When he kissed the tips of her breasts through the fabric of her gown, he could feel the surge of desire lash
through her. He held his own passion rigidly in check. He wanted her to know how beautiful she was, how desirable. He had to convince her that no matter what was in her past, she would always be beautiful and desirable to him. Slowly, very slowly, he began to undress her.
Love-dazed, she stared up at him, but when he freed her from her gown and swept it to the floor, sanity returned in a blaze. She seized his wrists before he could begin on her petticoats. “Don’t lie to me, Lucas. Tell me the truth. Have we ever been lovers?”
He shook his head. “Only in my dreams. I’ve waited years for you, Jess. Don’t turn me away now.”
He kissed her before she could begin to think coherently. Without severing the kiss, he removed the rest of her garments, then dragged the covers over them. His kisses became more intimate. He couldn’t resist the tips of her breasts. At the first touch of his tongue, she shivered. When he sucked strongly, her back came off the bed. He pushed aside the bedclothes, and his mouth wandered to her ribs, the flat of her stomach, a small mole on the inside of her thigh. He smiled when he felt her shudder.
She wanted to think, think, think, but those clever hands and lips of his gave her no respite. She couldn’t believe the things he was whispering in her ear. She wasn’t that beautiful. She couldn’t make him feel all the things he said he was feeling. He couldn’t want her that much. Lies, truth, everything disintegrated in a surge of pleasure when he touched her there, between her thighs. Yesterday and tomorrow ceased to exist. Mind, soul and senses were aware of nothing but him.
He stood for a moment to pull off the rest of his clothes. When he came back to her, he kissed her with slow, deliberate kisses, and his hands moved over her, exploiting with a lover’s caress all his newfound knowledge of her secret vulnerabilities. He wasn’t going to give her time to think; he wasn’t going to let her change her mind.
Blood began to pound through her veins in a slow, thick pulse. She grew restless. The room was too hot. Her lungs couldn’t find enough air to breathe in. Her skin was damp. There were odd animal sounds coming from the back of her throat. Anticipation shivered through her. And she knew, she knew that whatever was in her past, she had never wanted like this. Never.
“Lucas?” she said urgently. “Lucas?”
He rose above her. Her fingers curled around his arms, clenching and unclenching, conveying her need. His blood was singing. Nudging her legs apart, he positioned himself to take her.
When she felt him go still, she focused her eyes on his face. Light and shadow from the flickering candles made his bones stand out starkly. His hair looked ink black. But it was his eyes that held her. There was a curiously intense look in them, angry and determined at the same time.
“Listen to me, Jess,” he said fiercely. “This is the first time for both of us, do you understand? It’s never been like this for me. Never. I won’t let you spoil it for us. I don’t care if you’d had other lovers. From this day on, I’ll be your only lover, and you’ll be mine. That’s what counts. Believe it.”
Sweet, he was so sweet, so good, that she no longer doubted she’d loved him as a girl. She loved him now. Twice in her life, she’d fallen in love with him, and if they were torn apart and met as strangers, she knew that she would fall in love with him again. She would always love him. But that would be her secret. She wasn’t going to burden him with something he’d never asked for nor desired.
She framed his face with both hands and kissed him on the lips. He gave one short, explosive breath and slowly entered her. That first thrust sent shards of pain shooting through her entire body. She gasped. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t draw air into her lungs. He didn’t understand. He wouldn’t let her go, wouldn’t stop. She dug her nails
into his shoulders, trying to convey her distress. Something was wrong. This wasn’t possible. She recognized that he was trying to be gentle, but it wasn’t working. His words were soothing, but they hardly helped. She shoved, she bucked, trying to dislodge him, but he was immovable. She stopped struggling when she realized that with every movement to free herself, she only drove him deeper into her body. Then suddenly the burning pain receded to an uncomfortable fullness, and her whole body went slack.
He raised his head and looked down at her. Tears shimmered in her eyes, and her look was one of patent accusation. He couldn’t find the breath to express what he was feeling, not yet. But she must have seen something in his eyes because her look changed and, as enlightenment dawned, her cheeks bloomed and a slow smile spread from ear to ear. Its brilliancy dazzled him.
