The Ideal Bride (65 page)

 
Instead, she felt him pull up her gauzy skirts, gathering the fabric above her hips; the night air, warm and redolent with the scent of night stock, caressed her flushed and heated skin.

 
He shifted, and his silk robe gaped open; wrapping his hands about her thighs, he lifted her.

 
Braced her against the wall, and pushed into her.

 
She gasped, raised her head as he pressed deeper, as her slick and still-throbbing flesh surrendered, stretched and took him in. She felt every inch of his penetration as he impaled her, thrust powerfully up and filled her.

 
Without instruction, she wrapped her legs about his waist, desperate to gain some solid hold in a world that was suddenly whirling.

 
Then he moved and the flames flared again. Within seconds he’d driven her deep into the conflagration.

 
She sobbed, wrapped her arms about his shoulders and clung, held tight as he sent her rocketing into that fiery sea, with each powerful thrust sent the twin currents of passion and desire raging ever more hotly through her.

 
Until she burned.

 
Until she felt sure even her fingertips were pulsing with flame.

 
Then he slowed. Continued moving heavily, powerfully surging within her, but not hard enough, not fast enough.

 
His head, until then alongside hers, lifted; he drew back enough to look into her eyes. With an effort she opened them, knowing he would wait…

 
He caught her gaze. Moved once, twice, within her. Leaned closer. Their breaths mingled, their breathing ragged and harsh. His gaze dropped to her lips, then his lashes lifted and their eyes locked again.

 
“I will never, ever, turn from you.” The words were guttural, low, resonant with the weight of a vow. “Not tonight, not tomorrow, not in fifty years.” He continued to move within her, his thrusts punctuating his words. “Don’t ask it of me. Don’t expect it to happen, don’t imagine it ever will. It won’t. I won’t.”

 
His gaze fell; her lips throbbed.

 
He covered them.

 
And the firestorm took them. Melded them. Fused them.

 
Yet when, driven far beyond the world, she shattered, fractured by the pulsing glory, he didn’t follow. He hung back, anchoring her, driving rhythmically into her—drawing her back.

 
When she finally drew in a shuddering breath and lifted her head, bracing her arms, straightening her spine, opening her eyes to look at him in disoriented puzzlement, Michael clamped a desperate hold on his raging passions, felt her contract about him, confirming he’d yet to seek his release.

 
Before she could speak, he withdrew from her, slowly lowered her. “First act.” His voice was so gravelly he wondered if she would even make out the words. He waited while she unwound her legs, then swept her up into his arms. Carrying her to the bed, he caught her gaze. “Tonight, I want more.”

 
Much more.

 
Her widening eyes suggested his meaning—primitive, basic, less than civilized—had reached her. He didn’t feel anything like his smoothly sophisticated self as he tumbled her onto the bed. As he followed her and swiftly arranged her as he wished, bent over her knees before him.

 
His facade, his mask, had long gone as he pushed her nightgown up to her waist, as he ran his hands over the dewed globes of her bottom, then opened her and eased his throbbing staff into the hot haven between her thighs.

 
He heard her sob, catch her breath, felt her silent gasp as she instinctively tightened, then surrendered and let him in. He pushed further; her sheath stretched, easing in welcome, then clasped about him, a scalding lover’s caress. Closing his hands about her hips, anchoring her before him, he adjusted her position as he worked deep and filled her.

 
Then he rode her.

 
As he had told her, demanding more, wanting more, needing more. And she gave without reservation. Her already sensitized nerves leapt to every explicit caress; her nightgown simply added another layer of sensual taunting.

 
Her hips rocked as he rhythmically thrust, angling to penetrate as deeply as he could—and she met him. Sensuously shifted, wanton in her passion, riding each movement, taking him in, pressing her bottom into his groin as he joined with her.

 
He heard her pants, heard the soft moans she struggled to suppress, then surrendered and let free. The sound of female abandonment added yet more impetus to the primal passion driving him. He could no longer think. Didn’t need to. Instinct had claimed him, decisive, urgent, and commanding.

 
Reaching forward, he filled his hands with her breasts, ripe and sumptuous, the nipples hard pebbles he rubbed and taunted, then squeezed. She cried out, lifted, and felt his hand on her back holding her down, only then realized her inherent helplessness.

 
With a gasp understood, then gave herself over to it.

 
Let go as he’d asked, gave herself up to the turbulent tide, let it and him sweep her where they would. Let him take all he wished of her— give all he wished to her. Show her all.

 
He employed no restraint, no finesse, simply dropped all pretense and let her feel what she was to him, feel the primitive urges that whipped through him, that she and only she evoked.

 
Let her sense through him, through the power that drove him, all she meant to him, all she called forth in him. All that she controlled in him.

 
Whether she recognized that last or not, he didn’t care. His need for her transcended any logic, any consideration of self-protection. There was no longer any existence for him but with her.

