When He Was Wicked: The 2nd Epilogue Read Free Page B

tightened. More. Dear God, she was going to kill him.
    “Don’t go slow,” he gasped.
    But he didn’t think she was listening. She was taking her time, undoing his breeches, letting her hands flutter along his belly until she found him.
    “Frannie…”
    One finger. That’s all she gave him. One featherlight finger along his shaft.
    She turned, looked at him. “This is fun,” she remarked.
    He just focused on trying to breathe.
    “I love you,” she said softly, and he felt her rise. She hoisted her skirts to her thighs as she positioned herself, then, with one spectacularly swift stroke, she took him within her, her body coming to rest against his, leaving him embedded to the hilt.
    He wanted to move then. He wanted to thrust up, or flip her over and pound until they were both nothing but dust, but her hands were firm on his hips, and when he looked up at her, her eyes were closed, and she almost looked as if she were concentrating.

    Her breathing was slow and steady, but it was loud, too, and with each exhale she seemed to bear down on him just a little bit more heavily.
    “Frannie,” he groaned, because he didn’t know what else to do. He wanted her to move faster. Or harder. Or something, but all she did was rock back and forth, her hips arching and curving in delicious torment. He clutched her hips, intending to move her up and down, but she opened her eyes and shook her head with a soft, blissful smile.
    “I like it this way,” she said.
    He wanted something different. He needed something different, but when she looked down at him, she looked so damned happy that he could deny her nothing. And then, sure enough, she began to shudder, and it was strange, because he knew the feel of her climax so well, and yet this time it seemed softer…and stronger, at the same time.
    She swayed, and she rocked, then she let out a little scream and sagged against him.
    And, to his utter and complete surprise, he came. He hadn’t thought he was ready. He hadn’t thought he was remotely near climax, not that it would have taken long had he been able to move beneath her. But then, without warning, he had simply exploded.
    They lay that way for some time, the sun falling gently on them. She burrowed her face in his neck, and he held her, wondering how it was possible that such moments existed.
    Because it was perfect. And he would have stayed there forever had he been able. And even though he didn’t ask her, he knew she felt the same.

    They’d meant to go home two days after the christening, Francesca thought as she watched one of her nephews tackle the other to the ground, but here it was, three weeks out, and they had not even begun to pack.
    “No broken bones, I hope.”
    Francesca smiled up at her sister Eloise, who had also elected to stay on at Aubrey Hall for an extended visit. “No,” she answered, wincing slightly when the future Duke of Hast-ings—otherwise known as Davey, aged eleven—let out a war whoop as he jumped from a tree. “But it’s not for lack of trying.”
    Eloise took a seat beside her and tilted her face to the sun. “I’ll put my bonnet on in a minute, I swear it,” she said.
    “I can’t quite determine the rules of the game,” Francesca remarked.
    Eloise didn’t bother to open her eyes. “That’s because there are none.”
    Francesca watched the chaos with fresh perspective. Oliver, Eloise’s twelve-year-old stepson, had grabbed hold of a ball—since when had there been a ball?—and was racing across the lawn. He appeared to reach his goal—not that Francesca would ever be sure whether that was the giant oak stump that had been there since she was a child or Miles, Anthony’s second son, who had been sitting cross-legged and cross-armed since Francesca had come outside ten minutes earlier.
    But whichever was the case, Oliver must have won a point because he slammed the ball against the ground and jumped up and down with a triumphant cry. Miles must have been on his