He kissed her face, her throat, her shoulders as he slid the soft whiteness of her nightdress from her body, only partially managing to stifle his groan of longing as he looked at her clad only in moonlight.
Beneath Ran’s heavy-lidded gaze, Sylvie felt her will-power melting. He wanted her; she could see it in his eyes, feel it in the fierce tremble of his fingertips as they traced the outline of her body. Even with her eyes closed, she could feel how much he wanted her.
Shakily Sylvie mirrored his touch on his body, tracing the deep V left by the open neckline of his robe. When she touched the knot which secured the robe she lifted a love-dazed glance to his and commanded huskily, ‘Take it off.’
Silently Ran did so, never removing his gaze from hers as the robe slid to the floor.
Before, the last time, the only time, she had been too caught up in the intensity of what was happening and her own needs and emotions to do anything more than register the fact that he was there, that his body was...his... But now, this time...
Like a gourmet examining a banquet, a sumptuous repast which had been set out before her, she studied every bit of him, feasting her eyes and her senses on him. He was magnificent...he was perfect...he was Ran. Her love, her life, the father of her child, their child... A fierce thrill ran through her.
‘Ran.’
She said his name urgently, almost harshly. As she stepped towards him he stopped her, circling her wrists with his hands, holding her slightly away from him whilst he looked at her in turn. She could see the fierce hunger in his eyes as he focused on her breasts and an excited kick of pleasure gripped her.
There was something so dangerously erotic about standing there naked in front of him, her hands virtually pinioned, that it fed her own senses, her own need...to the point where she could feel her arousal beating a heavy pulse of longing so strongly within her body that she was forced to surrender to it.
Her eyes, soft with emotion, echoed the need, the feeling that was pulsing through her body, touching her, she felt, to her very soul as she looked deep into Ran’s eyes. The huge wave of emotion that caught her up and rendered her powerless to do anything to withstand it contained far, far more than just physical desire or the immediacy of the moment. She felt a sense of fate, of destiny almost, as though all the previous emotions, all the love she had known for him had brought her here, to this moment. He might not share her love but he was here with her; she could see in his eyes that somehow something within him was aware of her and responsive to her, even if it was only man’s most basic need for a woman that drove him, and against all logic and rational thinking Sylvie knew that what happened between them tonight would be something precious and almost sacred, that the child she now longed so deeply to conceive would be special and loved, so very, very loved.
Odd to think how fate worked, and she could see as clearly as though she were there the small pack of pills in the bathroom, still containing the ones she had accidentally omitted to take since her arrival in Derbyshire, not by design or plan and certainly not because she had had any intention, any pre-warning that this was going to happen.
‘You’re beautiful, do you know that?’ she heard Ran declaring rawly as, still holding her wrists, he leaned forward and slowly kissed her face, her eyelids, her lips, each one in turn, with something that was almost reverence. Then he moved on to her throat...her breasts...before releasing her wrists and scooping her up in his arms as though he couldn’t bear not to have the full length of her held tightly against his body any longer. He slid his hand into her hair and opened her mouth with a kiss so intense and passionate that Sylvie felt as though she was dissolving into him, becoming a part of him.
Just how long they stood like that, how long they kissed, she had no idea; all she did know was that when his mouth finally lifted from hers the room was full of the charged sound of their breathing, the oxygen content of the air somehow diminished so that she felt positively light-headed and dizzy, aching from head to foot with need and longing.