“You’re my first lover,” she breathed out.
He sucked air into his lungs. “No,” he corrected, “I’m your first and last lover. And that’s how it’s going to stay.”
She touched a hand to his face, and a worried little frown came and went on her brow. “Are you all right?”
“I am now.” He rested his brow on hers. “But I don’t mind telling you, I
never
want to go through that again.”
She giggled. “Lucas, do you know what I think?”
He could see that she was in a talking mood and had no conception of the sensual torments he was still suffering. She was hot and wet and incredibly tight, and he was ready to explode. He was appalled at how hard he had to fight to gather what was left of his control.
“I think—” she began.
He stopped her words with a kiss. When he slowly pressed into her, he heard the catch in her breath. Encouraged by that small sound of arousal, he began to move more forcefully, in deep, hard strokes. When she followed where he led, the smoldering fire in him flamed out of control. Her mouth was hungry. Her body was supple.
She was lifting herself to him, accepting him with utter abandon. He had dreamed of her like this. In so many hellholes in Spain, he had dreamed of her like this, wild and wanton with a hunger to match his own. Then he stopped thinking when he felt her begin to shudder in his arms. “Yes, love,” he said hoarsely, fiercely. “Give in to me.”
He felt her start of surprise as she went soaring over the crest, and as she convulsed beneath him, he gave himself up to the beat of his own body. There was nothing in the world but this; there was no one in the world but her.
She came awake slowly, and with eyes still closed, allowed impressions of place and time to sink into her. The sheets at her back were freshly laundered; her hair was spread out over the pillows; she could detect the flicker of candlelight on her eyelids; her body was warm and damp. There were scents that were unfamiliar to her. Love. Passion.
Memory returned in a rush and her eyes flew open. Lucas had pulled back the bedclothes, uncovering her to his gaze. He had donned his dressing robe and was sitting on the edge of the bed. His hand was resting on her breast, kneading it gently. As she watched, he lowered his head and blew a warm stream of air over one tensed nipple. She stifled the moan in her throat but he either sensed it or heard it. He looked up and smiled.
This was another Lucas she did not know. There was a sleepy look in his eyes, and a lazy slant to his smile. Lazy and sinfully, sinfully sensuous.
She wanted to reach out and pull him down beside her and show him that she could be sinfully, sinfully sensuous as well. And she would have, if she hadn’t felt so shy. Just thinking about last night made her go hot all over.
He bent his head and kissed her, but before he could do more than press his lips to hers, she hauled herself up. There was something she must do before she lost her nerve. Last night, as she’d drifted into sleep, she’d felt so
close to him, she’d wanted to share all her dark and ugly secrets. In fact, she’d made up her mind that that’s what she’d do. She didn’t want lies or half-truths to come between them. She wanted to be one with him. All she had to do now was say the words.
He sighed. “You’ve got that worried look in your eyes again. What is it this time? I thought you’d be happy, deliriously happy, to discover you had no lovers before me.”
“Well, I am,” she said. “But?”
Her eyes slid away from his.
He tilted her chin up with one finger, forcing her to look at him. “But?” he repeated softly.
He was so straightforward, so transparently honest, while she was all shadows and dark mirrors, a mystery even to herself. He always thought the best of everyone. He could never conceive of anyone trying to deceive him. Her mind was beset by suspicion and distrust. Why couldn’t she be more like him?
When he released her wrist, she unobtrusively edged under the covers. “Lucas,” she said earnestly, and stopped. She couldn’t just blurt the words out. She had to come at this slowly and carefully. She started over. “Lucas, you know I was run down by a carriage?” When he nodded, she went on. “Well, I think the accident did more than blot out my memory. I think it may have … affected my mind.”
“I’m listening.”
He was taking her seriously, and that encouraged her to go on. “Last night, everything seemed so familiar to me, as though I’d done it before. I knew what was going to happen, oh, seconds before it happened. I didn’t know everything. I mean, I didn’t know how I would feel. But I knew how you would touch me. I knew where everything was leading. Don’t you think that’s strange?”
“Not if your memory is coming back to you. Is it?”
