His shaking hand found her beneath the froth of skirts. She jerked and released a hoarse exclamation. His world dissolved into delight.
After what felt like years wandering among the stars, Sidonie returned to find her cheek pressed against the blotter, the rim of the desk jabbing her belly, and Jonas’s body pinning her down. His face was buried in her hair. He sprawled across her, cutting circulation to one arm. She flexed her fingers to relieve pins and needles and bit back a grunt of discomfort. With a reluctance she could feel, he tensed before moving away.
“Not yet,” she protested sleepily, even though he was heavy and the blotter provided an unforgiving pillow.
“I must be squashing you.” His hoarse voice hinted the encounter had been earth-shattering for him, too.
“You are, but I like it.”
“You’re insane.”
She loved it when he lit her world with ecstasy. Perhaps more, she loved these quiet moments when she rejoiced in a closeness she’d never felt with anyone else. At such times, even the slight distance he maintained became almost transparent, so she could imagine more existed between them than just physical passion.
Jonas Merrick was unique. As a man. In her life.
There would be no other.
Her heart faltered. Her happiness rested on the frailest of foundations. Reality’s slightest breath would scatter it to the four winds.
The memory of that incendiary moment when he took Sidonie from behind clouded Jonas’s mind as he followed her upstairs after dinner. So clouded that he only caught her calculating expression after he’d removed his shirt.
His attention sharpened on the way she leaned with apparent artlessness against a gilt bedpost. Accidental or not, the effect was spectacular. Sidonie with tumbling dusky hair and wearing, or half-wearing, red silk.
Now that he thought about it, she’d been unusually quiet all evening. As if hatching some plot. Sexual satisfaction made him dozy. Not that right now he felt particularly satisfied. Hunger for her gnawed at him, hunger fueled by the grim knowledge that this was their last night.
Their last night…
Around him, the mirrors reflected a hundred Sidonies. One caused enough trouble. Which didn’t mean he was in a rush to say good-bye. He already knew her departure, damn it to hell and back, would feel like someone removed his liver slowly with a blunt spoon.
“What are you conniving?” he asked warily, standing in the middle of the room with his shirt bundled in one hand.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She tried to look innocent. A few days ago, she wouldn’t have had to try. He’d loved her innocence, but even more he loved the richness of this woman she’d become. God help him, he’d never believed such a woman existed in this tired, bad old world.
At last at a visceral level, he understood his father’s outrage when he heard his beloved wife derided as a whore. Jonas had always believed himself incapable of experiencing the enduring love his father had felt for his mother. Because his life was bereft of close friends or lovers, he’d assumed he was a shallower, less steadfast man than the late viscount.
This past week made him wonder if perhaps he could want one woman alone. If she was the right woman.
Jonas struggled to banish the disturbing reflections. “Doing it too brown, amore mio. You’re scheming something.”
“Not I, sir,” she said without great force. A half-smile hovered around her lush red lips. Damn it, he didn’t trust that smile. Her gaze flickered to where his interest was visible and the smile intensified.
“I hope your evil plan involves two of us in that bed before much longer,” he grated out.
Her smile faded and she shot him a surprisingly searching look under long lashes. He was astonished to realize that beneath her teasing, she was nervous. Why the hell should she be nervous?
Before he could ask, she burst into speech. “Please take off your clothes and lie on the bed.”
Alertness tightened every muscle. Why should a request likely to elicit immediate cooperation make her skittish? He kept his voice neutral. Whatever this was about, he realized it was important. He needed to keep his wits about him. Difficult at the best of times with Sidonie.
“Let me blindfold you first.”
Her jaw firmed. “No.”
Ah. It seemed she finally rebelled. He should have expected this earlier. He wondered why he didn’t insist on his way as he had every other time she’d objected to the blindfold. Perhaps because his skin tightened with excitement at the prospect of temporarily surrendering control on this, their last night together. Perhaps because she’d demonstrated that she trusted him so many times, he owed her a return of the favor. His stomach curdled at the idea of making love to her face to face with no hindrances, but he stifled his qualms.
With any woman but Sidonie, he’d insist on his will prevailing. With Sidonie, he was willing to allow her some leeway. He wouldn’t let her go too far.
“As you wish.” Without shifting his attention from her, he dropped the shirt to the floor.