The Taming of Ryder Cavanaugh (Cynster #20) - Stephanie Laurens Page 0,128

and arched her brows. Sometimes they played games, but most often they opted for the direct and dramatic, their needs simple and complementary. Tonight . . . in the hardness of his hazel eyes, from the steely tension in the arm about her waist, she sensed there was something more he wanted, something he thought of to suggest, but, after an instant’s hesitation, he rejected all words and lowered his head, and she offered up her lips, his to claim.

He claimed them, and more. From that first touch of his lips, the first commanding kiss, she knew that tonight would be no simple repetition of anything that had gone before. Of anything they’d done before.

After his initial conquering foray, he supped and enticed, and she followed, into a long-drawn exchange of heated delight, of assured and unhurried savoring, not he of her or her of him but of them both relishing the moment, the confident presaging of the deeper, more enthralling intimacy to come.

From there, the engagement spun out; for once he openly brought to bear all his vaunted expertise and laid it at the feet of not her but what had grown between them. He deployed his undeniable prowess in its name, in its service.

She knew; she could taste that intent in his kiss, reveled in the passionate devotion that infused not just the melding of their mouths but every touch, every caress, every pressure.

Their clothes fell, shed by hands now well-accustomed to the ritual, to the worship of flesh and naked skin as it was bared to the night air, to the gilding of moonlight.

To the touch of a lover’s hands.

To the caress of fingertips that, as the primitive beat rose, trembled.

He drew her fully against him, her delicate frame and silken skin flush against his powerfully muscled, hair-dusted body, and they paused, both caught in the sensual succulence of the instant, enraptured.

The feel of him all around her, his heat, the hardness of his flesh, the tension investing his heavy muscles, the hot, rigid column pressed against her belly, all impinged and drove her on.

Her hands sweeping up over his shoulders, she sank her fingers into his hair and deepened the kiss even further.

Wantonly met his challenge and, shifting sinuously against him, issued her own.

She’d been right; there was more for them both in this deeper engagement as blindly they breached some level beyond and intensity abruptly flared, their senses expanding dizzyingly until the physical merged with passion, with feeling and driving need, was subsumed by that all-consuming desire and became a conduit, a means of pure expression—of honest, unscreened, irrefutable communication.

Breaking the kiss, he swept her up in his arms and carried her to the bed.

As he laid her down, then joined her, she opened her senses to everything he said. Not in words but with his actions, both the caresses he swept over her quivering flesh, with the web of delight he wove to snare her awareness and hold it captive to the pleasure, the joy, the passion—and the overwhelming, near suffocating eruption of their desire.

She felt it as a pressure in her chest, a swelling, welling, geysering need to give, to open her heart and share, to let that unrelenting build of emotion out. To give it to him, share it with him. Openly.

To let it free.

Her hands tangling in the soft mane of his hair, as she bucked and writhed as his tongue licked and probed and his lips caressed, lightly tugged, and he tasted, eyes closed, breathing ragged, she searched for the way.

He raised his head a heartbeat from the point where it would have been too late, and rose over her.

And she reached for him. Raked her hands down his chest, and felt him shudder.

She found him, rigid and burning, and guided him to her entrance.

He pressed in, then, on a harsh groan, thrust fully home.

He hung over her, head hanging, the muscles in his braced arms quivering with the strain of control, of holding still as she adjusted to the deep penetration, to the solid intrusion, the glorious filling.

Even in extremis, her lips curved.

After the last weeks, she no longer needed that moment but nevertheless gloried in it. Took it and, tonight, used it to reach up, draw his head down to hers, meet his lips with hers, arch her body to his, and join with him.

Wholly and completely and with no reservation.

None.

No screen, no holding back.

She felt her heart open, let it happen, didn’t try to hold anything back.