Once again, she grasped his beautiful behind, urging him closer. He smiled patiently and pushed back on one arm. “This isn’t a good position. I need to move you.”
“I thought—me underneath you, isn’t that right?”
“It’s the worst position to lose your virginity in,” he explained, planting baby kisses across her shoulder.
“I think I’ll like it.”
Gabriel pulled back. “Not for your first time; it would be too easy for me to hurt you without realizing it.”
Hurt? she thought.
His heart stuttered at the worry that flitted across her eyes. He placed his hands on either side of her face. “I am not going to hurt you, Julianne. I am not a teenage boy. I’m not him. I’m going to be very, very gentle. That’s why we can’t do it like this.”
“Why?”
“The angles. My weight on top of you, even if I’m distributing it to my knees. Gravity. If you’re on top, you can control the movements, the depth of penetration. I’m giving the control to you. Trust me,” he breathed, kissing her ear.
He continued to caress her, murmuring adorations against her smooth, almost translucent skin. Then he wrapped his arms around her back, lifting her from the bed and switching positions so that he was flat on his back and she lay on top of him.
As she rested on his chest, he whispered Dante’s words to her in Italian:
“Color di perle ha quasi in forma, quale
convene a donna aver, non for misura;
ella è quanto de ben pò far natura;
per esemplo di lei bieltà si prova.
De li occhi suoi, come ch’ella li mova,
escono spirti d’amore inflammati,
che fèron li occhi a qual che allor la guati,
e passan sì che ‘l cor ciascun retrova:
voi le vedete Amor pinto nel viso,
là ‘ve non pote alcun mirarla fiso.”
Gabriel praised her beauty and her goodness, comparing her to a pearl and declaring that Love, itself, was featured in her visage. Julia whispered her thanks for his beautiful words, stilling so that she could hear his heart beat under her ear. She was overwhelmed to think that she held this person, this man she had loved for so long, in her arms. She couldn’t stop touching him, tracing every muscle, every sinew of taut perfection. She traced his eyebrows, the indentation above the center of his sensuous upper lip, his sideburns, his ears…
He reached up to kiss her, tracing her lips with his tongue and drawing her plump lower lip into his mouth. For a few moments there was skin on skin, two naked bodies flush and prone. Julia’s hands continued to explore Gabriel’s form, his face, his chest, his hips. She began to stroke his erection softly, hesitantly, pressing kiss after kiss to his neck and throat as she worked him with her hand.
He growled in her ear, signaling his pleasure. A surge of confidence propelled her to stroke him more surely, quickening her pace as she brought her lips to his chest, kissing his pectorals and his tattoo. He was panting now.
“Let me worship you with my body, Julia,” he rasped, not wanting his impending satisfaction to take place in her hand.
She released him as he grasped her thighs, gently coaxing them apart so that they rested on either side of his narrow hips. She felt him beneath her, lifting of his own accord between her legs. She shifted slightly, and a worried look shadowed her lovely face.
Gabriel placed his hand on her heart. The little beating thing inside her spluttered frenetically at his touch and sped up. “Are you all right?”
She leaned forward, allowing her hair to hang about her face like a screen.
He reached up to push her hair behind her shoulders so that he could see her better. “Please don’t hide. I want to watch you.”
Julia bit her lower lip and looked away.
“What?”
She shook her head.
“Sweetheart, now is not the time to be shy. Tell me.”
She stared at his chest, trying very hard not to look at the dragon as it mocked her with its permanence. “This isn’t how I imagined it,” she whispered, so low he had to strain to hear her.
“Then tell me how.”
“I thought you’d be…over me.” His banner over me is love.
“I like being on top, I won’t deny it, but you’re very small, sweetheart, and very delicate. I’m worried that—”
“I know I made you wait a long time, Gabriel.” Her voice was just above a whisper. “It will be all right if you can’t be careful with me. If you need to be…aggressive.”
Her remark disturbed him deeply, for behind the words he recognized not her voice but Simon’s. Of course that’s what she thinks—that’s how he treated her. Men are dogs with no self-control, and she’s just a plaything for their sexual release. The idea sickened him, but he fought to keep revulsion from showing on his face. He placed his hand on her cheek and gently stroked her.