The sensations in her skin were absolutely foreign, heady. When Gregory’s fingertips slid up the naked skin of her leg, bringing the hem of her nightgown higher, a strangled noise came from Arabella’s throat. It pleased him, and she was rewarded with the lightest scraping of his nails against her sensitive hip.
When her eyes finally closed, the woman lost, his hand worked at the flap of his breeches. The arm cradling her lower back lifted her body high enough for Gregory to delve under the ruffles and lace. A touch, light as a feather, swept between her legs. A smear of feeling, and she tensed, bucked, and felt heavily drugged. Temple to his shoulder, certain too much wine, too many troubles had brought forth such a hallucination, Arabella found she did not know her body or why such feelings existed.
There was no shyness in the way he parted her folds, how fingertips tripped and toyed until she could feel a heartbeat growing between her legs.
Harrow’s touch retreated. After fumbling between them something hard and smooth, something larger than fluttering fingers touched the place where all the growing intoxication seemed to center. Gripping the length of his cock, Gregory ran the swollen crown over drenched softness, enjoying the way Arabella’s lashes flared, pleased with her sudden hitched breath. A furious burst of feeling rocked her as the instrument in his fist found where it sought to burrow. With an appreciative growl, Gregory urged her to lower, ignoring her slight resistance, until the throbbing head of his cock breached a passage so warm it melted for him.
Stretching her, filling her, arms slipped around her middle and he bore her down, Gregory taking on an expression of impassioned pain at her internal clench.
It seemed too much.
Instinctively, Arabella tried to rise, her eyes hooded and desperate. His arm tightened, the man’s muscles bulging to slowly force her back until impaled fully. A small gasp and more girth pressed forward, spearing more soundly than the initial small push— conquering and stretching, linking their bodies in a way that caused her to both try and force the trespasser out and draw him deeper.
The connection was far too intense, Arabella felt him grow harder, the throb of his blood pumping in rhythm with hers.
Lost green eyes, shined perfectly confused and aroused when Gregory rolled his hips and
offered a pleased groan. His deepening thrusts started gently, Arabella making little noises of pleasure, her body naturally following the movement of the pulsing invasion.
He continued his explorations, parting the fabric tied in a satin bow at her throat. When warm heat slipped behind the lace and enveloped her breast, when full flesh was squeezed, her aching nipple fondled, that was all it took for her knees to buckle and the resistance to end. She sank onto the remaining length of his thick cock, held him inside her from base to tip, and only squirmed a little.
Smiling the grin of a victorious warrior, Gregory relished the strangle of her walls working to accommodate his claim. He cooed to her and cupped her cheek, tracing her parted lips with his thumb.
When she moaned, he let out a hot breath against her mouth, flexed the arm that held her to him, and began to rock his hips. Fisting her hands in the fabric of his sleeves, she held on, panting, unsure if she felt pain or pleasure—unsure why she wanted more, or why she had so great a need to grind her body down hard against such a man.
Gregory explained it all when his hand left her face and found its way to where they were joined. Fingertips explored where she was stretched full of him, teasing further at her folds until he brushed something that made her whole body jolt. The bastard smiled at her, the swipe of his thumb skimming over the swollen bud of flesh again. Mystification, sudden insatiable need, and madness took over.
Lost in the touch, pressing her breasts to his chest, her hips swirled to the movement of his thumb.
Gregory bounced her body on his lap, endlessly toying with the pert part of her sex which thrummed to life, enjoying every little mew and cry she made in response. When Arabella could hardly bear another moment of such intoxicating touch, when her very soul seemed on the brink of being torn from her chest, full lips brushed hers, the devil commanding, “Tell me I please you, Arabella.”
The sound of that voice, heady and rich, made her stiffen. She felt the dampness of his coat still bunched in her grip, slowly became aware of the stretching brand that filled her womb.
An encroaching wave of desolation left her in such a state, Arabella could do little more than breathe, “I loathe you, Gregory Harrow,” taking his plunging cock deeper still, frightened again that she was about to succumb to that terrifying wave threatening to consume and destroy her.
A look passed over the blackness of his eyes, and just as he had begun it, Gregory smoothed his cheek against hers and moved his lips to her ear. He cradled her closer to cease their frantic movements, nuzzling until her hips stilled and they were deeply joined. The tip of his tongue skimmed the shell of her ear. “And I you.”
After several deep breaths, he lifted her off his turgid cock. When the silken heat of him left flesh that ached she felt somehow less... wrong. Cooling the inferno did not seem to be her salvation, it only left her wanting. Even so, her heart filled with a rush of immense relief, as if rescued from a dividing line that, should she cross, would forever change her.
His nose was in her hair even as she sagged, Arabella tiredly resting her head in the crook of his neck. Pressing into the curve of his body, craving more of the unbearable heat, she settled. With the cadence of his breath at her ear and the gentle tugging of his fingers buried at the roots of her hair, sleep came hard.
Chapter 7
L ashes fluttered and Arabella found that the darkness of her bedchamber held an otherworldly quality. Wondering what warm weight had eased from her waist, why she suddenly felt the chill, and why the usually wonderful cold felt nothing but unwelcome, a deep abiding sleepiness made her roll toward the loss of heat and burrow.
A feather light touch, almost imperceptible, ran down the side of her face.
There was a subtle shift of the mattress.
The first light of morning had yet to creep inside her windows and break up the shadows, leaving the smoldering coals of her fire the only thing that separated her from utter darkness. As if dreaming, she glanced upon the silent figure pulling on his boots at the edge of her bed. The shine of his eyes in the dark, when the phantom turned to look over her, made Arabella move as if to rise. At once the weight of a heavy hand pressed her back into the mattress. Their eyes held, but all she could read in the shadowed lines of his face was the same brooding expression that always hardened his features.
He seemed to hesitate for a moment before his fingers drew away. Gregory straightened to his full height and merged back into the deeper shadows. She heard the sound of coal being added to the fire, but by the time glassy eyes could see by the flicker of new light, the room was empty. Her lashes lowered and with a deep breath, sleep returned.
“Wake up, my lady.” A familiar hand shook the baroness’s shoulder. “You must dress before the men arrive for breakfast.”
Shocked to find her mistress still sprawled in bed, Magdala selected a dress as silently as possible, pleased the young woman had uncharacteristically slept past sunrise.
Groaning, Arabella sat up.