Page 29 of When the Laird Claims
She never wanted it to end. If he had broken away from her then, it would have ruined her far more than any gossip from society or the scandal sheets could have done. Sheneededthis in a way that was tantamount to madness… or perhaps everything she had been doing before was the true madness.
Why should this be deemed so wrong?She was beginning to think that society had no idea what it was talking about. Therewas nothing wrong or sinful or deviant about this at all. It felt like… the most natural, wonderful thing in the world.
Just then, Arran carried her to the bed and, kneeling slowly, he set her on the edge of it. The bed was high enough that his head came up to her chest, though it did not make him seem small. With those broad shoulders and so much muscle, nothing could have made him seem small.
Throat thick with want, lamenting the fact that he had stopped circling that bundle of nerves, she gazed down at him. If someone had told her not so long ago that she had the power to get a man on his knees, she would have laughed… or flinched with the fear of what might happen to her. There was no fear now. No fear at all with Arran.
From the moment he had taken her away from the Earl of Ashbrook’s manor, roots of trust had begun to take hold, wrapping around the thorns of caution and unease that Charles’ arid soil had forced her to grow.
A sultry smile curved his kissable mouth. “Am I a fool?”
“Pardon?”
“Am I a fool?” he repeated, his calloused palms slowly sliding up her thighs, gathering her skirts back up to her hips.
She frowned, a nervous laugh bubbling up. “No, I do not think you are.”
“Exactly,” he replied.
For a moment, she did not know what he meant, and she did not have any opportunity to ask as he enlightened her with his tongue.
A shocked gasp left her throat while her hands grasped the coverlets that draped over the edge of the bed. Her back arched instinctively, her thighs parting wider for him, her astonished gaze turning up instead of down at him, as if she was not supposed to unveil the mystery of the sudden bolt of pleasure that shot through her.
“Oh…” She managed to moan, his tongue rolling slowly over that part of her that she had no name for.
But how could she not have known of the existence of something with such… power? It was as if she had had a powder keg inside her all these years, and Arran had ignited the fuse. Fresh pulses of crackling energy thrummed along the branches of her veins and her nerves, more intense than before, like galloping scouts hurrying to light fresh beacons of pleasure.
One flared in her chest, shallowing her breath. One ignited in her stomach, unleashing a rush of lively butterflies. Two were kindled at the tops of her thighs, that feeling shivering down her legs and back up into her abdomen. It seemed impossible that she could not have known such a potent thing.
Arran fluttered his tongue quickly against that center of total bliss, stoking up the flames of those blissful beacons.
She finally looked down to observe his talent in action, running her hands through his hair, completely overwhelmed by the thrill of seeing him on his knees with his head buried between her legs. As if he were worshiping her. She had never known a feeling like it; not just the stroke of his tongue against that unknown bud, but the feeling of being somewhat in control, and knowing that he was doing this entirely for her pleasure.
As he rolled his tongue upward, he raised his gaze to her, the connection between his eyes and hers as potent as his intimate caress. She gasped breathlessly; everything intensified.
Just then, his hand slid higher up, skimming over her hip and onto her stomach, bare beneath her dress, at least up to the edge of her short stays. With some light pressure, he pushed her backward, and she did not resist, as the down-stuffed mattress molded around her.
“Oh, Arran…” She murmured in a daze as his tongue continued to tease her, torment her, and pleasure her in the most remarkable way. “Yes… oh, yes…”
She became aware of something building inside her, though she could not do it justice with description. The closest thing she could compare it to was when someone scratched a particularly good itch, or the intense sensation before a sneeze, yet even that did not encompass what was rising with each stroke of Arran’s tongue.
Victoria writhed upon the coverlets, raking her hands over the linens and the woolen blankets, her thighs already shaking. Itwas like a thousand threads being pulled at once that seized her body, and Arran was the one holding them. She relinquished control willingly, letting herself feel every sensation, not running from that unknown feeling within her but hurtling toward it, because she knew that he would not abuse his control. He merely meant to create something good from it.
At that moment, when he curled his tongue around that secret bud and sucked gently, she soared. She raced past the point of no return and flew, an all-consuming rush of ecstasy carrying her into a different world where nothing evil could exist. It was a realm of light and bliss, and feeling more in control of herself and her body than she had in years, perhaps ever. She was aware of every nerve and limb and speck of her being, from the prickle of fine hairs at the back of her neck to the violent tremble of her thighs, from her swimming mind to the curl of her toes, from the stretch of muscle in her stomach to the scratch of her fingernails against the woolen blankets, as that pleasure continued to sweep through her.
Slowly, the sensation began to fade, those beacons of bliss dimming down to a few smoldering embers. She relaxed into the bed and gazed up at the canopy, finally able to catch her breath as she lay there with her hand on her heart, feeling its still-racing beat.
Between her legs, Arran tasted her once more in a leisurely, greedy stroke before he turned his head and kissed the sensitive flesh of the inside of her thighs.
She gasped softly and closed her eyes, wanting to feel each kiss that he placed as he made his way up to her mouth instead of seeing it. Curiously, it seemed to anchor her, a means of bringing her transported self back into her mortal body.
“Am I a fool?” Arran asked again as he leaned over her, his hands braced on either side of her head.
She swallowed at the sudden and exquisite pressure where his tongue had been, her parted thighs lining her up perfectly with the peak of his, where that unknown hardness still seemed to strain for her.
“No,” she murmured. “You might be…” Her voice caught as he slyly rocked his hips forward, adding to that sweet pressure. “…the least foolish man I have ever met.”
He kissed her, soft and slow, until her hands relaxed their grip on the coverlets and ran up his muscular arms. She looped her own arms around his neck and kissed him back, so relaxed and so at ease that she could have slept for a fortnight. What he had just done had brought her a peace she did not know she would ever feel again, and she was determined to embrace it for however long it lasted.
