Diana’s hand flew to her mouth at DeVere’s unmitigated presumption. While she was certainly guilty of encouraging a harmless flirtation with him, the notion of joining ranks with such as Caroline Capheaton was beyond the pale. With her blood near the boiling point, she spun on her heel and returned to her room. It would be a cold day in hell before she ever allowed herself to be used by such a libertine.
But then again, it was precisely this illicit thought that took root in her subconscious as she returned to her chamber—what it would be like to know such a man as a lover, to give herself up to selfish, lascivious lust, to finally let loose the deep and relentless yearning after a lifetime of suppressed passion?
She recalled the hungry way his blue gaze had devoured her at their very first meeting, and the suggestion that had hung heavily in the air between them. She had thought herself dismissed as a potential lover until overhearing his profession of interest to Edward, a confession that inspired within her equal parts loathing and lust.
Feeling stifled, Diana flung open the French doors and stepped onto the balcony into the moonlight. She stood there in the deep silence of the night, lost in her reflections and the illicit visions that kept returning to DeVere. When the damp chill forced her back inside, Diana explored her room, still restless and seeking escape from her disquieting ruminations. She discovered a leather-bound volume of John Donne and opened it at random to The Dream, an unfamiliar work, but one whose theme she hoped might induce sleep. By the end of the first stanza, however, Diana realized her error. The erotic message of the poem was clear.
Unbidden, her mind conjured Donne’s lovers. The man asleep and dreaming of his love only to be awakened by the object of his passion took the form of DeVere. She cast the book aside with a listless sigh before her mind’s eye could invoke what she knew would be the intimately familiar features of his lover.
***
Her footfalls were lost in the plush Turkish carpet of DeVere’s bedchamber. Behind the shield of her hand, the flame of the lone candle flickered as she padded across the room to the massive tester bed. The curtains were drawn back, but the bed was cast in the obscurity of shadow. She wondered briefly if one body or two would be revealed in the faint light of her fluttering flame, yet she moved closer still with bated breath that expelled from her lungs in a soft rush to find him alone. She snuffed the candle, waiting for her vision to adjust. She stood there, pulse racing and heart hammering a rapid tattoo against her breastbone at the thought of him waking to find her there.
He was sprawled on his back, arms outstretched in the confident repose of a king or some other invincible being. A sheet draped over a thigh and a portion of torso left the other half of him bare to her ravenous gaze. She devoured the vision of lean, sculpted muscles that closely resembled a god manifested in all his masculine splendor.
“Enter these arms, for since thou thought’st it best not to dream all my dream, let’s act the rest. You are called forth from my dream,” he whispered. “I knew you would come.”
She stepped back with a gasp. “But how could you know that?”
“Because this is ineludible, you and I. You can’t escape it.” He reached out a hand, his voice husky with desire. “Come to me now, my magnificent huntress.”
The words were an irresistible magnetic lure that drew her to him. Untying the sash at her waist, the silk wrapper slithered from her shoulders to pool softly at her feet.
His pupils flared beneath sleep-heavy lids as she stood before him, unabashed in her nakedness. She let him look his fill, his lazy inspection sending mixed anticipation and trepidation washing over her in tiny waves. He peeled back the sheet and sat up. Her gaze was riveted at once to the jutting proof of his arousal. She licked her lips, the wicked promise of unknown delights filling her with a sharp-edged hunger.
He drew her into his arms, and the game began. Their mouths met and melded, his tongue darted over her lips, his teeth grazing them lightly. He pulled on the lower, sucking it into his mouth and then urged her to open to a hungry, breath-stealing match of capture and release that heated her blood. Their tongues met in a simulated lovers’ dance that became an explosion of sublime sensation, sending blazing jolts to her belly and a hot pool of moisture between her thighs.
He cupped her breast, teasing her nipple with his thumb. His mouth broke away from hers to ply hot, open kisses to her throat that left her gasping. Of their own volition, her hands engaged in a tactile exploration of his body, reveling in the erotic abrasiveness of his coarse hair against her own smooth skin. She roamed his hard chest, the rigid plain of his stomach, the powerful thigh muscles that now encased her hips, pulling her closer, tighter, and anchoring her against him until she could feel the hot pulse of his jutting manhood against her most private place.
He took her hand in his, guiding her to his rigid staff and enclosed her fingers about it. It was thick and hard and hot and pulsing. “I make no secret of how much I want you,” he said, low and hoarse. “Tell me you do, too, Diana. Say you want to take me into your body.”