Her mouth kept luring him back. He had ten years of kisses to make up for. Each kiss was hotter and sweeter than the last. He couldn’t get enough of her taste.
“You’re wearing too many clothes,” she said in a broken voice.
“Whereas you’re dressed just right,” he said with a low laugh, kissing her breast again.
She’d been lovely as a girl, fresh and dewy and as rich with promise as a furled rose. But the voluptuous woman in his arms now took his breath away.
With every second, he felt her confidence increase. When she dragged his shirt up from his breeches, her caresses on his naked back shot lightning behind his eyes.
“Sebastian, I want to see you.”
He’d never heard her sound like this, choked and frantic and starving for him. In those joyless, mean little encounters in his bed at Balmuir House, she hadn’t spoken at all. And then she’d cried. This woman claimed her right to sample every pleasure.
He couldn’t remain immune to her pleading. He rolled off the bed and tore his clothes away, hurling them into the corner. Then he paused, wondering if he should have been more circumspect. Would his rampant nakedness terrify his wife?
When she was a girl, his unabashed maleness had frightened her. He’d come to her in the dark, and even then what he’d done had revolted her. Could that have changed?
She slid up against the headboard, making no pretense at modesty by covering herself with the sheet. Dear Lord, she was a sight to set a man’s passions afire. Her face was flushed with eagerness and curiosity, her lips were full and red, her body was a symphony of curves and hollows. Her golden hair cascaded around her shoulders, teasingly covering one breast and leaving the other bare. Kinvarra felt himself grow harder, larger, needier.
Her eyes widened as her inspection continued down past his chest and belly. Hell, what would he do if she stopped him now?
Could he stop?
Yes, something inside him insisted. For Alicia, he could stop.
“Magnificent,” she murmured, her eyes glinting blue fire under their heavy lids.
Her smile glowed with such anticipation that his foolish heart crashed inside his chest. She’d always been able to confound him with a mere word. A decade without her hadn’t changed that.
She stretched out one hand in invitation. To his astonishment, she wasn’t shaking. All trace of her earlier uncertainty had vanished.
“Come to me, my husband.”
Chapter 4
ALICIA STUDIED THE expressions that crossed Sebastian’s striking face. Somewhere in the last years, perhaps only since they’d entered this room and laid down their weapons against each other, she’d learned to read him. When they’d first married, she hadn’t known how to pierce his shell of physical perfection to reach the man beneath. He’d seemed a godlike creature, too far above lowly mortals for her to feel worthy of being his wife.
But the man who stood before her, superb in his nakedness, was heartbreakingly human.
For all his strength and beauty, he was vulnerable. Even more, he was vulnerable to her. She’d always felt powerless in this marriage. Now she recognized his overwhelming longing for her. And with a shock, realized that he’d longed for her when they’d first married, too. How had she never seen that before?
Tonight she’d also learned that he blamed himself for their difficulties. How odd, when finally she admitted that she’d been at least as much at fault as he. She’d been over-indulged, demanding, headstrong, quick to take umbrage, slow to offer understanding or tolerance.
Tonight she surveyed her husband’s powerful body and rejoiced in a woman’s desire. And a woman’s ability to forgive. She’d finally cast away the chains of hatred and prejudice. Sensual need raged in her blood, made her heart pump with eagerness to know this man’s possession. Fear lurked as well, but she refused to succumb to it. Fear had crippled her for far too long.
She saw also that he was still unsure of her, unaware how much she’d changed. He didn’t know that, after a long and difficult road, she’d discovered exactly where she ought to be.
In Kinvarra’s arms. Forever.
How had she ever imagined that weak, inadequate Harold Fenton could compare with the wonderful man she’d married?
“Sebastian, I want you,” she said softly, surprised at how easily the words emerged. “Don’t make me wait.”
Something in her voice or her smile must have convinced him she’d grown beyond the skittish girl who had fled his passion. Determination lit his face, hardened his jaw, set his eyes glinting in a way that, for all her arousal, made her pulse race with trepidation.
