he growled throatily. His hands ran down her body possessively. ‘I don’t know whether to hate you or despise you or—’
‘Love me,’ she whispered, twining her fingers in his hair. ‘Please, Leo. Love me.’
With a muttered groan that came from deep inside him, he bore her down to the polished wood floor as if he could no longer bear to hold back, stretching her arms over her head and covering her with his hard body. She felt his mouth on hers, fierce and uncompromising, angry, perhaps, because he wanted her so badly when he thought that she was worthless as a wife. And at the back of her mind she prayed that their lovemaking would bring them close, that the anger would subside and they could start to unravel the tangled threads of their unstitched marriage.
The onslaught of his mouth, teeth, tongue and hands and her frantic attempts to ease her despair with physical energy alone caused them to tumble and roll across the floor, her back sliding on the slippery wood, and Ginny became swamped in a whirl of sensation—the feel of silkwood and the smell of polish on her naked back, the pressure of Leo’s muscular arms around her and the wonderful sweetness of his mouth, tugging gently at her breast.
Lost in deep passion and an uncontrollable hunger, grabbing, clutching, kissing, they slid into a table. Something crashed to the ftoor—a lamp, an ornament; she wasn’t sure what—but Leo ignored everything, intent on possessing her, sweetly caressing every inch of her body as if to drive away any memory she might have of other men.
Equally driven, she gave up trying to undo his buttons and pulled the edges of his shirt with both hands, burying her face in his chest. She wanted him naked, to feel his body against hers, because only then would she dare to believe that they could shut out the threat from all outsiders and prove to one another that they were still in love.
He was as helpless, as frantic as she. Finally his naked body met hers and she let out a long, loud groan of relief. At last he was inside her, stroking her with a fiercely restrained gentleness. Overjoyed, she forced her eyes to flutter open, her lush mouth smiling with pleasure. Ginny arched her body in demand. ‘Love me.’
Her mouth teased his, urging it to soften into a sensual curve. And because she wanted him to desire her more than ever and to remember this moment for a long, long time she used all the arts she’d ever learnt from him, writhing sinuously, clutching his buttocks and thus increasing his unbearably slow and deliberate thrust.
She wanted to make him desperate for her. To love her—her. With a siren’s lure in her eyes, she slid her tongue out and licked the sweat over the curving arcs of his chest, teasing the nipples till he gave a satisfying groan and she felt his rhythm increase to a pitch where she couldn’t think any more, was only capable now of reacting like an animal, wildly driving her body against his, countering his thrust with equally hard, demanding jerks of her own body, drawing in her pelvis to hold him tighter and devouring him with her mouth as he devoured her, as if they’d starved for months and wanted to fill themselves to satiation.
Ginny flung her arms around Leo violently, bearing him over in a wild and uncontrollable tumble that had them both fighting to hold their bodies linked and to maintain the beautiful, shuddering rhythm, while she emptied all her passion into her body, kissing Leo with a fervour born of desperation and urgency.
He was so strong, so beautiful. They had been so in love and she wanted that back—the wonderful moments they’d shared together, the quiet evenings by the firelight, the walks in the park. A groan broke from her parted lips and she bit into his shoulder to stem her distress that their love had been threatened. He gasped and kissed her so hard that she felt the deep pressure of his teeth on her lips.
And then her body began to sing as it had never sung before, every nerve taut and stretched, all the bitter-sweet pain rising with the crescendo of Leo’s fierce movement, the beautiful satin strength within her offering the wonderful promise of a release from all her distress and tension.
‘Ginny,’ he rasped thickly into her hair. ‘Ginny, Ginny!’
She sobbed, groaned loudly, not caring who heard—oblivious of everything but the sensations crawling through her, the tingling, rippling waves driving all conscious thought away, lifting her into a fevered delight that shuddered for a few seconds on a peak of ecstasy and held there, seemingly for ever, while their bodies remained like tensile steel, taut and rigid, only their pulses and hearts and their blood pounding, and everything focused on the lyrical thrust of their loins and the spinning spirals of pagan pleasure that was driving them slowly insane with exquisitely agonising sensation.
And when she thought she’d die of love Leo let out a deep, shuddering groan. The turmoil that had held her in its thrall slowly subsided, easing with it every muscle in her bods.
Beneath him, crushed by him as he lay for a moment in exhaustion-yet still somehow tense—she felt limp and drained. But her face shone with a radiant joy that came from every inch of her body, her heart, her soul. ‘Oh, Leo!’ she mumbled incoherently, blinded by happy tears.
And then he groaned. Once, twice, as if in despair.
His welcome weight lifted away when she wanted him to stay and to hold her in his arms. Her naked body chilled with the emptiness that was left by his absence. Dazed and confused, she struggled to lift her lids and clear her vision. Her heart missed a beat. Sounds nearby told her that he was dressing.
‘Leo?’ she murmured weakly. Even from there she could hear his harsh breathing, rasping like an angry saw. Panic clutched her heart. No, she thought. They were bonded together for ever now...
‘Yes?’
She whimpered at the curtly spoken word. ‘Didn’t you... wasn’t it... good?’ she asked tentatively.
‘Stunningly good. Highly accomplished and extremely satisfying,’ he husked, the words shooting out painfully. His eyes smouldered at her. ‘What a lot you’ve learnt since we last made love!’
‘Don’t say that!’ Unusually awkward and uncoordinated, she struggled in horror to a sitting position and watched him grimly wrench his trousers up to his waist. ‘Not so, Leo! I—’
‘Don’t try to explain,’ he growled, angrily snapping his shirt around his sweat-licked torso. Every movement tight with anger, he picked up his shoes and began to stalk to the door. Ginny had the impression that he’d turn on her like a wounded animal and savage her if he stayed. ‘Quite a sexual artiste, aren’t you, now someone’s taught you how to be uninhibited?’
‘No one taught me,’ she breathed, her throat dry with fear.
His eyes chilled every inch of her body as his scorn-filled gaze swept over it and dismissed her denial with a snort of disbelief. ‘You expect me to believe that, after your performance just now? Yes, it was “good”. For a moment there you made me forget everything. We were lovers again—but lovers as we’d never been before. And then I realised that some other man—or men—must have been teaching you the art of love.’
‘No!’ she wailed.
‘I wish I could believe you!’ he said fervently. ‘I wanted to be that man, Ginny! I wanted you to unfold that tight rein you kept on yourself. But no, some jerk I don’t even know has shown you how to gain access to your sexual well!’ He drew in a deep, shuddering breath, his face bleak with the same dark hell that he was digging for her. ‘How could you, Ginny?’ he roared. ‘How could you do it? That exhibition told me everything I needed to know. Thanks for the information. Now I’m under no illusions about you.’
Ginny
