The Illegitimate King (Castaldini Crown 3)

“Now show me the miracle of you.”

She opened her mouth to ask him for help. The back zipper had needed an extra pair of hands to do it up. She clamped her lips. He wanted her to undress for him on her own. And she was doing it.

She reached back and managed to yank the zipper down in a feat of agility she hadn’t known she was capable of. Unbearable hunger was an unstoppable motivator, a miracle worker. The dress spilled off her arms. She caught it before it pooled to the ground.

“Let it go, Clarissa. Let me see what ingenious lingerie you’ve got underneath.”

She let it go.

Ferruccio stared. And stared.

He’d told her to be creative. He hadn’t imagined anything like that.

“This was the most creative thing I could come up with.”

He shuddered at the mixture of uncertainty and brazenness in her voice. Why uncertain? She wasn’t sure how this affected him? She didn’t know he’d never again open his eyes or close them and see anything but the sight before him now?

Her. Standing tall and proud and annihilating in her transparent high heels and the jewels he’d had made for her, in the middle of a dream of glittering white. Totally naked.

He wanted to hurtle to her, slam into her, squeeze and devour every inch of her. He rocked on his heels under the force of the compulsion. But he wanted to savor the sight of her more, her counterattack on his reason, see her coming to him, bent on pulverizing it, on beating him at his game of seduction.

“An ingenious choice of…un-wear, regina mia.” He beckoned to her. She stepped out of her pooled dress, prowled toward him, her beauty intensifying with every step. He licked his tingling lips, almost feeling them on her shiny lips, on her other now equally smooth ones. “Unique and unrepeatable.”

“Glad you approve.” She entered the circle of moonlight, stopped. He rumbled, prodding. She was half-a-dozen steps away.

She stood her ground. “Show me your magnificence, re mio.”

His first impulse was to tear at his clothes like a demented man. He called on the remnants of a control he’d once thought unassailable and unhooked his cape. He swung it over his shoulders like a matador, before giving it a swirl and tug, bringing it spooling around his forearm.

She whooped, clapped. “Do it again!”

His lips spread in delight at seeing hers. “Glad you approve. But there will be only one thing I do again—and again—tonight.”

Her pose grew languid, seductive and shy all at once.

He took off his sash and sword, undid his jacket a button a second, dropped it to the floor. His dress shirt followed. The moment his hands went to his pants she ran to him.

She grabbed his hands, stopping them. “My turn.”

His eyes glazed over her as she dropped to a crouch before him. The sight of the ripe swell of her buttocks, the graceful curve of back, her gleaming skin and sparkling hair almost drove him over the edge. She pulled his pants down, causing his engorged manhood to rebound against his belly, throbbing, straining.

She tried to touch him, but he stepped away and out of his pants, kicked away his shoes and got rid of his socks. Then he did what he’d wanted to do ever since he’d first seen her.

He bent and hauled her over his shoulders.

She gasped as he swept her across the chamber, crossed into the wide circle of candles and lanterns around the bed that he’d placed by the open windows overlooking the sheer side of the mountain and the sea. Her panting became moans, then he felt her lips latching on to his shoulder blade, her teeth sinking there. He roared, ran the last steps, flipped her over onto the bed, watched her bounce on the dark violet sheets, a goddess of sensual decadence and dementia, bidding him come lose his mind.

He obeyed, came down over her, filling her outstretched arms.

She grabbed his head as his lips branded their way from her neck to her nipples. “Sorry I couldn’t layer more clothes.”

He raised his head. “Sorry I couldn’t grow my hair faster.”

She buried her nose in his chest, inhaled his unadorned scent. “But you followed my other instructions. I say we call it even.”

“I say we call it even better. Than our first night.”

“There could be nothing better. I just want encores.”

“Ah, Clarissa, you force me to sound condescending, but you have no idea. The pleasure I gave you was only an appetizer. Now I will give you a…full meal.”

“Oh? And how are you sure of that?”

“I’m going by the fact that you were in a measure of pain then. Now, it will all be pleasure.”

“Show me.”

“I will. Always.” He rose, bent to run his lips and tongue over her breasts, her abdomen, lower, bringing her to the edge before retreating, until she was begging for his invasion. He held back, came up, captured one nipple after the other, drawing soft, then hard, had her thrashing with each pull.

She sabotaged his reason, surging into him, bringing him full over her, taking his weight, containing him in hunger-driven limbs that clamped him, body and will. Her fingers caressed his flesh, unraveled his control, her lips, full and fragrant, pressed against his, her tongue invading his mouth, flooding him with her taste and her passion, turning the kiss into a full rehearsal of the mating they’d soon lose themselves in.

He tore his lips from hers, growled at the separation, at the convulsion that went through her, saw his insanity reflected in the depths of eyes gone purple. He shuddered in unison with her as arousal turned into agony.

“I can’t bear it…just thrust inside me.”

He had to face it. He couldn’t wait. Not this first time. And she couldn’t either. He’d give them this, the first explosive release that would free them to explore the fathomless depths of their passion with the leisure it deserved.

He reached for the side table and grabbed one of the foil packets he’d placed in a bowl, which sat among the colorful array of wine, brandy and water bottles and crystal glasses.

“Don’t.” She stayed his hand as he began to open the condom.

His eyes clung to hers, as if he could read her mind if he looked into them intensely enough. Had she installed her own protection?

Whatever the reason, she wanted to feel him without barriers again. Wanted to feel him pour his seed inside her. And that was the biggest gift, the only real one he felt he’d ever received.

He threw the condom away and crashed his lips on hers.

She jerked, wailed into his mouth, “Just fill me.”

He rose between her splayed thighs, probed her with a finger, then two. She was flowing for him. He soothed her frenzy, trying to rein in his own, took her buttocks in one hand, tilted her to him as his other hand roamed her, in wonder, in ownership. He brought his shaft to her scorching entrance, rested there, struggling with the elemental need to plunge hard, seek her depths, go home. There would be no rush this time. No pain.