Page 48 of Winter's Waltz
Her fingertips dug into his muscles. “You say everything I want to hear.”
“Wrong,” he said tenderly, gazing up at her as he caressed her waist and kissed back down her scar. “I say everything youneedto hear. It is true, Gen. You are bold and intelligent and brave. You have overcome more than I can imagine to be where you are, and in a world dominated by men, you are daring to rule your own kingdom.”
“Fine job I am doing of it.” She let out a bitter laugh. “I haven’t opened yet, and already, I’m in desperate straits.”
“We will discover who is behind these cravenly attacks on you and your business,” he vowed. “One way or another. But that is for another day. Tonight is about pleasure.” He kissed lower, his fingers working the fall of her trousers. “Your complete and absolute pleasure. I am yours to command tonight, empress. Tell me what you want.”
He looked up at her and their gazes clashed and held. Her lips were parted, eyes glazed. She wanted this every bit as much as he did. It would seem they were at each other’s mercies now.
“I want…” she began, then allowed her words to trail off. “Damn it. I do not know, Max. Show me everything. Do what you wish with me. All I want is you.”
He was unprepared for the ferocity of his reaction to those words. Desire flooded him. For a moment, he could not speak.
“Naked,” he finally managed. “I want you stripped bare for me.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
And he stood back, giving her the power once more. Allowing her to make the decisions. She disrobed with surprising haste and finesse. Trousers gone. Stockings gone. He guided her to the chair she had vacated, and she sat.
Max allowed himself a moment to admire her—the turn of her ankles, the elegance of her calves, the fullness of her thighs. The patch of golden curls at the apex of her thighs.Christ, even the arches of her feet and her toes were worthy of admiration. She was smooth and feminine and bold.
Mine.
There was that voice again, rising from deep within.
He could not seem to contain it. His need for her was bigger than he was, consuming him, taking control. He sank to the floor before her once more, ready to worship her.
“Show yourself to me,” he said. “Please.”
He would beg if he needed to. Fortunately, he did not.
She did as he asked. Her knees, which had been pressed together in maidenly shyness, moved apart with painstaking, delicious slowness. And then, all at once, she was revealed. Pink, glistening flesh. Perfection.
He could not wait another moment. His palms traveled over her inner thighs in a caress that left him feeling as if she had branded him. Such softness. Such femininity. So many secrets she hid beneath her trousers and waistcoats and aloof demeanor. He wanted to be the only one who knew them, the one who unlocked each, one by one, the one who kept them forever.
But he did not have forever.
For now, he had tonight.
And for tonight, he would savor.
He slid his touch higher, gliding over her skin, getting nearer to her center, the warmth radiating from her core enough to make him want to hurry in spite of his intentions to the contrary. His questing hands trembled with the force of his ardor as he eased her thighs farther apart.
He dipped his head, pressing a kiss to her inner knee. Then up the same path he had just caressed. Torturing the both of them as he kissed all the way to the swollen bud at the center of her wet heat. He flicked his tongue over her, testing, teasing, tasting.
A guttural oath tore from her, and he would have smiled had he not been so overwhelmed by his own body’s reaction to hers. His heart was pounding, his ballocks drawn tight, every part of him aflame. He swirled his tongue, then pulsed, delivering fluttering, light licks to her pearl.
Her fingers threaded through his hair, grasping, tightening. Showing him she liked what he did. He sucked, the musky sweetness of her on his tongue, filling him with more need. He had never tasted anything better. She was ruining him, and he did not care. She was all he wanted.
And he showed her.
Showed her with his lips and teeth. Showed her so thoroughly, she was bucking against him, tugging at his hair, thrusting into his face. And then she was coming apart splendidly. She cried out his name, quaking beneath his mouth as she spent. He gave her no quarter, showed no mercy. Max wanted everything she had to give and then more. He wanted this night, his touch, the pleasure he gave her, to be imprinted upon her memory as thoroughly and irreversibly as ink on paper.
Which was why he did not stop.
As she rocked beneath him, her breaths emerging as ragged pants, he remained where he was, on his knees before her, worshiping her as thoroughly as he could. When he found a place where she was particularly sensitive—the breath hissing from between her lips and a moan echoing through the room—he worked harder. Licked and sucked and nibbled.
“Oh, Max.”
