Page 64 of Married to the Forbidden Duke
But there was little of that now. Just delicious fullness and a surge of pleasure that took her by surprise—as though her climax had never finished, and he had just extended it.
He reached down and took hold of her hair, digging his fingers into her bun and tilting her throat to him.
Bare.Vulnerable.
Her stomach fluttered, but there was no fear here. She knew beyond any doubt that he would never hurt her.
“You aremine,” he snarled and accompanied the words with another thrust into her. She felt as though she would burst apart at the seams, but only in the best, most delightful way. “Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she gasped. “I understand.”
“And you are not to be anyone else’s.”
She nodded, wondering how she could ever want another man when he was the only one who set fire to her desires in this way. Infuriating, certainly. Difficult and tortured—yes. But regardless of all these reasons, she wanted him more than she could ever imagine wanting anyone else.
“Say it,” he told her, plunging inside her again. She watched the play of muscles, the way they moved and danced in his abdomen with each movement. Not like a Greek statue—he was utterly, vividly alive.
“I’m yours,” she breathed. “And you—”
“I have been yours since the first moment you came to me in the church,” he muttered and smiled crookedly down at her. Her heart gave another flip, and it felt as though he filled her more than just between her legs. He was everywhere inside her. Between her ribs, in her stomach, in her mind. She would never be able to be without him.
“And only mine,” she whispered.
“Only yours.” He bent to touch her again, and she almost jerked out of his grasp. But he held on and did it again. And again. Everything was almost too much to bear, so sensitive she couldn’t hold still, but he was relentless, thrusting her toward the edge with almost brutal insistence.
“I want to see your face,” he growled. “And I want you to say my name.”
He had pushed her almost beyond the ability of speech. And when she looked up at him, she rather fancied that he, too, had been pushed beyond some invisible boundary. His eyes were wild, and they were fixed on her face.
Her skirts fell between them, and she wished suddenly that there was nothing but skin there. Sweat beaded down her back, across her brow, and she could see sweat glistening on his shoulders, too. Once, she might have thought she would find such a sight disgusting, but now she felt her body tighten at the sight of it.
“Alice,” he groaned. “Are you there? Are you close?”
All she could do was nod. Unbearablyclose—scarilyclose. She was going to combust, and there would be nothing of her left. This was bigger and more powerful than anything she had ever experienced in her life before then. More than she had ever known she was capable of. When this was over, she would sleep for days. Emerge as a new woman, reforged, defined by his hands and his hands alone.
“Frederick,” she moaned, her voice cracking. “Frederick, I—”
“Hold on to me. I have you.” One hand still working between her legs, he reached for her other hand, linking his fingers with hers. She squeezed, desperate, and he squeezed back. A steady, grounding pleasure, even in the torment of building pleasure.
“Frederick,” she all but screamed, one final time, before the force of her climax took her in its arms and carried her away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Frederick bowed over Alice’s body from where he had bent her over his desk in his study. The past few days had been a whirlwind of too-good-to-be-true—she had sought his company, even spending time in the library with him, and they had been insatiable.
He hadn’t even known it was possible to want someone the way he wanted her. Constantly. As soon as he finished, he wanted her again. And she, too, sometimes came to find him purely so he could do things like bend her over his table and take her from behind. Though he always made sure to prop her leg on a chair or something else to make her comfortable.
He didn’t think seeing her ruined leg would ever stop bringing that surge of guilt with it, but it had come to symbolize more than that now. It was part of her, and he was beginning to realize he craved every single part of her she had to give.
He eased her up from the table and brushed her skirts back down. “How are you feeling?”
She cast her gaze over the documents strewn across the floor. “You are doing your accounts?”
“Iwasdoing my accounts. I have been somewhat distracted this past hour.”
She sent him an arch glance, then picked up the sheets of paper. “I used to help my father with the accounts, you know.”
“You did?”
