Lady Rosabella's Ruse - By Ann Lethbridge Page 0,66
nestled close by.
Her fingers raked through his hair, encouraging him to greater efforts. He pulled the bodice down, exposing one lovely globe of soft tender flesh. He stroked the peak with his tongue, over and around, tasting and savouring the softness and the contrasting hard little nub at the peak.
She squirmed and gave a moan of pleasure.
He smiled at that sound and stretched alongside her on the bed, taking in the softness in her expression, the haze of heat in her gaze, the desire.
He rolled the budding nipple between thumb and forefinger and watched her melt. ‘Where did you go, that night, when you left me sleeping beside the hearth?’
Eyes blank, she stared at him. He swept his tongue across the rise of her breast, then blew gently.
She shivered and moaned.
‘Where, Rose? Where did you go, all wrapped up in your cloak?’
‘To return the cushions and then to the bedroom,’ she said, her breath coming hard when he turned his attention to the other breast. ‘I looked in the desk.’
Truth.
He licked and nipped at each hardened peak in turn, caressing them, worshipping them with hands and mouth until she cried out each time he lifted his head to move from one to the other.
He raised himself up on one elbow, ignoring her cry of protest, and dropped a kiss on the point of her stubborn chin. ‘And did you find anything?’
‘I… No,’ she whispered her voice low and hoarse. ‘I found nothing. Oh, please, don’t stop.’
Her eyes were guileless. The heartbreak buried in her voice beneath the urgency of the desires he’d roused rang true.
A sense of relief flooded through him because she’d been telling the truth all along. About that, he forced himself to remember. Only about that. ‘And your real name?’
‘Rosabella.’
Truth. She spoke it too naturally for it to be anything else. Rosabella. He liked the way it sounded. He rewarded her by returning his mouth to her breasts and pressing one leg between her open thighs. She welcomed his intrusion with a lift of her hips, seeking the pleasure she’d learned at his hands.
He suckled.
She cried out. Her back arched. Her hands clutched at his shoulders, nails digging, as she uttered guttural cries of encouragement. In her need, her body sought to join with his, her hips rubbing against his erection inside his falls. If he had been hard before, he was more rigid than iron now.
The desire to be inside her, to fill her, to prove she was his, was unlike anything he’d ever experienced. It shredded his reason. He hung on by a thread. In that moment he knew no matter what happened, no matter who she was, or what she wanted, he would want her for a very long time.
And after that, she’d have marriage as her reward.
He lifted his head and gazed into her face, at the almond shape of her eyes, the taut skin over finely cast cheek-bones. ‘You really are beautiful.’
He broke from the mesmerising depths of her lovely eyes and kissed each nipple in turn; a light brush of his lips and each peak instantly puckered. He trailed kisses down between their shallow valley, through the filmy fabric, down her breastbone to the dark shadow of her navel, swirling his tongue while her hands wandered across his back as if they weren’t quite sure what to do. But when he kissed lower down, nuzzling into her curls through the fine lawn of the gown, she gasped and tried to push him away.
‘You can’t,’ she said breathless.
‘Can’t I not?’ he said, trying not to smile at her innocent shock.
He worked his way down the bed until he was sitting on his heels between her feet. He lifted her right leg, bending it at the knee, and wrapped his hand around her heel. She tensed and he smiled at her. She smiled back and relaxed.
Hers were not small feet, but slender and elegant, high arched and beautifully formed. ‘The winged Goddess of Victory never had such beautiful feet,’ he said, raising her foot to his mouth, kissing the arch, massaging the ball. She spread her toes like a cat stretching its claws.
‘Mmm,’ she said. ‘That feels good.’
He leaned forwards and opened the drawer beside the bed. Retrieved the scented oil he kept there for just such occasions. He put a small drop in his hand and rubbed his palms together to warm the oil and release its perfume.