Panting for breath, he tore his mouth away from hers. “Why didn’t you come to me?”
She had to grasp his taut upper arms to stay on her feet. “You said you wanted to get a couple of hours’ sleep before you left to find the posse.”
He covered her neck with wet, open-mouthed kisses. “That meant that I wanted to take you to bed. Didn’t you see me look at you when I said it? I’ve been lying awake in petrified agony waiting for you.”
His words tempted her to touch him to see for herself. She slipped her hand inside his partially unbuttoned waistband. As soon as her fingers closed around him, he thrust into her hand. Warm liquid coated the head on his second push. “You’re starting without me,” she teased, then kissed the center of his chest.
“Sweetheart, my mind’s already made love to you five times in the last hour. My body has some serious catching up to do.”
He lifted her and she wrapped her legs around his waist. With two long strides he erased the space to the bed, then whirled around to land on his back with her straddling him. He yanked at the buttons of her nightgown, tearing the flimsy cotton in the process. The same urgency had her attacking the fastenings of his trousers. She lifted her hips and he guided his length inside her. He grasped her bottom and arched off the bed while she came down on a long sigh.
They ground into each other, their movements slight. The sheer heat of him, filling her in a way he hadn’t before, left her lightheaded. She gripped his shoulders and hung her head, her hair spilling across his chest and leaving her in a hazy, ecstasy filled world of her own making.
He dug his fingers into her hips, pulling her down as he surged up, though there was no more room to maneuver.
“Lorelei, you feel so damned good.”
His husky voice drifted around her. Even his slight movement sent unbearable pleasure cascading through her. She gasped for breath, sure she was floating above herself in a whirl of heady lust too powerful to contain.
He rocked beneath her, and she could do little more than hang on. Her climax descended on her like a thunderclap, ear-ringing and powerful. She tossed her head, shaking her hair away from her face to gasp for breath.
Christopher murmured her name in deep, reverberating waves. She knew only the rapture of her own body, unable to discern anything but his hard flesh clamped in the center of her inwardly spiraling pleasure.
When the stars that clouded her vision started to fade, she cupped his rough cheek, feeling a little guilty for getting so carried away. He muffled an angry curse, gripped her by the hips, and lifted her off him. He groaned deathly low in his throat. Hot liquid spewed between them, splattering her and dousing the hair of his chest.
Her fog of pleasure conceded to the sharp clarity that he chose not to risk creating a child. They hadn’t spoken of children, but that was what marriage meant, didn’t it?
He laid his head on the bed, his eyes closed. His chest rose and fell raggedly.
She stared at him, the man she would marry, and suddenly she was unsure of herself and him. The idea of being a wife to a man she desperately loved had thrilled her like a dream come true. But theirs was no ordinary relationship, and Christopher no ordinary man.
He lazily opened his eyes. “Christ, you came so hard you about took my head off.” His satisfied grin turned down at the corners. “What’s wrong?”
Instead of blurting out her fears, something she instinctively knew would change the mood irrevocably, she softened her stance. She toyed with the smattering of hair in the center of his chest.
“Why did you pull out? I didn’t like it.”
He gripped her wrist and brought her hand to his mouth to kiss her knuckles. “I hated it.”
“Then why?” She bit her lip to keep her question inside her head, but her tongue pushed against her teeth anyway. “Don’t you want children?”
He stiffened beneath her and let out his breath. “I don’t know.”
He must have seen the look of sheer horror on her face. “I mean, can’t we get married first?”
It was hard to become indignant with your legs spread across a man’s hips, but she managed. “I want children, Christopher. Surely that’s no surprise.”
He tugged at her wrist and rolled her over so he lay on top of her, taking control physically, apparently the only way he felt comfortable.
“I want to give you everything you want. Including children. But I have to straighten things out first.” She relaxed beneath him, somewhat mollified by his answer, but not completely.
“You’re not going to get bossy and try to run the show again, are you?”
He smiled and tweaked her nose. “Yes. That’s what a husband gets to do.”