“Perfect for a honeymoon,” he said softly.
“Honeymoon?” she faltered, but after a night cuddled up against his body in the backseat of the SUV, she couldn't muster up the strength of her earlier defiance. “No,” she tried with more certainty than she felt. “Not going to happen.”
“I assure you.” He looked down at her in a way that made her shiver. “You are going to be my wife in every way.”
He picked her up and carried her over the threshold into the beach house. The rosy light of dawn shimmered through the wide windows, pooling everywhere around her as he set her gently down on the bed. She heard the roar of the ocean crashing outside, felt the fresh, salty tang of the breeze.
He set her down against the mattress and she felt his hands everywhere. He cupped her breasts through her white lace dress.
“You are mine, Ellie,” he murmured against her throat. “And I am yours.”
“Mine?” she said, her voice choking with emotion. “Just mine?”
He smiled. “While you are in my arms, querida,” he promised against her skin, “I am yours.”
A feeble bargain, when offered his loyalty of the moment for an eternity of her own fidelity. But beneath his touch she still couldn't protest the injustice. She was lost and adrift in sensation as he stroked her. Every nerve ending hummed with desire.
Only Diogo could make her feel like this.
Her breasts felt full and heavy as he yanked down the stretchy fabric of her dress, suckling her as he cupped the other mound roughly with his hand. She gasped aloud as his lips descended, the erotic pressure of his tongue causing crashes of pleasure in her as tempestuous as the waves against the beach outside.
He slowly pulled off her dress. She was naked on the bed. He pulled off his own vest and shirt and slacks. Standing naked in front of her in the rising sunlight flooding the bedroom, he was illuminated like a Greek god.
“You're beautiful,” Ellie whispered, then blushed. She, a married woman and soon to be mother of two, blushed at her own forwardness!
He looked surprised at her compliment. Then he lifted her heavy breasts in his large hands. “And you are magnificent.” He kissed slowly down the curve of her body, stopping to give her belly button a sensual lick with the tip of his tongue that made her shiver all over.
Then he stopped, staring down at her belly.
“I'm sorry I got you pregnant against your will,” he said in a low voice. “Sorry I had to force you to be my bride. And yet…” He looked up at her, and the stark emotion in his face made her catch her breath. “I find I'm not sorry at all.”
Her heart stopped, then started to pound faster. He kissed her, running his hands up and down her hips, her belly, the inside of her thighs. He held her so fiercely, and yet so gently, that she felt lost.
But he did something more. Something that threatened her to the core.
Diogo wasn't touching her as if he callously regarded her like a toy.
He touched her as if he loved her.
And it was doing crazy things to her mind. To her heart. Every caress seduced and lured her into far more than his bed. Every passionate stroke and lick against her flesh seduced her into falling back in love with him. Into a loveless life with a broken, bitter heart and an uncaring, cheating husband.
And yet, she couldn't stop…
Diogo pulled her close against his naked chest, soft with coarse, black hair. She relaxed into his arms, relishing the warmth and protection of his arms.
“Let me love you,” he whispered.
He pushed her gently back against the bed. Brushing her hair from her cheek, he pulled off her bra and panties, kissing every inch of her skin as he moved against her.
She tried to fight her desire, but with every stroke against her neck, against her thigh, against the backs of her knees, she was more completely his slave….
The pleasure was unbearable. She didn't know if it was the pregnancy hormones or the intensity of her engorged breasts, but when he suckled her nipples, her back arched as she desperately pressed against him. He reached his hand between her legs.
She gave an abrupt cry as she felt his fingers inside her. Pressing one thick finger, then two. Languorously, as if he had all the time in the world, he softly stroked her slick wetness, and her whole body tightened as she started to twist beneath his commanding touch.
No. She stared up at the rhythmic swish of the ceiling fan above the bed. She couldn't let Diogo do this. It was one thing to become his wife, or even to share his bed, but she couldn't surrender. Not like this!
Still stroking her with his fingers, he kissed softly up the inside of her thighs. With his other hand, he squeezed her breast.