Page 68 of The Beast of Beswick
If she wasn’t seated in the most exquisite position of her life, Astrid would have laughed at her own absurdity. Here she was, half naked in the arms of averyvirile man, who happened to be her husband, copulating in a deserted garden in the most magical setting possible, and all she could talk about was women’s rights.
Thane didn’t seem to mind.
Not now, when his eyes were closed and his head was thrown back, the thickness of him lodged inside her, foreign and pulsing and utterly wonderful. Lord above, he felt good. It had been a tight fit—given it was only her second time—but her body had been ready to ease the way. More than ready. Astrid squirmed slightly, adjusting her position, and he let out a ragged groan. The corded muscles of his neck stood out in stark relief.
“Are you well?” she whispered.
Eyelids parted to reveal stormy golden discs. His jaw was rigid, the muscles in his forearms braced against the stone bench even more so. “Yes, but I’ll come if you move.”
“Isn’t that the point?”
He huffed a laugh. “Equals, remember? This has to be good for you, too. Wouldn’t be sporting of me to renege on my promise so quickly, would it?”
This man.
Astrid’s chest squeezed. In that moment, she wanted to give him everything. Her body, her soul, her brain. Her heart. And she wanted all of him in return. But then all conscious thought fled her mind as her husband began to move, his hands grasping handfuls of her hips and lifting her up, withdrawing himself almost to the edge of her body. And then he released her, startling matching moans out of them both, as she hurtled back down for him to fill her again. It was better than the first thrust, now that her body had adjusted to his size.
“Again,” she commanded.
He arched an eyebrow at her high-handedness but complied. “Bossy.”
“I know what I want, and you’re not a mind reader,” she said and gasped with pleasure as his body sank home a third and fourth time. “I call it leadership.”
“I love the way your brain works.” He thrust again. “And I love a woman in control.”
She opened her mouth to retort, but his lips closed over hers right then. Astrid sighed into the embrace. He tasted of strength, brandy, and spice. She loved kissing him. He was a formidable man who held nothing back, and his driving passion fed the fire inside her. Part and parcel of him being a captain on the battlefield. It madeherfeel powerful to have a man like him acquiescing to her every want.
His tongue challenged hers, luring it into his mouth and then catching it gently with his teeth. He nibbled at her lips and then sipped from them as if they were something infinitely precious. The sweetness above belied the ferocity below—of him completely and unequivocally possessing her with shorter, more uncontrolled thrusts. The two extremes drove her wild.
“You feel like heaven,” he murmured.
He groaned, closing his eyes, his control seeming to slip as his pace increased. Thane’s hand slid between them, burrowing under the layers of her skirts to where their bodies were joined. He stroked his thumb gently against the slick bundle of nerves, and Astrid almost fell off the seat as white-hot sensation streaked through her body. He did it again, but this time a delicious roll of his hips accompanied it. And suddenly everything inside her coalesced—every thought, every feeling, every sensation—into one giant ball of tension that made her feel like she was being pulled apart in a thousand different directions.
“Please, Thane, I can’t take it…”
“Almost there, love. It’s yours.”
And then it was. The pressure built blindingly and then shattered, spilling through her in waves and waves of undiluted pleasure. Astrid muffled her scream with his mouth, holding on to his shoulders for all she was worth, her body feeling like a limp noodle, aftershocks quivering through her. Thane drove home once, twice, and then his entire body jerked and went still as he clutched her to him.
“Holy hell,” he whispered against her hair.
Astrid bit at her lip, wondering if his paroxysm had been half as ferocious as hers. The thrill of discovery had heightened every illicit second. From the dazed look on his face, she suspected it might have been. “Was that good?”
“Very fucking good.” His eyes snapped open at his hasty words. “I’m sorry, I—”
“No, I like it.”
His eyebrows launched into his hairline, his lips curling at the corners. “Do you just? What would your dear Ms. Austen say?”
“Ms. Austen, were she still alive, probably would have had some choice words to teachyou, having to write about such conceited, dull, moody men and their fragile male selves. I’d wager she might have whispered one or two filthy oaths in her time.”
He laughed. “I think you may be right.”
Astrid kissed the bridge of his marred nose, her finger gently tracing the thick, roped scar that cut across it from his right brow to his left jaw. He was so many extremes, this man. Savage on the outside, a passionate but thoughtful lover on the inside. And he did not make her feel foolish with her unconventional thoughts and ideals.
“We should probably be getting back,” he said, ducking free of her light caress.
“Yes.”
