He touched her, gently opening the flower of her sex. Phoebe moved against his fingers, aware now only of the hot, wet center of her being. He found the erect little bud of pleasure and teased it with the tip of a finger, flicking delicately until she moaned, hovering on the brink of a maelstrom of sensation, her belly and thighs tightening, her loins quivering. His fingers slid within her as his thumb continued to play on the swollen little nub.

Phoebe gave a little cry almost of surprise as the first sweet ripple of ecstasy radiated from his fingers, moving up into her belly and along her thighs. She twisted on his lap, pushing herself against his hand under the spiraling urgency of pleasure. Then something astounding burst deep within her, making her cry out, her breathing swift and shallow, as streamers of delight shot through her body.

Cato held her as she quivered in his arms, the entire surface of her skin flushed and damp against his chest.

Phoebe’s loins were filled with a delicious languor and yet deep inside her the faint stirrings of desire renewed themselves. She brushed his mouth with hers. Her lips touched the tip of his chin then trailed down the strong brown column of his throat. Her tongue darted against the pulse at its base and then painted downward. She found his nipples and her lips closed over them, her tongue flicking, her teeth lightly grazing.

The scent of him filled her with heady need. It was musk and leather and lavender. She wanted him… all of him. She could feel his hardness pressing against her bottom and she moved seductively against it as she played with his nipples.

Cato gave a little sigh as he yielded to the irrational power of desire. It was a tiny sound that filled Phoebe with an almost triumphant satisfaction. Following blind instinct, she squiggled her hand between their bodies, her fingers pulling at the fastening of his britches. Her hand slid within the loosened waistband to close over his erection.

His penis jumped against her palm. It was hot and hard and her finger brushed the jewel of moisture at its tip. Cato slipped a hand beneath her bottom and lifted her off him just enough to enable him to release his swollen flesh. It sprang forth, and Phoebe with a little moan of delight moved her thighs to take him between them.

Cato’s head fell back against the chair with a soft murmur of satisfaction. He scooped her breasts into his palms, playing with her nipples as she squeezed him between her thighs, pressing her sex against him, bringing the ripples of delight in her belly to dancing life again.

Phoebe swiveled on his lap until she was facing him. Again she seemed to know instinctively what to do. She brought one leg over so that she was sitting astride him and then raised herself and lowered her body onto the hard, thrusting shaft of flesh. She took him deep within her moist and opened body, feeling him touch her womb as she pressed down on his thighs.

Cato grasped her hips and stretched his legs beneath her. The movement changed the sensation inside her and she gasped. He smiled and drew his legs up again. He moved his hard muscled thighs, bouncing her on his lap.

Phoebe gazed at him, her eyes locking with his in astounded wonder. She leaned forward, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, so that every part of her sensitized body was touching him. His tongue snaked over the mounds of her breasts, licked down through the deep cleft between them. Phoebe threw back her head as sensation ripped through her, seeming to tear her apart, hurling her through space into star-shot oblivion.

Cato cried out with the strength of his own climax; his penis throbbed deep within her velvety sheath as her inner muscles closed around him with a life all of their own.

Phoebe fell forward, her head on his shoulder, her sweat-slick skin pressed to his. He laid a hand on her curved back as if to soothe her, and for a moment her eyes closed and she seemed to sleep. But it was only a moment. Then she felt his hands beneath her bottom, lifting her slightly as he slid from her body.

She raised her head from his shoulder and looked down into the dark eyes. A smile still lingered there but there was a question behind the smile.

“I think… yes, I really think you have to explain,” he said. “Just what is all this, Phoebe?”

Phoebe climbed from his lap. She stood looking down at him, the sweat cooling on her skin, her expression now uncertain. “I thought… Portia thought…”

“Portia!” Cato exclaimed. “I might have known. She has a hand in everything.”

“Well, I had to ask someone!” Phoebe said, stung. “I knew it wasn’t right, the way every night we did this…” She threw her hands in the air. “I don’t know what it was that we were doing, but it wasn’t making love. And I wanted to make love. I didn’t know how to tell you that, so I had to show you.”

Cato regarded her in frowning silence. He felt as if his entire world had turned upside down. The frigid girl he had believed he had taken to wife was no such thing. She was as lusty as any of the women of the night he had enjoyed, as uninhibited and, it seemed incredibly, as knowing. Yet he knew she’d been virgin on their wedding night. He didn’t know what to make of it. He didn’t even know whether he liked it. Which was pure contrary ingratitude, he recognized, but it was such a shock to find a gently bred young woman possessed of such an earthy sensuality.

He saw her shiver and said swiftly, “You’re cold. Climb into bed now.” He drew back the bedcurtains and then stared at the hump of the bolster in the middle. “Phoebe, what on earth…”

“Well, I was afraid you might look in the bed before you undressed and if I wasn’t there…” She shrugged.

Cato shook his head, at a loss for words. He pulled out the bolster and turned down the covers. “In.”

Phoebe clambered into bed and nestled against the pillows. The deep feather mattress cradled her languid body and the crisp sheets were wonderfully cool and fresh against her still-overheated skin.

She watched as Cato turned away and kicked off his unfastened britches. The moment of unease disappeared as her eyes drank in every glorious inch of his back view. The long sweep of his back from the broad shoulders, the sinuous ripple of his shoulder blades beneath the muscled flesh. His backside was glorious. So different from a female bottom, Phoebe thought with a little hug of delight. It was smooth and taut rather than rounded, and startlingly white against the darker line at his waist. Obviously he had spent time shirtless in the sun. His thighs were long and hard; even the backs of his knees and the muscled swell of his calves delighted her.

And then he turned to come to the bed, and she gazed at the wide expanse of his chest, the points of his nipples nestled in the light dusting of dark hair, the narrow waist and the slim hips. Her eyes followed the trail of black hair that began at his navel. His quiescent sex now looked small and almost vulnerable, she thought, like a dormouse asleep in its nest of crisp curling black hair. A little tremor went through her as she remembered the feel of its thrusting hardness deep within her.

“Why didn’t you wish to make proper love with me?” The question spoke itself.

Cato paused, one hand resting on the bedpost. “I didn’t expect you to enjoy it,” he said after a minute.

“But… but why not?”

He ran a hand over the back of his neck. “In my experience, wives are not particularly…” He paused, searching for words. “Particularly lustful,” he said finally. “In truth I hadn’t expected you to be any different.”

“Is it inappropriate for a wife to feel lust?”

Cato considered the question. “You’re an exception to every rule in the book, Phoebe.”

Phoebe wasn’t quite sure how to take that. “What about love?” she asked, tentatively now.