“Inside me,” she told him, an edge of hoarseness in her voice. “You think you made me come to make my body ready for you, but you are wrong, my Sam. I have been ready for you for many days.”
With a low growl, he flipped her onto her back. “Impatient vixen.”
“Seductive scoundrel,” she shot back.
He couldn’t wait. Not a second longer. He needed to be inside her. Now.
He found her entrance. There was no fumbling, no need to direct himself to the proper location. Like everything else, despite the differences in their sizes, they simply matched. They fit. They belonged together.
He stared into her eyes, his cock hovering at her opening. She gazed back up at him with those lovely blue eyes, and then she gave him a small smile. She gripped his shoulders, but otherwise she held her body still, waiting.
“Élise,” he said gruffly. And then he pushed home.
She arched up into him and cried out, and he froze. Her heat wrapped him in a viselike grip, and the pleasure was so overwhelming that a tremor gripped the base of his spine.
But fear also consumed him. He’d gone too fast. Too hard. Forced her little body to accommodate him too quickly.
“God, are you hurt?” he rasped out, shaking from pleasure, his arms trembling with restraint. “Did I hurt you? Do you want me to—”
“No,” she groaned. “No, no, no … do not stop, you foolish man. Dieu, you make me feel so full, so complete. It is so good, my Sam. Do not stop. Move.”
And he did. He slid out slowly, then in again. He held on to his control now, knowing that if it snapped, his body would demand that he rut with her like some wild animal.
So he moved slowly, sinking into the hot clasp of her, then drawing out again, her body bringing him such pleasure that stars blinked at the edges of his vision.
Beautiful Élise. She held on to him, meeting him thrust for thrust, exhaling harsh breaths whenever he locked deep inside her. He kept his eyes on her, watching her lips part, her eyes glaze over, the expressions of rapture move over her face.
He wasn’t bringing her pain; he was bringing her pleasure.
Knowing that, he moved faster. The sweet edges of completion furled at the base of his spine, hardening his cock, making his muscles tense all throughout his body.
“Yes,” she said, her arms tightening around him, her sex tightening around him, her muscles tightening beneath him. “Yes. Give me more of you, Sam.”
“I need to …” He ground out the words, his voice almost refusing to cooperate with his effort to create words. His entire world had narrowed down to the pleasure Élise’s body was bringing him. “I need to pull out.”
Her arms tightened even more, and her legs wrapped around his thighs. “Oh no.”
He pushed in and held still. Damn, his entire body was trembling with restraint. He was close. Too close. “I don’t want to—”
“You cannot. I am barren, remember?” Her voice was soft but sure.
He closed his eyes against the edge of pain in her voice. “Élise,” he groaned.
“Come inside me, my Sam,” she said. “That is what I want.”
Just like that, his control snapped. He surrounded her, a heavy fortress, his muscles tight, his thrusts deep and hard. He lost himself to the pleasure.
God, it felt so good. So right. She was his heaven.
She came again, crying out as her body squeezed tight, then arching and pulsing. He faltered for the briefest of moments, but she clasped his cock so tightly, he lost himself to the pleasure once again. He thrust once, twice, three times. She grew hotter, silkier around him.
He pushed in one more time and came hard, pleasure ripping through him.
The sensation ebbed slowly, and it seemed hours before he came back to himself, though he knew it was only moments. Realizing he was probably crushing her, he gathered his energy and rolled to his side, keeping her with him, his body still locked inside hers.
She gazed at him, flushed and deliciously rumpled. “God, you’re beautiful,” he said to her.
“So are you, my Sam,” she murmured with a serene smile. “So are you.”
Chapter Sixteen
Sam received his instructions from his superior at dawn three mornings later. He and Élise had just made love and were lying on the bed wrapped in each other’s arms when there was a knock on the door, and a tentative, gruff voice called, “Hawk?”
Élise recognized the voice. Carter.
