by Emma Darcy
Relief burst into a grin that almost rioted into a peal of laughter as Matt’s whole body churned from despair to a bubbling sense of the ridiculous. “It’s okay, Father,” he had to choke out. “Let’s rerun it.”
Peta was biting her lips through the whole repetition. Her shoulders were shaking. She kept her eyes downcast and Matt knew she was brimming with laughter. It was all he could do to keep serious himself. This time, however, her hand was spread ready to receive the wedding ring and Matt felt a huge well of satisfaction as he slid it home.
Then it was Peta’s turn. She took a deep breath, stared fixedly at his mouth, spoke each phrase with a tremulousness that bordered on breaking down, then lifted her gaze with a look of twinkling triumph as she enunced the last words... “... Your lawful wedded wife.”
They grinned at each other, a mad zany grin that wiped out all the nervousness of doubts and fears. Laughter broke all barriers, Matt thought exultantly, and as they were finally declared husband and wife, he felt a bonding that went far deeper than words, a sense of sharing that would take them through every trial and tribulation. They could always laugh together.
“You may kiss the bride.”
Matt lifted Peta’s veil. He knew it was supposed to be a dignified kiss. A cavalier sense of mischief seized him. He bent Peta over his arm in exuberant tango style, ravished her astonished mouth, and before she could catch her breath, scooped her off her feet and weighed her in his arms like a pirate appraising his booty.
“Matt! Put me down,” she insisted.
“My wedding ring is on your finger,” he reminded her, whispering in her ear. “The vestry is only ten paces to my right.”
“What?” She looked befuddled.
The congregation was clapping.
“We can get back to our appreciative guests much faster if you’re not wearing pants.”
She focused on his teasing eyes and began to laugh. “You can’t...get past...my chastity belt,” she gasped out between giggles.
“What?”
“No key...until you’ve signed...the marriage certificate.”
“Okay.”
He carried her over to the table set for the final deed and sat her down on the chair which Tony, grinning from ear to ear, had swiftly drawn out for her. Even Megan had a genuine smile on her face as they went through the last formalities of signing and witnessing the marriage certificate. Matt felt so happy he was right in tune with the song being sung, “I Finally Found Someone.”
Not even the taking of an excessive amount of photographs dimmed his good humour. Then it was party time at the reception place Peta had chosen and the next few hours flashed by him, which seemed odd, because most wedding receptions he’d been to tended to drag on. Somehow it was different with his own.
Occasionally there were awkward moments when some of the guests—mostly Peta’s aunts—gushed over him with sentiments he wasn’t quite comfortable with. Women did get very mushy at weddings. However, he was delighted to see his mother getting on well with the Kelly clan. They were nice people. He looked forward to being part of their family.
They were certainly a productive lot. Paul had four children, two boys, two girls. John had three, all boys, his wife pregnant with the fourth, hoping for a girl this time. Megan only had the one so far but she was the youngest. Matt understood Peta feeling like a very late starter in the family stakes, understood about the tests, too.
Just as well he’d passed the sperm count with flying colours. Though, of course, he’d had every confidence he would. Nothing amiss with Peta’s fertility, either. Not that he’d imagined there would be. A woman built like Peta was made to have babies. This time next year...
The urge to check out if Peta was wearing pants was very strong.
Wrong time and place, he sternly told himself. He needed hours to do all he wanted to do with her. A rushed coupling in a broom cupboard would not suffice, however tempting and exciting the thought was. Besides, the long train on her dress probably wouldn’t fit into a broom cupboard. Maybe the cloakroom... No, he’d waited this long. Tonight would come fast enough. Their first time together should have some class to it. But he sure was ready for it!
His mother grabbed him as he was circulating amongst his friends, Peta having been snaffled from his side by her nieces who were demanding yet another photo opportunity.
“Do you know Peta’s mother is only the same age as me?” she said in wonderment.
