She reached for the box with trembling hands, opened it, and gasped, so stunned that she fumbled and nearly dropped it.
Nestled on a bed of velvet was a diamond choker and matching earrings, and she knew exactly where she’d last seen them. It had been back in Cincinnati, the night he’d brought her dinner from Jean-Robert at Pigalls. She’d left the office late, taken her usual path past Tiffany’s to collect her car from the corner lot. There’d been a new window display up, and she’d been briefly captivated by the elegance of the simply set stones. She’d paused, gazing in the window at the matching pieces. Wondering, with feminine curiosity, what kind of man showered what kind of woman with such jewels. Wondering if she’d ever get so much as a diamond ring on her finger, or even a plain wedding band.
He must have been somewhere behind her, watching her.
Just as he must have been at Macy’s.
I take care of what is mine, he’d told her when he’d handed her the keys to the BMW.
Indeed.
As she lifted the glittering strand of diamonds from the box, a small slip of paper fell out. She caught it as it wafted toward the floor.
Four words in ancient script, an arrogantly slanted scrawl.
Accept these, accept me.
Well, she thought, blinking, that was certainly direct and to the point.
She held the glittering stones in her hands for a long time, looking at them but not really seeing them. No longer really thinking but opening her heart, feeling, wondering. Hearing an echo of Gwen’s words: Will you be able to live with yourself if you don’t let yourself have a happy-now, and end up having had nothing at all?
Eventually she placed the box back on the bed and slipped on the panties and bra.
Stepped into the clingy black dress, tugged it over her hips, and zipped the tiny side zipper.
Perched on the edge of the bed, she strapped on the dainty, sexy shoes.
Then she reached for the box, donned the earrings, and fastened the strand of cool stones around her throat.
Adam had just stepped out of the shower when he heard a soft tap on his bedchamber door.
He hoped like bloody hell it wasn’t another maid. When he’d returned from his ride, there’d been dozens of them loitering about in the great hall. While he was accustomed to women throwing themselves at him, he wasn’t accustomed to them staring with such unnerving intensity directly at his crotch. Hard. As if they were trying to see through the leather to what lay beneath, or rather, stood beneath, because the damn thing was never going to go down until he’d had Gabrielle beneath him at least a hundred times.
“Who is it?” he called warily.
When he heard the soft reply, his eyes flared, then narrowed. With a lazy smile and slow deliberation, he dropped the towel he’d just knotted loosely about his waist.
“No holds barred tonight, ka-lyrra,” he murmured, too soft for her to hear. He’d not thought to see her until dinner. But she was here, outside his door, outside his bedchamber. She might as well have strolled up to the lion’s lair, nicely basted in fresh, warm blood.
His mouth was suddenly fiercely dry, his breathing harsh and shallow.
Would she be wearing them? Was she ready to admit? To take him? This woman who’d been raised on the worst tales of him, some of which were completely true?
And she knew that. She knew he’d razed the Highlands after Morganna; he’d seen the look on her face when she’d asked him about the date Morganna had died. She knew that, for all the things that were inaccurate in her Books, there were some that weren’t. She knew that in nearly six thousand years he’d done a thing or two to merit some of the bad press he’d received. Gabrielle was no fool.
Had she seen past it? Had she seen him?
Would she have those damn diamonds on? He was almost afraid to open the door and see, so badly did he want her, given completely, without reservation, tonight, now, this moment. He needed it. Felt like he’d been waiting six thousand years for it. Christ, what was happening to him? Had he ever felt like this before?
He realized he was glaring at the door and had no idea how long he’d been doing it. He shook his head, muttering a curse at his idiocy. For Christ’s sake, he was Adam Black. Not some bumbling mortal lad.
“Come in,” he called, and if it came out a little more guttural than usual, he deigned not to notice. He stood at his full height of six feet four and a half inches, legs splayed, arms folded over his chest, wearing nothing but the ancient gold adornments of his royal house.
The door opened slowly—he felt like it was opening in slow frigging motion—but then there she was, and he felt as if someone had slammed a fist into his gut.
