by Miranda Lee
And then there it was, an experience that was almost frightening in its intensity, gripping at her flesh excruciatingly as every nerve-ending seemed to balance on a knife-edge before abruptly shattering, seemingly splitting her asunder. Gasp upon shuddering gasp broke from her throat as the sharply electric sensations reverberated around Elliot.
He cried out too, and she felt his release, felt the warm pulsating flood as his body blended even more totally with hers.
She slumped forward, her cheek against his shoulder, her chest still heaving. It took ages for her heartbeat to slow down and by the time it did a heavy blanket of contentment was already beginning to envelop her. Elliot’s arms moved to slide around her back, holding her close.
‘You’re fantastic,’ he said softly. ‘Do you know that?’
‘I never realised,’ she murmured against his shoulder.
‘Realised that you were fantastic?’
‘No. That sex could be like that.’ She let out a long, shuddering sigh, pressing soft lips to his skin.
‘Not sex, Audrey. Making love. We made love...’
A lump of emotion claimed her chest and tears pricked at her eyes. He was still her gallant knight...always saying and doing the right thing. What more could a woman ask for?
His heart? a relentless little voice whispered.
Oh, shut up, came her mental retort, fierce and angry. This is reality here, not some romantic fantasy!
Her head jerked up; she was determined not to let schoolgirl dreams spoil this time she had with Elliot. For who knew how soon it would end? He was always telling her to make her own decisions, forge her own future. Well, her future had to start with the present and the present was Elliot.
‘What is it?’ he asked, startled perhaps by the look of determination on her face.
‘Elliot...’
‘Yes?’
‘How...how...’ Her voice dried up, her courage failing her. Self-disgust made her look down. So much for forging her own future! She couldn’t even put a voice to a simple statement of desire.
‘How what?’ he said teasingly. ‘Come on, Audrey. Just say it. I can assure you I’m not shockable.’
A burst of spirit seized her and her head snapped up. But on meeting his dancing eyes she flushed. ‘I...I was going to ask...’ She gulped before going on, her voice still sounding croaky. ‘How soon before we could do it again?’
His laughter was soft, his eyes sparkling as he leant forward to place a light kiss on her mouth. ‘Well, you have had rather a draining effect on me, you little minx. Shall we say I’ll probably be recovered by the time we’ve had our bath?’
Her eyes flew wide. ‘Our bath?’
‘Yes, ours,’ he said firmly, and rose, carrying her with him.
* * *
‘I should ring home,’ she said tautly, closing her eyes against the feelings his hands were evoking in her as he gently soaped her breasts. ‘Let them know where I am.’
‘Later,’ he murmured. ‘Now we’re relaxing. Lie back.’
Relaxing? her aroused brain taunted. The man was mad! How could she possibly be relaxed lying naked in a bath with him, spoon fashion, his long muscular legs on either side of her? She felt like a cat on a hot tin roof!
‘I...I don’t feel very relaxed at this moment,’ she choked out.
He chuckled drily and kissed her wet shoulders. ‘You should be. Contrary to popular opinion, water is supposed to be a poor aphrodisiac for women.’
Says who? Audrey thought mutinously.
She stifled a gasp as his soapy fingers brushed once again over her nipples, which were pointing out of the bubbly water straight at the ceiling like twin mountain peaks. ‘Certain parts of me are not in the water,’ she reminded him in a tight little voice.
He laughed but he thankfully moved down on to her ribs and stomach, much less arousing areas of her body. Gradually, under his gentle massaging, she felt the tension unravel out of her muscles, the heat of the water and his hands performing a small miracle in her opinion. A quavering sigh floated from her lips, a sigh of relief and yes, relaxation.
‘Elliot,’ she murmured at last.
‘What?’
‘This is very nice.’
‘So glad you like it,’ he muttered.
‘Don’t you?’ she asked, vaguely aware of the edge in his voice.
‘I think perhaps it’s time we got out.’
‘All right,’ she said dreamily.