“You look younger, Mum,” he declared. “You look great. I bet all the older guys here have been flirting with you.” It felt as though champagne was fizzing through his blood, though he’d barely drunk a glass of it.
She laughed and shook her head. “You are a wicked boy today! I was just amazed she already has eight grandchildren and another on the way.”
“Well, I’ll be working on it for you, Mum. I’ll throw my whole heart into it. Not to mention my body. Four grandchildren coming up.”
“You didn’t really marry Peta for me, though, did you?” she pressed.
“Nope. All for me, Mum. Look at her! She’s my queen.”
“Your father used to call me that.” She heaved a deep sigh. “I do hope Peta lives up to it for you, dear.”
“No worries on that score,” he said with ringing confidence.
“Her mother was just telling me how pleased all the family is that you rescued her from some terrible affair with an Italian.” She paused, looked hesitant, then scanned his eyes anxiously. “She’s not still hankering after him, is she, Matt?”
“As far as Peta is concerned, the guy is buried, Mum. The future is ours,” he assured her.
At that moment, Matt felt absolutely secure in that belief.
The Bridal Waltz was announced and he moved to claim Peta from her family. She was laughing up at him as he whirled her onto the small dance floor with all the panache of Fred Astaire. Matt was revelling in panache today. He loved the sparkle it put in Peta’s beautiful blue eyes.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” the master of ceremonies called pompously, “I give you Mr. and Mrs. Matt Davis.”
Unaccountably the sparkle was suddenly drowned by a welling of tears. Matt swept Peta into a close embrace as he led her into the waltz. “Something wrong?” he murmured anxiously.
“No...” She burrowed closer, hiding her face. “A bit emotional...that’s all.”
Weddings, Matt thought. Women always shed tears at weddings. Nothing to worry about. He felt a rush of tenderness. It was probably nervous exhaustion with Peta. He’d take it slowly tonight, make her feel really good about everything, especially having him as her husband. He’d be a lot better for her than the Latin lover.
Matt frowned over that last thought. He didn’t want to get into comparisons. He hoped Peta wouldn’t, either. Their relationship was different. It meant more. It had to mean more. He was going to be the father of her children.
The rest of the bridal party joined them on the dance floor, his mother waltzing with one of Peta’s uncles. Partners were exchanged and Matt reluctantly passed Peta to her father. She was blinking furiously and clutched her dad as though he was a raft in stormy seas.
He found himself dancing with Megan and tried to steer a steady course through his troubled mind. “You did a fine job helping Peta today, Megan,” he said, giving her due credit.
“You’re a good guy, Matt,” she answered with a hint of strain. “I’m glad she found you.”
The words were generous. Perhaps he was oversensitive right now. He heard a “but...” in them and couldn’t stop himself from trying to nail it. “But...?” he prompted, looking directly into her eyes.
They were blue, too, but not as vivid a blue as Peta’s. He saw the flash of uncertainty in them, then the deep concern emerging. “You will hold on to her, won’t you, Matt? No matter what?”
Why wouldn’t he? Matt frowned at her, disliking the doubt she’d raised. “I never make promises I don’t intend to keep, Megan,” he asserted strongly.
>
She shook her head. “I didn’t mean...” A sigh, an apologetic grimace, a look of appeal. “Forgive me. This has happened so fast... I truly do wish you and Peta every happiness.”
What had she meant?
No use pursuing it. She’d closed off. Matt tried to make sense of what she’d said. If her doubts weren’t centred on him...what did she know about Peta that he didn’t?
The thought unsettled him further. He hated the feeling, needed to get rid of it. His instincts raged for positive action. He danced Megan straight over to her father and reclaimed Peta, almost crushing her to him in needful fervour. She was his. He wanted her... every part of her. The yearning ripped through his body, barely containable.
She wound her arms around his neck, her overbright eyes questioning his, her cheeks flushing as though suffused with the blast of heat coming from him.
“I’m dying for you,” he said bluntly.
