The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

keeps things more interesting. And since I’m thinking like a man right now . . .” He swept her up into his arms and muffled her surprised gasp with his mouth.
    How could a kiss be gentle and searing at the same time? she wondered. So gentle it had tears swimming to her eyes, so hot it liquefied the bones. She let herself slide into it, a warm pool with flames licking at the edges.
    “Do you want me, Jude? Tell me you want me.”
    “Yes, I want you. I always want you.” She was already neck-deep in that pool, and slipping under.
    “Make love with me here.” He chewed restlessly on her bottom lip. “Here in the moonlight.”
    “Mmmm.” She started to consent, then surfaced with a shot, an incautious diver clawing into the air. “Here? Outside?”
    He would have been amused by her reaction, but the seduction he’d begun had circled around to claim him. “Here, on the grass, with the night breathing around us.”
    Still holding her, he knelt. And with his mouth roamingher face, murmured to her, “Give yourself to me.”
    “But what if someone comes by?”
    “There’s no one but us, in the whole world, no one else.” His hands moved over her, and his mouth. Even as she opened her own to protest, he spoke again. “I’ve such a need for you. Let me show you. Let me have you.”
    The grass was so soft, and he was so warm. To be needed was such a miracle, so much more important than sense and modesty. There was a tenderness in his hands as he stroked her, slowly, slowly, heating her blood. His mouth brushed over hers, whispering of promises.
    And suddenly there was no one else in the world, and no need for there to be.
    Lazily, she lifted her arms as he drew off her sweater. when he trailed his fingertips down her body, her eyes grew heavy, her body slumberous. He slipped off her shoes, her slacks, undressing her without hurry and letting his hands touch and linger where they liked until it seemed her skin hummed.
    She lay naked in the grass, moonlight sprinkling over her. When she reached for him, he drew her up.
    “I want to unbind your hair, to watch it tumble down.” He kept his eyes on hers as he freed it. “Do you remember the first time?”
    “Yes, I remember.”
    “Now I know what pleases you.” He pressed his lips to her shoulder, then let her hair riot down to curtain his face and smother him with silk and scent. “Lie back on the grass and let me pleasure you.” His teeth scraped lightly down the side of her neck as he lowered her again. “I’ll give you all I have.”
    He could have feasted, but instead he only sipped. Long, luxurious kisses that shuddered into the soul and drew soft moans from it. And at each moan he went deeper.
    He could have ravished, but instead he seduced. Slow, tender caresses that slid over the skin and sent it quivering. And at each quiver, he lingered.
    She lost herself in him, in the delightfully dizzy mix of senses and sensations. Cool grass and warm flesh, fragrant breezes and husky whispers, strong hands and patient lips.
    She watched the moon soar overhead, a gleaming white ball against a deep blue sky, chased by tattered wisps of clouds. She heard the call of an owl, a deep, demanding cry, and felt the echo of it leap into her blood as he urged her up and up to that first rippling crest.
    She sang out his name, floating as the high, warm wave cascaded through her.
    “Go higher.” He was desperate to watch her fly, to know that he could send her up until her eyes were wild and blind and her body quaking. “Go higher,” he demanded again, and drove her there more ruthlessly than he’d intended.
    Heat flashed into her, a star exploding. The shock of pleasure was so intense, so unexpected after the tenderness, her body reared up, half in protest, half in delight. This time it wasn’t a moan that escaped her, but a scream.
    “Aidan.” She gripped him for balance as her world went mad and they rolled over. “I can’t.”
    “Again.” He dragged her head back by the hair and savaged her mouth. “Again, until we’re both empty.” The hands that had been so gentle dug into her hips, lifted her. “Tell me you want me inside you. Me and no one else.”
    “Yes.” She was frantic, all but weeping as her body bowed back. “You and no one else.”
    “Then take me.”
    He drew her down until she was filled with him, until the glory of it burst through her. Her breath tore from his throat as she arched back, her body silvered by themoonlight.