He lifted her wet body from the bath, her legs and arms floppy. She actually yawned and heard Elliot laugh as though from a distance.
‘I think you’ve carried my advice a bit too far,’ he drawled, and took her back to the now well warmed bedroom, spreading her damp body out on to the deep red velvet quilt that covered the large bed. Its velvet material felt deliciously sensual beneath her naked flesh. She felt deliciously sensual. She stretched like a cat, her arms flopping back above her head, revelling in the feel of the warm plush pile against her water-slicked skin.
‘Don’t go away,’ he mocked as she stretched again, and disappeared back into the bathroom for a second before returning with a large fluffy red towel in his hands.
‘Where shall I dry you first, I wonder?’ he murmured. ‘Here?’ He took one arm and rubbed it gently. Then the other. She sighed appreciatively.
‘Here perhaps?’ Now her legs got the same attention.
Audrey was enjoying that too, her eyelids growing heavy, till she realised the towel was going higher and higher up between her thighs. When it reached its goal her eyes shot open.
‘Ah,’ Elliot said with satisfaction. ‘I see you’ve decided to rejoin the living.’
When he started rubbing the towel lightly across her stomach, then up over her breasts, a low groan rumbled in her throat. He didn’t stop, however; he kept rubbing and rubbing, less gently now.
‘I think you might be dry enough,’ he ground out at last and threw the towel away. Audrey looked up at him with eyes dark with desire, but he just stood there, staring down at her body, spread out seductively on the red quilt.
When he reached out to run the back of his fingers over her breasts and stomach, her whole skin broke out in goose-bumps.
‘You’ve got beautiful skin, Audrey. So soft and creamy. I could look at it forever. And touch it...’ He stretched out beside her. ‘And kiss it...’
His mouth bent to kiss the underside of one breast, then travelled slowly upwards to close over a nipple, drawing it in sharply, rolling his tongue over and over the tenderised peak till she made a whimpering protest.
He stopped immediately, then startled her by sliding down her body and putting his mouth where no man had ever put his mouth before. She would have died of shock and embarrassment if Russell had made such a move, but with Elliot any momentary qualms were quickly put aside, replaced by the most enthralling experience of sheer sensual pleasure.
Though this kind of pleasure had its dark side, Audrey was to find, and soon every nerve-ending in her body was electrified by what Elliot was doing, the sensations almost too sharp to be enjoyable. Her head thrashed from side to side and she began to wonder if she really wanted this exquisite agony to go on.
Yet when Elliot stopped abruptly, her only feelings were an intense dismay and disappointment. When he rolled her body away from him over on to her stomach, she groaned in protest. Till he started kissing her shoulders, moving her hair aside and running his tongue up and down the soft skin of her neck, nibbling on her earlobe, breathing warm erotic air into her ear.
She shivered convulsively.
His chuckle was low and sexy. ‘I love your reactions,’ he murmured. ‘I love everything about you.’
She groaned in desolation when his mouth lifted from her ear, but then a lone feathering fingertip started tracing down her spine from her neck to her buttocks, and every muscle inside her sprang to attention, contracting into the most heart-stoppingly exciting knot. Her heartbeat suspended, then went mad again.
�
��You have a beautiful back too,’ he rasped, his fingertip wandering off to trace circles over her buttocks. ‘Beautiful...’
Audrey froze with anticipation when the finger returned to its initial travels, starting once again at the base of her spine and moving downwards. By the time Elliot finally reached the moistened depths of her desire, she was trembling. By the time he stroked her thighs apart, all she knew was that she had to have him inside her, no matter what.
She was utterly beyond caring when he grasped her hips and scooped her up on hands and knees, sliding into her from behind.
Her only reaction was a shuddering sigh of relief.
‘Yes...oh, yes,’ she moaned when he started to move, her desire flaring madly, twisting at her insides, her fingers clutching and unclutching the quilt beneath her hands with convulsive movements. Elliot’s hands were making similar kneading actions on her breasts, his breath hot in her ear as he told her how beautiful she was and how much he wanted her, how often he would take her. His impassioned words sent her wild, and before she knew it she was tumbling over into a shatteringly electric release that had her almost sobbing in bitter-sweet ecstasy.
