The Winter Wife

Staring into her beautiful face, he realized she was right. She was no longer the frightened girl he’d first married and he was no longer the greedy, thoughtless boy who hadn’t appreciated the jewel fate had delivered into his keeping. The yearning to prove himself worthy of

her confidence flooded him. He couldn’t fail her now. But nor could he continue to treat her as if she were made of spun glass. It would destroy him.

Time had changed them and now it offered the opportunity to start again, to move beyond their mistakes and create something new and invincible and shining. He wanted to insist on declarations, but he

was wise enough to know that the moment was too fragile to bear the weight of anything beyond the present.

His hands were gentle as he undid the next button on her shirt. By the time he slid the garment from her shoulders and let it fall to the floor, she was trembling. Her hands had dropped to her sides.

Her scent filled his head, making him drunk with desire. Even so, he still held back. Painful as restraint was. Carefully he undressed her. Finally she was bare to his sight and he paused in wonder.

In their years apart, she’d changed. Her body was a woman’s. Ripe. Alluring. He drew a shuddering breath and reminded himself of the risks in what he did. His blood beat hot and hard, but he managed to

cling to control.

Just.

In shy wantonness, Alicia lay spread before him. Color lined her slanted cheekbones and the breath came fast between her lips. Almost hesitantly, Kinvarra reached out to cup one full, white breast. It plumped in his hand as if created for his touch and the raspberry nipple pearled. When he bent to kiss that impudent peak, Alicia’s surprised gasp of pleasure rewarded him. He drew harder on the nipple and ran his hand down the smooth plain of her belly to the feathery curls at the juncture of her thighs.

She was already damp. Her musky scent lay heavy on the air. This slow seduction worked its magic on his wife, too. He took her other nipple between his lips and bit softly at the crest. She shifted restlessly under his hand and buried her fingers in his hair, urging him to continue.

He needed no further encouragement. But as he licked and bit and suckled, as his hands roamed her silky skin, some trace of reason lingered. She wasn’t ready yet, however her touch and sighs spurred him to further depredations. He wanted to be inside her more than he wanted his next breath. But this night wasn’t about what he wanted, but about showing her the pleasure a man and a woman could find together. To his everlasting regret, he’d never given her that.

Her mouth kept luring him back. He had ten years of kisses to make up for. Each kiss was hotter and sweeter than the last. He couldn’t get enough of her taste.

“You’re wearing too many clothes,” she said in a broken voice. “Whereas you’re dressed just right,” he said with a low laugh,

kissing her breast again.

She’d been lovely as a girl, fresh and dewy and as rich with promise as a furled rose. But the voluptuous woman in his arms now took his breath away.

With every second, he felt her confidence increase. When she dragged his shirt up from his breeches, her caresses on his naked back shot lightning behind his eyes.

“Sebastian, I want to see you.”

He’d never heard her sound like this, choked and frantic and

starving for him. In those joyless, mean little encounters in his bed at Balmuir House, she hadn’t spoken at all. And then she’d cried. This woman claimed her right to sample every pleasure.

He couldn’t remain immune to her pleading. He rolled off the bed and tore his clothes away, hurling them into the corner. Then he paused, wondering if he should have been more circumspect. Would his rampant nakedness terrify his wife?

When she was a girl, his unabashed maleness had frightened her. He’d come to her in the dark, and even then what he’d done had revolted her. Could that have changed?

She slid up against the headboard, making no pretense at modesty by covering herself with the sheet. Dear Lord, she was a sight to set a man’s passions afire. Her face was flushed with eagerness and curiosity, her lips were full and red, her body was a symphony of curves and hollows. Her golden hair cascaded around her shoulders, teasingly covering one breast and leaving the other bare. Kinvarra felt himself grow harder, larger, needier.

Her eyes widened as her inspection continued down past his chest and belly. Hell, what would he do if she stopped him now?

Could he stop?

Yes, something inside him insisted. For Alicia, he could stop.

“Magnificent,” she murmured, her eyes glinting blue fire under their

heavy lids.

Her smile glowed with such anticipation that his foolish heart crashed inside his chest. She’d always been able to confound him with a mere word. A decade without her hadn’t changed that.

She stretched out one hand in invitation. To his astonishment, she wasn’t shaking. All trace of her earlier uncertainty had vanished.