along the cut in her muscle there. His eyes met hers. “Have you taken up some kind of sport that is taxing to your body since I have been away?”
The muscles were aberrant. Though necessary for her survival, she hid them from society under the guise of modesty. For the first year, she wouldn’t even look at herself in the mirror. Avoiding her reflection became a habit. Her insides twisted and her chest ached while embarrassment burned behind her eyes. How could I have let this get this far?
She turned to the side and tried to pull the covers over herself, but it stuck under his body.
He pushed away the sheet. “No, Bella.”
“Just take your ten minutes and go.” She hated the catch in her voice. And more than that, hated how much power he possessed over her emotions.
“I’m sorry if I led you to believe that I am displeased with what I see.” His lips pressed against her chest just below her collarbone. “You are beautiful.” He kissed the top of her breast and trailed his tongue across to the nipple, took it into his mouth and tugged gently.
She arched up regardless of her attempt not to react.
He suckled her tenderly and his eyes never strayed from her face.
He released her flesh and blew gently on the moistened skin. The act sent tingles to every inch of her body and she gasped. She would have sworn she felt it in her toes. His tongue continued its path down her abdomen dipping in her belly button. She cried his name and immediately a new surge of moisture flooded between her legs.
“If something is unpleasant, Bella, you must tell me.”
“I…” Lie and tell him it is all unpleasant. She should send him away as quickly as possible but his mouth and his fingers gliding over her stomach and down her legs made her delirious with desires she had never felt before. “I…It is not unpleasant.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” His voiced rang with laughter.
His amusement should have annoyed her, but his hands distracted her away from any offense.
She tingled with pleasure. She closed her eyes, experiencing the bliss brought by every touch and kiss.
He lightly tickled the inside her thigh coaxing her legs further apart. He touched the delicate folds of her most private part.
The delight shot through her. Guilt pounded her mind and forced her eyes open. “Gabriel, you should not be doing that.”
He stopped the gentle sliding motion, but did not remove his fingers from her dripping center.
“You do not like it?”
“I…I do not know.” His touch made it impossible to devise a suitable response.
“Relax, love. Trust me.”
He touched her again, manipulating her slick folds and swirling around her opening.
Pressure built low in her abdomen, hips and between her legs where he touched her. Pleasure swamped her and she clutched the sheets. She tried to relax as he’d commanded, but still her muscles tightened.
His fingers opened her and then something wet was inside her.
She was about to scold him for breaking his promise, but he had not penetrated her as she had seen the demons doing in their lairs. His dark head rested between her legs. His tongue was inside her lapping her juices. She tried to say no, but the pleasure grew to the point that her complaint died on her lips.
Needing more, she threw back her head and arched closer to the source of pure delight.
He nibbled at her gently with his teeth and ran his tongue up and down her slit.
The tightness in her stomach and hips built higher and higher. She trembled with need.
Gabriel continued, relentlessly nipping, sucking and licking her until she reached the crest and tumbled over into ecstasy. Waves of rapture tumbled her higher than she had ever dreamt of or imagined.
He pushed hard against her bud, and she lifted her hips crushing her center to his face. With one last lick, he sat up beaming down at her. His eyes shone with passion.
“Are you all right, Bella?”
She lifted up onto her elbows. “That was…I do not know what that was.”
He touched her cheek. “That was an orgasm, my love. Something I hope to share with you many, many times.”
She had lost control, and the pleasure still buzzed inside her. If she lost her grasp so completely, would he? Her cheeks warmed. “Does this happen to you also?”
His smile was contagious. “Under the right circumstances it does.”
“I see.” Feeling shy, she pulled the sheet and covered herself.
His smile faded. “You’re going to send me away.”
“I think it would be best.” Even as she said the words, she wished things were different and she could let him take her as a husband takes his wife. She wanted to feel him inside her, but his proximity to her only put him in danger, and if she hoped to protect him, she had to send him away.
“I see,” he said.
“I’m sorry.” The feeble apology was not sufficient.
He smiled. “Oh, Bella.” He touched her cheek and kissed the top of her head as he rose from the bed. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I wanted to give you pleasure, and if your cries were any indication, then I have done that well. I would wait another four years to hear you come that way again. But I hope I shall not have to.”
He moved toward the window where he had entered.
She stood and wrapped herself in the sheet. “Gabriel, go out the front door. It is far less dangerous, and as you noted earlier, no one is about the house to see you.”
When he turned toward her, it took every ounce of her strength to resist asking him to stay.
He unlocked her door and walked into the dark corridor.
Chapter 2
Belinda’s face in total rapture had been perfection. If only he could separate that spectacular part of the evening from his memory of her sneaking into the house through the garden, covered in filth and bruised as if she’d been struck across the face. What was she up to?
He’d ignored the mountain of paperwork on the desk in his study for far too long. His secretary had handled the business while he was fighting in France, but some things had been put on hold and now he tackled the arduous task of putting things back in order.
Unfortunately his fiancée’s less than warm welcome home a few weeks earlier had caused him to spend a great deal of his time speculating about what had happened while he was away. He had discreetly asked around town and no one had noticed anything strange or different about her. Lady Belinda still attended balls and occasionally she and her mother attended the theatre. There was no
