“Faster,” she sighed as he fumbled at the fabric. “Hurry.”
The buttons were stubborn beneath his touch. Or perhaps it was his choice to move with such slowness. “I will not allow you to tempt me to speed,” he whispered in her ear as he worked, the breath of the words sending shivers of anticipation through her. “I want the whole night.” He pressed a kiss to the curve of her shoulder, his tongue coming out to stroke along the skin there as the fabric of her bodice came loose and she caught it to her chest.
He lifted one of her hands, kissing her palm, then worrying the pad of her index finger with his teeth. Her dress fell to the floor, his gaze falling to her fine-spun chemise and beautifully boned corset, desire flaring hot and wonderful. “I want longer.”
She sighed at the words. Of course, she knew they couldn’t have longer. But they could have tonight, and he was enough to make her forget everything else.
Tomorrow, they would return to their lives—he, to the one he’d too long missed, and she to the one she’d too long deserved.
He guided her hands to the bedpost, leaving her there as he worked at the ties of her corset, his fingers pulling at silken strings, loosening the piece until it dropped to her feet, and his strong touch sent her silk chemise after it.
She was naked in the clocked stockings he’d bought her, the ones she’d imagined him removing when she’d donned them—even as she’d desperately tried to ignore the thought.
And his hands, those strong, wonderful hands that she’d come to love for their gentleness as much as their force, slid over her bare skin as his lips settled on the curve of her shoulder.
Not hands. Hand.
Always one hand. Always the good hand.
She turned to him. “Wait.”
He waited. Because she told him to. And she loved him all the more for it. She lifted his wounded hand to her lips, pressing a kiss to his knuckles, letting her tongue slide out to dip into the valleys between them. He watched, his eyes dark with passion, but something was missing. Something she might not have seen if she had not been looking.
He couldn’t feel her.
She turned the hand over, pressing a kiss to his palm. Whispering there, “What have we done to you?”
He snatched his hand away, but she would not let him escape.
Instead, she lifted his other hand and repeated her ministrations until his breath caught in his throat and he shifted with desire and want and a dozen kinds of lust.
Shock rocketed through her. His hand. They’d stolen it from him.
“Temple,” she said softly, reaching for it. Loving him more for it.
“No,” he resisted, turning her once more, returning her hands to the bedpost. Kissing the spot behind her ear, the place where neck met jaw. Where shoulder met neck. Her spine.
Distracting her with pleasure and wickedness. “You are trembling.”
And she was, too wrecked by his touch, by his nearness, to stop. To return the conversation to his hand. “I can’t—” she started. “It is too much.”
He growled, low and dark and promising at her ear. “It is not nearly enough.”
He kissed his way down her spine, the tip of his tongue licking and swirling as he marked his path. As he marked her, as cleanly and clearly as if he’d done it with a needle and ink.
And when he reached the place where back met bottom, he worried the soft, untouched skin there until she was gasping her pleasure. Only then, once she’d given herself over to his touch, to his kiss, did he turn her to face him.
She should not have been surprised to find him there, on his knees staring up at her once more, but she was, a thread of panic and desperation coursing through her. A desperate desire to repeat the events of the previous morning in the ring. A desperate desire never to repeat them again.
“Temple,” she whispered, reaching for him, letting him catch her hand in his, letting him press it to his cheek.
“William,” he corrected her.
Her gaze flew to his. “But you—”
“You’re the only one who thinks of me as such. The only one who has ever seen me.”
The truth ached. Reminding her of all she’d done. Of all this night could be. Of all it couldn’t be. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, tears in her eyes. “I never—”
He came to his feet with stunning grace, pulling her to him. “No. You mustn’t regret it. Your seeing me has changed everything. It’s changed my life. It’s changed me.” He kissed her, long and thorough, and added, “Christ, Mara, of course it’s you. It’s always been you. It always will be.”
The words shattered her. “I cannot stand.”
“Then don’t. I have you.”
She fell into his strength, and he laid her back on the bed, spreading her legs wide as he sank between them, draping them over his shoulders, leaving long, lush kisses along the soft skin of her inner thighs, coming closer and closer to delivering on their promise as she writhed on the silk bedcovers and wondered how it was that she had come to be here. Come to deserve him.