Forbidden by Susan Johnson (best feel good books txt) 📗

"Do you like it?" He lightly caressed her nipples as he asked, forcing her wider with a slow upward movement, his legs flexing beneath her as he lifted her weight.

Her yes was muffled by a throaty sob of pleasure.

"I'm glad," he murmured. "Would you like to climax now?" he whispered, lifting her so she glided up his erection, sliding her down again, setting a slow rhythm of withdrawal and penetration.

She was past speech at the moment, but he understood her sighing exhalation and her fingers lacing into the silk of his hair. He sucked on her nipples when she raised herself up so she lingered for long moments each time on her knees. And he held her on the downstroke keeping her impaled for measured seconds more until she trembled. And expired like a jeune fille in sobbing release.

The Duc stroked her hair and kissed her, his hands gentle, soothing, conscious her insatiable need might last for several hours more.

It was, he knew, partly circumstances. For a sensuous woman like Daisy, weeks of celibacy were an inducement to greedy pleasure. But the almond milk was often strangely aphrodiasic. He'd been surprised the first time Louis had given it to him for fatigue.

But other times he'd drunk it, the milk had only soothed. And he'd not done enough scientific sampling to know conclusively, his previous partners in amour never the recipients of his valet's concern.

"I love you," Daisy said in a dissolving whisper, her words muffled against his shoulder.

"And I love you," the Duc said, the words he'd spent half a lifetime avoiding simply uttered. His paradise on earth was represented, he mused, by one beautiful dark-haired woman who'd captured his heart. "I'll make you happy."

She raised her head and smiled. "You have already…" She felt at that moment so suffused by love she wanted rose-covered cottages and swarms of bouncing babies by this man she loved to distraction. She wanted a lifetime of his teasing smile and gentleness and his magical passion too. Would his captivating smile be reproduced in his child, or the distinctive obliqueness of his dark brows—would he mind a girl? Some men did. "Do you want a boy or a girl?" she asked, wishing she could please him.

"What do you want?" he queried, lifting her from him and laying her against the pillows.

"Both."

"That's easy then. You're bound to be pleased either way. And you can always have another later."

"I'm going to lock you away so you can't leave me and go back to Paris," Daisy softly said, lying in a froth of pale yellow silk. "So you can give me more children."

He lay beside her, untying the bow at her neck, and bending low, kissed the softness of her mouth. "Come back with me sometime and we'll make babies in Paris too. But I like Montana so far," he quickly added, cognizant of the sudden anxiety in her eyes.

"You haven't seen much, but thank you," Daisy replied with a grateful smile, knowing he was allaying her fears.

"You're here. That's enough. And Justin can learn some of the business so I'll be more available to be locked away for your pleasure."

"A fascinating concept. Would you do my bidding?"

He grinned. "Probably."

She remembered the wrecked harem bed and smiled back. "Probably not, you mean."

"I'm being diplomatic on our first night together in months. Newport doesn't count." His grin widened. "We didn't do much talking."

And they talked that night between the playfulness and love-making. They curled up on the couch before the fire or lay on the large rumpled bed and discussed their future, their child, their hopes and dreams and the irrepressible wonder of their love. Both practical people at base, even cynical at times about the extent of goodness in the world, they agreed that the spirits or shamans or unknown gods had taken a benevolent hand in their meeting that night at Adelaide's.

"I didn't like you when I met you," Daisy said, lying on the solid strength of his muscled body, her face only inches from his, her warmth reminding him of childhood security—and his nanny's sunrises from the nursery window. He'd loved ancient chubby Rennie McLeod with the same unconditional delight.

"I didn't like you either," Etienne said, lounging with his arms under his head, his grin roguish, "but then I wasn't looking for a friend. In other ways, of course, I found you fascinating."

"We have your lust, then, to thank for our fateful meeting." Her teasing glance was close and coquettish.

"That's about it." He nodded in a brief small movement. "And the Baron Arras's broken leg on the polo field. Although Valentin's persistence should be added to the catalogue. I'd turned him down three times before I finally capitulated. I didn't dine out often in those days."

"Why?"

She stirred on him slightly, her soft voluptuous form distracting him momentarily. He wanted her again. Not again, he drolly thought… but always.

"Tell me," she prompted, wanting to know more of the man who had become her world.

She looked so innocent at times, like a young girl in the openness of her expression, in her artless curiosity. It made him more careful in his choice of words, as though the cynicism of his life before meeting her might sully that wide-eyed eagerness. Dining out was too tame for him in those days; he preferred more direct seduction without the hours of flirtatious conversation over twenty courses at table as prelude. Although Daisy had fascinated him enough to alter his longstanding prejudice against society dining.

"I had an excellent chef," he said, stating the truth and evading the pointed reasons, "my clubs had very good wine cellars and," he added in explanation, "dinner conversation bored me. It invariably centered on society gossip."

"Did you eat alone?" She pictured him in solitary hermitage at a yards-long table.

"Not usually," he evasively replied, finding himself going deeper into prevarication. He usually dined in one of the private rooms the fashionable restaurants offered, in company with his friends and several