The Taming of Ryder Cavanaugh (Cynster #20) - Stephanie Laurens Page 0,92

shifted, then the hand at her breast released and stroked down. Down over her waist, pressing her clothing aside, sliding over her stomach to splay there, then his long fingers reached further, parting the curls at the apex of her thighs to push down and in.

She started, shivered, then caught her breath on a gasp as his fingers explored, caressing and parting her slick folds, then circling, lightly pressing. Delicious sensations spread under her skin. Panting, she squirmed, needing more, wanting . . .

Drawing his mouth from her breast, he softly cursed and withdrew his hand from between her thighs.

She clutched his arm. “No—”

“Wait.” The gravelly order brooked no argument, but he was already hauling up her skirts, pushing them high to reach beneath. Locating her stockinged knee, he skated his hard palm over her garter and up her thigh, then boldly cupped her swollen flesh.

Reaction jolted her, the possessiveness in his touch sharp and keen.

She shivered when he pressed first one, then two fingers into her. Deep, then deeper.

On a gasp, fingers gripping his arm, clutching his skull, she arched, lifting, instinctively giving him greater access. Access he seized; his hand flexing beneath her, he pressed in and stroked, deeper, faster, ruthlessly playing on her senses.

Tension gripped her—similar yet not the same as the compulsive need of their previous time, but swelling, rising, built and driven by his intimate touch. By every deep stroke of his fingers.

Then he returned to her breasts, setting his mouth to the aching, swollen mounds, catching the tightly furled buds of her nipples between his lips, tugging, then taking them into his mouth and suckling.

Sensations cascaded, clashed and sparked, flushing beneath her skin, pulsing through her flesh. She closed her eyes, listened as her breathing grew harried and desperate. Felt the flames rage and coalesce, sinking deeper, searing and burning, then flaring ever hotter.

Tighter, harder, faster, hotter—she gasped, squirmed, yet nothing seemed to ease her escalating need, to appease the hungry emptiness yawning within.

Then he shifted his hand and his thumb found the nubbin hidden amid her slick folds, and he artfully pressed in rhythm with his increasingly forceful penetrations, with the increasingly powerful suckling at her breast—

She fractured.

Cried out and clung as her world shattered and her senses fragmented and spun.

Overcome by the cataclysm of sensation, she swayed. All strength fled; a deep, unraveling lassitude swept her.

All awareness seemed distant, remote, detached, yet she still felt, still knew. Could still follow what was happening.

Her breathing in ragged disarray, her heartbeat echoing in her ears and pulsing in the honeyed flesh between her thighs, she felt—acutely felt—the retreat of his fingers from her body. Drawing his hand from beneath her skirts, he swept her unresisting—unable to resist—off the table and into his arms, and carried her to his room.

Juggling her in his arms, Ryder opened his bedroom door, angled her inside, then heeled the door shut. Tonight, Collier had left only the two lamps on the bedside tables burning; although both were turned low, they spilled golden light over the golden bed.

A perfect shrine for beauty in aftermath.

Carrying Mary to the bed, he knelt on the mattress and laid her gently down, her head on the pillows, her sable curls a sharp contrast against the ivory. He took an instant to savor, to give thanks he’d been able to rush her on to her climax and so grasp the chance—the slim and possibly only chance—to reassert control. To regain the upper hand.

Passion beat powerfully, unrelentingly, in his veins, insistent and demanding, but this was a situation he—and that driving need within him—recognized. A familiar pause in proceedings, not a denial but a staving off, a temporary holding back that would ensure he would soon reap a deeper and even more complete satisfaction.

God, she’d been . . . the word that came to mind was potent. A drug that held the power to drive him crazed with desire, and make him ache with passion.

With a powerful drive, one he needed to rein in and manage; even after their first encounter—perhaps even more because of it—he felt an absolute need to remain in charge, of himself at least, if not her as well.

Knowing he would have only so long before she stirred, and sought to manage him and them, this, and all, he leaned over her and stripped her of gown, chemise, and stockings. Tossing the gold silk coverlet over her cooling body, accepting that if he didn’t shed his clothes himself, she would be eager