Scoundrel of My Heart (Once Upon a Dukedom #1) - Lorraine Heath Page 0,71

her thigh, spreading her, opening her. He did the same with the other side, and when he was done, she was surprised to discover somewhere along the way she’d abandoned all modesty. She parted her legs farther, and his resulting groan turned her blood to lava. The heat swamped her. Her body tightened in anticipation. She didn’t know what he had in mind, what his next move might be, but she knew it would result in gratitude.

He tilted his head back, and his smoldering gaze nearly ignited her. “I used to be jealous of the sun for all the kisses it bestowed upon you. Now, I’m going to kiss you where it never could.”

Burying his head between her legs, he kissed her most intimate center just as he kissed her mouth: open with tongue delving and exploring. Crying out, her thighs trembling, she dug her fingers into his shoulders, anchoring herself to him as he plundered. To keep watching him was too much. Falling into the depths of the wonder that he was creating, she looked out to the sea.

In the far distance lightning flashed, hinting at more rain, momentarily illuminating his wide shoulders and broad back, glistening with dew. He was so gorgeous. She wanted more lightning. She wanted sunshine to flow over him and fill her with jealousy because it could touch all of him at once while she could only touch portions at a time.

He suckled and stroked and teased. He swirled his tongue around the tiny bud and then closed his lips around it and tugged. The sensations built. She clutched his shoulders. “Griff?”

“Let it take you under, Kathryn, to the deepest depths, and then the tidal wave can shoot you into the stars.” She hadn’t known he had such poetry in him or that he could accurately describe the promise that was thrumming through her veins with each stroke of his tongue.

“I can barely stand.”

“I have you.”

And she knew that he did. Perhaps always had.

When the cataclysm came, it rocked her to her core, a tempest that thrashed her about, wrecked her, and left her lethargic on shore. While tremors cascaded through her, he softened his attentive actions, slowed, licked gently before pressing a kiss to the heart of her. After rising to his feet, he circled his arms around her and tucked her face into the crook of his shoulder. She pressed a kiss against his heated skin.

“I shall never look at the sea in the same way,” she said in breathless wonder.

As his laughter circled her, she’d never treasured any sound more and feared she might never have another moment such as this, when she felt so loved and loved so much in return.

Chapter 16

She awoke to faint sunlight streaming in through the windows, disappointed to discover she was alone. But she could see the shallow dip in the pillow where his head had rested while he held her.

After escorting her to the bed, he’d crawled beneath the covers with her. While he’d not removed his trousers, at least she’d had his bare chest to snuggle against, to glide her fingers over. She’d counted his ribs and kissed the hollow in their center. She’d inhaled the earthy fragrance of him. Too sated to speak, she’d merely absorbed his presence and relished the way he held her close with one arm, while his other hand cupped her hip.

Once she’d awoken to discover her back against his chest, his hand cradling her breast, his soft snores near her ear. Contentment had swept over her as incessantly as waves over the shore, constant and never-ending.

But it would end, when they returned to London. Perhaps they’d stay here, one more day, one more night. Only this time, she would give to him as he’d given to her.

With that last remembrance, an ache formed in that secretive place between her thighs, a place he knew so well. While she chastised herself regarding what she had allowed, she couldn’t seem to regret it. Not when she cared for him so deeply.

Perhaps she always had. Perhaps the teasing had been a form of defense to protect her heart because she wasn’t destined for a rapscallion. She was destined for an heir. If she wanted to hear the wind whistling through the windows, the creaks of the ancient floorboards, the crash of the sea against the shore.

Thinking of him caused a pressure to build, centered in that tiny little bud that he had closed his lips around and suckled. What passed