Midnight Eyes by Brophy, Sarah (well read books .TXT) 📕

back into life, relieved that she couldn’t see the smug smile on his face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he murmured neutrally.

“I’m talking about your mad dash to this chamber as if you were being chased by a pack of hounds,” she said through clenched teeth. “I’m talking about my nonexistent tiredness; I’m talking about this sudden impulse you seem to have developed to hide me away.” Robert looked up in surprise at the sound of raw emotion in her voice. “For God’s sake, if you’re ashamed of me, just say so. I can hide away. I’m good at it and I can almost accept it, if it must be so. But not this. You can’t be kind and considerate one minute, then brisk and rude the next when you can’t stand people seeing your blind…wife.”

Robert let out a tortured groan as he quickly stood. He pulled her into his arms and buried her face in his chest, holding her tightly to his heart. “Oh, Imogen it wasn’t that! It was…I can’t explain it.”

“Try,” she said in a defiant, if muffled, voice.

He sighed and rubbed his chin along her hair, bathing his senses in the scent. “The men were looking at you like they liked what they saw,” he said lamely, rolling his eyes at how feeble it was. It sounded even worse out loud, he realized with a feeling of resignation.

He waited for the explosion that such an asinine announcement deserved but when nothing happened, he risked a glance at her face. If his jealousy hadn’t still been hot inside him and riding him hard, he might have openly laughed at the incredulous look on Imogen’s face.

“You were jealous of men looking at me?”

“Maybe,” he muttered grudgingly.

Her eyes widened, a slow smile curling into life on her face. The smile turned into a delighted laugh and she held her sides as they began to ache. “You can’t mean it?” she spluttered. “You can’t actually be jealous of your men looking at Lady Deformed.” Just saying it set her off into another peel of laughter.

“Imogen…” he said warningly.

She raised her hands in supplication, and gasped for breath. “Sorry, sorry. I forgot about not being able to say that, but you have got to admit, it is a little ludicrous, being jealousy of Lady De…me.”

“You will also notice that I’m not laughing,” he said through gritted teeth.

“I had.” She smiled, trying to get control of herself. She very nearly succeeded. “But you will understand if I find it amusing. I mean, who would have thought that it was even possible that you would feel jealousy? What are the chances of it happening?” She held herself for a second, then broke into unholy laughter.

Robert pulled her ruthlessly to him and smothered her laughter with his lips.

He ran his tongue along her delightfully full bottom lip, and Imogen immediately opened her mouth, drawing Robert deeper. He buried his hands in her hair, trying to draw her closer yet, trying to brand her indelibly with the heat of his moist breath.

Amusement had turned to desire and as Robert steered her to the bed Imogen tried to remove his clothes. They fell onto the covers in a tangle of limbs and unfulfilled passions.

Panting, Robert lifted his head and looked into Imogen’s flushed face. She was caught up in the web of desire he’d spun relentlessly around her, but it wasn’t enough, he thought grimily. He wanted her need for him so hot that the world ceased to exist for her.

He began mercilessly to seduce her body.

His hand moved over her soft skin, lingering here, tantalizing there, and tormenting everywhere. Where his hand went his mouth followed, drawing whimpers from her as her hands grabbed the furs, helpless.

But it wasn’t enough.

He brought her closer and closer to the edge, drawing her higher and higher. He relentlessly pursued his torment of her till her body was a taut bowstring under his calloused hands, her head tossing helplessly on the pillow, an inarticulate jumble of frenzied pleadings escaping her lips. When his mouth found the center of her need amongst her moist curls he tormented her with his knowing tongue.

And still it wasn’t enough.

He pushed his way deep into her slick, welcoming body, reveling in the heat and moisture that greeted him as he began to mercilessly drive them both into a frenzy.

Imogen’s body clenched around him as she came, wave after wave of the fathomless desire crashing over her senses. And yet her pleasure didn’t stop. With each powerful thrust, her body convulsed around his shaft with increasing frenzy. It was beyond her control. She could do nothing other than wrap her legs tightly about his slim hips and give herself over to the rule of Robert’s body in hers.

Only when he felt her absolute surrender did Robert let his body lose control, roaring with the sheer power of it. For a moment his body was a rigid mass, then it turned to water, and he feared that he might never be able to move again. Not that it seemed such a bad fate when his face was buried in the waves of her hair, and his softening manhood was buried deep inside her. It seemed an eternity before he could find the strength to roll off her and gather her into his arms, holding her tightly to his pounding heart.

And still it wasn’t enough.

His jealousy continued to eat at him. Logically he knew that he couldn’t justify it, but a primitive part of him longed to be able to hang any man who dared to look at Imogen. But if he did that, it would mean that Shadowsend would be left without any male inhabitants fairly soon, he thought ruefully. That it was his own men he was fantasizing about destroying only made it worse. After years of implicit trust, could he not now trust them to even look upon his wife without him going mad with jealousy and lust?

He really was going insane.

He