Goddess of the Hunt (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #1)

With his free hand, he palmed one breast through the shivering silk. He drew his thumb over her nipple. She gasped again, this time with pleasure.

“You didn’t need saving,” he said, sliding his thumb over the silk in tiny, maddening circles. Waves of sensation flooded through her, heat rippling beneath the gooseflesh that covered her neck, her belly, her thighs. Lucy bit her lip and closed her eyes. “Look at me,” he growled. “Look at me, damn it.” He gave her nipple a sharp pinch. Her eyes flew open.

“You don’t need my money.” He tore at the strap of her nightgown until the fragile lace gave way. The silk slid down, baring one breast.

“You don’t need my gifts.” He covered her breast with his warm, heavy hand, teasing the taut peak of her nipple, rolling it under his thumb until a tiny cry escaped her throat. He pressed his body against hers, pinning her to the tree with his weight. The heat of his arousal pulsed against her belly.

“You don’t need my protection,” he said through gritted teeth. His hand shot to her thigh, gathering up fabric, hitching up the hem of her nightgown in impatient tugs. His eyes bored into her.

“Damn it, Lucy, you are going to need me. I will make you need me.” He lowered his head to her breast, drawing her nipple into his mouth.

Pleasure surged through her—hot, white light arcing through the darkness. His tongue flickered over the sensitive peak, making her writhe with a sweet, torturous ache. One of her hands remained pinned above her, but she reached for him with the other, digging her fingers into his neck.

His hand tightened around her hip, then snaked beneath the silk of her nightgown, pushing it up to her waist. He curled his hand under her thigh and lifted it, wrapping her leg over his hip. Icy cold rushed under the silk, over her thighs and between her legs. Then he pulled his hips back slightly, swept his hand over the crest of her thigh and plunged his fingers into the gap between them.

There was no more cold, only fire. Liquid heat coursing through her veins, churning in her belly and that space between her legs. He slid a finger into her. Then two. His touch was rough and artless, but she was slick and ready, and it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough. His thumb found her most sensitive bit of flesh, and her mouth fell open in a startled cry. He clamped his mouth over hers, filling it with his tongue. Lifting her with his fingers and working her with his thumb until she nearly came apart.

And then it was gone. His hand was gone. His lips were gone. He leaned on her, pressing his chest to hers, all his weight bearing down on her aching br**sts, and she writhed against him, desperate for more. She heard him gasping for breath against her ear, felt him fumbling with the buttons of his breeches. Then she felthim , hot and heavy and jerking with impatience against her thigh. She arched toward him instinctively, but he grabbed her hip, pushing her back down. His other hand tightened over hers, still holding her arm above her head.

“Tell me you need me.” His eyes held her, dark and fathomless as the midnight sky.

“I—” Her voice failed. She couldn’t think how to speak, couldn’t remember how to make her mouth form words. Speech had no meaning. Her lips’ sole purpose was to kiss; her tongue existed to lick and suck. She burrowed her face into his neck and ran her tongue along his throat. He inhaled with a sharp hiss and pressed his thumb deeper into the flesh of her hip.

“Tell me you need me,” he insisted. He teased her with his shaft, brushing against her, and when he pulled away, a strangled sob wrenched from her throat.

“Jeremy,” she cried. “Please.”

“Tell me.”

“I need you.” God, did she need him. She was nothing but a quivering mass of desire and longing andneed . “I need y—”

He crushed his mouth to hers, cutting off her words, cutting off her air. He released her arm and grasped her hips with both hands, lifting her up. In one quick, desperate thrust, he sheathed himself inside her, filling her. Filling that aching void of need. She dug her fingernails into his neck and held on tight. He withdrew an inch, tilted her hips, and thrust into her again, burying himself to the hilt.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

This was where they belonged. Together, in the dark. In firelit rooms and shadowed gardens and deep, black ebony wardrobes. Fighting themselves, fighting each other. Fighting to get closer. Fighting to become one.

He braced his head against her shoulder, grasping her hips to thrust deeper still. Harder, faster. Again, again, again. Until the delicious tension threading through her pulled tight and snapped, releasing her into the darkness.