 
The driving, pumping rhythm had escalated beyond his control or hers. Desire roared; passion lashed out and caught them in its fiery embrace.

 
And they burned.

 
When she fell from the peak, she took him with her—this time, he went willingly. Surrendering to the glory. Surrendering to her.

 
Surrendering to the power that bound them, now and forever.

 
He stirred her again in the deep watches of the night.

 
Caro woke as he shifted behind her. She lay on her side; he must have moved them onto the pillows and dragged the covers over them. The power of their extended joining pulsed, a faint echo in her bones.

 
Hours must have passed, yet she still felt wrapped in the moment, in the passion, the raw hunger, the urgent desire.

 
Not just his, but hers.

 
Despite the many times they’d come together, enjoyed, indulged, and shared, she hadn’t understood—hadn’t truly comprehended from what source the power that commanded him, that compelled him and drove him, sprang. Yet this last time… even though she hadn’t been able to see his face, she’d felt that power, so strong it had been palpable, surrounding them, holding them, welding them. Until there’d been just them—not him or her, but one entity.

 
She felt his hand on her thigh, felt him raise the back of her nightgown, drawing the material to her waist. He caressed her bottom; she reacted instantly, her skin dewing, heating. His hand slipped lower, pressed between her thighs, found her. Fondled, probed, then, pushing her upper thigh higher, he opened her, and slid in.

 
She’d wondered if he’d known she was awake; he certainly knew as he sank into her to the hilt and she arched, a soft gasp falling from her lips as, head back, eyes closed, she savored that incredible moment.

 
He held still, let her enjoy it fully.

 
Then, when she eased, very gently, rocked.

 
Into her, about her, with her.

 
He slid his hand, palm splayed, over her stomach, holding her against him. She spread her hand over the back of his, murmured, caught her breath as he pushed deeper still.

 
The familiar heat rose within them, between them, poured through them. The tide rose and she went with it, whirling gently, senses aware, into its sensuous sea.

 
No urgency this time, just a long, slow, unhurried loving, one neither was eager to rush.

 
For her part, just the feel of him, hard, hot, unforgivingly rigid, drawing out of, then pressing back into, her body was bliss. As the minutes ticked by and the tempo remained severely restrained, she felt certain he knew.

 
But the slow pace allowed her mind to function, to drift, to snag on the question. “Why?” She was sure she wouldn’t need to elaborate.

 
Propped on one elbow behind her, he leaned close, nuzzled the curve of her throat.

 
“Because of this.” His voice was low, deep, a male promise in the dark of the night. “Because of all the women I could have, I want you— like this.”

 
He slowed, let her feel again how much he wanted her, let their loins come together as he sank deep. “Like this. Lying naked beside me in my bed, mine whenever I wish.” His voice deepened, darkened. “Mine to have, to fill with my seed. I want you to bear my children. I want you by my side when I grow old. Because at the end of all the explanations, it comes down to this—that you are the only wife I want, and for you, for that, I’ll wait forever.”

 
She felt her heart swell, was so glad he couldn’t see her face, see her eyes as tears welled and silently fell.

 
Then he picked up their rhythm, the tempo escalated, and there were no more words, but a wordless communion. An age-old melding; he held her tight, his chest to her back as she crested the peak and fell through the stars. He followed immediately, with her—as he wished, as she wished—when they found their distant shore.

 
Chapter 21

 
Michael left the house the next morning feeling for the first time in weeks as if he were walking in mental sunshine rather than fog. As if a miasma had blown away and he could finally see clearly.

 
Caro was all that truly mattered to him. It wasn’t just sensible but completely justifiable to devote himself wholly, single-mindedly, to her protection. To set aside all other concerns and concentrate solely on that, for she was the key to his future.

 
He’d left her still sleeping, sated and warm in her bed, safe in his grandfather’s house. He headed for the clubs and scouted through his contacts; none had anything to report. After lunching at Brooks with Jamieson, who was still puzzled and uneasy over the break-in, not so much over it happening but because he couldn’t see why, Michael headed for Grosvenor Square, confident there was no piece of accessible information he’d overlooked.

 
Devil had summoned him to a meeting at three o’clock; Gabriel had turned up something odd among the legatees that Lucifer agreed needed to be investigated. The meeting was opportune; Michael could report his findings, or lack thereof, and Devil would have news of Ferdinand and his doings.

 
Devil’s butler, Webster, was waiting to admit him; Michael surmised Honoria had not been informed a meeting was taking place. His brother-in-law had deeply entrenched prejudices against involving his wife in any potentially dangerous game. He now shared—fully—those same prejudices, and other similar reactions and emotions to which he’d never thought to fall prey. Thinking of Caro and all she made him feel, he wondered that he’d been so self-blind.