The English Bride. Margaret Way

acknowledge. His hand held her nape, cupped it, holding her head to him. She was almost lying back in his arms, allowing him to take his intense pleasure, and something deep, deep inside her started to melt. She was almost fainting under the tumult of sensation, her own ardent response. She had never known such intimacy, never before revelled in it, knowing it could be a cause of much unhappiness but she was too needy or too stupid to care.

      What bright spirit impelled towards delight was ever known to figure out the cost?

      They broke apart, both of them momentarily disorientated as though they had been beamed down from another world. Grant, for his part, was profoundly conscious his moods, attitudes and thoughts about this woman were vacillating wildly like a geiger counter exposed to radiation. She set his blood on fire, which greatly complicated their relationship. How could one think calmly, rationally when he was continually longing to make love to her? She might even see his masculine drive as excessive, a kind of male sexual aggression. She was so small, so light limbed, so fragile in his arms, the perfume of her, of her very skin, a potent trigger to desire.

      By contrast she seemed shaken, deprived of speech, unusually pale.

      “I’m sorry, Francesca.” Remorse was in his voice. “I never meant to be rough with you. I got carried away. Forgive me. It’s as you say, I lack the courtly touch.”

      She could have and perhaps should have told him how she felt, how she welcomed his advances with all her heart, but the tide of emotion was too dangerously high. She stood away, putting a trembling hand to her hair, realising a few long, silky strands had worked their way loose. “You didn’t hurt me, Grant,” she managed to say. “Appearances can be deceptive. I’m a lot tougher than I look.”

      His low laugh was spontaneous. “You could have fooled me.” He watched her trying to fix her hair, wanting to pull it free of its braided coils. What fascination long, beautiful hair had for a man. He could even imagine himself brushing it. God he had to be mad! He forced a grin, the smile not going with the look in his eyes. “I suppose we’d better take the coffee out. It’ll be getting cold.” He reached around and set the glass plunger on the tray. “I’ll carry it out. You relax. Get the colour back in your cheeks.” A tall order when he had reduced her to a breathless quivering receptacle of sensation, naked in her clothes.