Sam had turned to look at her, his dark eyes fathomless in the early-morning light.
“He comes with orders for you,” she breathed.
“Yes. But rest easy. It doesn’t matter what message he bears.” He spoke in a voice too quiet for Carter to hear. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
She nodded and watched as he slipped out of bed and quickly donned his clothes.
Whatever might happen, she would remember this moment—Sam dressing in the increasing light of dawn, the golden glow coming through leaves of the trees outside dappling his strong body with golden color and enhancing the ripples of muscles across his torso. He was so beautiful. Not thin and soft like Dunthorpe, but virile and strong.
He bent down and kissed her cheek. “Stay here.”
“Tyrant,” she murmured playfully.
He drew back, gave her a hard warning look, then turned and left the room.
She got out of bed and washed, dressed herself in the simple walking dress Sam had somehow procured for her while she’d been sick, then twisted her hair into a chignon at the base of her neck using the comb Masterson had given her.
She had decided that she liked Masterson, even though he had mostly avoided her and had never become as friendly with her as Laurent and Carter had. Of course, she had been ill most of the time she had been here. But she could tell that Masterson held a deep and abiding respect for Sam, and that was enough for her.
She wondered if Laurent had come with Carter. She hoped so. She rose from the chair, intending to go out to the parlor and greet the newcomers, but as soon as she took a step toward the door, Sam threw it open.
She stopped short at the thunderous look on his face. His gaze snagged hers and held, his eyes dark and dangerous. “We’re leaving,” he bit out. “Now.”
Too startled to do anything else, she nodded her agreement. But a sour feeling curdled deep in her belly.
Adams had sent the order to kill her.
Blindly, pressing her hand to her stomach to stanch that awful sensation, she went through the motions of preparing to go. The clothes she’d arrived in had been thrown away, and Sam hadn’t brought her saddlebag, so she didn’t have much. Just the second dress and the underclothes Sam had bought for her.
When there was nothing more to do, Sam grasped her hand and led her out of the bedchamber. She stumbled after him, giving a brief glance behind at the mussed bed where he’d loved her for the first time.
Moments later, they hurried down the drive in front of Masterson’s house, headed for the carriage waiting at its end. Small, dark, and inconspicuous, it was much like the carriage they’d ridden north in—but that carriage was still in the stables at the cottage by Lake Windermere.
Laurent was already seated on the driver’s perch beside Carter. Both men tipped their hats and nodded at her as she approached, but even Laurent’s usual lighthearted demeanor had darkened.
She had time only to give them a little wave before Sam hustled her into the carriage, and the vehicle lurched into motion.
Sam was stiff and still, looking straight ahead. She laid her hand on his thigh to find it tense and unyielding—solid as a rock. “That was … abrupt.”
He turned to her slowly. His eyes were dark in the gloomy interior of the carriage. His body resonated with an energy she couldn’t define.
The Agency wanted her dead.
She should be terrified. Horrified.
But she was with Sam. And she was safe, as she’d never been safe before. He’d allow no harm
to come to her. She knew this as intrinsically as she knew she’d take her next breath.
Suddenly, Sam grabbed her waist and hauled her into his lap. And then his mouth was on hers, kissing her as though he were a man dying of hunger and she was his ambrosia.
She loved him so much. It seemed impossible that she could say this about a man who’d killed her husband, kidnapped, pursued, and recaptured her, but in spite of all that, he was so utterly good.
Arousal flooded through her, heat pulsing between her legs. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him fiercely.
“It’s all right,” she said against his lips. “It will be all right, my Sam.”
Because it would be. She knew this.
He fumbled with his trousers, then with her skirt, yanking it up, kissing her all the while. Then his fingers pressed between her legs, and she moved against him, dry at first, but the wetness came quickly in response to his insistent touch.
She shuddered in his arms. He had learned her body so quickly. He already knew how to touch her, what made her mad for wanting. Her husband had never known these subtle details about her.
