Page 76 of Suddenly a Bride
His breathing was harsh, his face looked pained, as she felt him probing her moist, swollen flesh. He slid inside her by slow increments, then back out again. He repeated the motion again and again, stretching her. She was mildly uncomfortable, but that was nothing compared to her frantic need to feel him inside her.
Desperate, she lifted her feet right off the bed, pressing her hips up toward him. He sank all the way inside her, filling her, and she gave a little gasp as pain blossomed and faded away.
Edmund straightened his elbows, looking down into her face with worry. “Did I hurt you?”
A slow grin widened her mouth and she shook her head. He was heavy and full inside her, and she loved it. She raised her arms over her head, reveling in the way his wide eyes watched her breasts. She trailed her foot along his backside, and he shuddered.
She almost cried out her disappointment when he slid out of her, but then he surged back inside her hard, making her slide up the bed. That wonderful ache began again low in her stomach, stroked into outright need with every thrust of his body. Soon she was pressed against the headboard, gasping his name, feeling more alive and aware of herself as a woman than she’d ever felt before.
This time she cried out with her climax, then could only hold onto him as he shuddered and released his seed inside her, stroke after stroke.
Feeling as weak as a newborn lamb, Edmund lifted his chest off Gwyneth. He felt a little tremor in her muscles where she held his cock inside her. He groaned and moved slowly, knowing it wouldn’t take much at all to make him come again.
“Edmund?”
He opened his eyes and suddenly realized he had forced her so hard against the headboard that her head was tilted to the side. With his hands beneath her hips and shoulders, he sat back on his heel, bringing her with him to the edge of the bed. While she straddled his lap, he managed to stay inside her. Laughing, she clutched his shoulders to lean back, with her hair dangling down past her hips.
He bent her even farther backward and tasted the sweetness of her breasts again. Even as she sighed, she ran her hands through his hair, and he turned to kiss her palm.
“You were right, Edmund,” she said.
He pulled her upright until they were face to face. He moved gently inside, watching her exquisite expressions. He had never imagined a woman could enjoy sex this much or how it would make him feel to know that they gave each other pleasure. And he’d thought being married to her would be a hardship. “And what was I right about?” he murmured, kissing the sweet, soft spot behind her ear, inhaling the seductive scent that was all hers.
“If we’d done this on our wedding night, it would not have been the same.”
He lifted his head and looked at her, shuddering when she rose up, then took him back inside. “Why?”
“We were strangers and I was very nervous. I do not think I would have felt so”—he tilted his head back so she could kiss the hollow between his collarbones—”so free and comfortable with you.”
Her tongue darted out to lick him, and he shuddered again. He didn’t know what to say, because he knew that wasn’t at all why he’d waited to take his wife to bed. He would have enjoyed having sex with her on that first afternoon. But women were different. Though she was brave, he knew she’d been frightened marrying a stranger. She wouldn’t have squirmed so joyously in his lap, not that first day. And it would only have been a release for him.
Guilt swept through him, leading his thoughts away from this pleasant encounter with his astonishingly passionate wife. She never had to know what he’d meant to do with their marriage, with her trust. The plan had existed only in his mind after all and had affected no one. She was even grateful that he’d waited to consummate their vows.
She squirmed again, and his guilt slipped away for the night. He lay back in his bed and taught his wife how to ride him.
Chapter 18
The most difficult thing Edmund ever had to do was lie in bed in the morning and watch his wife bathe in the cool bath water and dress. He knew she would be sore, and he’d even felt uneasy when he’d seen the spots of blood on her thighs. But he wanted to be inside her again, where it was hot and tight.
When she walked over to him, Edmund sat up and swung his legs over the side, pulling her against him. He nipped between her breasts with his teeth.
“I wish you would wear the gown you wore when we were married. I could uncover your breasts whenever I wanted to.”
She laughed and rested her hands on his shoulders. “Would we not have to be in our bedchamber first?”
“I can think of a dozen places where we could find enough privacy for a quick viewing. In fact, you covered yourself far too quickly.”
Gwyneth giggled as her husband unbuttoned her bodice and peered inside her gaping clothing. She barely resisted the urge to hug him close and tell him how much she loved him.
But that would have been foolish, because she was starting to know him too well. Although they’d just spent hours doing the most intimate things together, he’d never spoken words of love—or even trust. There was a part of him he held away from her, a distance she wished he wouldn’t keep. She was glad that he had finally shared his bed with her, yet she wanted him to share his soul.
But there was all the time in the world for him to fall in love with her, and she considered their night together a wonderful start.
“I must leave,” she said breathlessly, when he’d pulled her bodice wide and her smock down to take her nipple into his mouth.
“Wait a moment,” he murmured against her.
Only when she was shuddering, bent back over his arm, as his tongue licked and tormented her, did she blurt out, “This is not fair.”
