“I’ve never wanted anything in my life like I want you right now, Amanda,” he said and grabbed her to him, her feet coming off the bottom of the pond. Neither of them noticed her dress catching water and sinking.
Hank opened his mouth over Amanda’s until he almost swallowed her, as his hands pushed the straps of her undergarments off her shoulders, and when they wouldn’t slide, he tore them off.
Amanda was too bewildered to think. There had been an absence of passion in her life and she responded to him with all her pent-up desires. He was every flirtation she’d ever missed, every dance, every social, every romantic novel she hadn’t read; he was every piece of cake, every glass of champagne, every handholding she’d never experienced. “Yes, yes,” was all she could say, her head leaning back, her hands in his thick hair.
When her breasts were bare, he fastened his mouth on the pink tip, drawing her into the hot, wet cavity of his mouth.
Amanda’s knees gave way and he supported her, one hand clutching her firm, round buttocks. He picked her up and her loose, torn garments fell away into the water. She was wearing only black silk stockings and black, lacy garters.
Hank put her legs about his waist, his hands cupping her buttocks as his mouth stayed on her breast, sucking, his tongue hard and firm, running across her hard nipple. He set her down in the grass, her back at an angle against a mound of earth. He ran his tongue down her belly, nipping with his strong teeth at the fleshy part around her navel.
“Let’s see how all of you tastes,” he said, and he buried his tongue in the most intimate part of her.
Amanda’s eyes came open; she grabbed the hair of his head and started to push him away, but then his tongue was moving, his lips sucking. She arched her back and clasped his ears with her silk-clad knees. His hands came up to clutch her breasts, his thumbs flicking at her nipples, which were hard and sensitive.
Just when she thought she might die, he moved his mouth down to her inner thighs and his hands were rubbing on her skin, making her skin feel hotter and hotter and hotter. She moaned under him as he ran his hands down over her legs, over the silk of her stockings. Silk and skin.
He paused with his hands on her ankles, then withdrew them from her body.
Amanda opened her eyes in horror. Was it over?
“Just a pause, baby,” Hank said huskily, reading her mind. He was removing his clothes, and Amanda turned her head away.
“No you don’t,” he said and leaned into her, his body between her bent legs. She could smell herself on his face, and instead of repulsing her, it made him seem more intimate. “You don’t turn away from me,” he said. “You look at me like I look at you. You kiss me where I kiss you.”
Amanda opened her mouth to say no to that, but he put his tongue in her mouth, ran it over her teeth, pulled her tongue into his mouth. She wasn’t going to say no to anything he said.
He came out of his clothes quickly, and if Amanda thought she was going to die before, the feel of his bare skin next to hers almost did her in. His ribs were between her thighs as he once again kissed her breasts then began moving up. She kissed his lips, his chin, his neck, the soft spot in his collarbone; then the hair of his chest was in her face, and she turned her face back and forth, feeling the maleness of him, smelling him. His strong arms were by her head, big enough to crush her. He made her feel so small and yet so powerful because she could feel his heart pounding.
He moved up and her mouth opened onto his hard, flat belly. She could feel his manhood prodding her throat, so smooth, so strong. And then it was at her mouth.
“No,” she whispered and turned her face away.
“I don’t believe in double standards,” he said throatily. “Taste me, Amanda.”
She grabbed him in her hands and sucked him down her throat. He was hard and smooth, like hot marble, and she sucked on him until his skin nearly came off.
She groaned when he moved away from her, but she felt his frenzy as well as her own.
She was wet when he entered her, wet and ready, and he slid into her like a hand into a glove. Amanda bucked under him but he calmed her as he held himself back. He didn’t dare move because he was ripe to bursting.
Amanda found her rhythm and began to move slowly while he held above her, supporting himself on his arms, his eyes closed and an expression of pain-pleasure on his beautiful face. Amanda was like a child with a new and wondrous toy, sliding up and down, in and out, gliding, silk and satin, hard and soft.
And then her body began to tighten and her fingers clawed into his back and she pulled him down to her. She wanted him closer and closer to her. She wanted his hot, tawny, male skin next to hers. She wrapped her legs around his lower back, the black silk on his skin, and pulled him deeper and deeper into her.
His reserve left him and he became an animal: a wild, violent, mindless animal as he thrust into her, holding her to him as if his life depended on her. Only she could give him what he had to have.
> He came in one blinding, debilitating flash that made him shudder as if he might come apart, and Amanda clung to him as he lifted her with him. They were one.
It took long, long moments for Amanda to come to herself. She held him fiercely, with her arms, her legs, held him inside her with muscles she’d just discovered tonight. She buried her face in his neck, touching him as much as she could.
Hank held her just as tightly. Never had he had an experience like this. No woman had made him come so hard, as if his whole body were pouring into her. When she began to relax her grip on him, he couldn’t bear to release her. He pushed her legs down beside his and, doing his best to stay inside her, he rolled to his back and held her hot, delicious body on top of his. He wouldn’t even let her foot hang off his body. He wanted all of her, every hair, every pore.
He thought maybe she dozed. She was as limp as…as a woman who was sated, and she fit every plane of his body, as if they had been carved out of one piece of flesh and somehow accidentally separated. But now they were together again.
He caressed her hair at her temple and lay as still as he could to let her sleep. If anyone deserved rest, she did. Ever since he’d met her he’d wanted to open her eyes to the world around her, but today, when he’d seen her eyes opening, he’d wanted to take her out of that dingy little rented house. She’d been so horrified at the poverty of the people. And he’d seen the way she had blamed herself. Why did she think the world’s evils were her fault? Why did she think it was her responsibility to give Driscoll what he wanted? Or Caulden? Didn’t she ever do what she wanted?
He pulled her closer, felt her snuggle near him like an infant—his baby, his precious, darling, beloved baby.