Sara blinked, looking momentarily puzzled as he shifted his grip on her so his fingers could dip lower.

“You’re ready for me.” He didn’t keep the smugness from his tone as he swiped a pair of fingers in a long, slow caress up her damp sex. Sara’s body shuddered, and he repeated the caress, studying her as he did.

“You like that. What about this?” He dabbled at the opening to her body, gently, but not too gently for a woman becoming aroused.

“Do that again,” she said, closing her eyes. Beck obliged by easing a single finger shallowly inside her.

“Better?”

“Not better enough.” She arched her hips against him as he continued the same fleeting and shallow penetrations. When he limited himself to those teasing caresses, she pushed against him as if asking him to speed up, or for the love of God, to enter her.

Cautiously, Beck brushed his thumb over a spot higher up.

“Push harder,” she muttered, grasping his hand and anchoring it against her. “Right there, Beckman, ah, God, yes, right there.”

“And there we go,” Beck whispered, pleased and relieved, because God help him, Sara was so bloody snug, he hadn’t been sure quite how to go on.

“Don’t you stop,” Sara hissed through her teeth. “Please, Beck, you can’t…”

“I won’t.” He leaned over, kept up his stroking, and took her nipple in his mouth. He pleasured himself more than her, suckling greedily and drawing firmly in a rhythm that counterpointed the movements of his hand.

“Beckman…” Her fingers clamped around his wrist, her back arched, and her hips thrust up hard against his hand. His control nearly slipped when Sara began to make low, soft noises of pleasure and need and greater pleasure still.

“Everlasting, merciful…” Sara rolled to lay panting on her back, turning only her head to gaze at him. “God above, Beckman Haddonfield. You should be banned by royal decree.” She rolled back into him, tucking herself against his chest, and hiding her face against his body.

Despite the arousal roaring through his body, Beck was pleased. Pleased for her, pleased for himself. Embracing her, he was reassured he had the patience to see this through, and the determination. He gathered her against him and swept her hair over her shoulder.

“You’re all right?”

“Buzzing,” Sara replied. “Once more, in very short order, buzzing. You?”

“I will be,” Beck answered. God willing, he would be soon. “But I’m concerned.”

“Hnn.” Sara’s tongue found his nipple, and by the lazy way she stroked him, Beck knew he’d chosen his moment well. Sara would not know a concern now if it kissed her on the lips.

“It’s not a serious concern,” Beck went on, “but I’d like your agreement to humor me, Sara.”

Sara sighed contentedly. “Right now, you can have anything you please of me, Beckman. I am powerless to refuse you.”

Beck smiled, his imagination taking off with that offer. “I want you, Sara, more than I can recall wanting anybody or anything, but there’s only one way I will have you.”

She raised her face up to peer at him, the gravity in his voice perhaps penetrating her haze of well-being.

“What are you about, Beckman?” She reached up and brushed his hair back from his forehead. “And you needn’t be diplomatic. Have I disappointed you?”

“Does this feel like disappointment?” He wrapped her fingers around his shaft.

Sara smiled wickedly. “No. That feels like the sweet shop is still open for business.”

“Not to you.” Beck answered as sternly as he could, but he had to close his eyes as Sara’s fingers stroked lightly over the head of his cock. He caught her hand with his, stilling it, but not making her turn loose of him.

“What do you mean, Beck?” The beginning of hurt laced her tone, and Beck was relieved to know he had her attention.

“You have to promise me, Sara, you’ll let me have the reins for the next little while.” He kissed her cheek to soften his words and to take in a gratifying whiff of her fragrance.

“Didn’t I just give you my reins? And the whip and spurs, along with a few lumps of sugar?”

“You did.” Beck smiled despite himself. “But I want to be inside you, Sara. Want it so badly my eyes are crossing, and if you get to showing your enthusiasm, I could hurt you.”

“That is nonsense,” Sara began. “You are being overly…” But he held her gaze and slowly stroked her hand over the entire hard, thick length of him.

“I’ll sleep in the stables,” he threatened. “I’ll sleep in the Solent rather than hurt you, Sara. You can’t undermine my control on this, not this time.”

She frowned, maybe sensing there was a compliment, a reason to be pleased in his words, and then he saw her put it together: she could drive him beyond reason were she too enthusiastic. Her, Sara Hunt, retiring, rusticating, widowed housekeeper.

