Diana Palmer Collected 1-6: Soldier of Fortune / Tender Stranger / Enamored / Mystery Man / Rawhide and Lace / Unlikely Lover. Diana Palmer
she was trembling and pleading with him. He moved, dragging his aching body into a sitting position against the headboard, his dark eyes glittering with frank desire. He lifted her over him and guided her, his body rigid with self-control, his face hard with it.
She gasped at the contact and her hands clenched on his shoulders as she found herself looking straight into his eyes.
“You do it,” he told her huskily. “That way you can control the pain.”
She started to argue, but she knew that it was becoming unbearable for him. She swallowed down her fear, closed her eyes, bit her lip and moved. She caught her breath and tried again.
“Help me, Eric,” she begged, guiding his hands to her hips. “Please…oh!”
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” he ground out. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry….” His fingers contracted as his body began to fight his mind. The hunger was exploding in him. He began to tremble, his hands clenched. “Dani…!”
She opened her eyes at the new note in his voice and looked at him. The sight of his face took her mind off the pain. She watched him, fascinated. His eyes opened and found hers. Then his body seemed to take control away from his mind. His face changed, his breathing changed, the movements of his body intensified as she stared into his wild face. He arched and his face contorted, and all at once she realized what she was seeing and blushed wildly.
He was still for an instant, then he shuddered. His eyes opened slowly, looking into hers. His body still throbbed, his breathing unsteady and strained. His hands on her hips became caressing.
“I thought…you were dying,” she whispered.
“I felt as if I were,” he whispered back. His voice trembled, like his body, in the aftermath. His eyes searched her face. “You were watching me. Were you shocked?”
“Yes,” she confessed, but she didn’t look away.
“Was it bad?” he asked.
“Yes. Until I started watching you.”
He brought her fully against him, still a part of him, and held her gently, with her face against his damp chest. “I think that was what pushed me over the edge,” he murmured. “I saw you watching me and my head flew off.”
“You looked as though you were being tortured to death.”
“And you can’t imagine pleasure so intense?” he chided her gently. He laughed, but it wasn’t a taunting laugh. His hands caressed her back. “When I’ve rested for a few minutes I’m going to watch it happen to you.”
“Will it?”
“Oh, yes. You just needed a few more seconds than I could give you. The second time,” he added, easing her away from him, “always takes longer, for a man.”
She looked into his eyes. “You’re my lover now,” she declared.
He looked down where they were still joined. Her eyes followed his and she blushed furiously.
“I’m still your lover,” he told her. His hands pressed against her thighs, dragging her even closer, and all at once something happened that even her inexperienced body understood immediately.
He laughed softly. “Yes, you know what’s going to happen now, don’t you?” he growled. He shifted, easing her down onto the mattress as he loomed over her.
“Now,” he said hotly, blazing with renewed passion. “Now watch what I’m going to do to you. Look!”
Her eyes dilated as she watched him. But the sensations were unexpected, and she cried out helplessly, her body lifting toward him as if it recognized its master.
“Shhhh,” he hissed, smiling as her face began to contort. “Yes, you’re going to feel it for me this time. I’m going to make you feel it, just as it happened to me. Yes, Dani, yes, yes…!”
She throbbed with a new rhythm. She moved and twisted and tried to throw him off, and tried to bring him back; she cried and pleaded and bit and whimpered and finally threw back her head and moaned so harshly that she sounded as if every bone in her body had snapped suddenly. And then it was all free fall. Bonelessness. Purple oblivion.
When her eyes opened again she was exhausted. He sat on the bed beside her with a warm, damp cloth in his hands, bathing her gently.
“Is it always like that for men?” she asked, needing to know.
He shook his head. “It’s never been like that for me with anyone. The second time was even more intense. I cried out.”
Tears touched her eyes as she looked up at him. “Thank you.”
“Oh, God, don’t,” he implored her, bending to kiss her. Once he kissed her he couldn’t seem to stop. He put the cloth aside and took her into his arms, holding her, touching her face, brushing his lips over every soft, flushed inch of her face with a touch that was more healing than passionate.
She trembled in his arms, and they tightened, and she gloried in the delicious warmth of his skin against hers, the feel of her soft breasts being gently crushed by his hard-muscled chest.
“You cried out, too,” he said at her ear. “Just as you felt it. I had to cover your mouth with mine so that no one would hear.”
“Even in my dreams it never happened like that,” she confessed.
“I’m glad it happened with me,” he told her, lifting his head. “Thank you for waiting for me.”
She smiled slowly. “I’m glad I waited.”
“I didn’t use anything,” he said then. “Do you want to see a doctor tomorrow, or do you want me to take care of it until we get back to the States? A wife I can handle, but not a baby. Not yet.”
“Then, could you…?” She hesitated. “I’d rather see my own doctor.”
“Okay.” He bent and brushed his mouth over hers.
“Do you want children eventually?” she asked because it was important.
He brushed the hair away from her eyes. “Perhaps,” he said finally. “Someday.”
“Too much, too soon?” she murmured dryly.
“Getting used to a wife is enough for now,” he said. He let his eyes wander slowly over her. “You have a beautiful body.”
“So have you.”
He kissed her softly. “We’d better get some sleep. And, sadly enough, I do mean sleep.” He sighed as he rose, cloth in hand. “I’m not prepared for anything else until we go into town. Unless…there are other ways if you really want…”
She blushed wildly and changed the subject. “Where are we getting married?”
“In a little chapel down the street.” He grinned. “They’re open at 10:00 a.m. We’ll be waiting on the doorstep.”
“You aren’t sorry?” she asked as he started into the bathroom.
He turned, his body open for her inspection, his face faintly smiling. He shook his head. “Are you?”
She shook her head, too. He laughed and went on into the bathroom. Minutes later she was curled up in his arms, both of them without a stitch on, the lights off and the sounds of the city at night purring in through the window.
“You can have one of my undershirts if you like,” he said gently.
“I’d rather sleep like this, if it won’t bother you,” she murmured.
“I prefer it this way, too,” he confessed. He drew her closer. “Breathing may be a little difficult, and I may die of a heart attack trying not to indulge myself a third time, but I prefer it like this. Good night, lieveling.”
“Good night, Eric.”