Page 74 of The Dravenhearst Brides
The third time their lips met, there was no desperation, no aching, no questions. There was nothing but steady surety, smooth molasses on the hottest summer day, pouring languidly into each other.
Slowly, indulgently, Margot pushed his shirt off his shoulders. Her hands drifted over the planes of his strong back, then slid around to his stomach. Her fingers fluttered over the trail of dark hair there. Followed it down, down, down until she latched onto his belt buckle. He inhaled sharply.
“Should we…” He brushed his nose along her jawline.
She tipped her head upward, guiding his lips to the soft space beneath her ear. The skin there was damp with sweat.
“The house?” he asked. “My bedroom?”
“No. Here.” Here in this rickhouse. In this place that brought him both the greatest love and deepest sorrow of his life. She wanted him right here, believing that together, they could bloom where he’d once bled.
She unbuckled his belt.
He lifted her, slamming her bottom onto a barrel. Her eyes floated to the rafters, sightline blurring, dizzy, with row after row of barrels. Her nose filled with cedar and oak. With the whisper of his sweet bourbon breath.
She closed her eyes.
He hitched up her skirts.
She spread her legs.
He was there, finallythere, and she suddenly knew. The realization came from a distance—the hard, rigid pressure between his legs was meant for her. The barrel put them at the perfect height, his tip notching in her entrance.
Her eyes popped open.
“If it’s too much…” His gaze flicked to her, watching every micromovement of her face as he pressed himself inside her. Deeper than deep, slower than slow.
“It’s not,” she breathed. But it almost was. There was just somuchof him.
And that was what she told him, over and over again, when he began to move. That he was so much. Enough. Too much. Everything.
That she wanted him. Needed him. Now. Harder. More. With her. Deeper. Closer. Please. Now. Please. Please.Please.
Merrick let out an agonized, tortured moan. Began to move faster. With greater surety, losing himself within her. The intensity of his every thrust reached unbearable peaks, hitting a secret spot inside her every time…deep and true…
“Merrick, I…I’m…” He reduced her to impulse. Stole her words. Her rationality. Her sanity. He took it all. Robbed her blind.
A whiskey thief, indeed.
She couldn’t fight it, wouldn’t try. She surrendered herself, tipping over the edge. Spinning and reeling and clinging to his shoulders, digging in, crying out. She jolted when he found his release, emptying himself deep inside her with a groan. Collapsing onto her when it was over, his chest slick with sweat, melting into hers.
Hotter than hot in this hot as hell rickhouse.
Margot slowly regained her breath. She opened her eyes to a new world.
Merrick was there, waiting for her. Drinking her in.
“In case I haven’t made it abundantly clear,” he murmured, his chest rumbling against hers, “you are simultaneously the best and worst thing that has ever happened to me.”
Her paranoid brain registered only one word. “The worst?”
“Yes. You’ve ruined me. Quintessentially and thoroughly.”
She smiled, not the slightest bit displeased by his answer.
They stole back to the manor in the dark of night, exchanging secret, shy smiles, her hand clutched in his. A gentle breeze ruffled their hair, fanned their flushed cheeks.
The ebony stairs creaked under their feet. The hinges of his bedroom door whined. Springs groaned when he pulled her down onto his bed.
