Forster, Suzanne (42 page)

She jerked her arms free of his hold and tried to touch him. She didn't know quite what she intended to do, but it didn't matter anyway. He wouldn't let her. He captured her arms and spread them like wings, pinning her wrists to the wall on either side of her head and holding her there, spread-eagle and breathless, very much at his mercy. A shudder took her, and she began to tremble, shocked by what he'd done.

The pain, the hunger, all of it flared through him as he searched her startled face. His breath was shaking, but he seemed determined to master the emotions, to prove that he didn't need anything, not sex, not love, not even her. His powerful thighs pressed her to the wall, forcing her to feel every quivering inch of the hunger that lived between his legs. He was already hard, already burgeoning, as he moved against her, grinding his hips into hers. His sex burned her soft flesh. It pressed hard against her pubic bone, searching, seeking deeper access. His eyes probed, cutting like diamonds, holding her in thrall.

There was a part of Gus that burned to resist him. Fighting back was as natural to her as breathing, but this time she couldn't summon the strength. She was too weak. This was too wonderful. Though she couldn't have thought through the reasoning or explained why if someone had asked her, she had already decided to be this man's sacrifice. It was pure impulse driving her, not reason, but the idea had taken her imagination captive. He'd kidnapped her, forced her into marriage, and now he would claim the spoils of war like a scene out of an epic medieval novel. Gus had done many things in life, but she'd never done this, never willingly surrendered herself to the enemy, even in fantasy.

He must have sensed her acquiescence. His warrior's mind must have read the signals, because he was suddenly powerful, a man who knew victory was imminent. The enemy was on her knees, but total capitulation was necessary before his triumph was complete. It was a ritual that went back to the primordial fights for territory and sex, triggered by the most basic of urges, the mating instinct.

"Be my wife," he said, his voice harsh, his breath soft.

He was nuzzling her neck, his teeth hot against her flesh, and there was a roughness about it that thrilled her. He was claiming her, physical sex the only thing on his mind now. Coupling was the ultimate destiny. And the thought of it left her breathless as his lips descended on hers. The fierce sweetness of his mouth, the sharp ache rising inside her made her want to cry out.

She broke away, needing to tell him what she'd experienced. "I feel the pain, " she whispered, her voice thick with it. "My God, it's terrible. It's awful!" Her laughter was hoarse and startled. "It must be the same pain you described. It's never happened with anyone else. "

His eyes were suddenly piercing as he searched her face. Even in the darkness, their blue-black radiance was unmistakable.

"This mouth of yours..." He caught the fullness of her lower lip between his fingers and gently pulled. "These lips that don't always get words out right... they're eloquent when you're kissing me. I just want you to know that. You speak perfectly. "

Her throat tightened uncontrollably and tears stung at her eyes. He had touched into the part of her past she'd shown to no one, the pain she'd been guarding and hoarding for a lifetime. The speech impediment had always felt as if it were her personal stigmata, a punishment for being unwanted and the emblem of her unworthiness. Now he was telling her it was beautiful? When he cupped her breast, she felt passion so intense it was no longer pleasure, it was anguish.

If she thought she'd felt the pain before...

He had released her hands, but she couldn't touch him now. She couldn't do anything but sink to the floor.

He picked up the blanket and spread it out across the wooden planks for them, and then he pulled her with him onto it. There wasn't time to undress leisurely or remove their clothing, only the urgent rush to create a primal, life-sustaining bond. The hot fusion of bodies and souls. Her soul touching his. Soon all the pain would be gone and there would only be ecstasy.

He rose over her, bringing her skirt up with him and then stripping her nylons from her body with such urgent grace it felt as if he'd done it all in one unbroken wave. The stockings ended up in a heap across the room. It was ironic that she'd been worried about ruining them. They must be torn to shreds by now.

An image filled her mind as he loomed above her, his hands braced on either side of her head. She could feel the beautiful, thundering power of it all through her. She could hear the explosion of horses' hooves, the startled snorts of their breathing. She could smell the steam that came off their hot, surging bodies. The very ground seemed to shake beneath her as the magnificent herd of animals stampeded her senses.

