‘I want my tigress back, mali mou,’ Leonidas husked, nipping at the base of her ear with his even white teeth, guiding her hand down to the hot velvety length of his erection.
Her slim fingers flexed round his hard male heat. A sense of vulnerability and the dread that she might be in danger of giving away too much warred with her desire. She truly loved touching him, and adored the intimacy and the thrill of sending him out of control. But, in the aftermath of the one night they had shared, she had also fallen victim to a whole host of humiliating fears. Had she been too bold? Too clumsy in her inexperience? Too keen?
Leonidas groaned out loud. Hot pleasure was shot through with the sudden darkling suspicion that she might have been practising. Anger stirred and sharply disconcerted him, forcing him to shut out the thought. Even so, he slid out of reach of her ministrations.
‘What’s wrong?’ Concerned eyes as purplish a blue as violets questioned him.
‘Nothing.’ But Leonidas was uneasy with the disturbingly irrational thoughts and responses assailing him. Highly intelligent and pragmatic by nature, he rejoiced in the benefits of cold logic. He had never felt possessive of a woman in his life.
There was hurt and confusion in Maribel’s gaze now. With a stifled curse in Greek, Leonidas drove her reddened lips apart in a ravenous kiss that sent her anxiety flying like skittles out of sight and out of memory. Each plunge of his tongue only stoked her yearning higher. A little clenching frisson low in her pelvis made her press closer to him, seeking relief from the ache thrumming at the heart of her desire. She was quivering with that almost agonising awareness long before he removed her last garment to discover the damp, delicate folds beneath.
‘Se thelo…I want you, hara mou,’ he breathed in a driven undertone.
‘I want you too,’ she whispered feverishly.
A whimper of sound halfway between protest and delight was wrenched from her when he stroked the most sensitive place of all. Very soon, she was lost in the dark, pulsing pleasure that he unleashed. Perspiration dampening her creamy skin, she writhed in moaning response to the flood of erotic sensation of which he was so much the master. She was caught up in the irresistible surge of exhilaration. Her blood was hammering through her veins, her heart pounding. Bewitched by his touch, in thrall to his strong sensuality, she was all liquid warmth and seething frustration. Her desire reached a bitter-sweet edge of torment for she could not bear to wait another moment for fulfilment.
In that same instant, Leonidas slid between her thighs. Supplication in her passion-glazed eyes, she was shaking and shivering, pitched to an almost painful pinnacle of need. He entered her at the peak of that longing. Bold and powerful, he forged an entrance into her hot, wet sheath. A surge of ravishing sensation engulfed her for the feel of him within her melting flesh was exquisite. He kissed her and she responded with all the wild passion consuming her. He delved and teased her mouth with his tongue while he took her with long, hard thrusts. She was delirious with a pleasure beyond anything she had ever felt. Excitement flamed through her slim body like a ravenous fire that consumed every ounce of energy and thought.
When she felt the urgent tightening at the very centre of her, she sobbed his name. A split second later she was flung from the whirlpool of passion over the edge into rapture. Dizzy and out of control, she tasted ecstasy and abandoned herself to the rippling tremors of shocking delight that seized her. It seemed like for ever before she felt earthbound again.
‘Leonidas,’ she mumbled, and in that period of quiet joy and respite all her barriers were down. She did what she wanted to do and gave way to the love she kept locked away inside her. She wrapped her arms round him and hugged him tight. She smoothed his damp hair, landed a kiss on just about every part of him within reach and sighed happily in blissful contentment.
Engulfed in that flood-tide of appreciation, Leonidas froze for an instant, and then he almost laughed, for his son was equally affectionate. In a rather abrupt movement for one so graceful, he pressed his lips in a fleeting tribute to the corner of her mouth and rolled free of her. Almost immediately, however, he reached out across the space between them to close a hand over hers. She turned her head and gave him a huge smile.
Familiarity tugged a cord of memory and his ebony brows pleated. ‘Do you know? Until this moment I didn’t realise that you resemble Imogen, but now I have seen the family likeness.’
‘Have you?’ Maribel was sharply disconcerted by that unexpected remark and very surprised, as it had never occurred to her that she was in the least like her cousin. Suddenly she felt as if a giant ice cube had settled in the warm pit of her belly and she lay very still and tense.