The Ghost by Greyson, Maeve (best motivational books to read .txt) 📕

Pushing away from the pillows, she sat straighter with one arm clamping the bedsheet up over her breasts. Fingers outspread, she drifted her palm over the corded muscles of his arm and ridges of his chest. She didn’t touch him but held her hand close enough to draw in his heat. His strength. His very essence. Such a good man. Nothing to fear. Both her heart and her loneliness urged her on. Curling her legs beneath her, she went to her knees and leaned closer. “Will ye help me learn?” she whispered. “Help me discover the joy two people can share?”

“Aye, dear one.” He grazed a fingertip along her jawline, then cradled her cheek in his hand. Brow furrowed, he studied her, as though trying to decide what to do next. “As long as ye are certain?”

“I am certain.” And she was. He had set loose a hot aching inside her, a yearning for him to burn away all the years of suffering. But it was more than that—something she could never put into words. “Make me yer wife,” she said, pulling him toward her. “Make us one.”

With a kiss that tasted of wine, whisky, and unquenchable need, he eased her back across the bed. She laced her fingers in his hair, holding him, allowing all her doubts and fears to fall away. This was right and good. This precious man would never harm her.

Her breath caught as he raised up and shoved the sheets out from between them. “Ye are loveliness itself, dear one.” His gaze raked across her. Sliding a finger down her arm, he took hold of her hand, lifted it to his mouth, and pressed a lingering kiss into her palm. “Ye are still certain, aye?” His head tilted over her, and she felt his encouraging smile even though she couldn’t see it in the shadows.

“Aye, my fine husband.” She shifted and moved, aching to know the complete wonder of him. “Fear and dread are gone. Only love and yearning remains.”

“Mo ghràdh,” he breathed as he stretched across her. “My precious love.”

His heat became hers. Their flesh became one. She raced her hands across his back, reveling in the ripple of his muscles beneath her fingers. Moving with him, she was both amazed and thrilled at the ferocity of the building ecstasy. It raced out of control. Wave after wave of bliss crashed across her, forcing a cry from her lips.

Magnus drove harder, spurred on by her release. “Mo chridhe!” he growled long and low, then thrust forward with the roar of a beast unleashed. Suspended together in timeless pleasure, he sank into her embrace, melted into her, touching her heart and soul with love and a rare vulnerability.

Heartbeat pounded against heartbeat. Gasps slowed to steady breathing.

A wholeness, centeredness she had never known filled her as she held him. Such a wonderful contentment. She couldn’t remember the last time she had known such serenity. “Ye have gifted me peacefulness, dear one,” she whispered into his hair.

He lifted himself up and gave her a nuzzling kiss. “Ye have made me whole.” His breath tickled across her as he trailed his kisses lower. “I fear I must beg yer forgiveness, though.”

“Beg my forgiveness?” She combed her fingers through his hair, splaying it across his shoulder as he rested his head between her breasts. “For what do ye need forgiving?” Surely, he didn’t speak of the past? She had moved that blame to fate’s shoulders. The fault of all that had happened was no longer his.

Lifting his head, he smiled. “I intended our first loving to be slower—savoring each other for hours.” His slight shifting with the barest shrug, a mix of confession and embarrassment, made her heart swell even more. “But I couldna help myself. I needed to possess ye and have ye possess me.”

With a turn of her head on the pillow, she looked toward the window. “’Tis still early. See the slant of the moonlight on the floor. It’s verra far from its zenith.”

He rolled with her in his arms, settling back into the pillows with her cradled on top of him. Gently, he lifted her until she straddled him. Pressing his hand to the center of her chest, he kept it there for the longest while, a faint smile tugging at one side of his mouth. “I love the feel of yer heart through the softness of yer skin.” He took her hand and placed it in the same spot on his chest. “We are matched. Feel it?”

She closed her eyes, focusing on the strong thud against her palm. He spoke the truth. Their hearts thumped with the same steady beat. “A good omen for certain,” she whispered as she leaned forward for a kiss.

“Aye, my love.” He rolled with her again, resuming the ancient dance and rocking into her with a tantalizingly slow rhythm. “A damn fine omen.”

Now, she understood why some called this loving. For that was what this was. Unexplainable joy. Excitement that squeezed your heart and knitted your soul to another’s. A bliss like no other. She gave, but so did he. Both reaped pleasures of which she had never dreamed. Never had she known such a sensation of being this alive was possible. Once would never be enough. Nor would hours, days, or years spent with this man.

A lazy, fully sated smile overcame her as she collapsed atop his chest, shifting with its every rise and fall. Aye, this was how it should be between a husband and wife. For the first time in her life, she knew in her heart she no longer faced the world alone. No more did she fear the future, or what terrors life might hold. Never again. She had this. She had now. And it was enough.

*

On his side, head propped in his hand, he watched her sleep. He allowed his gaze to follow the delicious curve of her fine round rump as she lay on her stomach. The sun