His mouth found hers again and her hands faltered at the slide of his tongue against hers. Slower now, easier like he was trying to make this moment they were stealing last.
Oh, how she wanted that, too. Wanted it so desperately. She found herself leaning into him, hands clutching at the ends of his neck wrap helplessly. She was shocked when she felt his hands against her back, only her chemise separating them. He had done wonders while he distracted her with his mouth.
He drew back, blue eyes glinting in the firelight, and tracked every moment as he slowly glided her gown forward, down over her arms, left it to dangle at her waist. It had been years since a man saw her like this. Her late husband was the last. He had not looked so…astounded as Dash did. Dash looked at her like she was the most beautiful creature in the world. Like he was stunned to have found her, to be near her.
She could almost believe it. Preen about it. Own it with the same certainty that she owned her everyday duties to the country.
“Gia,” he murmured, holding out a hand. He traced the bare flesh of her arm with his fingertips. He cupped her elbow and drew her closer. “My God.”
She swallowed hard, keeping her gaze locked with his as she slid her fingers beneath the chemise straps. With a deep breath, she folded the undergarment down over her arms, pushed it to join the dress. She was naked from the waist up.
She was not as young as she’d once been. Who was, after all? She knew she wasn’t as firm as she’d been at twenty. She wasn’t as smooth. But she watched Dash watch her and she felt utterly, exquisitely beautiful through his eyes.
And utterly and forever hot with desire for him. She caught his hand, which he had dropped to his side when she pushed her clothing away and lifted it. Gently she placed it against her breast, sucking in a breath at the weight of him. At the rough slide against sensitive flesh.
If he had seemed stunned into stone a moment before, forcing his touch woke him. He caught her arm and tugged her closer, even as his opposite hand began to stroke her breast. He swirled a thumb around her nipple, making her remember how responsive that part of her could be. She arched against him, gasping out his name in the quiet just before he lowered his head and licked her.
She dug her hands into his hair, holding him closer as he sucked her nipple, then swirled his tongue around it over and over. She found herself lifting her hips in time, seeking release, seeking more, seeking that ultimate joining that she had told herself would never, could never happen.
Now she needed it more than breath. She would have traded anything to have it and have him. The alternative seemed, in this charged moment, to be a fate worse than death.
He backed her through the antechamber and into the bedroom behind it. Her fire was lit and it cast dancing light across her bed. They moved toward it, one body, never breaking their kiss. His hands roved over her, down her bare back, tangling in the gown around her waist, shoving it aside the moment he had reached the bed.
She wanted to cover herself. For a brief, but powerful moment, she recognized she was basically naked with him. Emotionally as well as physically. But as his hands trailed down and he cupped her bare backside, pulling her tighter against him, the flare of fear and embarrassment was erased.
All that was left was the wet pulse of need, throbbing between her legs in the same rhythm with which he kissed her. She never broke that kiss as she unbuttoned his shirt with shaking hands. At some point he pulled away just long enough to remove it and then ducked his head to kiss her again.
“I want to look at you,” she gasped as she flattened her hand against his chest.
He made a rumbling sound deep within that same chest, but he didn’t deny her. Not that he ever had in all the time they’d been together. He stepped back and let her look.
He was wonderful. Just as wonderful as she had pictured in her heated dreams over the years. Just as she’d fantasized as she touched herself until she came undone while her husband slept with his mistresses in the next room.
Dash was everything. Lean muscle tapered to trim hips with a peppering of hair that trailed into his trouser waist. He moved to embrace her again and she caught her breath at the scar on his left forearm.
He followed her gaze to it and held it out. “It’s not so bad, Gia.”
“You nearly died. For Grantham.” She lifted her gaze. “For me. Always for me.”
He nodded slowly. “Everything for you, Gia. For right or for wrong, for good or for bad.”
She traced the scar with her forefinger and then dragged it up his arm, across his shoulder, down the middle of his body until she hooked it into the waist of his trousers.
“Show me,” she whispered, and tugged him closer.
He kissed her once more. Their fingers tangled together as they both worked to undo the fall front of his trousers. It fell away and she looked down at his cock.
She shivered at the look of him, hard and ready for her. And when she touched him, taking him in hand to stroke him, he shivered for her, as well.
“Please,” she whispered, whimpered, and he nodded.
He lowered her back on the bed and she shifted to rest on the pillows. He joined her, putting himself between her spread legs. He reached between them, and for the first time he touched her there.
The stroke of his fingers against her sensitive flesh was enough to make her arch in pleasure. He parted her outer lips and she knew he found her wet for him, ready for him. After all, she’d been waiting so long. This moment was a culmination of over a decade of foreplay when she really thought about it.
He found her clitoris and circled there, gently at first, then harder and faster. She turned her face into her shoulder, biting her lip to keep the gasps and moans from filling the room. He was expert at this, just as he had been at every other thing she needed for so long.
She was right on the edge of release now, the pulse of pleasure mounting with every flick of his fingers. He caught her lips with his, driving deep with his tongue, and the orgasm hit with an intensity that surprised her. She gripped one hand against his back while she fisted the other in the coverlet beneath her. She jerked against his hand, moaning his name into his mouth as the waves washed over her again and again and again.
She had hardly begun to come down when he stroked the head of himself against her entrance. She widened her legs farther and broke their kiss. Together they watched as he pushed inside of her, stretching her and filling her in a way she’d almost forgotten felt so good.
“Don’t stop,” she begged, gripping his forearms. “Please don’t stop.”
“I would never,” he promised, and then he thrust. Gently, at first, giving her time to remember this glorious feeling of being full and how much pleasure each slide of a man inside of her brought.
No, not any man. This man. Because it had never been like this before and she doubted any other man could ever make it like this again. She dug her fingers into his hair with one hand and clung to his back with the other as she rose to meet his thrusts. They ground together gently, slowly, deeply, and then faster and with a hunger that was almost frightening in its intensity.
The pleasure he had given with his fingers returned now, but it was deeper than before. Sharper when his pelvis rotated against hers. She gasped against his mouth and he nipped her lower lip gently, their breath mingling. She arched against him, pleasure overtaking a second time. She pulsed around him, digging her fingers into his flesh and loving the way he groaned low in his chest, as if her pleasure was his pleasure.