Riding wild horses
... the sweet, liberating power of that dream was to be hers. He would be her wild horse. He would take her on a thundering ride into the world of her senses.

She opened herself to the man braced above her and moaned softly as he fit his hardened body to hers. Throwing her arms over her head, she was aware of the pull against her shaking flesh. Her breasts were luminous. They were quivering, wanton pools, flowing with sensation, and she was offering them to him in an act of total abandon. It was one of the most thrilling things she'd ever done. Her belly tightened sweetly, and then painfully, as she imagined his mouth, the pull of his lips against her flesh.

"Jesus, you're beautiful. " His jaw muscles bunched, and she could see that he was fighting the urge to drop and give her the thrill she'd imagined. He wanted to take her in his mouth, but another urge shook through him and he jerked reflexively. Muscles rippled wildly up and down his body as he tested the soft throb between her legs.

The first deep prick of his hardened flesh made Gus arch and gasp with surprise. "No, you're too big, " she said, knowing he couldn't be. She'd had him before. "I'm not ready! You'll never—"

"Trust me, " he grated. "You are. And I will. "

He barely had the words out before he had penetrated her so deeply she could scarcely breathe. Gus's head and shoulders came off the blanket. Her muscles curled with shock and delight. She'd expected discomfort, but there was none, there was only wild, fluttering excitement and a deep, glorious fullness. The impulse to stop him had been overwhelmed by the swiftness, the utter sureness, of his possession. He'd buried himself, sword to her sheath, and now his sex was all muscle and mastery, and hers was all quivering sensation.

He began to flex slowly and she began to die with pleasure.

It was beautiful, so beautiful she could have cried. She wanted him to go on forever. He was hard and thrillingly thick. The swollen friction of his shaft, its velvet surfaces, caressed her inner walls. But the very fact that he was delving so deeply and moving so slowly made her wonder if she could possibly endure another moment.

She had never allowed herself to be dominated by anything. The thought of it terrified her, and yet, just this once in her life, she craved the thrill of abject surrender—to his rules, his pace, his male will,
whatever
that might be. She wanted to stretch out languidly, hostage to whatever wanton, terrible pleasure he could bring her. She wanted to submit to him in every way, but the pressures building up inside her were too fantastic. They wouldn't let her give up control. Sparking nerves urged her to curl around him like a cat and claw him into action.

"More," she pleaded, curving into his slow thrusts. Her fingernails racked his biceps. "Do it deeper, faster!"

His eyes flared, warning her that she was close to unleashing something dangerous in him.

"If I go any deeper," he said, "I'll be in your throat."

"I want you in my throat. I want you everywhere."

A shudder caught him, and he jerked deep inside her. "Everywhere?" he said. "You want my cock in your mouth and in the other, darker parts of your body? Are you sure?"

Gus had never been penetrated in the other, darker parts of her body that he must be talking about. Still, at this moment, in the crazed heat of sexual frenzy, she would probably have said yes to anything.

"I'm sure," she whispered, wondering what he would do. If he turned her over and began to probe in taut forbidden places, what in God's name would
she
do? "But right now... I need you just where you are. " Deep muscles clutched involuntarily, squeezing him. "I'll die if you don't stay there. "

He let out a shaking breath and lowered himself to her mouth, nipping at her lower lip, brushing it with his heated breath. "Good, " he said, "because this is just where I want to be. Where I am right now. "

Something was building swiftly inside her, a keening cry, and she told him so. "Make me come, " she whispered. "Make me scream. "

He had stopped moving altogether, and when he started again, she did scream, a sharp little gasp of pleasure that reverberated in the small room and sent him into a fabulous frenzy of coupling. He caught hold of her wrists and pinned them to the floor, arcing into her body with the grace and force of an athlete.

Gus Featherstone had wanted to ride the wild horses. She had urgently needed that liberating rampage. She had wanted him to go faster and faster and bring her the hard, thundering satisfaction her body craved. She got all of that and more. He thrust with the power of a stallion, and as their bodies came together again and again, she alternately ripped at him with sudden, urgent need and fell back to the blanket, helpless.

