Free Fit for a King by Diana Palmer Page B

least," he returned. "Come here. I'll teach you
how."
    She
hadn't known there was a right and wrong way to touch a man, but
with his hands showing her how, urging her mouth to his skin, teaching her
what excited him, what pleased him the most, she felt her confidence
grow, and with it a new sense of womanly power. She didn't protest, not even when
he guided her hands and let her experience him in a way she'd never dreamed of.
    Finally
he emitted a low groan and slid her arms around his waist.
    "Sometimes
I forget how innocent you are," he said in her ear. He
bit it, laughing softly, and his cheek nuzzled hers. "You make me
forget," he whis pered. He drew his mouth across her cheek,
then
    raised his head to
search her eyes. "You shut out the world while I'm
holding you."
    He kissed
her gently then, and she understood. She blotted out his
hunger for Bess—that was what he meant.
    But I love
you, she wanted to say. I love you, and I want so much more
of you than this. Two years of friendship, and it had never occurred to her
just how necessary
he'd become to her, just how possessive she'd become of him. Nothing he'd done
to her was unwelcome. She realized she
could lie with him and give herself
and live on it for the rest of her life, despite all her hard-won principles. Was that lust? Or was it the natural hunger for oneness, for total
knowl edge?
    With his
mouth still over hers, she frowned and opened her eyes, only
to find his eyes open and watching her. Her heart went wild. His tongue
pene trated her mouth, his hands came up under her breasts, and she
couldn't sustain the look a second longer. She closed her eyes with
a hungry moan, and he kissed her deeply, thoroughly, before finally releasing her and putting her from him. She straightened up and smoothed out her dress as best she
could.
    "Don't
brush your hair," he said when she reached for a brush on his
dresser just as they were about to leave the room.
    "Why not? I must look a mess."
    "Because I want her to see you like this," he
said

92
    Diana
Palmer
    Fit for a
King
    93

gruffly. "With
your mouth swollen and your hair in a tangle and your skin glowing. I
want her to know that we've been making love."
    "That's cruel," she whispered.
    "I
have to be cruel, don't you see? My God, Elissa, he's my brother,"
he groaned.
    "Yes,
I know." She stood in front of him, reaching up to smooth away his
frown. She smiled gently, drowning in new fantasies, brimming over
with her new knowledge of him, new memories to put under her pillow and
cherish.
    "Too
bad you're such an innocent," he said with a sigh.
    "What
would you do if I weren't?" she teased gently.
    "I'd
take you into my bed and work Bess out of my system with a
vengeance," he said honestly. "And I could, with you. I've
never wanted anyone so much in all my life."
    "I
wish I could let you," she replied. "I think I'd like
sleeping with you, King. Lovemaking is more beautiful than I ever
realized."
    "I'm glad you think of it
that way, and not as something to satisfy a
passing physical urge," he said.
"Ideally it is an act of love. With you," he added quietly,
bemusedly, "it feels like it. I don't understand...."
    She drew in
a slow breath and went to turn the radio off, flushing at the reason it
had been turned on.
    She looked across the
room and found him watching her.
    "There's
no need to blush," he said quietly, once again reading her
mind. "You did my ego a world of good—believe me. If it hadn't been
for our house-guests, I wouldn't have given a damn if you'd yelled the place
down."
    "It's
embarrassing to feel like this," she whis pered. "They'll
see...."
    "Yes," he agreed tersely. "Thank
God."
    She
couldn't answer that. She opened the door and walked ahead of him.
    Bess
wasn't there. Bobby looked up with a sly grin. "Bess has gone for a walk on the
beach," he mur mured. He cleared his
throat. "I guess you two settled your
differences...."
    Elissa
blushed to the roots of her hair. King laughed delightedly
and slid his arm