“I will abide by your direction,” she said gently. “No matter what, Beck. You can trust me on this, for this once at least.”

He kissed her to hide his relief. In bed at least, he’d never disappointed a woman. And he really would sleep in the stables before he’d start now. Carefully, he shifted over her and settled between her legs.

Sara’s hands came to rest low on his back. “What do you want me to do?”

“You can kiss and pet and carry on all you want above the waist.” Beck nuzzled her throat. “Below the waist, you don’t move unless I tell you to. Not a wiggle or a tease, Sara.”

“Below the waist, I am your statue. I will come to life only at your command.”

For several minutes, he tried to content himself with easy kisses.

“I like kissing you.” Sara brushed his hair back and levered up to capture his mouth again. “Like it a lot.”

As did he, but Beck’s concentration was fixed on the territory Sara had given into his exclusive control. As she settled into the kissing and let her hands roam over his back, Beck gradually eased himself more snugly against her sex. The urge to thrust—to push into her and keep pushing—was nearly overwhelming, but he contented himself with nudging, then nudging again.

“This is harder than I thought it would be, this holding still,” Sara said against his neck. He angled up on his arms to regard her.

“Is it too difficult?” Let alone hard.

“No.” Sara smiled slightly. “But what is the problem? I want you inside me, Beckman.”

“This is the problem.” He did flex his hips then, and by rights—she’d had a child, for pity’s sake—he should have begun to slip into the sweet, wet heat of her.

Sara cocked her head on the pillow. “It doesn’t hurt. Do that again.”

He did, watching her face closely, waiting for the telltale wince.

“Again.”

He gained a bit of entry but saw her expression change fleetingly. “I’m hurting you.”

“No. It’s just different, that’s all. Again.”

He complied, hamstrung between increasing arousal and the certain conviction—as closely as her body wrapped him—he had to be hurting her. She wasn’t hurting him, though; God above, just the bloody opposite.

“Don’t stop, Beck,” Sara said, but he could hear the caution in her tone as the head of his cock was now lodged blissfully inside her.

He tried to think.

“Close yourself around me,” he suggested, settling down on his forearms.

Sara hugged him to her more tightly.

“Inside, too, Sara. Here.” He gave her a minute thrust to demonstrate.

“Close myself?”

“Grip my cock with your sex. Like you don’t want me to pull out.” She comprehended that, and Beck felt the snugness of her contract around him. Had he been a Papist, he would have started saying the rosary on behalf of his disintegrating wits.

“Do that again, slowly, as if you could pull me into you, then let me go.”

She did it, and he experimentally eased forward as she relaxed.

“That works,” she reported, starting up again.

It worked too bloody well. It worked to arouse him to the point where his entire being was an exercise in self-discipline. By the smallest increments imaginable, Sara’s body eased around him and admitted him to her intimate depths.

“Are you in pain?” Sara’s hands were anchored on his buttocks, her face tucked against his chest.

“Bliss,” he managed. But as soon as he let go, the bliss would implode into ecstasy. He couldn’t do that until he was sure he wouldn’t hurt her. “Can you move just a little on me now?”

“Like this?” She rolled her hips conservatively.

“Just like that,” Beck rasped. “Until you’re comfortable.”

Or until he died, because all this holding back would surely kill him.

“I’m comfortable.” She set up a tidy little rocking. “I just…”

“What, love?” Beck dropped his forehead to hers. “Tell me. Please.”

“I want more.” Sara let go with a luxurious undulation and sighed against his neck.

Sainthood loomed within Beck’s grasp, but he declined for the greater pleasure of making love to the woman in his bed.

“I think we’ve earned a little more,” he said. “But you hold still now. I don’t want to take any chances.”

Immediately, she quieted and waited for him. When he flexed on a long, slow thrust, she moaned softly and melted around him. “Better,” she pronounced.

Thank you, God.

Beck found a rhythm, keeping his movements slow and languid but not letting himself open his eyes, not when the sound of Sara’s sighs alone was driving him beyond reason.

“I want to move, Beck.” Sara took his earlobe in her mouth and gently nipped him. “Just a little.” He nodded. His jaw was clenched too tightly for speech.