Livia stared at him in fascination. She had thought him magnificent before, but to see him like this—the hard planes of his chest, the muscled curves of biceps, his narrow hips, long rock-hard legs, the whorl of dark hair at his groin and from it springing his erect shaft—well, she would have liked to have studied him at her leisure, devoured him with her eyes, but he went to her dressing-table and quickly she said:
“What are you doing?”
“Blowing out the candles.”
“Don’t.”
He looked at her. “No?”
“No. I want to see you.”
“I am all obedience,” he said, and as he returned to her, with a very purposeful air about him, she knew, vaguely, that it probably would have been more ladylike to consent to the candles being extinguished, but at the moment it was hard to care.
She gave him a small, provocative smile. “You don’t look very obedient to me.”
“No. It was only a figure of speech. Stand up.”
“How masterful you are,” she murmured, sweetly, but didn’t move.
Without replying he took her arm and brought her, rather roughly, to her feet. With that same savage speed he undid the ties of her petticoat, pulled it down, and ripped her shift up over her head and tossed it aside. Now she, too, was naked.
Livia expected him to look at her in the same hungry way in which she had done to him, study her breasts and waist and hips and her own dark mound of hair at the juncture of her legs, but instead he put his hands on her shoulders and backed her to the bed. Silently he pushed her down; she sat, noticing with a little shock the smoothness of the bedcovers against her bare skin, and then Gabriel was on her: with a greater, far nicer shock she registered the feel of his warm muscled self, heavy, hard, utterly male.
She made a little purring sound in her throat, and allowed him to bring her fully onto the bed, although he stopped before her head reached the pillows, as if he couldn’t wait a second more, and then he had parted her legs with his knees and with his shaft poised at her sex he stopped, although Livia had the distinct impression that it took every last ounce of self-control that he had.
A voluptuous anticipation made her feel wonderfully limp. She flung out her arms onto the bed, further emphasizing how completely open she was to him, and arched her back a little, knowing how such a gesture flaunted her breasts, full and heavy with nipples that had a lovely tingling feel to them.
“Do you . . .” she murmured, and paused. Very, very delicately she shifted her hips so that the tip of his shaft just touched the wet, warm opening of her sex. She felt Gabriel jerk a little, in a flatteringly responsive way. “Do you think it will rain tomorrow?”
He stared down at her in the dim, flickering light. His face was very close to hers; she could see the golden flecks in his eyes. She smiled, ever so slightly.
“You,” he said softly, “are a fiend.”
He plunged into her and she only just stopped herself from crying out with the joy, the pure hot pleasure of it, of him, of being filled so completely by him. Urgently she grabbed at his head, pulled his mouth to her, kissed him with open lips and a tongue that sought his, all warmth and wetness.
Gabriel kissed her back, hard, not stopping in the thrust of his hips, grinding against her. Tightly she gripped him with her legs, receiving, returning. Oh, this was right, right, right. It was like a little voice within her, singing. Like her body was an instrument which he played with a devastating virtuosity. Or perhaps he was the instrument she played.
No, that wasn’t the right way to think of it, for they were—simply, absolutely, fully—one.
Right, right, right, sang her body and her heart.
She could not have said how long it went on, this rough exquisite joining, only that they were far beyond words, and that all too soon she shattered, gasping, letting him stop her mouth with his own, and hard upon that, he gave a final thrust, shuddered, and was done.
For a few moments Gabriel lay on top of her, his long form a kind of splendid weight blanketing her. He nuzzled her with his jaw, and she could just feel the beginning growth of dark beard; then he withdrew from her, rolled onto his back, still breathing heavily.
Livia listened to this intimate sound in the darkness of her bed, smiling to herself.
Right, right, right.
Then his deep voice said:
“Livia.”
“Yes, Gabriel?”
“Lift up your head for a moment.”
She did, without bothering to ask why, and gently Gabriel tugged free a mass of her hair.
“Thank you.”
She watched as he lay back and draped the long strands across his throat and chest.
“I was right,” he said lazily.
“About what?”