Page 68 of Affair

“I want you.” Feminine need throbbed in her voice.

He put one hand on her sex. She pulsed gently against him, her flesh swollen with desire. He could feel the small bud straining against the pad of his thumb. He rubbed it gently and reveled in the way her entire body quivered in response.

“Make love to me, Baxter. Please.”

He almost laughed. The sound emerged from his throat as a short, husky croak. “I could not stop now, not even for the secret of the Philosopher’s Stone itself.”

He braced her against the sturdy workbench and guided his shaft to the entrance of her moist passage. He felt her go very still.

He thrust heavily into her, willing himself to go as slowly as possible because he knew from last night’s explorations that she was snug and tight. It had no doubt been some time since her last lover, he thought, perhaps even longer than it had been since his own last affair.

But his willpower had been weakened along with his brain, he discovered. The moment he felt the clinging grasp of her narrow channel, he forgot all about restraint. In the grip of a triumphant recklessness, he cradled her buttocks and plunged forward.

Charlotte yelped. Her body went rigid. Her nails dug into the acid marks on his shoulders.

He suddenly realized the truth. Charlotte had had no previous lovers.

“Bloody hell.”

In spite of her knowledge of men, in spite of the veneer of worldly sophistication she exhibited, in spite of her age, she was a virgin.

Correction, he thought. She had been a virgin.

He stopped moving but he was already sunk deep inside her. He could feel the small muscles of her soft passage straining to encompass him.

“Why did you not tell me?” he demanded.

“You never asked.” She kissed his throat. And then she smiled. “And it does not matter. I wanted this.”

“God help me, so do I.”

He adjusted himself carefully and began to move. He retreated slowly, aware of a sensation that was both pain and pleasure. It seemed to take forever to withdraw to the very entrance. She clung tightly to him the whole way. He finally halted when only the tip of his shaft remained inside her.

She drew in a deep, shuddering breath.

He reached between them, found the taut nubbin hidden in the soft curls of her sex, and stroked it until he felt her begin to relax.

“Yes.” She kissed him frantically. Her legs tightened around his waist. “Yes.Yes.”

She lowered her hand and gently, tentatively, cradled him. The blood roared in his veins.

Stroking gently, he pushed himself deliberately into her until he was once more sunk to the hilt.

She sighed and wriggled her hips.

“For God’s sake, don’t move,” he muttered.

She did not appear to hear him. Perhaps she was not listening. She twisted herself with mounting eagerness. Baxter closed his eyes. His hands shook when he tried to hold her still. But he was too close to the fire now. The lure of the crucible drew him with inescapable power.

Charlotte kissed him again. He was lost.

“Next time,” he heard himself promise in a hoarse whisper. He began to move more quickly within her. “Next time …”

But he did not have to make her wait until the next occasion for her release. He heard her cry out, a wonderfully triumphant scream of delight and satisfaction.

And then she turned to molten gold in his hands.

She convulsed around him, tiny spasms kneading his engorged flesh. He slammed into her one last time and spilled himself into her warm, welcoming body.

---