Page 27 of A Diamond for My Forbidden Bride

I sat up, desperate to touch him, reaching out for his wet skin, feeling heat and hard muscle. I shook with desire, with desperation, because I’d never touched a man’s bare torso like this, and I couldn’t believe how hungry it made me.

I’d never felt such desire for a man. I’d never felt desire at all for anyone, not even Constantine.

He looked like Valentin, but people had always been wrong in thinking that they were identical. They weren’t. Constantine hadn’t thrown me into the sky. Constantine hadn’t argued with me about the best way to build a fire. Constantine hadn’t held me in the darkness and kissed me and told me he loved me.

‘Ah, little star,’ Valentin whispered, taking my hands away from his body and kissing my fingertips the way he’d used to do. ‘No touching. Not yet.’

‘I don’t care,’ I whispered back. ‘Let me.’

‘No.’ And, before I could protest further, he pressed me back down, taking my wrists in one strong hand and pinning them to the sand above my head. He stared down at me, his expression fierce, blazing with intensity as he reached down with his free hand to undo his jeans.

The warning in my head sounded again, but I didn’t listen.

I didn’t want to.

I knew what he was going to do and I couldn’t think of anything I wanted more, because it was perfect like this. On the beach, in the dark, under the stars.

‘Estrella,’he murmured, the Spanish lilting and musical, and then something else, something I didn’t understand.

I began to tremble as his hand settled on my bare stomach, his gaze on mine, and then he stroked me and every one of my senses came alive. His fingers were hot, a brand on my damp skin, and the ache between my legs suddenly felt like more than I could bear.

Every inch of my body wanted his touch, his hands, his mouth, his tongue. And I couldn’t stop myself from arching up, from offering myself to him.

‘Please,’ I moaned.

‘You want me, Livvy?’ His hand slid down, his fingers grazing the curls between my thighs and making me shiver all over. ‘Tell me. Say it.’

I shouldn’t do what he said, yet I didn’t even think of disobeying him. ‘Yes, I want you. I want you now, please.’

‘My name, little star.’ His voice deepened, became a growl. ‘Say my name.’

‘Valentin...’ I sighed, his name escaping like a prayer. ‘I want you, Val.’

His hand moved, sliding down further, touching me where I was most sensitive, where I ached and ached and ached.

I shuddered as his fingertips struck sparks of pleasure along every nerve-ending I had, stroking through the folds of my sex, gently exploring me. A gasp escaped me and I shut my eyes as pleasure bloomed.

But then he said, ‘No, don’t close your eyes. Look at me, Livvy. Look only at me.’

So I did, staring upwards into his beautiful face. Because he was beautiful; he always had been. And, despite what I’d told myself all these years, I’d missed him so much. When I’d heard he’d died, a part of me had been ripped away.

He wasn’t gone any more, though. He was here. He was right here with me, his gaze on mine, all velvet darkness, but not wholly black. Not completely. I’d never realised till now, but there were stars in his eyes, light glittering deep in all that shadow. I couldn’t look away.

His fingers shifted, sliding inside me, and I groaned as the pleasure spread out, engulfing me like the sea. Then he took his hand away and put his mouth there instead and I burst into flames like a bonfire.

He explored me with his tongue, licking insistently, his hands holding my hips to the sand as I writhed in an agony of pleasure. I reached down and buried my fingers in his damp black hair, crying out his name as he continued to taste me with a single-minded relentlessness that had me losing my grip on reality.

There was nothing but the fire of his touch and the black sky above me; the heat of his mouth and the pleasure that threatened to consume me. He pushed me to the brink with that magic tongue of his and then, when he pushed it inside me, he sent me over the edge and I cried out as the orgasm crashed over me, ecstasy glittering in my bloodstream like the stars above, making me shake, gasp and tremble.

Then he rose above me as I lay there panting in the sand and got rid of his sodden jeans and underwear. Naked, he looked like a god...a sea god...all wet skin, sleek seal-dark hair and glittering black eyes. His body looked as if it was carved from rock, taut and hard, and so hot that when he covered me I felt as if I’d been burned.

I reached to touch him, still trembling from that orgasm, but he shook his head, pinning my wrists again, holding me down. The expression on his face was so intense it took my breath away...so fierce. As if I were a prize he’d fought long and hard for which now he could finally claim. Finally, I was his.

It was thrilling to be looked at like that, because I’d been the irritating girl-child with all her various flaws. Reluctantly given a company I didn’t deserve when, really, both my parents would much rather have had a boy.

But I’d never been a disappointment to Val. Not even that first day we met, when he’d appeared on the beach and his eyes had lit up.

‘Don’t go. Please stay.’

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