Willow groaned her delight; she could not help it, her hands reaching to circle his neck. Did it really matter that she surrendered without a fight? Did it matter if it was only lust, or chemistry, even love. . .? He was her husband and, dear heaven, she wanted him. She tilted back her head for his kiss, her fingers threading through his hair and urging his head down, her lips softly parted in anticipation.
Theo obliged with the sweep of his tongue around the lush outline of her mouth, while his hand stroked and caressed a tantalising, subtle path down to the triangle of hair at the apex of her thighs. A long finger found the sensitive nub within, and he watched her incredible blue eyes widen and flare as he stroked with slow, sensual skill until he felt the tremors she could not control racing through her incredibly receptive body. His own heart pounding like a drum, he swung her up into his strong arms and laid her on the bed.
He was determined
to make their wedding night unforgettable, and, after ravishing her mouth, he covered the pulse beating madly in her throat and sucked gently. Then he licked and kissed a slow, expert trail to her breast, delighting in the silken smoothness of her skin. He took one perfect rosy peak between his teeth and nipped gently, then began to suckle with greedy pleasure until he heard her feverish gasps of excitement. He relished the sound and transferred his attention to the other breast, with equally devastating results. His own skin began beading with sweat, his heart pounding as he moved lower to tease her navel and lower still to the juncture of her thighs.
She was hot, wet and wanting and went wild beneath him. She wanted him inside her and he ached to be there, rock-hard and hurting. But he fought back the incredible urge, and, raising his head, he slipped his finger inside her. A triumphant primitive smile slashed his darkened features as he saw the pale beauty of her body suffused with colour, her blue eyes unfocussed and blind with passion.
At last she was his, her surrender complete. She was his wife. He kissed her hard with a dominant, possessive passion. 'Willow mou, all mine,' he groaned and, drawing back, he tilted her slender hips with hands that shook, and slowly thrust into her silken depths, and stilled.
'Theo. . .' Willow gasped, breathless as wave after wave of sensation buffeted her slender body. Delirious with excitement, she raked her hands down the solid wall of his chest and back again, her hand grasping his hip bones. 'Please,' she almost sobbed. It was like being tortured, held on the rack between pleasure and pain, but his hands tightened on her thighs, holding her still.
'Not yet,' Theo growled, his dark eyes intent on her, gauging her response to the nth degree. He slowly and skilfully took her to the edge and, testing his own control to the limit, he kept her there while he caught her whimpering cries with his mouth. With his tongue he did what her body, arching beneath him, was urging him to do with his own body. By a mighty effort of will he held back, and then once more tasted her luscious breasts before moving in her again. He felt her muscles clench around him and still he withdrew and waited, holding her on the pinnacle yet again.
'Please, please, Theo, don't stop,' Willow cried, her nails digging into his taut buttocks, her mouth urgently seeking his, her eyes closed. Breathless and out of her mind with excitement. Now. . .no. . .please, I can't. . .' she whimpered, incoherent in her need for his complete possession.
Hearing her pleading shattered Theo's control. He thrust deep and hard, filling her to the hilt, his muscles locked, his great body taut as he thrust over and over again. Instantly she met and matched his rhythm and they rocketed over the edge, his seed shooting into her in a prolonged, explosive climax that left them both shuddering in the aftermath.
Later as the pounding of their hearts slowed Theo eased up and brushed the tumbled mass of hair back from her face and looked down at her. Her magnificent eyes, sated and slumberous, smiled lazily up at him.
'Wow,' she said dreamily.
'Wow—is that the best you can do as a writer?' he teased, and gently trailed a finger around her love-swollen lips.
'What do you expect when you have knocked every sensible thought from my brain?' Willow confessed, her breathing shallow but slowing.
'Good. I will have to make sure I keep you from thinking. That way our marriage will be fine.' And he fell back on the bed and slid an arm around her to cuddle her close to his side.
Even in her euphoric state she was taken aback by his statement and, rolling over to lean an arm on his chest, she looked lazily up at him. 'Do you really believe that a brainless wife makes for a good marriage? Is that why you divorced Dianne?' she asked without thinking. Immediately she felt the tension in him, and saw the hardening in his night-black eyes, and wished the words unsaid. . .
'Sorry. I should not have asked.' She withdrew her arm from his chest and turned onto her back. For a moment she had forgotten that theirs wasn't the kind of relationship that included sharing confidences.
'No, you shouldn't,' Theo said quietly, turning his head to glance across at her. 'But now you have perhaps it is as well you know the truth.' His dark eyes clashed with hers. 'I divorced Dianne because I caught her in bed with another man. So be warned.'
Whatever she had expected as a response, it was not that. She looked at him carefully. He was strikingly handsome, sinfully sexy and his great, tanned body simply oozed virile male power. He had to be joking, and Willow couldn't help but chuckle. 'I don't believe you. The other way around maybe.'
'Am I supposed to be flattered by that backhanded compliment?' Theo asked with a sardonic arch of one ebony brow.
'No, well, you know what I mean,' Willow muttered, suddenly realising he was not in the least amused.
'No, I don't know what you mean. Explain.' Theo leant up on one elbow, his dark eyes pinning her to the spot. 'Bearing in mind that adultery is not the sole prerogative of the male.'
'Yes, I know.' Suddenly she wished she had never started this conversation, but now she had. . . What the hell? She might as well tell the truth as she saw it. 'But let's be honest here, Theo, you're a very handsome man, very wealthy, and you must have had dozens of women over the years. Also given the fact that you were unfaithful with me when you were still engaged to Dianne and then married her anyway, the odds are that if anyone was going to stray in your marriage, you have to be the prime candidate.'
'Thank you for your opinion of me,' Theo ground out sarcastically. 'But you could not be more wrong. A, I was not engaged to Dianne when I slept with you, and B, I had finished with her the day before you and I met. Got it?'
Willow's eyes widened in stunned amazement. He looked so serious that she was inclined to believe him. Had she been wrong all those years ago?
'And, before you say anything, yes, I had spent the night before in Dianne's flat, but I had slept in the spare room. Because, and listen and learn, she tried to manipulate me using sex into giving her a commitment. I allow no woman to do that, not even you, my sweet wife.' The arrogant warning was evident in his dark eyes, and it surprised her.
'As if I could. . .' Willow said with a wry smile. Her knowledge of the male sex was so small she would not know where to start.
'You're a woman. . .' Theo drawled cynically. 'Anyway, I told Dianne it was over and I could not get away fast enough. Her frantic calls the next morning, one of which you apparently answered, were to try and get me back. I don't know what you said to her but you must have given her the idea that she had a rival.'
'I did nothing of the sort,' Willow exclaimed. 'I simply said you were still in bed asleep.'
'You said what?' Theo asked, his dark eyes widening incredulously, and then narrowing on her honest outraged blue. It was his turn to chuckle. 'Ah agape mou.' He threaded long fingers through the silken waves of her hair, and lazily smoothed them over the curve of her breast. 'You really were an innocent. Surely you can see by telling her I was in bed asleep, you had as good as told her you had shared my bed.'