Unwed and Unrepentant. Marguerite Kaye

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ his breath warm on her face.

      Her hairpins scattered. She pulled at his coat. He threw it on to the floor, then kissed her again. She reached behind her to unfasten her gown. He turned her around, wrestling with the buttons and fasteners, kissing her neck, her shoulders, his breathing ragged. The gown took some time to wriggle out of, hindered and impeded by kisses. He pulled her against him when it finally fell to the floor, her bottom against his thighs. She was frustrated by the layers of her undergarments. He curved his arms around her to cup her breasts. She shuddered, wanting his skin on hers, her nipples hard, aching for his touch. He began to untie the strings of her corsets.

      He cursed under his breath. She could not understand the language, which might have been Gaelic, but might have been something more colloquial. When her stays dropped to the floor, releasing her breasts with only her chemise to cover them, he turned her around. Slashes of colour on his cheeks. His eyes glittering with desire. Her own breath quickened, the knot in her belly tightened, the low throb lower down began. ‘Take them off,’ she said, pulling at his waistcoat.

      He discarded his own clothes quickly, efficiently, without any modesty. He was as lean and hard as she had imagined, his shoulders broader, his skin paler, the muscles beneath tensed. And he was more than ready, his erection jutting up against his stomach. Cordelia shuddered. She had never wanted anything so much as this man inside her.

      He had been watching her studying him. She smiled at him then, quite deliberately, and felt an answering heat as he smiled the same smile in response. This was going to be—everything. Anything. All. Did she say it aloud? She thought it as he pulled her to him once more, and she felt the thickness of him against the apex of her thighs. His kiss was desperate now. Her own too, her mouth ravaging his, her hands clawing at his back, at his buttocks, at his flanks.

      He pulled her chemise over her head. She untied the drawstrings of her pantalettes. She wore only her stockings and her garters. He swore again, this time a word she recognised, a harsh, guttural word that should have shocked her, but expressed exactly what she was feeling. Then he cupped one of her breasts in his hand, covered the nipple of the other with his mouth.

      Heat, shivering, frissons of pleasure, tugging, connecting up. Delightful. Delicious. But almost too late. There was no time for this, not now. She pulled his face back up to hers and kissed him frantically, pressing herself against him with abandon. Now, now, now. ‘Now!’

      ‘Aye. I hear you. Dear God, I hear you. Cordelia, I am so—I don’t think I can wait.’

      ‘Iain, I know I cannot.’

      He laughed. A deep, masculine laugh that vibrated against her breasts, her stomach. Then he kissed her, pulling her on to the floor because even the small distance to the bed was too much. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, her legs around his waist, as he thrust into her.

      She cried out.

      ‘Wheesht yourself, these walls are thin,’ he said, but he was smiling wickedly, and he thrust, and she covered her mouth to muffle her cries, and dug her heels into his buttocks and clenched around him, holding him deep inside her, and he stopped smiling and swore again, that shocking word that said exactly what it was she wanted from him, and inside her, she felt him thicken.

      He thrust again. She felt her climax building. She never climaxed as easily as this, not this way, but it hadn’t even occurred to her that she would not. He was sweating. His face was strained, his eyes were dark, but focused on her with an intensity that made her feel as if they were connected. Not just joined, but connected. He was inside her. She was inside him. When he kissed her, she responded with every part of her body.

      ‘Come with me,’ he said. She had heard that before. Had pretended before. This time, there was no need to pretend. She nodded. He thrust. She held him. He pulsed high inside her. She could feel it, the spiralling, but she could still hold on to it. He thrust again. She arched up under him, tilting her body to hold him higher, and it happened, the loss of control, the fall, the clutching, pulsing, ecstasy, and she cried out, and he thrust one more time, and cried out too, pulling himself free of her at the very last moment, and she had the urge to hold him, to keep him there inside her, regardless of the consequences. Or courting them, even.

      When it was over they lay panting, sweating, tangled on the floorboards, like victims of a tempest. In the aftermath, as the urgency abated, and the bliss cocooned her, Cordelia forgot about the ending. One of Iain’s legs covered hers. His hand lay possessively on her stomach. He was staring up at the ceiling, his face a blank. Empty. Sadness washed over her. Something else that was different. It had never been anything other than a pleasure before. Some more pleasurable than others, but always fun, usually satisfying, in the way that a glass of wine fresh from the cellar was satisfying, or a bowl of fresh pasta eaten in the sunshine, or a walk on hot sand in bare feet.

      Not like this. This was something much more elemental. Before, during, she would have given him anything not to stop. He had invaded her, seen things she did not want anyone to see on her face. Come with me, he had said, and she could not have done anything but what he asked. He hadn’t taken her, she had given herself to him. All of herself, in a way she never had, nor ever thought she would want to. That he had, despite the power he had over her, been so careful of her too, made it somehow much worse. That she had not wanted him to be careful, that she had for one wild, fierce moment, wanted to court the consequences, frightened her.

      It was as if the whole day had been a peeling back of all her layers culminating in this revelation, the core of her, the lonely inner self. Cordelia jumped to her feet, suddenly appalled at what she had done. Her dressing gown was at the top of her trunk. Pale-yellow silk embroidered with flowers, it was masculine in cut, with straight sleeves and a collar. It was one of her favourite pieces of clothing. She tightened the belt, turning to find Iain on his feet, his expression troubled.

      ‘I’m sorry that was so— We got carried away. I am not usually so...’ He shrugged hopelessly. ‘I’m sorry, I thought it was what you wanted.’

      ‘I did,’ she said shortly, unwilling, unable to lie. She had never been the type of woman to take pleasure in making a man feel guilty.

      ‘Then what’s wrong?’

      ‘I’m tired. I have to leave early.’

      ‘Don’t lie to me, Cordelia, and don’t think you have to pander to my ego either. If it didn’t work for you—though if it did not, you’re a bloody good actress.’

      ‘It did.’ Now she was embarrassed. After all that. She would not think of all that. Cordelia began to pick up her clothes.

      Iain was already wearing his trousers, pulling on his shirt. ‘Then what is it? And don’t give me the line about being tired.’

      Don’t give me the line. His accent was rougher, the Lowland gruffness taking front stage. She couldn’t think what to say. I can’t believe I did that, would give him the wrong impression, though it would certainly help get him out the door, and getting him out the door was what she needed more than anything.

      Whatever he read in her face, it made him look grim. Iain picked up his coat and pulled it on, stuffing his stock into the pocket. ‘So you’ve had your bit of rough, and now you want to be alone, is that it?’

      ‘No! What an appalling thing to say.’

      He ignored her, pulling on his shoes.

      ‘Iain, that’s not it.’

      ‘Then what?’

      Fully СКАЧАТЬ