Pieces of Dreams by Jennifer Blake Page A

securely in his hand. Accepting that mute gesture of need, he cupped their fullness, suckled them, draped them in long, cool strands of hair and licked the pouting rose-red nipples that peeked through. Face absorbed, he surveyed his handiwork. And he smiled.
    If this was loving, she knew why everyone tried so hard to keep it from young women. They could grow too easily to crave it, following mindlessly after the man who could make them feel such splendor. There was no embarrassment in it, only voluptuous, spreading wonder.
    Entranced by Conrad's deftness and her own tingling reactions, she barely noticed as he drew off more layers of clothing like shucking an ear of corn to reach the tender kernels. He tasted her as he might a freshly roasted ear also, nibbling as he went, gathering her flavor with his tongue.
    Amazement rasped in her throat. She writhed, a movement that parted her legs to give him greater access. With a soft groan of wonder, he took it, penetrating to her silken, pulsing core. She cried out, pleading, reaching convulsively for him. Her fingers pressed into his shoulder until her nails bit the skin.
    He answered her need, enclosing her in the protection of his arms even as he slid between her thighs. For an instant her tight, desperate constriction prevented entry. He did not force it, but aided her with gentle stretching until she could accept him. Even then, he eased inside by heart-melting degrees of advancement and retreat, filling her so slowly that her veins pounded with the maddening escalation of glory.
    She wanted, needed, all of him, and could not bear to be denied an instant longer. Sliding her hands down the powerful curve of his back, she pressed the palms of her hands to his hips as she arched against him.
    The pain stung. It was so unexpected that she fell back, taking him with her to impossible depths. He made a short, winded sound in his chest and was still. He hovered above her, and she heard him grit his teeth, felt the slow bunching of his muscles as he fought for control. A moment later, he put his hand under her and lifted her, tilted her hips a little while he eased from her, then lowered himself into her again with shuddering slowness.
    The abrupt beatitude was so overwhelming that a soft sob rasped in her throat and tears streamed from her eyes into her hair. And suddenly nothing was too deep or too hard or too much. She clung to him with desperate yearning. It was not mere lust but something deeper and more elemental, a passion for love and the life that he could give her by kindling it inside her.
    She moved with its ancient rhythm, hesitant and awkward. He felt the tentative accommodation, took it, molded it to his own efforts. As he drew back to carry her higher, she opened her eyes and looked into his face.
    The firelight in his eyes was echoed in her heart. She loved him, and spoke the words though her lips did not move and she made no sound. Never would she forget this moment. Never, not even when she was old and gray and had dismissed all else from memory. In this eternal instant he was hers and she was his, and nothing could ever take that from her.
    Then he sank into her, banishing thought with his surging power. Together they moved, rising, falling, while their skins glowed with the fiery heat of their blood and their hearts beat in thudding syncopation. Her very being rose to meet him, rushing toward him, pouring out to him like the river that coursed past where they lay. Higher it flooded, deeper, wider. She took his strength and gave him hers until their two beings were merged, so tightly and deeply mixed that there was no way to tell where one ended and the other began. No way, ever, to wrest them apart again.
    And abruptly she was caught in the surging tide, racing with it, flowing in a run for the sea. She reached its depths and spread, voluptuous, serene. Home. He pressed deep as he came to meet her, welcoming her with hard, enclosing arms.
    Afterward, they held each