Page 91 of Texas Honor

She didn’t protest when he lay down beside her. Her slender hands reached for his face, drawing it down until she could give him her mouth.

She trembled as his hands found her soft body and slowly teased it again into the fierce, throbbing submission he’d won from her before. But this time he didn’t draw back. He shifted over her, giving her his full weight for an instant before his forearms caught his weight. His sore arm felt the pressure, but he didn’t flinch. His body was aching, throbbing, on fire to bury itself in hers. It was an anguish to hold back, to go slow. But he had to. He couldn’t frighten her—not now.

His leg coaxed hers to move, to admit the hard shift of his hips against shocked softness. Her eyes opened, and she gasped as the reality of what was going to happen washed over her and brought back all the old fears.

But he sensed that. His hands framed her flushed cheeks, and he kissed her eyelids closed. “God made man and woman to join this way,” he whispered. “Not in animal lust, but in exquisite sharing. I want to give you pleasure. Let me have your body. Let me give you mine.”

She trembled at the tenderness in his deep voice, at the slow, exquisite probing. “Gabe, I’m...frightened!” she cried, her voice a keening mixture of apprehension and desire.

“I won’t hurt you,” he breathed. He moved—tenderly—and held her eyes at the same time. “Watch me. That’s it, watch me. Feel me, feel my body cherishing yours....”

It was the most incredibly intimate thing she’d ever felt. Never like this with Dennis, who had hurt her and forced her and never taken the slightest care of her body. But it was Gabe, now, Gabe’s quiet, hard face above her, Gabe’s body so warm and powerful over hers, his skin as hot as her own, his hips gently moving down, his body...penetrating!

Her mouth opened, her breath stopped, at the feel of him. Her eyes mirrored her frank astonishment. It didn’t hurt. It didn’t hurt at all, it was... Her eyes closed on a moan. It was...tender and slow, and he was...filling her...his body, locking, interlocking, moving, stopping, rising, probing...

His hand moved down her side, his thumb working at the hard nipple on one breast, his mouth tender on her face, adoring it, cherishing it, while his body made a miracle of this unexpected intimacy.

He was breathing as roughly as she was, but every movement was tender, calculated, unselfish. He smoothed back her damp hair as she trembled under him, straining upward, her arms holding him, her voice shaking with tiny, pleasured noises.

“It isn’t sex, is it?” he whispered at her ear.

“No,” she agreed in a voice high-pitched with building pleasure. “Oh, Gabe...it’s...not!”

His hips moved now in a slow, building rhythm, his skin gently abrasive against hers, his dampness clinging to hers, the sofa cushions shifting beneath them with the hard, sharp movements.

“When it...happens,” he whispered urgently, “don’t...cry out. Bite me, claw me, but don’t...cry out, they’ll hear us.”

“Gabriel.” She was weeping, her voice thick with tears she didn’t understand. Her body was like a puppet’s, manipulated by his, possessed by his. She followed his movements with desperate abandon, blind with pleasure, her nails scoring him, her teeth against his hard shoulder, her tongue tasting his damp, salty flesh.

It was sudden. Like a flash of lightning, like summer hail. All at once, blinding colors came rushing down on her in a hot, sweet flood, and she threw back her head, arched her body in a tension that had to be fatal as it curled up inside her like locked steel. She made a sound she couldn’t hear, burying it against his skin, and her body began to echo the sudden feverish, rough motions of his.

Crashing together, she thought in the back of her mind. Crashing together, we’ll hurt each other!

Somewhere in the middle of the thought, her body burst into sweet flames. She heard his deep voice, biting back a harsh groan, felt him over her, felt him convulsing. Her mind welcomed the sudden oblivion that washed over her, the sweet pulsing aftermath of something she didn’t even understand.

She was damp all over. It was hard to breathe. Her heartbeat was shaking her, like his, and she was so tired. So tired.

Her arms curled around his neck, and she began to kiss him languorously. On his chest, his shoulders, his chin, everywhere she could reach. Brief, adoring kisses that tasted salt and cologne and pure man.

“You made love to me,” she whispered. She sounded and felt awed.

“Yes.” His hands drew her with him as he shifted onto his back with a heavy, shuddering sigh. “Never like that, Maggie. Never in my life.”

“I thought we were going to hurt each other, at the last,” she murmured drowsily. “It was so...violent.”

“Violence, out of such tenderness,” he mused, giving a shaky laugh. “Oh, God, I cherished you,” he breathed fervently, crushing her against him. “Cherished you with every part of me!”

She trembled at the emotion in his hard voice, at the feel of him, the scent of him. She clung, nuzzling her face against his with tears staining her cheeks. “I don’t mind anymore.”

He frowned. “Mind what?”

“If Dennis accuses us of being lovers,” she whispered at his ear. “I feel like shouting it to the world, telling everyone what a wonderful lover you are.”

He nipped her ear. “My mother would be shocked. She didn’t raise me to seduce women in her parlor.”

She lifted her head and looked around, dazed. “Oh, my goodness,” she faltered, glancing down at him.

“Shocking, isn’t it?” he murmured with a smile, looking down at the scattered clothing. He looked back up at her. “Shocking. And good. Right. Like marriage is going to be.”

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