Page 130 of Gabriel: Duke of Bencalor

Gabriel came up be­hind her and banded his arms around her waist as he nuz­zled his face against her neck. “I as­sure you they’ve changed the sheets since then.”

“We’re go­ing to have sex on the king’s bed.” A hys­ter­i­cal gig­gle bub­bled up in her throat.

“Are you laugh­ing when I’m try­ing to se­duce you?” He slid his hands up­ward to cup her breasts through her T-shirt, mak­ing her nip­ples sen­si­tive and hard.

She couldn’t hold back a lit­tle gasp of plea­sure, but she also couldn’t stop star­ing at the pris­tine bed cov­ered in a blue-green du­vet. “Isn’t it sac­ri­le­gious or some­thing?”

Gabriel sighed and took her by the shoul­ders, turn­ing her to face him. “Tío Luis has slept in many beds. He does not ex­pect any­one to put up a sign say­ing, ‘The king slept here. Do not use!’”

“Right. Of course. I think it’s the coat of arms that’s freak­ing me out.”

Re­leas­ing her, Gabriel yanked the throw blan­ket off the foot of the bed and draped it over the coat of arms. “Prob­lem solved.”

He prowled back to her like a hunt­ing cat, his beau­ti­ful mouth curved in a hot, preda­tory smile.

She reached for his belt buckle, but he caught her wrists and pulled her to­ward the bed.

“No,” he said. “This is all for you. You lie back and let me show you how I feel about you.”

“Can I make re­quests?” she asked.

He lifted her hands to kiss first one palm and then the other. “As long as they’re for your plea­sure.”

“Then I want you to strip for me.” She sat on the bed and waited.

“For that, I need mu­sic.” He barked a com­mand, and the room filled with the sound of a raunchy rock beat.

He spun on his heel so his back was to her, his hips swivel­ing to the driv­ing rhythm. The worn denim of his jeans pulled across his tight back­side with ev­ery mo­tion.

“Nice,” she said as her fin­gers itched to slip into his back pock­ets and squeeze.

He reached over his head and grabbed hand­fuls of his cot­ton T-shirt, slowly pulling it up­ward so she could trace the long in­den­ta­tion of his spine un­til she reached the mus­cles of his shoul­ders. Then her gaze slid over the olive skin that curved and flexed over well-de­fined delts and traps. She could glimpse the frill and tail of the dragon tat climb­ing his side.

He yanked the shirt over his head and spun it in cir­cles a few times be­fore he let it fly into a cor­ner of the room. That left his dark, wav­ing hair tou­sled as though he’d just got­ten out of bed.

She swal­lowed hard while de­sire ran hot through her veins. She’d never seen him like this be­fore, loose and al­most play­ful.

He glanced over his shoul­der, his eyes smoky with a heat that matched hers.

“Keep go­ing,” she croaked.

The mo­tion of his hips slowed as his hands dropped, and she heard the clink of his belt buckle. With a whine of leather against fab­ric, he whipped it out of the loops. Then he turned to lay it on the bed be­side her, his face just a few inches from hers when he said, “We might want to use that later.”

She sucked in her breath as his words tight­ened her nip­ples even more.

He twirled away again and danced for her, his head in pro­file to her, his move­ments sin­u­ous, yet proud. The dragon etched on his skin seemed to un­du­late to the mu­sic.

Fla­menco. He was danc­ing fla­menco to the rock mu­sic. He stomped his feet in a swift beat, yet the car­pet and en­gine hum swal­lowed the sound. But his fin­gers flick­ered and snapped as though he held cas­tanets, his arms curved first by his sides, then over his head with wrists crossed, then drawn down slowly in front of his face. He spun to put his back to her be­fore he arched into a deep back­bend, his arms held out like wings, his hair cas­cad­ing down like a dark wa­ter­fall. He straight­ened and flicked each foot up­ward, his arms shift­ing po­si­tion with each kick.

Then he faced her and dropped his hands to the fly of his jeans, his gaze hold­ing hers with blaz­ing in­ten­sity. He pushed open the but­ton and slowly pulled the zip­per down, let­ting the denim fall open to re­veal the bulge of his erec­tion press­ing against the black silk he wore un­der­neath.

His dance turned to pure strip­per with his hips thrust­ing to work the jeans slowly down­ward to the tops of his thighs. She watched their progress with un­blink­ing eyes. When the bulges of his thigh mus­cles stopped the denim’s de­scent, he hooked his thumbs into the belt loops and slowly dragged the fab­ric down­ward to his an­kles.

He toed off his shoes, kicked away the jeans, and stood in noth­ing but black briefs.

“I wish I had a hun­dred-dol­lar bill,” she said, let­ting her gaze roam over ev­ery inch of his bare skin. As al­ways, the frilled dragon drew her eyes to the mus­cles in his chest and the cor­ru­ga­tion of ab­dom­i­nals down to his waist­band. There was the scar from har­vest­ing rib bone to re­pair his ear. She could al­most feel the long hard lines of his thighs be­tween hers. De­sire siz­zled into her belly.

“I was hop­ing for a larger de­nom­i­na­tion.” He stepped in so she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes. “And now,” he said, “it’s your turn. Raise your arms.”

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