Page 51 of When She Loved Me
“I do.” She continued to rub herself, finding the sweet spot. She tossed her head back and breathed raggedly, “I want you inside me now.”
He obliged, sheathing himself inside her, nearly crying out as she did at how tightly and hotly she welcomed him. She needed no tutoring now, but rode him perfectly, up and down, her knees finding leverage on the bed. Trevor could not take his eyes off her, the slim light of the moon through the window blessedly showing him her figure and face, her long curls bouncing against her shoulders as she rose and fell. He grabbed her bottom, imprinting his fingers, and nipped at her bottom lip with his teeth.
Nicki arched her back, thrusting her breasts at him, caressing her own nipples with each swipe against his chest. She bit her bottom lip when he could no more reach it. Trevor ground out an ungentlemanly curse for the voracity of his need, pumping into her as she began to make sounds that alerted him of her coming orgasm. Each little whimper provoked him further, stirred greater need and desire, until she covered his cheeks with her hands and kissed him fiercely, driving her tongue at him, moaning into his mouth and then going completely still while she cried out with her release. She actually sobbed, or it sounded as if she did, but he could not stop, even as her head lolled against his shoulder and her swollen lips touched his skin.
“Oh, but I’m dying, I think,” she murmured and Goddammit, if he didn’t almost weep himself. But she was sobrilliantly wet and throbbing around him, still lifting and lowering her hips for him—and yet she was spent and breathless, so that Trevor stood up, carrying her with him while her arms looped lazily around his neck. He pivoted and pushed her onto her back on the bed, having almost come out, that when he thrust deep once more, she cried out again. And he continued to love her, pushing harder and faster, watching her beneath him. Her eyes were shiny in the near darkness, her breasts swaying exquisitely to the tempo of his thrusts, her hair a halo all around her head. Her hands reached for him, pulling his shoulders down, bringing his mouth to hers. She kissed him again, more, saw him home, until he came.
“Ah, Jesus,” he grunted and sighed, slowing his rhythm while his own release crashed over him, dizzying him, killing him, it seemed, while at that exact moment he thought, with no small amount of joy,All my life, I will have this with her. He stopped eventually, collapsed on top of her, though yet held the bulk of his weight off her. Every inch of his body was on fire, for her, because of her. He closed his eyes and just reveled in it, let it consume him.
When he was sure his arms were about to fold, he shifted, and rolled to her side, onto his back. He stretched one hand out to touch her still, laying it across her belly, needing to feel her.
With his forearm thrown over his face, while he recovered and relived every sensation, he worked to steady his breathing. He wanted to catch his breath and start it all over again. My God, but it had never been like this before. Nothing even came close.
Next to him, Nicole rolled onto her side, facing away from him, so that his hand slipped up and over her hip and then fellaway from her. Suddenly recalling that last night, she’d fairly quickly hinted that he should leave, he moved again, turning on to his side, wrapping his arm around her.
He didn’t want to leave her.
Burying his face into her neck and her hair, they were silent and unmoving for many long minutes. When finally her little voice came to him, “Trevor?” he felt no guilt at all about pretending to sleep, even going so far as to almost snore against her ear.
She was still for a moment, until she temptingly wiggled her bottom against his groin. But she was only settling in, and not trying to entice him, he determined, aware of a tenseness leaving her, her limbs and shoulders going slack as she nestled against him. And then her hand settled over his, sliding down over his wrist until she intertwined her fingers with his. Trevor allowed only a small but pleased grin to crease his lips before he did, actually, fall asleep.
Chapter Fifteen
HE BELIEVED HE DIDher a courtesy, by leaving before she’d risen. Sleeping the entire night with Nicki wrapped in his arms had been nearly as perfect as any previous imaginings had suggested it might, but he thought not to push his luck, and had spared her any possible uneasiness if she’d waken with him still beside her.
That day would come, he knew, was convinced it would be so, was convinced he would make it so, that one day he would wake her with sweet kisses and lose himself in her smiling love.
Today, however, he planned to show her love in different ways, and waited with a good measure of restlessness for her to join him at breakfast.
And then all his well laid plans went to pot, when it seemed she might not, after all, join him for breakfast, that he slapped his napkin down upon the table and went in search of her. He passed Lorelei in the front hall and was advised that the countess was indeed awake and dressed, but she couldn’t say where she’d gotten to once she’d left her chambers. He strode into the kitchens, and had to shout to Mrs. Abercorn to be understood, until finally Charlie walked by, and answered the question Trevor had been trying to ask.
“Her ladyship is below stairs, with the new servants Mr. Wendell called in.”
Somewhat mollified that she was only busy, and not intentionally avoiding him, Trevor descended the back stairway, certain he had never in his life entered the servants’ quarters in any home he owned. But he was excited to get on with the day, and if that meant helping her to see the new servants settled, or ratherconvincing her it was a task best suited to Mrs. Abercorn, so be it.
He left the stairs and entered the servants’ quarters, which was naught but a long corridor with rooms and private chambers on either side. Standing at the very far end was his wife, whom he easily recognized in the dimly lit hallway, even as she had her back to him and sported a mop cap similar to the one Lorelei and Mrs. Abercorn always wore; he would know her shape anywhere.
She was talking to a man, one of the extra hired servants, he assumed, striding quietly toward them.
And this is what he saw, what sent everything to rack and ruin: while his darling little wife in her plain gray gown was chirping and pointing her slim fingers, apparently with some instructions, while she and the man stood in an open doorway, the man leaned his hand up against the door jamb, moving provocatively close to Nicole. Even from the diminishing distance, as Trevor was not halfway across the hall, he read well the middle-aged man’s lecherous grin, even as he could not hear his surely cajoling words. This alone provoked him into a swift and inflated anger and lengthened his strides, but the sound of his wife’s answering giggle was what truly sent him over the edge. She’d taken one step backward, just as Trevor reached them, just as the soon-to-be unemployed man lowered his arm and noticed Trevor’s presence. The man understood his own peril rather quickly—the what, if not the why—upon spying the feral gleam in Trevor’s dark eyes.
He tried to duck as Trevor came around Nicole, but perhaps did not honestly believe he was about to be slugged, so that he didn’t stoop completely that indeed, Trevor’s fist caught him squarely across the face.
Nicole screamed, but Trevor ignored her, placing one foot between the fallen man’s legs and growling fiercely above him, “Do not ever—ever!—get that close to Lady Leven again! In fact, get out!”
“Trevor!” Nicole cried, pulling at his arm.
Trevor yanked his still fisted hand out of her grasp, and resisted kicking the man, who was trying to scramble to his feet. “Get out!” He roared again, while the man beheld him with wild eyes, until he lowered his head and spit out a tooth into his palm.
He opened his mouth, to speak or to cry, Trevor did not know, did not allow him the courtesy of listening to whatever pitiful excuse he might announce as reason to be nearly accosting the lady of the manner in the servant’s hall.
“You’ve got five seconds to leave my sight, and this house.” The man bent to retrieve his valise, which had fallen when he’d been hit, and hugging it to his chest, skirted around Trevor and Nicole, giving wide berth to Trevor, before running down the hall and up the stairs.
“Trevor, honest to God—”
He turned on her. “This how you greet all the fresh servants? Letting them avail themselves to your charms? Should I be asking Timsby if he received such exceptional treatment?” Her eyes widened and she gasped, but Trevor didn’t care, allowed the full venom of his gaze to rake over her with abhorrence.
Belatedly, he realized two other new hires, both females, had come to their doorways, hovered just inside their rooms, sending horrified and gape-jawed glances his way.