He was pleased to see she appeared to be suffering the same sensation.
She froze, her lovely green-gold eyes flying wide. “Y-y-you’re . . . n-n—” she sputtered. Tried again, “Oh. Heavens. My. Goodness.” Wet her lips. Took a deep breath. “Holy shit, you’re naked. And oh—OH!” Her gaze dipped then flew back up to his face, and her eyes went even wider.
A smile of pure masculine triumph curved his lips. “Ah, yes,” he purred. “And you, my sweet Gabrielle, are wearing my diamonds.”
Gabby stood in the doorway, her heart hammering wildly.
Two-hundred-pounds-plus of gorgeous naked man stood before her, and he was so savagely, intensely beautiful that she couldn’t tear her gaze away. Had to remind herself that oxygen was good for a girl, so breathe, O’Callaghan. She looked up and down, up and down again, little breaths slamming together in her throat.
Abruptly, she knew that after this night she was never going to be the same again. Nothing was ever going to be the same. Oh, yes, the man could define himself as the dawning of an epoch if he wanted to. There was, quite simply, before Adam and after Adam.
He stepped forward, moving with sleek animal grace, a predatory glint in his dark gaze. He was hunter and she was food. And from the look in his eyes he was going to devour her.
He stalked to her, towering over her, staring down, reaching out to lightly touch the choker at her neck with his fingertips. “You know what this means,” he said softly, intensely. “Mine. You accept it. You’re mine. No, shush.” He pressed a finger to her lips. “Don’t say a word. Just let me look at you. I’ve been waiting to see you in this dress.”
Circling behind her, he pushed the door gently closed, and she heard the metallic clicking of tumblers as he locked it. He padded slowly around her.
“Christ, you’re beautiful, Gabrielle. Do you know how badly I want you? Do you know what fantasies I’ve been playing through my mind about you? Do you know how many times I jacked off, trying to get rid of this bloody eternal hard-on? Knowing that the only thing that was going to help was you?”
He padded another slow naked circle around her. “And now here you are. In my chambers. Locked in. And you’re not getting out until I say you are. And I may never say it.”
He paused behind her, leaned close, front to her backside, rubbed his cock against her ass in that sexy dress. The dress looked every bit as good on her as he’d known it would, clinging to every lush curve. Felt good too. Breath hissed between his teeth at the contact; it was so excruciatingly pleasurable that it burned. He sucked in a sharp breath and yanked himself back, knowing that if he touched her again like that it would be all over.
“And those shoes,” he purred, his gaze dropping down over her ass, down the shapely curves of the backs of her thighs, to her slender ankles with those little dainty straps tied around them.
“I watched you looking at them in Macy’s. You’ve got the sweetest legs and ass, Gabrielle. When I first saw you in Cincinnati, you had on shorts and sandals on your feet. Even your painted little toes turned me on.”
He circled around in front of her. Her eyes were wide, deliciously unfocused. Her lips were parted and she was panting softly, her chest rising and falling gently.
He pressed the tip of his finger to her lips, pushed inside. She closed thos
e lush lips on it, sucking, and such raw heat lanced through him that, for a moment, he couldn’t move. He finally managed to withdraw his finger, sliding it slowly from that luscious pucker, then traced a damp path over the shape of her mouth, across her jaw, down her neck, to the lush valley of her cleavage.
He should seduce her, he should woo her with kisses, he should gently entice, lead her slowly yet inexorably down the path to her ultimate and costly capitulation.
But it was too late; he’d waited too long, and there was a thing he could no longer deny himself. A thing he’d been thinking about too much while riding today. A thing he needed. Right now. And it pissed him off, the hold it had on him, how savagely he wanted it. To know the taste of her, to have her on his tongue, captured in his immortal memory. If somehow, for some reason, she managed to stop him this night, at least he’d have gotten this.
“For the record, Irish,” he informed her tightly, just in case she got the wrong idea, “I kneel to no one.” Then he dropped to his knees at her feet, shoved her dress up, gathered a fistful of silky material in each hand, and pushed her back against the door, pinning her to it by the fabric.
