Quinn, Julia - Romancing Mister Bridgerton With 2nd Epilogue

His fingers moved to the back of her gown, moving expertly along the buttons until she felt the fabric loosening, first around her breasts, then around her ribs, then around her waist.

And then it wasn’t even there at all.

“My God,” he said, his voice a mere shadow louder than breath, “you’re so beautiful.”

And for the first time in her life, Penelope truly believed that it might be true.

There was something very wicked and titillating about being so intimately bared before another human being, but she didn’t feel shame. Colin was looking at her so warmly, touching her so reverently, that she could feel nothing but an overwhelming sense of destiny.

His fingers skimmed along the sensitive skin at the outside edge of her breast, first teasing her with his fingernails, then stroking her more gently as his fingertips returned to their original position near her collarbone.

Something tightened within her. She didn’t know if it was his touch or the way he was looking at her, but something was making her change.

She felt strange, odd.

Wonderful.

He was kneeling on the bed beside her, still fully clothed, gazing down at her with a sense of pride, of desire, of ownership. “I never dreamed you would look like this,” he whispered, moving his hand until his palm was lightly grazing her nipple. “I never dreamed I would want you this way.”

Penelope sucked in her breath as a spasm of sensation shot through her. But something in his words was unsettling, and he must have seen her reaction in her eyes, because he asked, “What is it? What is wrong?”

“Nothing,” she started to say, then checked herself. Their marriage ought to be based on honesty, and she did neither of them a service by withholding her true feelings.

“What did you think I would look like?” she asked quietly.

He just stared at her, clearly confused by her question.

“You said you never dreamed I would look this way,” she explained. “What did you think I would look like?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Until the last few weeks, honestly I don’t think I thought about it.”

“And since then?” she persisted, not quite sure why she needed him to answer, just knowing that she did.

In one swift moment he straddled her, then leaned down until the fabric of his waistcoat scraped her belly and breasts, until his nose touched hers and his hot breath swarmed across her skin.

“Since then,” he growled, “I’ve thought of this moment a thousand times, pictured a hundred different pairs of breasts, all lovely and desirable and full and begging for my attention, but nothing, and let me repeat this in case you didn’t quite hear me the first time, nothing comes close to reality.”

“Oh.” It was really all she could think to say.

He shrugged off his jacket and waistcoat until he was clad only in his fine linen shirt and breeches, then did nothing but stare at her, a wicked, wicked smile lifting one corner of his lips as she squirmed beneath him, growing hot and hungry under his relentless gaze.

And then, just when she was certain that she couldn’t take it for one more second, he reached out and covered her with both his hands, squeezing lightly as he tested the weight and shape of her. He moaned raggedly, then sucked in his breath as he adjusted his fingers so that her nipples popped up between them.

“I want to see you sitting up,” he groaned, “so I can see them full and lovely and large. And then I want to crawl behind you and cup you.” His lips found her ear and his voice dropped to a whisper. “And I want to do it in front of a mirror.”

“Now?” she squeaked.

He seemed to consider that for a moment, then shook his head. “Later,” he said, and then repeated it in a rather resolute tone. “Later.”

Penelope opened her mouth to ask him something—she had no idea what—but before she could utter a word, he murmured, “First things first,” and lowered his mouth to her breast, teasing her first with a soft rush of air, then closing his lips around her, chuckling softly as she yelped in surprise and bucked off the bed.

He continued this torture until she thought she might scream, then he moved to the other breast and repeated it all over again. But this time he’d freed up one of his hands, and it seemed to be everywhere—teasing, tempting, tickling. It was on her belly, then on her hip, then on her ankle, sliding up under her skirt.

“Colin,” Penelope gasped, squirming beneath him as his fingers stroked the delicate skin behind her knee.

“Are you trying to get away or come closer?” he murmured, his lips never once leaving her breast.

“I don’t know.”

He lifted his head and smiled down at her wolfishly. “Good.”

He climbed off of her and slowly removed the remainder of his clothing, first his fine linen shirt and then his boots and breeches. And all the while, he never once allowed his eyes to stray from hers. When he was done, he nudged her dress, already pooling about her waist, around her hips, his fingers pressing lightly against her soft bottom as he lifted her up to slide the fabric under her.

She was left before him in nothing but her sheer, whisper-soft stockings. He paused then, and smiled, too much of a man not to enjoy the view, then eased them from her legs, letting them flitter to the floor after he’d slid them over her toes.

She was shivering in the night air, and so he lay beside her, pressing his body to hers, infusing her with his warmth as he savored the silky softness of her skin.

He needed her. It was humbling how much he needed her.

He was hard, hot, and so desperately wracked with desire it was a wonder he could still see straight. And yet even as his body screamed for release, he was possessed of a strange calm, an unexpected sense of control. Somewhere along the way this had ceased to be about him. It was about her—no, it was about them , about this wondrous joining and miraculous love that he was only now beginning to appreciate.

He wanted her—God above, he wanted her—but he wanted her to tremble beneath him, to scream with desire, to thrash her head from side to side as he teased her toward completion.

He wanted her to love this, to love him, and to know , when they were lying in each other’s arms, sweaty and spent, that she belonged to him.

Because he already knew that he belonged to her.

“Tell me if I do anything you don’t like,” he said, surprised by the way his voice was shaking over his words.

“You couldn’t,” she whispered, touching his cheek.

She didn’t understand. It almost made him smile, probably would have made him smile if he weren’t so concerned with making this, her first experience, a good one. But her whispered words— you couldn’t —could mean only one thing—that she had no idea what it meant to make love with a man.

“Penelope,” he said softly, covering her hand with his own, “I need to explain something to you. I could hurt you. I would never mean to, but I could, and—”

She shook her head. “You couldn’t,” she said again. “I know you. Sometimes I think I know you better than I know myself. And you would never do anything that would hurt me.”

He gritted his teeth and tried not to groan. “Not on purpose,” he said, the barest hint of exasperation tinging his voice, “but I could, and—”

“Let me be the judge,” she said, taking his hand and bringing it to her mouth for a single, heartfelt kiss. “And as for the other . . .”

“What other?”

She smiled, and Colin had to blink, because he could swear she almost looked as if she were amused by him. “You told me to tell you if you did anything I didn’t like,” she said.