Marriage on the Rebound

It was as if he needed to demonstrate to her that he could be warm, gentle, beautifully controlled, and still be devastatingly passionate. He kissed her all over, left no place untouched, until she lay there a weak, boneless mass of pulsing sensation before he slid slowly inside her.

Then stopped.

It brought her eyes flickering open, blackened by desire, to find his face wearing a sombre cast to it that actually hurt something deep inside her.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he murmured huskily. ‘I adore you.’

Was adoring something similar to love? she wondered hazily. Well, if it wasn’t, it was close, very close—close enough for her to feel the exact same way about him.

So, ‘You too,’ she whispered, and watched his eyes turn to silver, felt him swell inside her as if her simple reply had the power to incite him, and she closed her eyes as her body turned to liquid again.

A moment after that he was moving in her with deep, slow, rhythmic thrusts that filled her with a magical sense of both his and her own entity.

It was wonderful. It was special. It was all the more enriched by those few small words of mutual caring which seemed to transcend the mere physical which they had been relying on until now. And the climax, when it came, was more like a gentle flood than a wild torrent, engulfing her in a warm, lazy sea of sensation that seemed to go on and on and on into a softly pulsing world of pure ecstasy…

‘Are you going to tell me where you were today?’

He was lying propped up on an elbow beside her, watching her make that slow, sinking journey back to earth again while the back of one finger gently stroked her heated cheek. It was a nice, soothing, almost tender gesture, and so beautifully in keeping with what they had just shared together.

She opened heavy eyes, too sensually languid to do much else, and found his own eyes, darkened by similar satiation, resting on her.

‘Not if you’re going to start shouting again,’ she warned. ‘Because I’m just too content to listen.’

His small huff of laughter accompanied the soft slide of his finger across her kiss-swollen mouth. ‘If I promise not to shout, then?’ he offered lazily.

‘Josh,’ she said. ‘I was with an American called Josh.’ The caressing finger went still. ‘He has a wife called Sadie and they are both in their seventies. I asked if I could join them on an organised tour of the island. They agreed, and I had a lovely time into the bargain.’

He didn’t say a single word for the space of several taut seconds. ‘God, you know how to punish a man,’ he muttered then. ‘You deliberately let me imagine you swanning all over Hong Kong with some hunk of a guy!’

‘You promised not to shout,’ she reminded him poutingly.

‘So I did,’ he ruefully agreed, and the finger began moving again, sliding across her cheek to begin gently stroking her hair behind her ear while something else passed across his eyes—she wasn’t sure what, but it warmed a special spot inside her to see it.

Tenderness; that was what it was. Tender amusement. And wry indulgence for her teasing. And—

‘So, where did you go with these nice Americans who took you under their wing?’ he murmured.

She told him, giving him a detailed account of her whole day—then she remembered something when she reached the part about Stanley market. Suddenly she jumped off the bed to run naked across the room and collect the carrier bag of the purchases she had made today.

‘I bought you a present,’ she said, explaining her sudden fit of energy.

‘Not a new watch, I hope,’ he drawled mockingly, his eyes lazily indulgent as they followed her.

‘No—not a watch,’ she said, turning to teasingly wrinkle her nose at him.

He was still lying as she had left him, reclining on his side with the sheet negligently draped over his lean hips while the rest of him was wonderfully naked.

He looked so gorgeous it stopped her breath for a few throbbing moments, and then she came back to sit crosslegged on the bed near to him so she could place the bag on her lap while she rummaged inside it.

‘Now, let’s see…’ she murmured, producing first the cerise scarf she had bought for herself, which she draped around her neck, then showing him the ones she had bought for her aunt and Jemma. Next came the tiny jade Buddha for her uncle, and, finally, the slightly larger one she had bought for Rafe.

‘They’re supposed to be lucky,’ she explained. ‘If someone else buys one for you. So…’ Feeling suddenly awkward and shy, she handed the palm-sized sculpture to him. ‘Be lucky, Rafe,’ she murmured softly.

For a few moments he didn’t move a muscle, and she couldn’t see his eyes to know what he was thinking because he had them lowered while he stared at her small pale green offering.

Her stomach muscles began to knot, her chest growing tight in tense anticipation, white teeth pressing into her full bottom lip as the silence stretched without him so much as saying a word.

OK, she began thinking anxiously. So it wasn’t the best jade the world could offer, and it certainly hadn’t cost the earth to buy, but the thought counted for something, surely? Even with this man, who could afford the very best in anything he wanted?