Gabby leaned weakly against the door, gasping for breath. The exotic scent of him was filling her nostrils, making her dizzy. Merely looking at him naked had gotten her so intensely aroused that she knew what he was about to find—she was wet; she was so wet she was almost embarrassed by it. She was ready right now; she didn’t even need a kiss, or any other foreplay, for that matter. She certainly didn’t know if she could survive what it looked like he was about to do. She just wanted him inside her. When he’d circled her like some big dark beast, talking to her, telling her how much he wanted her, she’d nearly begun begging.
And now he was on his knees between her legs, her dress rucked up to her waist, exposing her to him, naked but for a lacy scrap of silk slipping between her legs.
Oops, make that naked, she amended with a half-laugh, half-sob, as he dragged that lacy bit of fabric from her body with his teeth, tugging it down, down, teeth grazing her lightly, pausing to nip, scattering tiny little love bites over her skin, sending waves of chills skittering up her spine.
She felt drugged, drunken, intoxicated on passion. She had no idea how she’d managed to put him off this long, or why, and was suddenly astounded at how much time she’d wasted.
“I’m going to taste every inch of you before this night is through,” he purred.
And then he began making good on that promise, with long, hot, velvety strokes of his tongue up the insides of her thighs. Lazy sweet nips on the plump inner parts of her legs, hot, openmouthed kisses on the delicate skin of her hips. He left no inch of her skin unkissed, unnibbled.
Then a hand was pushing her legs apart and his dark head was between them. When he flicked his tongue over the tiny bud nestled in soft folds, she grabbed great fistfuls of his silky, dark hair and shuddered, leaning weakly back against the door.
“Stay standing, ka-lyrra. If those sweet knees give out and you come down on the floor, I’ll fuck you right there.”
She let her knees buckle instantly, barely smothering a laugh.
“Aw, bloody hell, Gabrielle, I wanted this to last,” he cursed, rolling instantly with her, catching her, going down beneath her to absorb the impact of her tumble.
But she was beyond niceties, she’d been waiting a lifetime for this. Couldn’t wait one moment more. Sprawled atop his great, big, naked body, she wriggled against him until she’d cinched his hot, hard erection right where she wanted it, the swollen ridge of him riding with delicious friction against her. God, she was so close, a few good rubs . . .
“Oh, no,” he hissed, instantly understanding. “You are not getting yourself there. Not without me inside you the first time.”
“Then I’d suggest,” she panted, “you hurry up and get inside me.”
He made a choking sound, a husky, erotic-sounding laugh-growl. “Ah, Gabrielle,” he purred, gripping her by the hips and rolling her beneath him on the soft carpet, “I’m never going to get enough of you, am I?”
“Not if you keep going so slow,” she snapped testily.
“Spread your legs,” he demanded. He stretched his body the full length of hers, supporting his weight on his forearms, kneeing her legs wider for him. “Lift them around my hips.”
She obeyed instantly.
“Lock your ankles. This isn’t going to be easy.”
A delirious little shiver rocked her at his words. She knew that. She’d known it the first time she’d felt him pressed up against her bottom, there in Cincinnati, the morning he’d burst through her door, and it had been one of the things wreaking havoc with her senses ever since. All of her boyfriends had been big, tall men. She liked big men, always had, liked a bit of dominance. And Adam Black was big and bad to the bone, all around. She’d told the maids the truth, sort of; he wasn’t in proportion, he was larger there than a woman would expect. “Somehow, I don’t think anything about you is ever easy,” she managed to gasp out.
“No it’s not, but I think easy would bore you, ka-lyrra. I promise you I’ll never bore you.”
And then his hand was between her legs, a finger slipping into her sleek heat, pressing in, pressing upward, searching for her barrier. Then two fingers, and she was only dimly aware when he breached the thin membrane, the fleeting pain eclipsed by the pleasure of him moving inside her. Her hips arched helplessly up, wanting more, needing, aching for all of him.
