Uncovering the Silveri Secret - By Melanie Milburne Page 0,40

about marrying a man you don't love?' he asked.

'I do love him,' she said.

He gave a mocking grunt. 'And yet you just had sex with me.'

'It was just sex,' she said. 'It's just a physical thing. It means nothing.'

'Do you really believe that?' he asked.

Bella wanted to believe it. She needed to believe it. 'I should never have slept with you,' she said. 'It was a mistake. I wasn't thinking.'

'No, maybe not, but you were feeling,' he said, pulling her closer, right up against his naked body. 'Like you're doing now. Can you feel what you do to me, Bella? What we do to each other?'

Bella could and it sent a wave of hot, pulsing longing through her. His erection was pressed against her thigh. She felt her feminine core tingling in anticipation, the nerve-endings still sensitised from their passionate coupling earlier.

His mouth came down and covered hers and in a heartbeat she was lost. Her arms snaked around him, holding him as close as she possibly could. She wanted to crawl inside his skin, to melt into him so that her body didn't ache with this maddeningly feverish want.

Her hands delved into his hair, her fingers threading through the thick black strands. She breathed in the scent of him, that erotic mix of his maleness with the delicate overlay of her perfume and body musk.

His hands slid down to the curve of her back and pressed her hard against him. Bella felt the potent power of him like an electric current through her body. All of her senses were screaming for his possession - it was a raw hunger that could not be satiated any other way.

She took him in her hand, stroking him, relishing the satiny feel of his skin, delighting in the iron-strong length of him. She loved hearing those deep, unmistakably male noises he made in the back of his throat - guttural groans that had a distinctly primal quality to them. She loved the way his mouth moved with such heated fervour on hers, the way his stubble was so sexily raspy on the soft skin of her face.

He used his teeth in playful little bites against her lips, tugging and releasing, tantalising her with that little hint of danger in the caress. She bit back with little nips that she followed up with gentle sweeps and flicks of her tongue.

He walked her backwards, thigh against thigh until the backs of her knees felt the bed. She tumbled backward, all legs and arms and red-hot need. He quickly applied a fresh condom and came down over her, his weight pinning her down, his mouth still locked on hers as his body speared hers in one deliciously vigorous thrust that made the breath hitch in her throat and her bones melt.

He set a fast pace that made shivers course down her spine and the fine hairs on the back of her neck dance and twitch in response. She felt the contraction of her muscles, all the sensitive nerves twanging as he rocked against her with passionate, heart-stopping urgency.

'You drive me insane, do you know that?' he said against her kiss-swollen mouth.

'Ditto,' Bella said, taking another nip at his lower lip.

He worked his way down her neck. 'Am I going too fast for you?'

She angled her head so he could get better access. 'Can you go faster?'

'I don't want to hurt you,' he said, pulling back his pace a bit. 'You're so tiny compared to me. I feel like I'm crushing you.'

'You're not,' she said, urging him on with little hip movements. 'You feel just right.'

He kissed her mouth again, lingeringly and tantalisingly. Bella writhed beneath him, her body so wired she felt like she was going to implode. He read her movements as if he had direct access to her thoughts and feelings. He slipped a hand between their bodies and found the swollen nub of nerve-endings that were all shrieking and clamouring for release.

It was a cataclysmic explosion of feeling. Her whole body quaked with it as if she had been caught in the epicentre of an earthquake. She couldn't stop from crying out, her breath coming out in jerky little gasps as the aftershocks shuddered through her.

She was still gasping as he came. She felt every powerful thrust as he emptied himself. She skated her hands down his back, holding him against her, wanting to prolong the deep connection of their bodies. There was something profoundly moving about his total loss of control. Was