Within her the heat of her own desire seemed to be melting her flesh, so that it softened and expanded. Her body moved under his hands and their grip on her tightened. It couldn’t be happening like this, without any need for anything other than the satisfaction of the compulsive drive that was now pounding through her, but it was. All she could think of—all she wanted—was the satisfaction of having the full deep thrust of him within her.
Ilios was like a mythical god, Lizzie thought dizzily. His touch made reality and reason disappear and replaced them with the most ancient and relentless of human drives. The need he aroused in her possessed her and drove her, so that all she wanted was to wrap herself around him.
They had reached the far end of the pool, where water fell from the top of a cliff past the opening to a grotto with soft lighting that turned the water a rich blue-green.
When Ilios eased her away from his body and stood up Lizzie could see that the water here was shallower. Water from the pool ran down his body, and Lizzie’s gaze followed each drop hungrily.
‘What?’ Ilios asked watching her gaze with his own. ‘What is it you want to do? This?’
He leaned forward and held her waist, kissing his way down past her collarbone and between her breasts—light, lingering kisses accompanied by the curling movement of his tongue against her damp flesh, making her burn with longing to do the same to him. His hand dropped to her thighs. Lizzie gave a small moan that became a gasp of tortured pleasure when Ilios started to kiss the slope of her breast, and then to circle the tight ache of her nipple with his tongue-tip.
The heavy pulse of the ache low down in her body picked up tempo. She leaned into Ilios’s hold, her thighs parting. In response he tongued her nipple, and then drew it between his lips. Wanting more, Lizzie pushed towards him, welcoming the heat of his hand between her legs, whimpering with pleasure when his fingers found her wetness, her body clamouring for urgent and immediate release.
But instead Ilios lifted her out of the water and put her down at the side of the pool, then getting out himself to join her. Lizzie’s heart was thudding. Her body was aching with frustration at the interruption and the removal of his pleasure-giving touch.
She reached for him, wanting to show him how she felt, cupping his face as he had cupped her own earlier, and then kissing him fiercely and eagerly, arching her body into his. His arms tightened round her and he kissed her back.
‘We need to go back inside,’ he told her. His voice was thick with the desire she shared as he urged her towards the bedroom.
‘I know,’ she whispered back. ‘But I don’t want to let you go. I want you so much.’ She kissed him again, her hands on his body, her own body on fire with all that she was feeling.
Somehow, between increasingly passionate kisses, they managed to make it to the bedroom, where Lizzie wrapped her arms tightly around Ilios and kissed him, tasting his mouth with her own. She smoothed her hands over his shoulders and his back, stoking the heat of her own arousal with every caress as her senses greedily absorbed the pleasure of their intimacy. Every bit of him was hers to explore and enjoy, and her fingertips memorised the smooth flesh at the back of his neck, the thick strength of his dark hair, the shape of his ears, whilst her senses recorded his response to her touch: the way he arched his head back into her hold, the small thick sound of pleasure he made when she caressed the tender flesh behind his ear, the accelerated sound of his breathing when she had kissed his skin. Small milestones on the longer journey they were sharing, each one faithfully monitored and logged within her heart.
Her heart? But that would mean…From the shocked thud of her heartbeat its reverberations spread out through her, carrying to every part of her body and mind a warning—a message of anxiety and apprehension laced with disbelief. Surely there was only one reason why her heart might want to log every second of her intimacy with Ilios? If her heart was involved, then so were her emotions. Emotions and Ilios did not and could not mix. They were incompatible. Just as she and Ilios were incompatible.