake, he might hear her leave.

“No,” she said. “I think it’s better if I go back to my own room tonight.”

He paused, looking as if he wanted to argue. “If you insist. But only because I know you need rest and I might not be able to resist waking you up later.”

She ought to have been relieved. Instead, the crushing weight of her decision came upon her, along with the looming misery of their parting. “Nick,” she murmured.

“Yes?”

“Kiss me,” she said with a rush of desperation. “Just one more time before you go.”

“I’ll only be just down the hall.” He smiled. “And you’re welcome to change your mind about our sleeping arrangements, you know.”

But she couldn’t. She did not dare.

“Kiss me,” she pleaded, blinking again to hold back the tears that threatened to betray her.

With a tender smile, he pulled her tight and pressed his mouth to hers. She kissed him back deeply, ravenously, knowing it would be for the very last time.

When it was over, something inside her seemed to die. Sobbing inside, despite her outwardly dry eyes, she let him lead her upstairs.

A
bird was trilling a tune on a branch outside Nick’s bedchamber window the next morning, cheerful October sunlight filtering through the panes.

A broad grin spread over his face but not because of the bird or the sunshine.

It was because he was happy.

Happier than he could remember being in a very long while.

Not even the always-lingering shadow of Peter’s death could mar his good humor.

Not today.

Not after last night.

He reached his arms above his head and gave a twisting all-over stretch against the sheets. A vital, pulsating heat stole through his veins as memories flashed inside his mind, his body growing instantly hard and aroused.

He wished Emma were here with him now, lying beside him in his bed. But not just for the sex—which had admittedly been fantastic and no doubt would be again—but also for the closeness and the pure, indescribable pleasure of her company.

He wanted her again, right now.

Even more, he wanted her for his wife.

He didn’t know the exact moment when he’d arrived at that decision, but at some point after she’d come into the library last night he’d simply known that she would be his bride.