“I want you, too, Matt,” she answered, fueling a desire that rocketed to intense urgency. “There’s a change room waiting for us. We could go there now.”
Change room? He’d forgotten that one. “Peta...” He struggled with his previous intention to wait for less limited time.
“I need you right now,” she said, her eyes flaring with the irresistible promise of instant satisfaction, hot, hard and reckless. “Come with me.”
Come with her! Wild horses couldn’t stop him.
She took his hand and led him off the dance floor. “Going to change, Mum,” she said as they passed her parents who were now dancing together.
“Do you want help, dear?”
“I’ve got my husband to help me.”
My husband. It sounded good to Matt. It sounded great!
No holding back from Peta.
She had his wedding ring on her finger—the symbol of good faith—and she wanted him in her pants every bit as much as he wanted to be there.
No matter what!
It was more than enough to zoom Matt’s confidence in their future together sky-high.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“BETTER lock the door, Matt.”
The provocative lilt of her voice and the hot simmer in her eyes had Matt spinning to do her bidding. There was no key. No keyhole. His mind blanked in frustration for a moment, then snapped into high gear. Button on the doorknob. He clicked in the lock.
Peta had already unfastened her veil and tossed it on the chaise longue. He did a double take. Chaise longue? Ridiculous piece of furniture! There was only that and a couple of fancy antique chairs. Clothes rack by the window. Peta moving to stand in front of a cheval mirror. Nothing so handy as a bed in sight!
“Undo me?”
Peta slid a suggestive look at him over her shoulder. Matt instantly forgot about a bed. She had her back turned to him, one hand indicating the buttons at the back of her high collar, the other sweeping the train out of his way. He sprang into action, the erotic pleasure of undoing increasingly stimulating as he released buttons, found the head of the zipper and opened up the whole length of her bodice, baring a creamy expanse of skin and an extremely sexy corselet concocted of satin ribbons and lace.
Peta whipped her arms out of her long sleeves while Matt was still examining the exotic piece of lingerie, wondering how it undid. Then the dress dropped and he was staring at bare buttocks; beautifully rounded, firm, naked flesh, interrupted only by lacy suspenders attached to silk stockings.
“You’re not wearing pants!” The words shot off his tongue in sheer shock.
“Disappointed?”
“Hell, no!”
His gaze flew up to assure her he was mightily impressed. She was watching him in the mirror, a bold challenge in her eyes. The realisation thumped through him that ever since she’d walked down the aisle to him she’d been like this under her wedding dress, earlier than that, getting ready for him, making herself easily accessible so that once they were married, she really was his whenever he wanted. And she had to be wanting, too, conscious of her waiting nakedness all these hours....
Matt was too stunned to move. His gaze was drawn to the full reflection of her in the mirror, his mind dazzled by the seductive display of her sexuality. Her beautiful breasts swelled opulently above scalloped cups of peek-through lace, deliberately designed to be transparent over the darker area of her aureoles so her nipples stood out invitingly.
The ribbons on the corselet angled in to emphasise the smallness of her waist, then fanned out to highlight the lush curve of her hips. Lacy suspenders framed the bare apex of her thighs where an arrowhead of tightly curled hair waited for his touch, waited to be parted and spread for him, and he was so rock-hard and ready, his pants could barely hold him.
He dragged his gaze up to hers. “I could not imagine a more desirable woman,” he said, his voice so low and furry he barely recognised it.
Primitive instincts were running riot, the male animal in him stirred to fever-pitch, yet he wanted to prolong this moment of revelation, savouring the incredible sexiness of her and the deliberately blatant gift of it to him. An old saying floated through his mind... Start as you mean to go on. If this was Peta’s intent, he had himself a marriage made in heaven!
“I’ve tried to imagine you, Matt. Will you show me? All of you?”
The husky appeal drove him wild. He’d been fantasising about her for weeks, day and night, and the reality was blowing his mind, but the thought of her fantasising about him was even more explosive. He hurled off his jacket. He almost strangled himself getting his bow tie undone. The studs on his shirt went flying. Shoes, socks...
