The Next Santini Bride. Maureen Child

tasting her, learning every curve, every line. He’d wanted her so badly right from the start and now that he’d had her, enjoyed her, felt her body cradling his, it wasn’t enough. He wanted even more of her, and this was a first for him.

      Usually, when that initial rush of desire had been sated, he was content, and ready to move on. He didn’t want commitment. Relationships. Now, though, with this woman, all Dan could think of was more. More of her. More of them.

      His hands drifted over her flesh, and when she stirred beneath him, he knew her body, too, was flickering back into life. Back into need. At the nape of her neck, he nibbled at her skin until rows of goose bumps dotted her back and shoulders. She writhed beneath him, but he didn’t ease her discomfort, instead, he stoked it. With touch after touch, kiss after kiss, he fed the fires engulfing them both and hoped they’d be consumed by them.

      And when touching her wasn’t enough any more, he turned her over, scooped her into his arms and muttered, “Bedroom?”

      “Upstairs,” she whispered, locking her arms around his neck and laying her head on his chest. “Hurry.”

      “You bet,” he said, and took the stairs two at a time.

      “Second door.”

      “Right.” He went up to it, stepped into a cool, mint-green room with a lacy cover on the bed and more lace covering the windows, where moonlight tried to peek through the patterns of frothy fabric.

      Walking directly to the bed, he reached down with one hand and swept the coverlet down to the foot of the mattress. Then he laid Angela down atop the pale-green sheets and stretched out beside her. Dipping his head to her breasts, he took first one nipple and then the next into his mouth.

      Her hands fisted in his hair as she held him tightly to her. His tongue stroked the pebbly surface of her nipples, and he tasted them both until he’d had his fill. Until she was moving and moaning beneath him. And then he began again.

      “Dan…” she whispered, arching into him, turning toward him. “I need you. Now.”

      “Slow this time, Angel. Slow for both of us.” Though it killed him to maintain control, he wanted to make this last. To make this joining even more complete than the first.

      She chuckled harshly and shook her head. “I don’t think I can stand slow.”

      He smiled against her breast and let one hand slide down along her body to the warm heart of her.

      She gasped as he cupped her and lifted her hips into his touch.

      “Oh, now I know I can’t wait much longer.”

      “It gets better,” he assured her.

      “Impossible,” she murmured, twisting her hips into his touch.

      “Trust me,” he said and shifted, moving down along her body, trailing damp kisses and silent promises as he went.

      He glanced up at her and saw her hands pulling at the fine linen sheets, and holding them tightly. And he smiled to himself, enjoying the fact that he could bring her to this point again so soon after that mind-numbing pleasure they’d shared only moments ago.

      “Dan…Dan,” his name came on a gasp of sound as her breath quickened. She licked dry lips and tossed her head from side to side on the pillow as she tried to find the release only he could give her.

      He moved to take a place between her thighs and, kneeling, lifted her behind off the bed in a gentle, firm grip. His fingers kneaded the tender flesh as he lifted her higher and bent his head to taste her.

      Angela gasped aloud and looked at him as his mouth took her places she hadn’t dreamed existed. No man ever had done this to her before. And she wouldn’t have believed that she would not only allow it, but luxuriate in the sensations she was feeling.

      He’d been right. He’d claimed not only her body but her mind this time. Her brain spinning, her heartbeat thundering in her ears, she struggled to hold on to what was left of her sanity as another part of her raced toward the release she knew was awaiting her.

      His mouth and tongue tortured her with sweet deliberation. His breath dusted across tender flesh as he pushed her higher, higher until she felt as though the air was too thin to breathe. And just when she thought she couldn’t bear the suspense any longer, his intimate kiss sent her spiraling over the edge of sanity into a soft oblivion.

      And a moment later Dan’s body entered hers, and in a few quick, hard thrusts, he found a sense of completion he’d never known before.

      As he collapsed atop her, he realized that here, in the quiet rooms of a well-tended home, he’d made her his and fallen into a tender trap he’d never seen coming.