sorry.”
“Not at all.” He made a circle with his finger, a silent demand that she turn around again. “I’m not quite done.”
“Oh, of course.” She did as he requested, forcing herself to stand perfectly still while he finished unbuttoning her gown. “It’s just that these little memories should be special. I don’t want to tarnish them.”
He’d reached the last button, but instead of releasing her, he cupped her hips and slid her tight against him. Her breath escaped in a silent gasp, and she froze as his bare chest pressed against her bare back, heat against heat. One hand slid from her hip to settle low on her abdomen where one day she hoped a child would nestle. Desire intensified, driving her nearly insane with need. She could feel the strong, tensed muscles of his thighs and knew he was aroused. Seriously aroused. Knew that she’d done that to him, just as he’d done the same to her.
“What about you?” he asked. An almost guttural quality slid through his voice. “Am I tarnishing sacred memories for you and your future husband?”
“No, because this isn’t real.” But it felt real. His hands on her. Their partial nudity. The want that thickened the air and made it difficult to breathe. A wedding night waiting to happen. It felt all too real. “Someday I’ll have a real marriage. But this isn’t it. It can’t be.”
“It can, if you let it.” He spun her around. “Let’s start with that kiss we shared. Let’s find out whether that was real…or pure imagination.”
And then he took her mouth in a kiss reserved for lovers, one that claimed, just as it seduced. A kiss that proved that what they’d felt earlier hadn’t been imagination, not unless they were both experiencing the exact same fantasy. Time seemed to halt, to give them endless seconds to wallow in the moment. This man could have brought stone to life, Ariana decided, and she was far from stone. If she could have melded her body to his, she would have. Instead, she simply gave everything she had within her. And then she gave more.
He slid his fingers deep into her hair as he consumed her, tumbling them from one delicious connection into the next. “I don’t give a damn what we agreed. I need you.”
And she needed him. Needed the hardness of his mouth over hers. Needed the delicious blaze of heat. She wanted to fill her lungs with his breath, to inhale his scent and taste and revel in the very air that sustained him.
Every nerve in her body screamed in surrender, making it almost impossible to resist the inevitable. Somehow she managed. “We have an agreement.” The words were barely more than a whisper.
He pulled back just far enough to allow sanity to slip between them. “An agreement…or a suggestion?”
“It was an agreement you promised to honor,” she insisted. “Please let go of me.”
He bent his head and buried a final kiss in the sensitive curve between her neck and shoulder. Fire flashed through her, arrowing from her breasts straight to the warm feminine core of her, and a deep yearning threatened all she held most dear. “No one needs to know.” The words hovered, tantalizing with possibility.
“I would know.” Could he feel how she trembled? Could he sense her longing? She needed to stop him while she could still stop herself. She spoke with difficulty, fighting to translate her thoughts into English. And still her tongue stumbled over the words. “And it would prevent us from getting an annulment. Since we were married in the church, and since Romanos don’t believe in divorce, we can’t take this any further.”
To her profound relief—or was it regret?—he released her. “If that’s your preference.”
She clutched the bodice of her gown to her breasts to keep it from slipping. “It is.” Not. Most decidedly, not. She didn’t dare look at him in case her conflicted emotions showed on her face. “I’ll use the bathroom first, if you don’t mind.”
“Fine.” He