Her body thrummed, the hardness, power, and sheer masculine strength of his imprinted like some elemental memory on her senses. On her very female senses. With him, she knew what she was, could be all she was; she could deal with him confident in herself, and him. He’d always been the same, male to her female in some preordained way neither he nor she had ever questioned. She wasn’t about to start questioning now.
Shifting her head, she moved her hand and spread it over his heart. It thudded sure and strong beneath her palm. The crinkly dusting of black hair that laced across his chest, then arrowed to his groin, was a tactile fascination. She played, and knew he watched.
She didn’t stop, but pushed the covers down to his waist, baring his chest—and her own, but as to that she no longer cared. His body had always fascinated her, an illicit desire, one she’d denied, then suppressed for years. She didn’t need to suppress it now; spreading her hands, she gave it full rein.
And he let her. Remained supine in her bed and let her trace the broad, heavy muscles of his chest, run her palms over the curves of his shoulders and upper arms, then draw her fingers down to outline his ribs.
Then she pushed the covers farther still, down to his hips. Traced the long muscle bands, strong as steel, that bracketed his navel, then reached farther. Ran her palm down along his hip, down to his thigh, down to where the crisp hairs grew thicker again.
He’d tensed, unmistakably; she didn’t prolong the torture, more for herself than him. Gliding her hand up, she found him, boldly cupped him, took his scrotum in her hand and let her fingers explore, learning the weight, the texture, even as, with her forearm, she nudged the covers lower still, so that when she stroked upward and closed her hand about his erection, she could see as well as feel. Could use her eyes to guide her fingers as she stroked the ridged length, lingering over the thick, pulsing veins, then with her fingertip traced the circumference of the broad head.
He shuddered, caught her hand.
She looked up; he met her eyes briefly, his nearly black with just a hint of blue remaining. He looked down at her breasts as he laced his fingers with hers, then, pressing her hand and arm back and around, slowly rolled her onto her back.
“My turn.”
He lay beside her, one arm beneath her, still cradling her, while with his other hand he traced her body. Lightly. From her jaw, to her shoulders, over her breasts, around their ruched peaks, he drew slow whorls with his fingertips, barely touching.
Long before he sent those trailing fingers questing lower, her breasts had swollen and heated, her body had come alive.
Tantalizing. His touch was a promise, evoking sensual memories, yet leading her senses to dwell, not on what had been, but on what might be.
His fingers brushed her curls, danced lower, tracing the sensitive inner face of her thighs almost to her knees. Her skin, taut, nerves alive, flickered as he slowly returned up the other thigh, but instead of diverting inward, he took the outward track, following the outer line of her hip up to her waist.
Dragging in a breath, realizing she’d stopped breathing sometime before, she looked up at him.
He was waiting to catch her glance, to smile—devilishly—in complete understanding. “I have a proposition to put to you.”
“What?”
He closed his hands about her waist, shifted back and lifted her over him. She ended straddling him, rather lower than before.
“Let’s try it this way.”
It took an instant for her to realize what he meant, then she felt the head of his erection nudging against her. He gripped her hips, eased her back. Flattening her hands on his chest, she shifted, wriggled, found the right angle, and leaned back, slowly sat. Slowly, inch by inch, took him into her body.
The most amazing sensation, she savored it to the full, eyes half-closed, senses focused. She sat still for a long moment, simply wallowing, then the rigidity that had afflicted him registered; opening her eyes, she looked down into his. Noted the tension in his face, around his lips, evidence of the control she could sense holding back the wildness she knew was in him.
Unsure how his script read, she raised her brows at him.
With one hand, he gestured. “The reins are yours.”
Her brows rose higher. Indeed? How satisfying it would be to shatter that smug male control of his—in more ways than one.
She took him at his word and rose upon him. His hands rode lightly about her hips; he gave her little direction but allowed her to experiment, to explore the possibilities as she would. His grip tensed—she suspected involuntarily—when she nearly rose too high.
So that was the limit in that direction. In the other…
She settled to her purpose with a will, surprised to learn just how much pleasure she derived from using her body, under her will alone, to pleasure him. His comment about reins proved apt; she was accustomed to riding, and in many ways it was like that, rising up, sinking down in a deliberate rhythm.
But the contol over both rhythm and depth, over, it seemed, the very nature of their joining, was exquisite; she employed it, enjoyed it to the full. Rode him fast, then slow, then at the gallop again. Sensed the different ways she could use her inner muscles, use her hips and bottom to pressure him.
To fray those reins.
Once she was well embarked on her game, his hands rose to her breasts, to fondle, at first gently, then rather more explicitly.
Fingers flexing on his chest, her breath coming in increasingly rushed pants, she looked into his face, saw concentration, and more, possessiveness and something close to devotion. And wondered…