Free Velvet by Jane Feather Page B

for the long, unhurried scrutiny, her skin prickling, her nipples lifting and hardening with the cool breeze from the window.
    He held the generous swell of her breasts in the palms of his hands, his thumb flicking the nipples, his eyes holding hers before he lowered his head and drew his tongue in a slow, easy stroke first over the right breast and then over the left. It was a caress so full of promise that Gabrielle caught her breath, but she obeyed the unspoken rule of silence that held them both.
    In the same silence Nathaniel caught her waist and lifted her onto the windowsill before pulling off her boots and stockings in turn. Slowly, he unfastened the waistband of her britches, lifted her down again, andpushed the garment off her hips. Then, smiling, he hitched her back onto the cold stone windowsill and pulled the britches clear of her feet.
    Gabrielle shivered, but it was not with cold, although the stone was hard and chill beneath her bottom and thighs as she sat naked in the window.
    Nathaniel lifted her with the ease of before, cradled her in his arms, and carried her to the bed, laying her gently on the rumpled coverlet.
    “Why do you keep carrying me around?” she inquired, her voice sounding strange as the intense silence was at last broken. She tried for a lightly amused tone, but there was a quiver in her voice that spoke of much more than amusement.
    Nathaniel stood looking down at her as she lay on the bed, vulnerable in her nakedness. Her limbs were long and straight as hazel wands, and the generous curve of hip and bosom surprised and delighted him. Clothed, her height masked the richness of her body. “I suppose because it makes you more manageable,” he said. “Or at least it gives me that illusion.”
    “And you need me to be manageable?”
    “I have my share of masculine pride.” A glimmer of self-mockery touched his eyes, and it was as if the harsh, isolated coldness he so often evinced belonged to a different man. He threw off his dressing gown and came down on the bed beside her.
    “I’d never have believed it,” Gabrielle murmured, brushing her fingertips over his chest. “Such a modest and unassuming man, I thought you were.”
    Nathaniel chuckled, flinging a leg over her thighs, drawing her close against the warmth of his body. “I must have been too delicate in my approach. I’ve never had dealings with a devil woman before.”
    They both knew the banter was a delaying tactic, a last-ditch attempt to bridle the heady swirl of passion wrapping tight around them.
    Gabrielle closed her eyes, and the scent of his skinfilled the air around her. She inhaled greedily, her hands running over his back, learning the curve of hip and buttock, the swell and ripple of muscle, the knobs of his spine. She palmed his scalp, her fingers twisting in the crisp, wavy thatch.
    Nathaniel felt the press of her breasts against his chest, the tautness of her erect nipples as he tasted the sweetness of her mouth with a questing tongue. His need rose hard and urgent, eclipsing all else but the immediacy of desire. With a soft moan of assenting urgency Gabrielle moved against his rising flesh, her thighs tightening as she held him in the warm furrow of her body, the earthy words of uninhibited passion on her lips, whispering against his mouth.
    “I want you,” he said with low-voiced ferocity, his palms flattening against the insides of her thighs, opening her. He touched her heated core and she cried out.
    “Come into me, love,
now.”
    Despite her fervent imperative, he tried to hold back, to keep control for both of them, knowing that delay could only enhance their pleasure, afraid also that he might make an error of judgment if he yielded to hasty need, and knowing with aching certainty that this loving was going to be unique and must not be jeopardized by rash, unvarnished lust.
    He gazed down at her as she sprawled beneath him in wanton abandon, her hips lifting unconsciously, her thighs parted, a