Page 42 of When the Rogue Returns
The savage intensity in his look made her pulse jump. “Perhaps you should be sure you can handleme.” Without warning, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her into the other room to lay her on a very elegant bed. She was still lying there, stunned, when he covered her body with his.
Planting his hands on either side of her head, he loomed over her to add, “I’m different now, too.”
When he coupled that with a thrust against her below, a frisson of fear and arousal slid along her nerves. This new Victor could be very dangerous. She still didn’t know how he’d found her, why he’d come here, if he was here for revenge. All of that should give her pause.
Yet it merely emboldened her further.
“Really?” With a coy smile, she slid her hand inside his drawers to cup the hard length of him. “You don’t feel any different.”
He hissed through his teeth, his member hot against her palm. “Some things never change, wife. And I begin to think that wanting you is one of them.”
Before she could exult in those words, he seized her mouth with his.
After that, she was all instinct and urges, rising to the kiss and letting him explore whatever parts of her he wished. Better yet, she was exploring whatever parts of himshewished, something she would never have dared to do in the week after they married.
Some thingshadn’tchanged—his body, for one. He still had a nice sprinkling of hair across his chest, and solid muscle still roped his abdomen. She’d barely been brave enough to touch those muscles when she was young, but now she couldn’t wait to kiss and tongue them.
To her delight, his muscles flexed and rippled beneath her mouth, his skin went taut, and his caresses of her grew bolder and hotter and harder, until she was shimmying beneath him.
“I want you, too,” she whispered. “Victor... please...”
With a growl, he slid out of his drawers and began drawing up her chemise. “When did you turn into such a temptress?” he said hoarsely.
“After you left me.” She nuzzled his roughly whiskered jaw. “When I realized that I hadn’t seized what I wanted when I should have.”
His gaze was raw need. “Seize it now. Show me what you want.”
“You.” She pulled her knees up to allow him to settle between her thighs. “Inside me.”
His eyes blazed down at her. “Thank God.” And with a guttural groan, he entered her in one hard thrust.
She tensed at the suddenness of it, and he froze.
“Too rough?” he choked out.
“No,” she whispered and reached around to fill her hands with his bare buttocks. His exceedingly firm buttocks. Dear heaven. She squeezed, taking a feminine delight in his moan and the way he hardened even more inside her. “Too long since I lay with you, that’s all. But I’m ready now.”
When she punctuated her words by writhing beneath him, his gaze turned a molten gold. “I’ve been ready for a decade.”
He began to move, slowly at first, as if gauging her response. But as she rose to his thrusts, he quickened his motions until all she could do was grip his shoulders and hold on for dear life.
She couldn’t believe she’d forgotten what it was like to be filled by him, to be plundered by a man who wanted her,neededher. To have his heat against her skin, his hands all over her.
To have him driving into her so deeply that she could see only the fine sheen of sweat on his skin and the glitter of his hungry gaze as he took her, feel only the intimate press of his body to hers as the whirlwind swirled up from somewhere hidden to seize her and take her higher... farther...
“Come for me,” he gasped as he plunged into her. “Come for me... as you used to, my beautiful... temptress of a wife...”
And she did. Her release hit her like lightning, splitting her present from her past in one blazing flash and hurtling her into the future. With a hoarse cry she arched up into him, and he came, too, spilling himself inside her before collapsing atop her.
And as the whirlwind slowed, the room stopped spinning, and her body slid from pure pleasure to pure contentment, she realized one thing. Her memories had definitelynotbeen an illusion.
10
VICTOR FORCED HIMSELFto roll off of Isa, since his weight must be crushing her. But he wished he could linger forever with her beneath him, and he felt bereft the second he was on his back staring up at the canopy. What insanity had made him think that bedding her would purge the obsessive need for her from his soul?
It had only made it worse. He could still smell the violet water in her hair, feel the softness of her against him.
He wanted her again. And again, and again, until he could be sure this was real. That she was truly his once more. That he could trust her with his life. His future.