He pushed his free hand into her chignon and pulled the pins free, scattering them on the carriage floor. “I love your hair,” he said hoarsely. “I love it down and free, like your spirit.”
He combed his fingers through the curls that now tumbled over her shoulders as he stroked her sex.
When his fingers slid over the slickness of her growing arousal, he shifted her so she straddled him. Then he positioned her above his cock, and she groaned as he lowered her body over the length of his erection.
Her eyes nearly rolled back into her head, so powerful were the sensations his penetration wrought upon her body. It wasn’t only her sex, which squeezed over him, but the glowing strands of pleasure that seemed to undulate throughout her body. She’d never known that carnal congress could be this pleasurable for a woman, but Sam—he made it so … exquisite.
He pushed into her hard, his face against her shoulder, his hands clasped around her buttocks, regulating her movements, lifting her and then pressing her down over him. So hard and deep were his thrusts from this angle that she emitted a small whimper each time he fully lodged himself deep inside her. She held him, too, clutching his wide shoulders and murmuring, “Sam, Sam,” over and over again.
He was so big. So large that she’d hidden her feelings of trepidation when she’d first seen him in all his naked glory. She wasn’t sure he’d fit. But he did—oh so tightly. Like he was made for her, like a key fitting into a lock. And when he moved inside her, the stroke against her inner walls was so powerful it wrought all kinds of wicked sensations on her body. On her mind. On her heart.
The orgasm struck without warning, and as her body clenched, she threw her head back, forgetting to breathe. White-hot pleasure burst through her. She lost control, but that was all right. Sam would keep her safe.
She rode the pleasure as if it were a shooting star, hot and powerful and all consuming. There was nothing but the wicked, exquisite sensations shooting through her and Sam, keeping her whole, preventing her from exploding into a million pieces.
Slowly, she came down, sucking in breaths as she realized she’d starved her lungs for air.
Sam was relentless, though, positioning her so his cock moved deep and deliciously hard inside her. Bon Dieu. It was overwhelming. And before she completely came down from the previous orgasm, another one began to well.
His cock seemed to grow, touching her everywhere. Within a few moments, she felt his body tense, and then he pressed her hard against him, burying his face in her neck as he came. His cock pulsed deep, bathing her inner walls with his seed.
That knowledge was enough to take her over the edge again, too. Her whole body tightened in a sweet climax that rushed through her body like a powerful flood.
And they held each other through it, basking in mutual release, mutual pleasure.
When it was over, he crushed her to him, his lips caressing her ear. “You’re mine. Mine.”
She closed her eyes, sinking deeper against him. He spoke the truth. “Yes,” she murmured. “I’ve never wanted to be anything else.”
She knew that now. The knowledge of it was a balm to her soul. All that she had been through: the loss, suffering, war, death, abusive marriage. It all narrowed to this point. When she was with the man she was meant to be with. When they’d both just reached the pinnacle of pleasure, and he was still inside her.
She was meant to be his. She was born to be his. There was no greater truth—not for her.
How silly that she had tried to run from him. Twice!
She held him close, breathing him in. He smelled faintly of salt and sweat. He smelled of masculine, virile man, and his scent made her sex twitch with pleasure.
He smoothed her hair back from her face. “Look at me, Élise.”
She pulled her face back so she could gaze into his eyes.
“I won’t let anything happen to you.”
She stared at him. “It came, then. The order to … kill me.”
He was silent for a moment, and then he said the one word that turned her heart into stone. “Yes.”
She closed her eyes, still clutching his shoulders. “What shall I do?”
“We’ll figure something out.”
“Everyone wants me dead. Dunthorpe. England. If Dunthorpe has sent word to them, then France, too.”
“I will protect you with everything I have. My weapons, my strength. My family ties. My heart, my soul. My life is yours, if that’s what it takes.”