And excitement.
How had she never understood what an exciting man she’d married? The seventeen-year-old Alicia must have been blind. And insane.
This was no time for regrets. Not when her tall, handsome, overwhelmingly virile husband prowled toward her with such purpose. There was none of his earlier reticence in the way he drew her into his arms and tugged her under him. There was just hunger and a masculine strength that made her feel both delicate as a lily and stronger than steel.
She thought she’d measured his passion in his kisses. But now he was insatiable. He touched her everywhere, kissing her as if he couldn’t get enough of her mouth, whispering praise until she trembled with delight.
He touched her between her legs, stroking the sleek folds. She shuddered against him as frenzied response flared. New, strange, astonishing pleasure. She cried out his name and jerked her hips up to meet him. She wanted him to take her, to fill the lonely reaches of her soul, to feed her starving senses. Her arms closed hard around him, feeling the coil and release of the muscles in his back as he moved over her.
He rose above her, caging her between his arms, and she caught the turbulent emotion in his face as he stared down at her. The moment spun into eternity, then shattered when with a single commanding thrust, he joined his body to hers.
Her muscles tightened in instinctive protest at his powerful possession. After the years without him, the invasion felt unfamiliar, uncomfortable. He was a large man, and she’d been chaste for so long. She dragged in a shuddering breath, struggling to adjust to his size and vigor.
Another breath, heavy with Sebastian’s musky, male essence. She shifted, angled her hips, felt him slide further inside her. Then magically all awkwardness flowed away, and with perfect naturalness, she arched up to join him in a union as much of soul as body.
And recognized with despairing clarity that she’d never stopped loving him.
Her fingers curled into the hot, bare skin of his shoulders as the inexorable truth rolled over her like a huge wave. Then she closed her eyes and gave herself up to Sebastian.
Right now he was hers. She refused to let the old, unsure Alicia ruin this ultimate closeness. She clenched around him in a silent plea to stay with her, never to leave.
She felt his tension as he held himself still, then with hard, purposeful strokes that built her arousal to an inferno, he began to move. The dance wasn’t new to her, although this moment’s radiant intimacy was.
She soared higher and higher until she touched the burning sky. She shook and sighed and clung to him, blind to everything but the rising tension inside her. This was beyond anything she’d ever felt. Beyond anything she’d even imagined.
At the peak, glittering light blinded her and she cried out. Such fierce rapture. Such glory.
Such love.
Vaguely through the swirling storm of passion, she heard Sebastian’s deep groan. He shuddered and plunged deep, spilling liquid heat inside her. For a long moment, he held himself taut before he slumped over her, his body heavy with satisfaction.
Alicia lay in a haze of physical sensation. So this was what a man’s possession could be. She’d been a wife for eleven years, yet she’d had no idea. No idea at all what she’d missed.
The air was redolent of their lovemaking. It was as if she breathed the memory of pleasure. She tightened her grip on Seba
stian’s back, feeling the sinews flex as he settled himself against her without withdrawing. She’d never felt so close to another person. For the first time in her life, she felt whole.
The fire burned low, leaving the room in twilight. Alicia stared up at the ceiling, watching the shadows gather. Nothing could dull the glow she felt. She felt made anew. She felt capable of conquering the world. She felt tired and languorous and ready to sleep for a week. Maintaining the long pretense that she cared nothing for her husband had exhausted her, like a huge weight dragging behind her wherever she went.
Right now, she felt lighter than air. Free. Fulfilled.
With sudden desperation, her fingers dug into his back. Oh, dear heaven, don’t let fate take Sebastian away, now that she’d discovered him again. Not now that she was finally woman enough to be his wife in every sense.
He’d undoubtedly wanted her when he’d taken her. Not even the most inexperienced woman could have assumed otherwise. But had Sebastian intended this night to be a last goodbye to an unhappy past? Or had they taken the first step in a long, joyful journey together?
