Page 67 of Sweet Siren
Chapter 15
On their journeythrough the streets of Paris down from Montmartre, Liv found no words. Traffic was brisk and Killian's coachman arrived at the Grand Hotel within minutes. Liv tried not to twist her gloves to ropes, but she couldn't stop, couldn't look at Killian. He finally moved to her side of the carriage and took her in his arms. She welcomed his solace, even though she owed him anexplanation.
He didn't ask. Sweetman.
He was so wise. That was how he'd survived and prospered throughout hislife.
She was grateful. Coward that shewas.
When his town coach idled before the entrance to the hotel, instead of remaining inside, Killian got out. "Return in an hour,Robert."
If he walked through the lobby and followed her upstairs, everyone would see he was herlover.
But, what did itmatter?
Shame washed through her. Shame of her father. Her mother. Her husband. All theirchoices.
She picked up her skirts and marched inside. Everyone would learn soon enough. Courtesy of Alice, Lady HoraceMayhew.
Liv took the central stairs. Her rooms on the third floor overlooked the grand circle entrance to the Opera and she loved standing at the tall French windows watching the patterns of the hackneys and coaches, the omnibuses and the lorries. All hours of the day and night, they went round and round in an endless symphony of sound. She liked the synchronicity of it, as if the muffled notes were meant to be, inevitable and unemotional. She loved to stand her back against the open panes and let in the breezes and the sounds of their infiniterounds.
She opened her door and Killian walked in close behind her. She threw down her little purse and parasol on a hall chair and continued through her sitting room to herbedroom.
Standing before her chiffonier, she put her hands on her hips, her back to him. "Please undome."
She could hear him behind her, removing his coat, undoing his cufflinks and dropping them with two clinks to the bedside table. This would be their last minutes ofintimacy.
She felt the tug of his hands on her gown. A bit rough—angry most likely—he continued his pursuit of her buttons and hooks, her laces and tabs. Naked, her clothes a gaudy pile of fabric around her feet, she waited for his caresses. Today, she needed them, all of them. Long, fervent, enthralling strokes that he lavished on her, proving to her over and over that she belonged to him. At least for that moment, for theafternoon.
Today, he took an extraordinarily long time and she couldn't object. He smoothed both his palms down her throat and blessed her nape with a torrid kiss. She leaned back into his embrace, allowing him to spread his legs and support her this one last time. He circled his arms around her and cupped each breast, thumbing her nipples until she moaned, her lower body flooding with need and crying out at the emptiness that had to be filled by him andsoon.
He splayed his fingers down her ribcage and sent one hand down to her mound where he sank into her hair and found her center. There, he pressed his hand to her hot and needy core and bit her on theshoulder.
She tried to turn, but he clamped her to him like a vise. "Let me do this foryou."
And there in the middle of her carpet, he massaged her and petted her until she whimpered in ecstasy and her knees buckled underher.
He caught her up and led her to the bed where he laid her out as if she were his pagan prize, climbed up between her thighs and kissed her to a high and fulfilledkeen.
"Take these off," she yanked at his cravat and his shirt. "I needyou."
He stood away from her and dispensed with his clothes, his silver gaze caressing her face and naked form. Unbuttoning his trousers, he let them fall but fished something from his pocket, then joined her on the bed. With a hand under each of her knees, he pulled her legs up and pushed her ankles back. There he licked her to another erotic explosion and finally settled above her and dropped intoher.
He was fire and she was swollen desire. And with a madness only he could conjure in her, he brought her to a new and sweeter plain, this climax as wild as any of the others. He drifted down over her and held her tightly. She was his possession and she reveled in it one lasttime.
Cooler, sated, she pulled back and gave him a smile of gratitude. She made to leave him, but he pressed her shoulder to themattress.
"As we are now, is how we were meant tobe."
Her heart cracked open. Now the argument would begin. He'd ask what it was about Horace that had frozen her. She'd have to tell him everything. What a coward she'd been. What a mess her life had been. How she'd decided to meet him, gone purposely to Elanna’s wedding only out of curiosity and meanness. Gone to Remy’s and Marianne’s because she had to reconfirm how infuriating her attraction to him was. How errant her sexual attraction to him. How unethical her need to see him smile at her, flirt and pursue her. Revenge hadn't even been her motive, because how could she, insignificant as she was, hurt the magnificent wealthy tycoon, Black IrishHanniford?
"Liv, sweetheart." He placed a tender kiss on her lips. His body still joined with hers, he undulated inside her to bring her attention to him. "Listen to me. Look atme."
She saw him through the haze of her rapture and herpain.
"Liv, I loveyou."
She stared at him. She'd known it, of course, she had. He wore his love like a sheen of light. An aura in which he always enfoldedher.