She swung around to watch him, sliding off her high-heeled shoes, leaving her lovely, long, silk-clad legs slightly apart. Her gaze seemed to gloat over the taut muscles of his shoulders and arms. As he straightened up to unfasten his trousers, her focus moved to the hair on his chest, the dark line of it that ran down to his navel. He was acutely, excruciatingly aware of his fiercely aroused state. At last he was released from all constriction, his pants kicked away, and he stood with his manhood on uninhibited display, his heart pumping blood through him at a chaotic rate.
She stared at him, her breathing quick and shallow. She touched herself, her fingers sliding to her cleft as though wondering how he would feel there, and it was beyond Matt’s capacity to remain apart from her any longer. In sheer blind lust he moved and she met him, sheathing his erection with her hand as she pulled him with her onto the floor, urging their coupling in a frenzy of movement, uncaring of the clothes strewn underneath them, wanting him, demanding him, pushing, thrusting, arching.
Impossible not to follow her insistent direction. Impossible not to plunge straight into her, tunneling fiercely, heat enveloping him, her silky flesh pulsing around him, her thighs gripping his hips, legs locked around his buttocks, driving him deep, a savage cry from her throat stirring the beast in him, throwing him completely out of control.
Her breasts spilled out of their lace cups, lushly inviting. He couldn’t stop to touch them. Her mouth lay open, gasping, emitting sexy sounds of satisfaction, her lips pouting sensually. He couldn’t stop to kiss them. The need to keep pounding into her erased every other fantasy he’d entertained.
This deep inner world she gave him craved all he could give. He felt it in every cell of his body—the mating call—and he responded to it mindlessly, helplessly in thrall to the rhythm of it, loving the wildness of it, exulting in the roll of climactic spasms he felt coming from her. Her thighs were quivering, yet still she held him to her, willing him to take her further.
He exerted himself even more, changing the direction of thrust and contact, making her feel him everywhere, and the throb of her around him excited him beyond bearing. Every muscle in his body screamed for release. He couldn’t hold it any longer. As though she sensed him on the edge, she lifted herself, and he spilled himself into her, a last vital pumping that left him drained, yet so sweetly replete.
Her sigh feathered his face as he slumped forward and M
att knew instinctively it was a sigh of completion. He was too dazed to think. He gathered her to him and rested content, breathing in her scent, basking in her soft warmth, at peace with the marriage they had just consummated.
Peta smiled to herself as she floated back to earth again, deeply gratified that this first mating had been fast and furious and fulfilling the need to forget for a while what she had done today. She would be fine now. She could carry it off...being the wife Matt wanted. There was no reason to feel guilty about not loving him. Great sex covered a lot of shortcomings and they could certainly have that.
Her newly wedded husband was incredibly well endowed. Not even Giorgio, who’d been quite vain about his manhood... she winced at the insidious comparison, pushing it out of her mind. She had to overlay her memory of him with the life she’d have with Matt. It was starting now. No more tears for a lost love. No more nervous apprehensions. No more wondering and worrying.
She might be conceiving a baby right at this minute. And wouldn’t that be marvellous! Maybe a boy...if he inherited his father’s physique he’d be perfect. Peta doubted there could be a more beautiful male body than Matt’s.
The strength and power of him...her inner muscles spasmed again with the pleasure of having felt so much. He could drive her mindless with the sheer explosion of physical sensation and that was good. It concentrated her whole being on him, on the togetherness they could forge. And they would. She would make it happen...the kind of family unit she wanted...her husband, her children.
A fierce wave of possessiveness swept through her. She’d taken this man at his word and his word had proved good. He was good. In every way. She wished she could feel more for him but at least he was hers, every bit of him hers, and she would keep it that way, giving him as much of herself as she could. He’d been fair with her. No cheating. She’d return that fairness in full measure.
“Matt...” She ran her fingernails down his back.