And then his hand was gone and the thick head of his penis was nudging against her soft folds, and he was pushing himself inside her. She mewled, a whimper of distress, trying to adjust, wiggling, trying to accept, but he was too big and she was too tight.
“Easy, Gabrielle. Relax,” he gritted.
She tried, but she couldn’t; it was instinctive to resist, and they waged a silent sexual battle for a few moments, where he hardly gained another inch. Her muscles were bearing down on him, resisting the steely intrusion.
He sucked in a hissing breath through clenched teeth. “Gabrielle, you’re killing me; you have to let me in.”
“I’m trying,” she wailed.
With a muffled curse, he abruptly shifted her, pushing her legs apart and up, resting her ankles on his shoulders, tilting her pelvis up and back, ruthlessly exposing her.
Fisting a hand in her hair close to her scalp, he tugged her head back and slanted his mouth hard over hers, taking her in a deep, soul-claiming kiss, his hot, velvety tongue probing, retreating. She was too stunned by the kiss, by the fierce, possessive savagery of it, to tense when he impaled her, which was, she realized, precisely why he’d done it.
He drove himself deep inside her with one slow, smooth, relentless penetration, filling her so completely that she screamed into his mouth, but he kept his lips sealed over hers, swallowing the cry. He stayed like that for long minutes, in her to the hilt, thoroughly invading every soft warm crevice of her, but not moving, just kissing her, his hot tongue tangling with hers. He was so large that it took long minutes for her to adjust, to ease and accommodate. Long minutes while he stayed still, occupying his territory, not surveying the perimeters until she was whimpering against his lips, begging him to move. Now that the pressure felt good, she was feeling an entirely different kind of pressure, that needed lots of moving to sate.
“I’m in you,” he purred. “Ah, Christ, I’m in you.” Then—finally—he began moving, an erotic little circular motion of his hips—not a thrusting but a slow deep rubbing inside her. Grinding himself into her, backing off just a bit, grinding again, each time nudging the tight bud of her clitoris with exquisite friction.
His intense, slow movements abraded some crazy spot inside her she’d not even known she had, and all her muscles clenched again on him, locking, shuddering, and when she came it was like nothing she’d ever felt before, an explosion so deep inside her, so shatteringly intense, that a visceral cry was torn from her throat.
“Bloody hell,”
he roared, his whole body going tight. He clamped his hands down on her hips, trying to back off, to pull out, not anywhere near ready to come yet, but it was too late, the way her body was closing around him was more than he could stand and he exploded inside her.
Hours later, Adam propped himself up on an elbow and stared down at Gabrielle, pondering what made beauty.
He thought he was beginning to understand. It wasn’t symmetry of features; it wasn’t perfection. It was uniqueness. That which one person had that no other possessed. That which was only their own. Perhaps Gabrielle’s nose was like a thousand others, but they weren’t on her face, with her eyes, with her cheekbones and hair. Nor were those noses graced with her many expressions, crinkling so charmingly when she laughed, flaring so haughtily when she was irritated.
He’d run the gamut of her expressions tonight. He’d seen her demanding, aggressive with lust, eyes glittering wildly as she’d arched and bucked beneath him. He’d seen her soft, sweetly yielding when he’d taken her from behind, on her hands and knees in front of the full-length mirror in the boudoir. He’d held her head back by a fist in her long silky hair so he could watch her face in the mirror. Watch those slanted green-gold eyes narrow and gleam like a cat in heat as she purred with pleasure. Watch her full breasts swaying as his heavy testicles slapped rhythmically against her ass and thighs. Watch her watching him do it to her. He’d seen her dreamy and lost as he’d licked and lapped her to peak after shuddering peak. And he’d even seen her looking almost frightened as he’d wrung yet one more delicious shudder from her.
If he’d had his full Fae power he would have eased her virgin soreness; as it was, he’d had to stop because she couldn’t take any more. So he’d gently cleansed her as she lay sated in bed, built up the fire, then gone down to the kitchen for food, realizing they’d missed dinner. In fact, dinner had been over for many, many hours.
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