Seduction Never Lies(34)

She did not hear him arrive, but she knew the moment he was there just  the same. She turned slowly, standing motionless for a long moment to  let him look at her, before lifting her hands to take the clip from her  hair and shake it loose over her shoulders. And wait.

Jago's face was taut, the tawny eyes burning. He said hoarsely, 'Octavia-oh God, you're so beautiful.'

She walked back to the bank, smiling at him, not hurrying, then stepped up into his arms.

His hands trembled slightly as they touched her, tracing her shoulders,  her rounded up-tilted breasts, her delicate ribcage and tiny waist as  if she was some infinitely precious and delicate porcelain figurine that  a moment's clumsiness might shatter for ever.                       
       
           



       

He knelt suddenly, pressing his face against the flatness of her abdomen, his hands clasping her hips.

He said, his voice muffled, 'Now I'm the one who's scared.'

'No.' Tavy stroked the hair back from his forehead. 'How can you be?'

He looked up at her. 'Because this is the first time I've ever been in  love. I didn't realise how I would feel. How perfect I would want it to  be. For you. This first time.'

She knelt too. Kissed him on the mouth, aware of the first sweet stir  of pleasure as his lips parted and she felt the slow, hot glide of his  tongue against hers.

Jago's hands moved to her breasts, cupping them, his thumbs teasing her  nipples until they stood proud. He lowered his head and took each of  them into his mouth in turn, laving each erect, sensitive peak gently  but with total deliberation, and Tavy felt a quiver of response run the  length of her body and resonate in her loins with piercing, unequivocal  need that shocked her by its force.

Her head fell back and a gasp escaped her as his fingers tangled in her  hair, bringing her mouth back to his, in a deep and passionate kiss  that left her languid and drained.

He turned her in his arms, lowering her to the ground, but instead of  cool, crisp grass, she felt a rich and comforting softness against her  bare flesh, and realised she was lying on the rug they'd used for their  candle-lit picnic.

Jago took her back into his arms, and she stretched herself against  him, revelling in the graze of his hair roughened chest against her  excited nipples, slipping her hands inside his shirt and running her  hands over his wide, muscled shoulders.

He'd said once he worked out, and she could believe it.

She heard herself say in a voice she hardly recognised, 'You're such a gorgeous shape.'

He said huskily, 'And you, my sweet, are Paradise.'

Because his hands were discovering her too, exploring every slender  curve and delicate hollow, his lips following the intricate, enticing  path of his fingers, awakening sensations she'd never been aware of  until that moment. Feelings that turned her bones to water, and her  blood into a warm tide in her veins.

And made her want so much more, especially when, as now, his hand was  cupping her hip bone and straying with tantalising slowness down to her  thigh. Where it lingered, his fingers gentle as a breeze on her  sensitised skin.

Deep within her she felt a shaft of desire so piercing that she almost cried out aloud.

Her body was slackening, turning to liquid under the sensuous  incitement of his touch. Only it wasn't enough, she thought, suppressing  a tiny moan.

And then his hand moved, gentling its way between her parted thighs to  the scalding inner heat of her with innate mastery, finding the tiny  sensitive bud between the silky folds of woman flesh and circling on it  slowly and delicately with a fingertip, until he had brought it to  swollen, aching arousal.

And then, when she thought she could bear no more, she felt his fingers  penetrating the slick hot wetness of her, thrusting into her with sure  rhythmic strokes, taking her with relentless purpose towards some  undreamed-of brink.

Her body arched towards him, the breath catching in her throat, the  last vestiges of control slipping away as her whole being concentrated  blindly on the spiral of exquisite agony building so inexorably inside  her. She could hear herself moaning, voluptuously, pleadingly, and  thought she heard him whisper, 'Yes.'

Then as his clever insistent fingers took her over the edge, and her  body convulsed in the first sexual release it had ever known, her voice  splintered and she cried out his name.

Afterwards, she cried a little and Jago held her, kissing her mouth and  wet eyelashes, whispering words that would live in her heart and memory  for ever.

The echoes of the pleasure he had given her were still reverberating  deep within her, making her long for more, kindling a renewed and urgent  response to his lips. Wanting to return the joy.

But as her hands were reaching, fumbling a little, for the silver  buckle on his belt, Jago stopped her, saying softly, 'Not here, not now,  darling. It will be dark and much colder soon, and I want you in bed  with me not pneumonia.'

She found herself wrapped warmly in the rug and lifted into his arms as  he strode back towards the house, ignoring her not-too-serious protests  and demands to be put down.

'And ruin one of my favourite fantasies about you? No chance.' He  dropped a kiss on her tangled hair. 'This is the Spanish pirate in my  ancestry.'

And when they reached the bedroom, laughing and breathless, the waiting  four-poster was another revelation, heaped with snowy pillows, the  crisp sheets half-concealed by a sumptuous black and gold satin  coverlet.                       
       
           



       

'You did all this?' Tavy gasped as Jago put her down on the bed's yielding softness, and gently unwrapped her from the rug.

He shook his head. 'No, amazingly, it was Barbie-just before she  announced that Charlie was driving her to Barkland Grange for the night.  As I've mentioned, she's always been a law unto herself.'

Tavy watched him strip quickly, her eyes widening as she saw him naked.  Her imagination had never taken her this far, and what she saw made her  feel momentarily nervous, even a little daunted.

But the warmth and strength of his arms was a reassurance as he drew  her to him, and as he began to kiss and caress her again, there was no  place or reason for doubt.

In return, her hands scanned every inch of his lean, hard contours, her  fingers tracing the long supple spine down to his flat male buttocks  and muscled flanks before sliding across his hip to begin a more  intimate exploration, her touch tentative at first but growing bolder as  Jago softly groaned his pleasure.

And when the moment came, she helped smooth the protective sheath over  his erection before guiding him into the welcome of her desire-damp  body, taking him more deeply with every thrust, rising and falling with  him in love's eternal rhythm.

Experiencing once more with even sharper intensity the dizzying ascent  to rapturous fulfilment, and hearing his cry of ecstasy echoing her own  as he too reached his climax.

Afterwards they lay, making plans in between slow sweet kisses.

Jago went downstairs to fetch the champagne, still waiting to be  opened, and brought it back with her clothes which he'd collected from  the garden, explaining it was to save Ted Jackson's blushes.

'And I rang your father,' he added. 'Said we'd see him tomorrow.'

'Oh.' Tavy took an apprehensive gulp of champagne. 'What did he say?'

'Sent you his love and told me he was off to borrow a shotgun.' Jago  slid back into bed. 'I'm only marrying you to have him as a  father-in-law. I hope you know that.' He paused. 'And Mum and Dad will  be delirious. A first grandchild in Oz and a daughter-in-law all in one  year.'

'Isn't it lovely?' Tavy said. 'Making people happy.'

Jago smiled at her. 'Speaking of which,' he said, and took the champagne glass gently but firmly from her hand.