She swallowed hard, and tears sprang to her eyes. “That is very much to give, my Sam,” she said in a rasping voice. “Too much.”
His fingers tightened, digging into the flesh of her buttocks. “Not too much.”
“Why would you do this for me?”
“Because, love,” he murmured in a low voice, “you have brought me back to life.”
Her head fell onto his shoulder as she released a low moan. “I will fail you.”
“No.”
“I have failed you twice already. By running away from you.”
“You were held prisoner against your will, and you wanted your freedom. I would have done the same if I were you.”
“What if I were to run again?”
“Is that what you want?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. Am I your prisoner again? Your orders are to assassinate me. Perhaps it would be best if we parted ways. You could inform them I escaped—”
His arms went tight around her. “No. Don’t run from me, Élise.”
“It seems the rational solution,” she argued.
“How I feel about you—it’s not rational.” His voice was strained. “I need you with me. I need you near me. There will be no more running.”
“What if I do not wish to be your prisoner?”
“Is that what you think you are?”
Anger tinged his voice, and she pressed her forehead against the hard flesh at the front of his shoulder. “No.”
This was no time for games, she reminded herself. She needed to be honest with herself, and with him. England wanted her dead. Dunthorpe wanted her dead. Sam would help her. He was a master spy of sorts, so he had some reasonable expertise on these matters of killing and murder.
“No, I am not your prisoner,” she said again. She raised her head to search his face with her eyes. “I am your lover.”
She gazed at him with uncertainty, terrified he might laugh at her. But he didn’t laugh. He caught her chin in his fingers and tilted her head up until she faced him.
“You’re more than my lover.”
She gazed at him for a long moment, then whispered, “Yes.”
Her face burned. He was more than a lover she’d use for physical pleasure and then discard. Not that she’d ever done that, of course, given that she’d never had a lover. He meant so much more to her … too much, perhaps. So much it was … terrifying.
Clearing her throat, she moved off him. She didn’t look at him as he fixed his trousers while she arranged her skirts. Her hands went up to her hair, and she sighed. As she slipped off the seat with the intention to rummage around for the pins he’d dropped, he caught her forearm.
“Leave it down,” he said gruffly. The look he gave her made her belly clench. Trying to appear casual, she slid back onto the cushion.
“All right, then.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes, but Sam didn’t release her arm.
“Where are we going?” she finally asked him.
“To the Lake District. As planned.”
She lifted her brows. “Not to sound self-important, my Sam. And I know how critical it is for you to find the duchess your mother. But there are a great number of people hunting for me. I do not mean to be ungrateful, but perhaps I should go somewhere else whilst you perform your search. We could meet up again, perhaps …” She considered, then continued. “In Ireland?”
“We’ve been over this,” he said with an edge of a growl in his voice. “You’ll stay with me.”
She sighed.
“There’s nowhere safer than with me.”
“You are very stubborn, Sam Hawkins.”
He nodded, seeming unperturbed by this.
“Dunthorpe is in that area searching for us. And who knows how long it will take before your superiors determine that you don’t intend to kill me and they send someone else?”
“Dunthorpe is looking in the wrong place. There’s no way he can know where we’ll be. Even I don’t know where we’ll be, exactly. And as for Adams … he will have his hands tied for a while, considering Masterson knows nothing of the order or of my intentions, and Carter and Laurent are with me.”
She swallowed hard. “Do Carter and Laurent know?”
“Yes.”
“And,” she said in a small voice, “they do not wish to kill me, either?”
Sam’s lips twisted. “They believe in your innocence, as I do. Carter … he has been in this game longer than I have, but he is a good man with a strong sense of honor. Laurent …”
“Is a baby,” she murmured.
He looked surprised. “Right. That’s exactly it. He’s an innocent in many ways, and he came to us with many preconceived ideas about right and wrong. And eliminating any woman at all is unconscionable to him. But an innocent woman? Never.”
The Scoundrel’s Seduction Page 20