***
Kinvarra gasped for breath, his heartbeat drumming wildly in his ears. An ocean of satisfaction flooded his body, even as he cursed himself for losing control. He’d planned to take his time, prepare Alicia, raise her to peak after peak of ecstasy before he sought his own relief. But when he’d touched his wife’s naked body and read desire in her shining eyes, he hadn’t been able to hold back.
He’d been hungry, even hungrier than he’d been as an eager boy, although at least this time, praise the angels, she hadn’t closed away in fear. Instead she’d achieved her own delight in his arms. He’d felt the way she tightened, milking him, and he hadn’t mistaken her broken cry as she’d arched to take him deep in the final moments.
His big body still pressed her into the mattress. She must feel crushed, suffocated. He was a swine not to shift away.
But how sweet it was to lie here in the aftermath, to let his hands wander her silky skin, to listen to the soft music of her breathing, to rest surrounded by Alicia.
Heaven couldn’t offer an eternity of bliss purer than this moment.
Making love to his wife offered a profundity of experience he’d never known. He’d grieve forever if this was the sum of happiness allotted to him. If he was to possess her only this once.
Tonight they’d moved from hostility through a brittle trust to a conflagration of rapture. But was this truce only a pause in ongoing warfare? Or could it form the foundations of a life together?
He prayed so, but years of futile yearning had taught him not to rely on the promise of happiness.
Just like that, reality descended. He and Alicia had enjoyed blazing pleasure tonight, but it didn’t answer the larger questions. He needed her commitment beyond one tumble between the sheets, no matter how earth-shaking that tumble was.
He’d wanted this woman since he’d first seen her. And as more than his lover, however powerful his desire. He wanted to know her as the other half of his spirit. He wanted to build a family with her. He wanted to grow old at her side. Nothing in ten years of separation had changed that.
But he was wise enough now to know that wanting wasn’t enough.
He could probably compel her to return to him. After all, the law was on his side. But for all his faults, he’d never been a bully. And he couldn’t bear to have her hating him again. He’d glimpsed something in her eyes tonight that had set his heart dancing. Although after being hurt for so long, it was impossible to be sure.
Could he face letting her go if she rose from this bed and announced she went back to London alone?
He might not be a bully, but the primitive who skulked inside him howled denial at the prospect of losing her again.
Slowly he raised himself on his elbows to stare down at her. He smoothed the disheveled blond hair away from her face. She looked beautiful, replete, weary. In spite of his good intentions, he’d used her ruthlessly. He’d wanted to cherish her, but passion had swept them up into a whirlwind where all that mattered was the drive to blinding consummation.
Piercing tenderness overwhelmed him, and he bent his head to kiss her gently on the lips. Not the hard, demanding kisses of earlier, although the ghost of hunger lingered in the soft touch. “Are you all right?”
She smiled up at him, and he struggled against believing that the light in her eyes was love. “Better than all right.” Her slender throat worked as she swallowed. “That was…that was remarkable.”
“Yes.” He fought against saying more. She was tired and defenseless. It wasn’t fair just now to harangue her about the future. Instead he kissed her again then rolled to the side. “It’s nearly morning.”
“Mmm.”
When he drew her against his side, she was slack with exhaustion, a delicious bundle of warm, sated womanhood. He paused to savor the moment, praying again that it spoke of a new start and not an ending. He’d sell his soul for the chance to hold her like this for the rest of their lives.
He held her until she slept, but for all his weariness and the throb of sexual satisfaction through his body, he couldn’t settle. Eventually he rose and padded over to the window. The morning air was cold on his bare skin, now that the fire had burned down to ashes.
Very quietly so as not to wake Alicia, he parted the curtains. Immediately brilliant light flooded the room. It was later than he’d realized. The storm had blown itself out overnight, and the pale sun rose over the horizon, painting the fresh snow gold and making it sparkle like diamonds.
