Page 110 of The Reckless Love of an Heir
His hand moved to her hip as her fingers combed through his hair and he kissed a path across her breast then lower, over her stomach.
When he kissed her inner thigh she squealed as she had when he’d smacked her. He did not stop, but held that thigh and cherished it with several more kisses.
She laughed.
But she stopped laughing when he kissed the place between her legs, and her in-breath was sharp. Though, she did not stop him, and her hips rocked upward with a natural instinct as he worked.
Her naivety was as beautiful as she was.
As he carried on, one of her legs lifted and lay over his shoulder. He used his fingers as well as his tongue, pushing them into her moist warmth. She sighed.
He had never lain with a woman in his bed here. She was the first to make those sounds of satisfaction in this room. At least there was an innocence on his part too, in that.
He gave up and crawled up the bed, his hands moving either side of her body. ‘Ready?’ he asked as he hovered over her, looking into her pale eyes.
‘Yes.’
Her eyes shone with want, discovery and… affection… Love. He had not noticed those things when he was drunk, then, all he had felt was the acceptance of her body.
He pressed into her, and her legs rose, resting against his outer thighs.
He withdrew, holding his weight on his hands so his bodyhovered above hers as he lifted his hips. He looked down when he pressed back in, and watched himself glide inside her.
‘Ah.’ The sound escaped her lips, as her fingernails clawed into the skin of his upper arms, hanging on to him.
He looked up into her eyes as he withdrew and re-entered.
‘Ah.’ It was such a soft breathy sound.
He moved more swiftly.
As his gaze held hers, she bit her lower lip. He wished to see all the slight nuances in her expression as new sensations spun into his blood.
Her legs lifted higher, gripping above his hips as he moved more firmly but kept the weight of his upper body away from her. Her fingers slid into his hair. She was coming to her end, her gaze had clouded and she was warmer. She shut her eyes as he pushed into her, striking her hard with each thrust.
‘Henry! Oh.’
Heat flooded about his intrusion as her inner muscles clasped in a spasm about his invasion.
A sound of utter relief and contentment clawed to escape his throat as his end came and his arms trembled as he fought to hold his weight while the sensation of his climax raced through his blood. The feeling was more intense with her. Perhaps that was because of love.
When it passed, he smiled.
She smiled too, her fingers brushing his hair off his brow.
‘I love you,’ he said it to be the one to say it first, because he had seen the words in her eyes, and he wanted her to know he would not say it to her only in reply.
He withdrew and rolled onto his back, holding up his arm so she would come to him. Her head settled on his chest and he wrapped his arm about her. He lay still, listening to the birdsongoutside the window, announcing to the world that the sun was about to fall beyond the horizon.
It was dark in the bedchamber.
When Susan had fallen asleep the shutters had been open and the moon had just become visible, but now the shutters were closed, and she could neither feel nor hear Henry in the bed. She sat up, the sheet sliding across her skin.
There was a line of light about the edge of the door to Henry’s sitting room. Her nightdress still lay on the chair.
She got up, picked it up and slipped it on, then opened the door.
Henry was sitting in a high-backed armchair, clothed in the silk dressing gown he had worn the day she’d come up here in the spring. One bare foot rested on a low table before him. The table held a decanter, half full of an amber liquid, and he had a half-full glass of the same liquid in his hand, balanced on the arm of the chair he was slumped back in. His free hand dangled down and stroked Samson’s ear.
