Chapter 25

CHAPTER 25

L ying back on the bed, Archibald reminded himself that he was the luckiest man in all of England.

Even if he was currently in a state of agony.

His beautiful, delightful wife, who displayed every indication that she was going to drive him out of his goddamn mind, sat naked astride his torso, an excited gleam in her eyes. Archibald was coming to know her well enough to understand that this particular gleam foretold good things.

But only after she’d tortured him within an inch of his life.

Izzie smoothed her hands across the planes of his chest, making a sound of pleasure. He still couldn’t believe that she liked his burly frame. It wasn’t fashionable, as his tailor had made clear. But he no longer gave a damn, as apparently, it made his bride wish he would throw her on the bed and ravish her like a Viking, a request that would be extremely easy to grant, given that this was what he wanted to do every time he saw her.

He reminded himself that he had just pledged to lie back and let Izzie do whatever she wanted. It was her turn to ravish him.

Eyes sparkling with mischief, she proceeded to stroke every inch of his torso and arms, cooing with delight and murmuring admiring words all the while. When she grazed the sensitive skin beneath his arms, he gave a ticklish flinch, and his cock brushed her core.

She seemed to take this as an excellent suggestion because she aligned her bud with the ridge of his cock and began rocking back and forth. Archibald groaned. She was hot and slick and what she was doing simultaneously felt so good, and not nearly good enough. He wanted to grab her by the hips and lower her sweet, tight cunny down onto his cock, but of course, he couldn’t do that.

Izzie tried and failed to assume an innocent expression. “Is anything the matter, Archibald?”

“You’re driving me mad, and you know it,” he gasped.

She tutted. “Oh, no. I haven’t even begun to drive you mad.”

He was trying to decide whether this was a good thing or a bad thing when she slid down the bed, kneeling between his legs. She stroked her hands up and down his thighs. “There was a particular picture in that book my brother had. Would you like to know what it showed?”

“Oh, my God .”

She let her hands drift up to his pelvis, framing the base of his cock, but not touching him where he needed it. “Would you like for me to give it a try?”

“ Yes .”

She laughed. “I haven’t even told you what it is yet.”

“Touch my cock,” he begged. “ Please , just touch my cock. I’ve dreamed about you doing this for so long.”

She looked up, a smile curling the corners of her lips. “Have you?”

He was so far gone that he didn’t care what he was admitting. “ Yes .”

“Well, since you asked so nicely.”

She wrapped her hand around him—as far as it would go, in any case—and began a gentle exploration that was simultaneously heaven and hell. Her hands were so soft and felt so good on him. But if he had expected the orgasm he’d had ten minutes ago to take the edge off, he was doomed to disappointment, because he needed to come, needed to come right now . He couldn’t decide whether he wanted her agonizingly soft caresses to go on forever, or to cover her sweet little hand with his own so he could show her how to jack him off in three strokes.

She came up to explore his head, where he was the most sensitive, and where a drop of moisture had formed right at his tip. “Oh!” she exclaimed upon discovering how slick it made him. “That’s useful. Does that feel good?”

“ So good needa come please Izzie,” was the garbled string of babble that emerged from his mouth.

She laughed, delighted. Her expression was impish as she lowered herself down upon the bed. “Don’t you want to know what else it showed on that print?”

He thought he had a fair idea, and, as much as he did want that, he recalled that her original purpose was for them to make love again so she could see if she found more pleasure in the act the second time around. “I do want that, but if you want to make love, perhaps we should save the other thing for next time. I’m liable to explode the second you put your lips on me.”

“Let’s just see, shall we?”

“Izzie, are you sure you want to—oh, fuck .” His vision blurred as the indescribable pleasure of her soft, pink lips stroking the head of his cock washed over him. “I’m sorry!” he said quickly. “I didn’t mean to say… Oh, my fucking God, Izzie! That feels so good !”

All of his good intentions to apologize for his coarse language flew out the window as she started to use her tongue on him. If her giggle was any indication, she wasn’t overly offended. She had both of her hands wrapped around his shaft, and next time, he would show her how to pump them up and down in concert with what she was doing with her mouth.

Next time . Because this time, he was seconds from flooding her mouth.

God, just the sight of her was almost enough to set him off. The vision of Isabella Astley, pink lips twisted into a smile even as they were wrapped around his cock, was something he had dreamed about a million times and never imagined he would actually get to see.

Suddenly, it was all too much. “Wait, Izzie, I’m… I’m going to… That’s going to make me... Didn’t you want to… to…”

She pulled her lips off him with a pop. “Oh, all right.” She moved up the bed, throwing a knee on either side of him, and started aligning his cock with her entrance.

“Wait. Are you sure you’re wet enough? Maybe I should—”

Izzie laughed. “Oh, I’m wet enough.” She proceeded to prove it by sliding down onto his cock, taking him to the hilt in one smooth stroke.

“Izzie! God, that’s so good! God, I—”

He cut himself off before he could utter the words I love you , because, as far as she knew, they’d only really met three days ago and were having a whirlwind courtship. Never mind that for him, this “whirlwind courtship” had started more than a year ago. But he didn’t want to alarm her.

She didn’t want his heart, after all. She wanted him to protect her, and she wanted him to give her pleasure. She wanted to live with him in his Gothic mansion, and she wanted the extravagant library he was going to build for her.

That would have to be enough.

Speaking of making her come… Izzie was sliding tentatively up and down his length, a slight frown on her face. “Does it hurt?” he asked.

She blew out a frustrated breath. “No, it’s not that.”

It was plain as day that she wasn’t enjoying herself nearly as much as he was. And, although he had vowed to lie back and let her take the lead, he couldn’t let that stand.

So, he reached a hand between her legs, settling his thumb upon that little bud that was the secret to a woman’s pleasure and began to rub. She was already nice and slick there.

The change was instantaneous. Izzie’s back arched as she gasped. “Oh, Archibald! That feels…”

“Yes?” She was so distracted by his ministrations that she had forgotten to keep moving. But that wasn’t a problem. He reached his other hand around to grasp her hip, sliding her up and down along his length, pleasuring himself while he was pleasuring her.

“It’s so good!” she gasped.

“Touch your breasts,” he suggested because she had seemed to like that quite a lot and because, as much as he would’ve liked to do it for her, his hands were fully occupied.

Surprise crossed her face for a second, but then she complied, and the look of pure, unadulterated bliss on her face was beautiful to behold. Her head tipped back, sending her dark hair trembling down her back in a shiny cascade. “Oh, Archibald!” Her thighs began to tremble. “I think I’m going to… going to…”

He circled his thumb as quickly as he could, and she cried out. And this was what he wanted, what he had dreamed about for so long—the pleasure on her face as he brought her to orgasm, the feeling of her passage convulsing around him, the desperate way her hands clung to him for purchase.

It drove him straight over the edge. He exploded inside her with a shout, his motions as frantic as hers and the pleasure purer than anything he had ever known.

She flopped forward onto his chest, and he wrapped his arms around her. God, but this felt perfect. Surely this was the best moment of his life.

He was going to treasure this woman…

Gently, he lifted her face to his so he could kiss her.

And saw that she was blinking back tears.