The idyll of a winter’s night had given way to a new day. Christmas Day, he realized with surprise. A day of hope fulfilled. A day of beginnings.
Just what would those beginnings bring?
Would his glimpse of paradise prove brutally brief? Could all the lovely harmony of these last hours crash on the rocks of past wrongs and his insatiable demands?
Heaven forgive him, but he didn’t know how to be anything but demanding. He wanted Alicia with him. He wanted her in his bed. He couldn’t stop himself. He’d spent ten years yearning for her from afar. The experience had devastated him. He couldn’t go back to that again.
He mightn’t have any choice, damn it.
“How beautiful.”
He’d been so lost in his troubled thoughts, he hadn’t heard her rise from the bed. His heart slammed to a stop as she slid her arms around his waist and pressed her warmth to his back. He curled his hands over the windowsill to stop himself from sweeping her up and carrying her back to bed.
The bright light of Christmas Day told him that the magical night was over. Too soon, too soon, his aching heart protested. Now he’d tasted her ardor, he couldn’t live without her. And she’d tempted him with more than passion. The sweet intimacy of last night’s conversation. The tenderness of her embrace now.
Alicia was everything he wanted. Enduring their separation had been difficult enough before he’d glimpsed this joy. Now if she meant to leave him again, she’d destroy him.
“I thought you were asleep,” he said softly.
“I missed you.”
His gut lurched with anguish as she brushed a kiss across his bare shoulder. “I’ve missed you every day,” he said before he could stop himself.
“I thought you were glad to be rid of me.” Her voice was muffled against his skin. “I can’t blame you. I was such a silly chit.”
“You were enchanting. You still are.”
“You didn’t think so at the time.” The sheer neutrality of her tone betrayed her suffering as nothing else could.
He swallowed the choking lump in his throat and admitted the humiliating truth. “Yes, I did. But I believed the world would bend to my will merely for the asking. You were too fine for my possessing, and I was too arrogant to see just what a treasure I had. I was impatient and self-centered, and you were right to hate me.”
“You weren’t impatient last night.”
He laughed
without amusement. “Misery is an excellent schoolmaster. I’ve learned the error of my ways. Although I can’t expect you to believe that, after the hash I’ve made of everything.”
“I should have trusted you.” Her voice was muffled.
“I wasn’t worthy of your trust then.”
The question hovered—was he worthy of her trust now? He prayed desperately that it was so. He prayed that he hadn’t placed himself beyond redemption and that she’d give him another chance. He wanted to swear his allegiance, promise he’d never hurt her again, vow to make her happy. But emotion too strong for words jammed the declarations in his throat.
Silence fell, a silence heavy with remembered pain and everything still unspoken between them. Because he couldn’t resist touching her, he rested his hands lightly on hers. The urge stirred to seize, to grab, to compel, but he crushed it. Last night, she’d given herself freely. He refused to compromise that memory. After today, it might be all he had left.
She sighed softly, her breath a sensual tickle against his skin. “The snow is so clean.” Her voice was soft, musing. As if she spoke to herself rather than for his ears. “Even after the storm, it’s perfect. It’s waiting for us to make the first footprints.”
He tightened his grip on her hands. So much hinged on the next moments. He struggled to find the right words, wondering if the right words even existed.
“Our future could be like that, Alicia. A new path. A new life. A Christmas miracle.” He paused, swallowed, and his voice was husky when he spoke what lay in his heart. “Come back to me.”
He felt her stiffen. His heart breaking, he waited for her to move away, to reject him, to speak in that cold, cutting tone that she’d reserved for their few meetings in London.
“For how long?” Her voice was quiet.
She hadn’t moved away. Yet.
He stared at the glittering scene outside without seeing it. Instead he remained utterly focused on his wife. Again, he risked honesty, even if honesty cost him any hope of achieving his dream.
“For the rest of our lives.”
Mistletoe Wishes Page 5
