Page 58 of The Duke Says I Do
Instinctively, she went taut to keep him where he was. A muttered protest escaped her, and she bumped her hips up.
As he lifted his head, his groan was heartfelt. “Do that again.”
“Do what?”
“Squeeze me tight.”
This time, she did it on purpose. Rapture washed over his features. “Yes,” he purred.
He shifted again. Still away.
Her nails dug into his nape. “Don’t go.”
“This is part of the more.”
“Oh,” she said, then “oh” again in a different tone altogether as he pulled back. She felt every inch of withdrawal. She dug her fingers into his back, where his muscles clenched and released through his shirt.
Without quite leaving her body, he thrust forward. There was no pain, only the intoxicating sensation of her body adjusting to him. Portia sighed with enjoyment when he went deeper. The next time, she knew what to expect. She’d seen animals mate. How stupid she was not to understand that humans were animals, too.
Alaric established a rhythm as relentless as waves rushing up a beach. Flickers of pleasure ignited to become torment. Every nerve in her body awoke to what he did. She moaned and bowed up to take more. Heat and hunger surged higher and higher.
She strained for something that remained just out of reach. Her next moan verged on a sob. “Alaric…”
“Come for me,” he crooned.
She didn’t know what he meant. She bit her lip hard as the beckoning became red-hot demand. Still, he kept up that steady movement, taking her further with each plunge until she felt likely to shred into a thousand pieces.
His breath was ragged, and his skin turned into a furnace as she writhed beneath him. Under her hands, his back was hard like granite. Warm, living granite.
He shifted his weight onto one arm and slipped his hand between her legs to seek that hidden place that gave her such a frisson. Tension coalesced into a searing blast of light and heat.
Suddenly Portia soared free through the storm. The experience transcended anything that she’d ever known. Ecstasy crashed through her like lightning. The world turned gold and bright. She cried out and pressed closer to Alaric as molten fire coursed through her.
His rhythm faltered and turned choppy. His breath emerged in audible gasps. With a guttural groan, he wrenched out of her arms and slumped face down in the hay.
The abrupt end pierced her pleasure like a slap. She opened shocked eyes to watch him. He jerked in what looked like pain and groaned again.
“Alaric, are you all right?” The words scraped over a throat sore after her cries of pleasure.
He lay unmoving, face buried in his folded arms. It was difficult to brush aside the mists of pleasure, but she was worried. Forcing a body as loose as wet string to move, she rose on her elbows and turned her head to study him.
It seemed to take him a year to answer, but finally he turned onto his back with a heavy sigh. He still breathed with great gusts, as if he starved for air. His eyes remained shut.
She couldn’t help glancing down to his gaping breeches, but the loose shirt preserved his modesty. “What is it?” she asked, disquiet knotting her stomach.
“I promised I’d save you from a baby,” he muttered. He looked as far from the elegant Duke of Granville as it was possible to be. His face was drawn, and his hair was disheveled. His golden whiskers caught the lamplight.
“Yes,” she said. Then after a pause, “Thank you.”
His lips twitched and to her relief, he looked more familiar. “You’re welcome.”
Another silence fell. Portia hadn’t expected to feel awkward after that breathtaking intimacy. But she wasn’t sure how to handle this taciturn man who had been such a superb lover.
At last, Alaric glanced over and took her arm. “How are you?”
“I’m fine,” she said in a flat voice.
“Good.”