Elliot responded with a fierce climax of his own, holding her tightly as he shuddered into her for several seconds, then drawing her down with him as he collapsed, gasping, on to the bed.
Audrey lay there in his still quivering arms, stunned by what they had just shared. The passion...the intensity... And the marvellous contentment afterwards, the inner peace... It was so much more than she had ever dreamt, or hoped for. How was she ever going to survive when it was all over, when she would never be held in Elliot’s arms again, never feel this peace, this joy? How?
Her sigh was both sensuous and sad.
‘What are you thinking about?’ he murmured, pulling her back into him, spoon fashion.
‘That it must be wonderful to be able to do this every night,’ she answered quite truthfully.
He gave a soft chuckle. ‘I think that could be arranged, don’t you?’
Audrey stopped breathing. Surely he wasn’t going to ask her to marry him, was he?
The perverseness of her finding such an idea alarming did not elude her. Heavens, how often would a girl who was desperately in love not want her lover to ask her that question? Nevertheless, she didn’t want Elliot to ask her. Not at all. He didn’t love her and such a proposal could only mean one thing. Just thinking about his reason for asking sent a chill deep into her soul.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said, and pressed softly teasing lips over her ear, ‘how would you like to move in with me, live with me?’
Audrey’s heart leapt with both relief and instant excitement. She twisted in his arms, looking up into his waiting face with bright happy eyes. ‘Are you sure, Elliot? I mean...really sure? I...I’m not the tidiest person in the world.’
His smile was sardonic. ‘I don’t think I’m thinking of your tidiness at the moment, sweet thing.’ And, capturing her chin with his hand, took her mouth in an explosively hungry kiss.
‘God, I’ve never wanted a woman as much as I keep wanting you,’ he muttered against her swollen lips at long last. ‘Every night wouldn’t nearly be enough for me.’
His fevered words fired Audrey to run a bold hand down his body. ‘Nor for me,’ she husked, a wave of desire swamping her as her intimate touch quickly stirred him to full arousal again. ‘Oh, Elliot... I do so adore the way it feels with your body inside mine. Do it again... Please...’
He groaned and pulled her under him quite roughly, wrapping her legs high around his waist and plunging forward into her hot eager flesh. Her swollen muscles enclosed around him tightly, bringing a moan from deep within his throat. ‘Something tells me,’ he rasped, ‘that this is going to be a long...long...night.’
CHAPTER TEN
‘ELLIOT,’ Audrey whispered shortly after midnight, ‘I...I haven’t rung home to say where I am. They’ll be worried.’ She levered her head up from where it was resting on his stomach.
‘No, they won’t,’ he returned with cool logic, and stroked her head back down again. ‘They won’t start to worry till they check your bedroom tomorrow. And if I know Lavinia that won’t be too early on a Sunday. You can ring them in the morning with some plausible excuse as to why you’re not home. Say you stayed the night at Nigel’s place, that we partied on there after the races and I had too much to drink to drive you home.’
‘Yes...I suppose I could do that. It’s just that I’m not a very good liar. They’re sure to guess the truth.’
‘And if they do? You’re an adult, Audrey, not a child. There’s nothing wrong with your having a sex life, provided it’s discreet and not indiscriminate.’
Audrey flinched at Elliot’s categorising what they’d been doing as her ‘sex life’. Hadn’t he himself said they’d been making love, not ‘having sex’?
‘Besides,’ he added, ‘they’ll know soon enough when you move out of home and in with me.’
The ramifications of what she had done, agreeing to live with Elliot, hit her. What was her father going to say? And Lavinia...
‘You’re very silent and still all of a sudden,’ Elliot probed softly. ‘Are you having second thoughts about moving in with me?’
She sat up and pushed the hair back from her face, then lay down next to Elliot, her head on the pillow. ‘No,’ she said at last. ‘But I don’t think I’ll get the family seal of approval.’
