Page 43 of Forbidden Until Midnight

And he barked out a laugh. ‘As you wish,’ he said, his thumbs hooking into the band and drawing them slowly from his legs, delighting in Eleanor’s fascination.

Her sharp inhale when she saw all of him pulled him back to her innocence, to why he hadn’t just taken her up against the wall, as he’d wanted, the moment they’d crossed the threshold.

He was about to reassure her, remind her that they didn’t have to doanythingshe didn’t want, when she came to the edge of the bed, still on her knees, her cool little hands pressing into his body, his skin, his torso, around his hips and finally, exquisitely, around the length of him.

His head fell back as she explored him, as she felt her way around him, learning while she mystified him. But when he felt her mouth close around him, he nearly yelled out loud. He wanted to tell her she didn’t have to, but he was drowning in a sea of such pure bliss it was near pain.

‘Eleanor...’ Her name was a plea and a prayer on his lips.‘Cristo.’

Her response was a moan of delight around the hard length of him. Her tongue, the wet heat, the vibration of her pleasure was too much, and with a resolution that took more strength than he liked, he gently drew her away from him and pulled her up to face him.

‘Did I do something wrong?’ she asked, eyes wide, worried.

‘Absolutely not,’ he managed through the pounding in his chest. ‘But if you want me capable of anything more we have to stop there. For now,’ he said, more to reassure her than expecting more.

Realisation dawned in her gaze, a slight flush rose on her cheeks, and in that moment he thought that the crack in his heart began to close just a little. He kissed her then, covering the little fissures shifting like tectonic plates in his soul. He kissed her gently back against the bed, her arms sweeping up around his head, enfolding him, protecting their kiss against the outside world. He kissed the inside of her upper arm and just relished the heat of her body, the scent of her driving him wild. She opened for him, her legs gently wrapping around him, unconsciously guiding him to where they both wanted to be.

‘Remember,cara, talk to me. Tell me what you feel, what makes you feel good, what doesn’t, when you want me to stop,’ he said in between kisses.

‘If.IfI want you to stop,’ she insisted.

He smiled, but the seriousness remained in his gaze. ‘It might hurt.’

She nodded, understanding and expectation serious in her eyes as he nudged himself at her entrance. The slick wet heat of her was urging him on, but he controlled himself with a ruthlessness that bordered on pain. Slowly, he leaned into her, inch by inch, filling her, joining with her, hating that the pure ecstasy of it for him caused her pain, the price she was paying indecent in that light. And in that moment he knew that nothing would ever be the same again.

The feeling of intrusion was almost overwhelming.

‘Breathe,cara.’

Eleanor did as he asked, relaxing her body into it. Slowly, just like before, pleasure emerged from the pain, breath by breath, inch by inch, and her body, as if it knew him, as if it recognised him, began to unfurl for him.

As she adjusted to the size of him, she began to feel other things—the satisfaction of him inside her, the sense of completeness that began to fill her. The more she wanted him, the deeper she wanted him. The way that when he moved, he pressed against the bundle of nerves that snapped intense pleasure through her body.

A gasp fell from her lips and Santo responded by moving exactly the same way again.

‘Good?’

‘Amazing,’ she hissed on an exhale.

‘In what way?’ he asked, and she could tell that he was struggling. Struggling to hold himself back, struggling to care for her, to protect this for her. To make it special for her.

‘I never knew it could feel this way,’ she admitted as he slowly filled her again, her head falling back on the pillow, her body rising to meet his. ‘As if I had been empty until now,’ she said as he drew back, the slide so delicious, and once again the gentle tide of her orgasm began to build. ‘As if I had always missed you and never known it.’

He pushed into her slowly, deeply, as if hewasthat tide, gently covering her with a pleasure that was as strong as a life force. Not terrifying, not plunging towards the edge of a cliff, but, once again, accepting that inevitable conclusion where he would join her as they willingly stepped into the abyss together.

She started to shiver under the weight of that pleasure.

‘Cara?’

‘It’s so much, what you do to me. It’s everything,’ she said in wonder as she breathed through a bigger wave of pleasure, as if they were wading into deeper and deeper waters.

Santo’s head dropped to her chest, her hands coming to wrap around him, holding him to her breast as he teased her nipples. His movements became less smooth, and she knew that he was as affected as she was. His skin, slick with the same sweat as her own, the gentle slap of his body against hers, the gasps and moans no longer distinguishable between them as they came closer and closer towards this inescapable and undefinablething.

Eleanor lost her breath, lost her sense of self, only knowing him, only knowing this. Her orgasm swept over her, over Santo, drawing him with her as they fell together...always together.

Eleanor woke, realising that the bed was empty. Smoothing circles on the cool sheets where Santo had been, she shook away the heavy sleep she had fallen into and sat up in the bed. Frowning, she pulled the silk throw from the bed and, wrapping it around her, she went in search of him.

He wasn’t in the en suite bathroom, so she passed through the open bedroom door and, barefoot, made her way back towards the main part of the suite.

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