31

Cedric laughed as he scooped his hands under her bottom and swept her up from the bonnet. “Oh, yes, I can.”
“You bastard.”
His eyes glittered wildly down at her, his smile devilishly sexy. “Tch tch. You’re a lady, remember?”
“I don’t feel much like a lady at this moment.” Her frustration was at fever pitch, making her almost violent with need.
“Tell me what you feel like,” he challenged her, “Tell me what you want me to do to you.” Her already heated face must have gone bright red. “You can say it,” he whispered wickedly in her ear. “I’m your husband so it’s one of those things that are perfectly acceptable. There’s no one here to hear you but me. And I want you to say it, just the way you’re thinking it right now. Go on. Say it!”
Anna remained silent. Suddenly she felt so self conscious. Exposed. She stepped away from him, and this time he didn’t stop her. Just watched as she hurried out of the garage and into the house.
__________
Anna hurried up the stairs to her bedroom. The bedroom that adjoined Cedric’s.
A fact she became very aware of when, only minutes later, she heard him let himself into the adjoining room. She hurriedly took off her clothes and went to take a bath, unable to stop thinking about what had happened in the garage. Unable to believe that they had gone from arguing to doing…. That.
It felt good…. So good that even now her body throbbed just thinking about it. How could he do something like that? Touch her that way. Give her pleasure in a way that she’d never felt before, and then walk away? She lay down shakily on her brocade-covered bed, not sure that she was going to be able to sleep at all knowing Cedric was only on the other side of that connecting door…
_________
About thirty minutes after Anna got into bed, struggling to get Cedric out of her mind so she could fall asleep, she heard a door open. At first she thought it was the bedroom door, and wondered who it could be, then she realized that it was the connecting door, and that Cedric was in the room with her.
Anna found it disturbing to see him in the femininity of her bedroom, although he didn’t look out of place in his black robe amongst the room decor. Just disturbing… But she mustn’t let the unaccustomed intimacy of this situation throw her; she knew now that she always needed to be one hundred percent aware when dealing with Cedric.
“I thought that communicating door was locked.” She said as she frowned across to where the door stood slightly ajar.
His presence in the almost darkened room was disconcerting, and suddenly she was aware of every inch of her body under the sheets. Aware of the short, black nightie she was wearing, aware of her nipples hardening, and she squeezed her legs together, hoping he wouldn’t notice her discomfort.
Cedric gave a slight inclination of his head. “It opens from both sides, Anna. That’s why it’s called a connecting door, and like any sensible husband, I have the key,” he drawled mockingly.
She had wondered where it was when she noticed the connecting door! Well, now she knew. And obviously Cedric wasn’t averse to using it when he felt the need.
“So it would appear,” she returned coolly, moving slightly under the sheets, “To what do I owe the honor of this-visit?” She deliberately hesitated over the last word. Because his presence here was an intrusion-and she intended he should know what it was.
Cedric looked unperturbed by her coolness. “What the hell do you think, Anna?” He asked.
Anna looked at him assessingly for several seconds, her smile, when it came, completely lacking in humor. “Did you think I had sneaked down and brought ‘one of my boyfriends’ up to my bedroom?” she scorned hardily. She was referring to his comment earlier in the garage, and she was furious to think that might be what he had imagined, what had compelled him to open that communicating door and come into her bedroom unannounced.
He shrugged again. “It wouldn’t have done you much good if you had!” he bit out harshly, eyes narrowed dangerously.
Anna felt disadvantaged as she lay there while he stood, so she sat up in the bed, tilting her head back in challenge. “Oh is that so?” she asked.
Cedric took a step towards her. “I told you. I’m not going to share you with anyone, Anna,” he grated roughly, his next steps forward bringing him to the edge of the bed, so he was now within inches of touching her.
He was so close to her now that Anna could feel the heat emanating from his body, see the faint shadow of his stubble on the squareness of his chin as he glared down at her, smell the masculine tang of his aftershave. In fact, she was aware of everything about him!
She had to put some distance between them, if not physically, then emotionally! “You can’t tell me what to do, Cedric. We agreed that we could have separate lives,” she reminded him pointedly, instantly regretting the defiance as Cedric’s expression darkened coldly.
“And I said that part of the agreement is off,” he bit out, suddenly getting into the bed with her before she realized what he was about to do, then he reached out to pull her roughly into his arms.
Anna gasped in shock as Cedric’s mouth came crushingly down on her own. But her body thought otherwise, her lips opening beneath his, her body melting into his hardness as he curved her ruthlessly against him. She felt like a woman who had been on the point of drowning and had been thrown a life-raft, her hands clinging about his waist, her lips moving provocatively against his, deepening the caress as his tongue tasted, and then plunged into the warm moisture of her mouth.
He felt so good, his body firm beneath her touch, all hard muscle, the throbbing heat of his thighs telling her of his own arousal even as his lips left hers to burn a trail of fire down the column of her throat and into the hollows below. Anna gasped as Cedric roughly pushed aside the sheets, then pushed aside the restriction of her nightie, that questing mouth seeking, and finding, the pertness of her breast, his tongue moving silkily over her nipple in rhythmic pleasure.