‘Why? Because they know I won’t marry you in the end?’
Her eyes darted sideways to him, her heart squeezing tight. For Audrey wasn’t so sure any more that she didn’t want Elliot to ask her to marry him. Or that he didn’t love her. How could a man make love so beautifully and so often if he wasn’t in love? Where did the tenderness and caring come from that made her pleasure his first concern, never his own? Was that the action of a man who wanted only sex? She didn’t think so.
‘You knew that, Audrey,’ he said tautly. ‘I’ll be your lover for as long as you want me. But I won’t marry you. I’m not the marrying kind.’
‘You married Moira.’
‘That was different.’
‘How was it different?’ she demanded to know. ‘How?’
He sat up abruptly, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. ‘I won’t be cross-questioned,’ he threw at her over his shoulder, his voice chilling in its reproach. ‘Not by you. Not by anyone. You take me as I am, Audrey, or don’t take me at all. That’s the bottom line.’
She sat bolt upright and simply stared at him, her heart thudding. This was an Elliot she’d never seen before, a coldly ruthless Elliot, a darkly forbidding creature. A black knight, not a gallant one.
For a split second she was shocked. And hurt. But then she saw the unspoken pain in every rigid muscle in his stiffly held back and knew there had to be many complex reasons why he was acting this way. It was not at all like the man she’d come to know and love. Perhaps if she probed gently...
Kneeling up behind him, she slipped her arms around his chest and hugged him.
‘Elliot...I understand. Truly.’
He tensed even more.
‘You’re still suffering from your wife’s death. I can see you must have loved her very much. But can’t you also see that what we feel for each other is more than just desire?’
‘No!’ he denied, and slammed one fist into the other. ‘You’re wrong and I won’t be responsible for fooling you!’
He twisted round and took her by the shoulders, his face hard. ‘Firstly, let’s get one thing straight. My marriage to Moira was an act of friendship, not romance. Moira was worried over some greedy relatives getting their hands on her estate after she died. She reasoned that they wouldn’t contest a will against a legitimate husband. So to give her peace of mind—the doctors had said she couldn’t live longer than five years—I married her and promised to always direct a large percentage of her royalties to her favourite charities. Which I have. I liked and admired Moira greatly, b
ut I did not love her. I have never fallen in love with a woman, Audrey, simply because I’m not capable of it!’
Audrey just stared at him, eyes wide with shock and confusion and outright disbelief. A steely glitter came into his eyes when he saw her reaction, and quite deliberately he let one hand drift down to curve deliciously over her breast. ‘You think this means you love me?’ he rasped, his thumb arousing the nipple quite ruthlessly. ‘Not necessarily, Audrey. Any more than this means I love you.’ And he picked up her hand and held it to him. ‘This is desire, not love. Surely you’ve learnt the difference by now!’
He put her hand aside, every muscle in his jaw clenching down hard. ‘If you still think you love me then it’s better we terminate our relationship right now. You’ll get over me soon enough once I disappear from the scene. And you certainly won’t have any trouble finding someone else, looking as you look nowadays.’
Audrey stared at him, trying desperately to see beneath the tough surface to the human being beneath. She could understand that anyone with his unfortunate background would have difficulty with trust and love. This unwillingness to fall in love was shown by his earlier womanising tendencies, the love-’em and leave-’em attitude Yvonne had told her about. Moira must have been one special lady to capture as much of his affection as she had.
But couldn’t he see that he had changed, that the man who’d been so kind and sweet to her was capable of a deeply caring love?
His stubborn blindness in this matter frustrated the life of her. I’ve been hurt too, she wanted to scream at him. The answer isn’t to cut oneself off from feeling too deeply for risk of being hurt again. The answer is to open one’s heart, to keep searching for love. Russell was a disaster. But I didn’t give up. I kept looking and I found you, my darling. And I have no intention of letting you get away. I’m going to make you see all this if it kills me!