The Dangerous Mr. Ryder

He took a deep breath, drawing in not just the familiar scent of her but the sweet musk of arousal that seemed to perfume her skin, just on the edge of his ability to sense it. Could she detect that on his skin yet? Soon, very soon, he knew their urgent bodies would be sending that thrilling signal unmistakably; now it was as tentative and shy as Eva felt against him.

But this wasn’t a virgin trembling so close that the tips of her breast brushed in agonising unpredictability against his chest. This was a woman who had been married, even if she had been alone for a long time.

There were some benefits to being married to one of the most accomplished lovers in Europe.

Hell and damnation. He had tried so hard not to remember those words, not to dwell on them, to tell himself that, just as he never thought of one of his former lovers when with a new one, she would not remember Louis when she was in his arms. That was all very well when the thought of making love to her was just a fantasy to keep him painfully awake at night, or to distract himself with while he should have been thinking of practical matters. Now he was about to put that theory to the test and he knew, perfectly well, that while he could dismiss any number of lightly undertaken affairs, Eva’s memories of lovemaking were going to be clear, specific and important to her.

Well, Jack, he told himself ruefully, you had better do your very best. And he lowered his head, took her soft mouth with his and found that rational thought fled before the sensual shock of her yielding.

At last! She had dreamed of his mouth on hers again ever since that fierce, intense kiss in the alleyway, dreamed how it would be, wondered if it would be as overwhelming the second time. He was so gentle, yet so certain, in the way he kissed her. He did not even use his hands to hold her; he did not need to. His mouth angled over her lips, seeking, tasting, the flicker of his tongue teasing at the seam until she opened to him with a little gasp of surrender.

Eva found her hands were locked around his neck, her interlinked fingers brushed by the thick black hair at his nape where the strong tendons braced against the pull of her urgency. He explored her mouth slowly, as though seeking to understand something, tasting perhaps, as she tasted him, coffee, the freshness of the celery he had crunched and a taste that just had to be him. Jack.

Louis hardly had ever kissed her like this, taking his time, caressing. It almost seemed that for Jack this was enough, an end in itself, not a hasty part of a rush to consummation. Perhaps she could be more active…Eva let her tongue tangle with Jack’s then, greatly daring, thrust it into his mouth, almost gasping at the intensity of the experience. Something slithered across her bottom; he had dropped the belt, catching her in his arms and straining her against him in a blatant gesture that pressed her intimately against the hard ridge in his breeches.

Eva burrowed closer, twining herself wantonly against him, rubbing like a cat urgent for stroking, the hot ache low down where their bodies throbbed together, crying out for him to assuage it.

Jack left her mouth and began to lick and nuzzle at her neck, bending her back over his strong arm so that she arched like a bow in the hands of an archer while he followed the curve of her throat to where her breasts, unconfined by corset or waistcoat, swelled in the vee of her shirt.

‘You are so beautiful.’ His voice was husky, the words murmured against the aching curves as he lowered her on to her back on the blankets. He followed her down with a control that spoke of his strength and his care of her and lay against her flank, propped up on one elbow as he slowly opened the buttons to reveal her. ‘It is like pushing back the petals of a rose to find the fragrant, golden centre.’

As the sides of the shirt fell open, he made no move to caress her, only lay there, watching her, his warm hand lax on her ribs. As she breathed in and out she was conscious of the roughness of a rider’s calluses on his palm, the slight friction of his nails as his curved fingers touched her.

The intensity of his gaze shook her confidence. What was he looking at? What was he seeing? Surely she could never match up to his mistresses who thought of nothing else but how to make their lithe young bodies and smooth faces attractive to men. Her certainty wavered.

‘What is it, sweet? He sensed her mood instantly, his hand coming up to cup her cheek. ‘Are you cold?’

‘No.’ She shook her head, her lashes falling to hide the embarrassment she knew must show in her eyes. ‘Jack, I’m not a girl any more…’

‘No,’ he agreed instantly, his voice a sensual growl. ‘I can see that.’

‘I’m nearer thirty than twenty, I’ve had a child…’ He cut off her stumbling words by pressing his hand over her lips as he sat up. The other hand caressed over the fullness of her breasts, stroking and cupping the weight of them, his thumb flicking from one nipple to another until she bowed up, moaning against his palm.

‘You are a woman, Eva,’ he said huskily. ‘A beautiful, sensual woman. I am a man and what I want—what I need—is a woman. Not a girl, and not a woman pretending to be one, either. A real woman. You.’

She heard him, believed him, but she could not reply, for he was kissing her breasts now, suckling her pebble-hard nipples until she thought she was going to climax from that alone. Her fingers dug into his shirt; she felt the fine cloth tear and, reckless, ripped it more so that she could feel the skin of his back, hot satin, under her fingertips.

Jack’s hands were at the waist of her breeches, fighting with the fastenings, dragging them down over her hips, taking her drawers with them. He reached her boots, swore and spun round on his knees to drag them off, then sat down, pulling his own off with equal force. By the time he turned back to her she had kicked the tangle of cloth away. The heat of his gaze on her naked body stilled her and she crouched there, her eyes wide on his face as she absorbed the look in his eyes. Desire, heat—and something so fragile, so tender, it took her breath. This hard man, this adventurer felt like that about her. Her.

‘Jack,’ she whispered. ‘Jack, love me.’

‘Yes.’ He sounded as though his teeth were gritted in pain. ‘Eva—’

Her hands were on the fall of his breeches, slipping under the cloth to caress hot flesh as she found the buttons and pulled, breeches and underthings with them, freeing him in all his awesome state of arousal. ‘Oh. Oh.’ She should be fearful—how long was it since her body had known a man? Would it be like losing her virginity all over again? She did not care; all she knew was that she wanted this magnificent man inside her, joined with her.

Coherent thought, even about her wants and needs, fled as Jack came down over her, his knee pushing hers apart, his long, clever fingers slipping between them to caress her intimately. ‘Oh, so sweet, such honey.’ He teased and explored, inciting her and opening her ready for him.

As he thrust, one long stroke of mastery and possession, Eva wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him close, so close against her that she could feel their pubic bones together. He filled her, completed her and she pulled his head down to her lips as he began to thrust. Both of them were desperate for this, neither had any desire to temper the pace of their passion.

She felt his ardour buildi

ng, meeting her, driving her and she knew only that she screamed as he took her over into dizzying oblivion and that the sound mingled with his shout as he left her body. And then the little grove fell silent.

The moon was riding high when they finally fell apart, lying side by side, fingers entwined, bathing in the silver light.

So this is what it can be, Eva thought in wonder. This intense, this tender, this fierce. It was as though she had found the counterpoint to herself, she marvelled. They had hardly spoken—single words, gasps of pleasure, murmurs of delight—yet he had known how to drive her in to ecstasy, time and again, and some sure instinct had steered her hands, her mouth to bring him there, too.

‘Jack.’