The pleasure he gave her penetrated her entire being, shaking her from the inside out. It moved through her in crimson waves as she felt the climb toward ecstasy begin. Within moments the first shimmering implosion had rocked her, and she knew the riotous joys of surrender in a way she never had before and might never again. In giving up control she had freed herself. She had freed feelings that were bound up in the need to protect her wounds, and her body was simply going wild with the rampageous beauty of it all.

She was spent by the time the stampede had run its course, but the moment the horses had stopped their glorious thundering and her body had sagged to the floor in exhaustion—the moment she was complete—her thoughts were of him. Had he shared her ecstasy? Was he still in pain?

Jack had felt every second of her shaking rapture, but he hadn't been able to share in it, except through his joy at her pleasure. He'd been left with the most beautiful kind of pain. The tightness that gripped and caressed him made him ache to release the pressure. He could feel the mounting, flooding heat of his semen at the base of his body, in the head of his penis. He could feel the painful smash of his heart against his ribs. Every fiber in his body was screaming for relief, but despite the force of his feelings, he couldn't let go.

Instead he watched her coil and convulse and go limp beneath him, and when she was lost to everything but her own delirium, he pulled her into his arms and held her in the low glow of the lamplight. He was still throbbing deeply inside her, but the soft comfort of her flesh might have been enough if she hadn't begun to question him, to touch and try to soothe him.

"No, don't," he whispered as she pressed her lips to the wild pulse in his throat. "It won't help."

"You haven't even let me try," she insisted.

Sighing, he watched her stroke and kiss and caress his overstimulated body, knowing that none of it would have any effect except to make him harder and more miserable. Still, he could feel a razor-sharp tension building as she worked her way down his abdomen, and when she pressed her lips to the very heart of his discomfort, he groaned aloud. His shaft jerked involuntarily under her tender attentions, nearly sending him through the roof.

"Have faith," she promised, running the tip of her tongue to the very base of him, where all the fullness had accumulated in what felt like a swollen knot.

Her mouth worked him so beautifully, he couldn't help but relax, and soon she had him taut and tingling in every fiber, yet strangely fluid. The sharp stirrings he felt told him something was happening, but it was only when she curved herself seductively over his loins and took him deeply in her mouth, it was only when she began to stroke up and down, nearly swallowing him, that the miracle occurred. He lost control. Totally and mindlessly. All decisions were taken out of his hands, and his release, when it finally came, was so agonizingly sweet, it brought tears of wonder to his eyes. Fire from the gods, he thought. Like

Prometheus, he had stolen it. And now, like Prometheus, he would die.

Lake stood in the open doorway of his sister's bedroom, watching her as she spoke in hushed tones into the receiver of her cordless telephone. He had something urgent to tell her, but her secretive manner made him hesitate. She was clearly having a private conversation with someone, and though Lake was consumed with curiosity, he was reluctant to move closer and risk giving himself away.

Lily was seated at the walnut secretary with her appointment book in front of her, making notes as she talked. Strong morning sunlight, diffused by the mullioned windows, illumined shelf after shelf of the silver knickknacks and potted pansies she loved.

As she said her good-byes, hung up, and continued writing, Lake promised himself that he would have a look at that book the first opportunity he got. It wasn't like Lily to keep things from him, and his curiosity was fueled as much by brotherly possessiveness as anything else. As he watched her delicately boned hand move across the page and saw her shoulders lift with a tense sigh, he knew. His lovely twin had a secret.

She was wearing a floaty white silk blouse and brick-colored jodphurs this morning, and she'd gathered her hair into a thick bundle at her nape. He couldn't see the front of her blouse, but he assumed it was fastened with the diamond and pearl Medusa brooch that had been their mother's, and before that, their grandmother's, and so on, going back all the way back to the daughter of the founding Featherstone, Matthew Tobias.

"You didn't come down to breakfast," he said.