Читать книгу Royal Weddings: The Reluctant Princess / Princess Dottie / The Royal MacAllister - Christine Rimmer, Lucy Gordon - Страница 17

Chapter Twelve

Hauk held back the blanket. Elli slid in beside him. He wrapped the blanket around her and he looked down at her, a look so tender—and yet also somehow infinitely sad.

Apprehension rose within her. ‘‘What? What’s the matter?’’ She brushed two fingers along his brow, wishing her touch could soothe away his frown. ‘‘Hauk?’’

Instead of giving her an answer, he lowered his mouth to hers. His lips touched her lips and her apprehension vanished as if it had never been. And his sadness? Surely, he couldn’t be sad now. There was no such thing as sadness—not when he was kissing her, not when they held each other close.

He clasped her waist with his big hand and he kissed his way over her chin and down her throat. Pushing back the blanket, he raised up over her, resting on an elbow. He looked down at her—at all of her. She gloried in that, in having him look at her. She felt no shyness, no embarrassment. It seemed right that he should see her. She wanted him to see her.

It seemed that she could actually feel his gaze, that where he looked, he touched. She shivered in blissful response.

Slowly he lowered his head to her left breast. His hair trailed on her skin. She felt the touch of his tongue—one long, wet swipe, deliciously abrasive, against the yearning flesh of her nipple. And then he blew where he’d licked.

Elli moaned in delight.

He lifted his head again. She looked at him from under lowered lashes and saw his white teeth flash in the darkness—a rare smile.

She smiled back, her mouth trembling a little. ‘‘Oh, Hauk…’’

And then he dipped his head once more and took her nipple in his mouth.

Elli gasped and bowed her body up for him, offering herself, offering all she had to give as he caressed the aching bud, drawing on it, suckling her. She tossed her head against the pillow.

His hand strayed over her belly—and lower. He dipped a finger into the curls where her thighs joined. She cried out in excitement. Anticipation shimmered through her.

He raised his head from her breast and moved up a little, so his face loomed above hers. A blaze of lightning cut the night and she saw the feral gleam in his pale-blue eyes.

Thunder rolled and the room was dim again. Still, his eyes shone at her through the shadows. ‘‘I want to bring you pleasure, Elli.’’

‘‘Oh, Hauk. You do. You are.’’

He brushed a kiss on her brow.

And below, very gently, he eased the curls aside, finding the slick groove of her sex. She gripped his big shoulders and whispered his name.

His finger moved. One long, shockingly intimate stroke and no more—right then. He took his touch elsewhere, sliding his rough and tender palm down the vulnerable inner surfaces of each of her thighs.

She sighed and let her legs ease open.

He was kissing her again. Kissing his way down the center of her. Elli lay beneath him, awash in pleasure, a willing victim of his mouth and his seeking tongue that dipped into her navel and played there. She gasped as she felt his teeth, lightly nipping. She moaned with the wonder of it—moaned and then moaned again.

Lower and lower, down over the tender skin below her navel. He put his lips there, against her mound, not delving in, just pressing his mouth, open, upon her.

And he let out a long, warm, focused breath of air.

Several bolts of lightning struck in quick succession, each followed by that rolling, booming sound. Elli was tossing her head on the pillow, muttering words she hardly knew the meaning of.

‘‘Yes’’ and ‘‘Oh’’ and ‘‘Please’’ and ‘‘There…’’

Gently, he moved her thighs wide apart and positioned himself between them. She dared to open her eyes, to gaze dreamily down the length of her own yearning body. His mouth was on her, now. And his tongue was…

His tongue was…

Elli groaned and the room lit up with wild stormy light. There was the thunder. And the hollow pounding, like a continuous sigh, of driving rain.