Scoundrel of My Heart (Once Upon a Dukedom #1) - Lorraine Heath Page 0,70

why should she not indulge in pleasure when neither the duke nor she had committed themselves to the other. Especially when she cared so very much about this man. When she’d thought he might die, she’d wondered how she would go on in a world that didn’t include him. Even though he no longer wandered about in high Society, she at least knew he still drew breath.

Even if it did sound as though he was having difficulty doing so now, his panting harsh and heavy.

“You’re already so wet and swollen,” he rasped near her ear in a strained voice that made her wonder if the knowledge made it as difficult for him to remain standing as the delicious vibrations were making it for her to do so. “I love how quick you are to react.”

“Is that not a testament to your prowess?”

“It’s a testament to your lack of inhibitions, to your sensuality, to your own power. Your body wouldn’t react thus if you didn’t want it.”

It? It wasn’t it that she craved, but him. She wanted him. It pleased her that he wasn’t boasting or taking credit but was instead crediting them both for creating this fire that was blazing within her. Could the match create a flame if the wood was not receptive to it?

She started to turn—

“Keep looking at the sea that you love.”

She would give him that, if it was what he wanted, but she raised her arm and bent it back until she could tangle her fingers in his hair. She hadn’t the ability to not touch him when one of his hands was kneading a breast and the other circled her nether regions. Then he slid a finger inside her, and she couldn’t stop the whimper or the tautening of her muscles.

“So hot, so tight,” he growled low as he worked his finger in and out. Another joined the first as his thumb circled her nubbin, pressing against it, sliding over it. “Christ, this isn’t enough for me, Kathryn. I want to taste you.”

“Then, kiss me.”

Coming around, blocking her view of the sea and the stars and the moon hovering on the distant horizon, he took possession of her mouth, her heart, her very soul. Even as she knew she shouldn’t give the last two aspects of herself to him. But she also knew they would never go to the Duke of Kingsland. Her grandmother hadn’t made them a condition of receiving her inheritance, hadn’t indicated she should marry a man she loved, only a man with a title. Why had she favored status over her heart? Why sacrifice this, a man adoring her, for position?

She’d always admired, respected, and trusted her grandmother. But it was becoming increasingly difficult to have faith in her opinion on this matter, on her future, when the present was so deuced satisfying. When his kiss reached every aspect of her.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered again, reverently. “Cream to be lapped up.”

He cupped a breast, plumped it, and scattered a series of kisses over the soft mound. As the heat coursed through her, she dragged her fingers through his thick hair and then down over his shoulders, digging into the hard muscle. Then he closed his mouth around her nipple, sucked hard, tugged, and her whimper was one of pleasure and slight pain. His tongue soothed, and he suckled more gently, pulling glorious sensations up from her toes.

He dedicated himself to ensuring her other breast didn’t feel overlooked. She adored the intimacy of being able to touch him as she pleased, wanted to touch all of him, but was careful with his healing wound. Images from the earlier nightmare threatened to return, and she shoved them away. Now was not the time for horror, not when he was doing such wicked things to her body, was causing such riotous sensations to burst forth that she wondered if it was even possible to survive the exquisite commotion that he was stirring to life throughout her, from head to toe to fingertips. How was she to have known that a touch in one spot would travel through every muscle, across every inch of skin?

His large hands cradled her sides as he took a journey along her ribs, leaving a trail of kisses in his wake. Sinking to his knees, he continued his expedition, along her stomach, dipping his tongue in her navel. Kissed one hip and then the other.

Lowering his head, he kissed her right knee and then traced a path along