“I … I don’t know. There have been little things, but nothing of any significance. Nothing to explain this.”
“Perhaps it’s just a flash of recall.”
“What does that mean?”
He grinned wickedly. “Well, you were very precocious for your years, and I was mad to have you, though I wouldn’t admit it. It’s fair to say we went too far a time or two back then. That’s probably what’s coming back to you.”
She said indignantly, “I was precocious? You’re years older than I! It isn’t fair to blame me. And just how far did we go, Lucas Wilde? Mmm?”
His eyes were sparkling. Holding her gaze in his, he raised her hand and pressed a kiss to her open palm. “I swear, no further than we’ve gone since you came back to me, except for last night.”
“And you’ve never undressed me?”
“Only in my dreams. Jess, you were a virgin. We proved it right here in this bed. I don’t see what the problem is.”
“The problem,” she said, beginning to get edgy, “is that I don’t know what’s real and what’s unreal anymore.”
He kissed her on the lips. “Don’t let yourself become obsessed with it. Your mind isn’t deranged. I’d stake my life on it. You lost your memory. You’ve been cloistered in a convent for the last three years. You have no reference for sorting out what’s real and unreal. Give it time and everything will fall into place. Jess, you’re not abnormal. You’ve been through a harrowing experience, that’s all.”
Deranged. Abnormal. The words set off alarm bells inside her head. He wouldn’t believe her. He would think she was insane. And he was wrong. As time passed, things weren’t falling into place. They were becoming more confusing, more frightening. She wasn’t thinking only of last night and how everything had seemed familiar to her. She’d wanted to tell him about Rodney Stone. Most of all,
she’d wanted to tell him about her Voice. But there was no Voice, not now. And that seemed strange to her, too.
He was watching her, waiting for her to speak. The coward in her won the battle for control. She didn’t want him to change toward her, or look at her with revulsion. And maybe, just maybe, he was right.
Lucas watched the play of emotions on her face and thought that he’d seen the same resigned look in the eyes of a wounded deer just before the hunters closed in for the kill. Then the look was gone and she was smiling brilliantly. Once that smile would have fooled him, but not now. She’d let him get too close to her.
“Jess, what is it?” His voice was soft, reassuring.
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” Hers was brittle.
“Talk to me.”
His eyes were intense on hers. She had to divert him or he would pry the truth out of her—just when she’d decided she didn’t want him to know how abnormal she really was. Raising her arms, she flung back her head and ran her fingers through her hair. The covers slipped to her waist as she knew they would, exposing her breasts. The cursed man didn’t even drop his eyes. He was still staring at her with that questioning look.
The tremulous smile she gave him wasn’t all playacting. She brought his hand to her breast. “This is what’s real,” she said. “When you touch me, when you make love to me, I forget everything else. Make love to me, Lucas. Now.”
There was a moment when he resisted. But the fingers on her breast flexed involuntarily and she shivered in arousal. He touched her again, deliberately, his thumb grazing her nipple, and her back arched off the pillows.
He quickly removed his hand. “Later. After we talk.”
But he was wavering. She could see it in his dilating pupils, hear it in the sudden huskiness in his voice. His formidable control was slipping away.
“I don’t want to talk.” She hoped her smile was alluring. “Lucas, I ache for you. I want you. I need you.”
She didn’t wait for his response but slipped her hands inside his robe and pushed it from his shoulders. At the first brush of her fingers, every muscle in his body tensed. He didn’t say anything or take her in his arms, and both his silence and stillness unnerved her. She didn’t know the first thing about seducing a man. Maybe she was doing it all wrong.
With only blind instinct to guide her, she put her lips on his bare skin. His strangled groan of pleasure was the sweetest sound she had ever heard. Her confidence soared and she shoved him down on the bed and loomed over him.
He was a magnificent specimen of the male animal. But she already knew this. What was different was how she saw him. So much brute strength, so much blatant masculinity, and it was all held rigidly in check for her sake. In the act of love, he surrendered his power to her, and it was all hers to command.
She touched the male part of him and drew back violently when he suddenly reared up and tumbled her on the bed. His eyes were hot with passion, but laughter lurked in their depths.