“I don’t mind,” she told him softly, clinging. “Blake… I’d give you anything…!”

“Yes.” His mouth whispered against hers. “I’d give you anything, too, Meredith. I’d do anything to please you, even forgo my own pleasure.”

That didn’t sound like lust. Neither did the exquisitely slow movements of his hands, the gentle crush of his body. He was hungry, she could feel his need, but he wouldn’t take his pleasure at her expense. That consideration, incredible given the length of abstinence for him, made her want to cry. He had to care a little to be so…!

Her mind went crazy as his hand moved and she felt a stab of pleasure so sweet that it lifted her and she cried out.

She clung to him, telling him without words that it was pleasure, not pain, she was feeling. He warmed, remembering his own earlier withdrawal when she moaned or gasped, because he’d never known how a woman responded when giving herself to pleasure.

He opened his mouth on hers and let his tongue gently stab inside her lips, aching at the implied intimacy, delighting in the way her soft, slender body turned in his hands when he did that. She was loving this, he thought dizzily. Loving every second of it, reveling in his mouth, his touch. He could feel her pleasure even as his built and built until he couldn’t contain it any longer.

She was trembling now, and tiny whispers of excitement were moaning past her lips as she lay waiting for him, her body twisting sensually with mindless abandon.

He was heady with pride at his own latent abilities. He hadn’t dreamed that with his inexperience he could bring her to this frenzy.

He stripped with quick, deft movements and slid onto the coverlet beside her, his hands moving on her body, holding her while he kissed her with whispery tenderness.

“Pl…ease.” She managed the one word, and her voice broke on it.

“I want you, too, little one,” he breathed against her mouth. “I want you so much.”

He balanced his weight on his forearms and slid over her, trembling at the soft warmth of her legs tangling with his. She moved, helping him, and he let his hips ease down.

She felt the first hesitant probing and shuddered, but she didn’t tense. She forced her body to relax, not to fight him.

He could feel that, and his mouth smoothed over her lips in silent reassurance.

His hands went to her face, holding it while he kissed her, and he felt her soft cry go into his mouth as he pushed gently against the veil of her womanhood.

And it was easy then. He felt the faint tension go out of her body, felt her sigh feather against his lips.

“I won’t ever have to hurt you again,” he murmured unsteadily. “I’m sorry it has to be this way for a virgin.”

“But it wasn’t bad,” she whispered back. Her fingers slid into his cool, thick hair. “Oh, Blake…” she whimpered. She kissed him softly. “Blake, it’s…incredible!”

“Yes.” He touched her eyes, closing them; he touched her nose, cheeks and forehead with lips that were breathlessly tender. And all the while his body moved with equal tenderness, drowning her in the exquisite sensation of oneness. She pulled his mouth to hers as his movements began to lengthen and deepen with shuddering pleasure, her breath filling him, her tiny cries making him feverish with contained passion.

His hands slid under her, savoring the warm, soft skin of her back and hips, holding her to him.

“Meredith—” His voice broke on her name. His eyes closed. He felt the tension growing in his powerful body with each torturously slow movement, felt the control he had beginning to slip. But her control was going, too. She was trembling, clinging, her mouth ardent and hungry. He lifted her up and overwhelmed her with desperate tenderness, and when the spasms came, they were white hot, blinding, but with a gentleness that he couldn’t have imagined.

She bit him in her passion, but he was riding waves of completion and he hardly felt her teeth. His hands contracted. He cried her name against her damp throat and the tide washed over him in pulsating shudders.

He heard her crying an eternity later and he managed to lift his head and search her face. “Meredith?” he whispered huskily. “Oh, God, I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“No!” She buried her face against his chest, kissing him there, kissing his throat, his face, everywhere she could reach, with lips that worshipped him. “Blake!” she moaned, her arms contracting around his neck. “Blake…!” She shuddered again and again, and when he realized why, he put his mouth gently against hers and began to move.

The second time was every bit as sweet, but slower, more achingly drawn out. He hadn’t dreamed a man could hold out as long as he was managing to. But he adored her with his mouth, his hands, and finally, when she was crying with the tension he’d aroused, he adored her with the slow, worshipping motion of his body in one long, sweet pinnacle of fulfillment.

She couldn’t seem to stop crying. She lay in his arms with her wet face pillowed on his chest where the thick hair was damp with sweat. She couldn’t let go of him, either, and he seemed to understand that, because he held her even closer and gently brushed her hair away from her face while he kissed her tenderly and soothed her.

“I thought…passion was uncontrollable and…and quick…and men couldn’t…men were rough,” she told him.

“How could I be rough with you?” His mouth touched hers, brushing softly over her trembling lips. “Or make something that beautiful into raw sex?”

Her breath sighed out, making little chills against his damp skin. “I’m so glad I waited for you,” she said simply, shaken by the experience. “I’m so glad I didn’t give in to some man I didn’t even like out of curiosity or because everybody else was doing it.” She nuzzled her face against him. “You are so wonderful.”

He drew her mouth up to his and kissed her possessively. “So are you,” he whispered. “I didn’t know what lovemaking was until tonight. I didn’t know that there could be such pleasure in it,” he murmured against her mouth.

“I thought men felt the pleasure with anyone,” she replied.

“Apparently it’s an individual thing,” he said quietly. “Because I never felt anything approaching this before.” He heard the words without realizing their importance, until it suddenly came to him that he’d hardly felt anything with Nina. But Meredith’s soft young body had sent him spinning into oblivion and he’d done things with her and to her that had come naturally. Perhaps it was instinct. But what if it was something stronger?

He’d called it lovemaking, and it had been. Not sex, or the satisfaction of a need. And he couldn’t imagine doing that with anyone except Meredith. Not that way. Not with such staggering tenderness. He hadn’t even known he was capable of it.

“I wasn’t sure I could wait for you,” he confessed, nuzzling her face. “Was it enough?”

Her body burned with the memory, and she kissed his throat with breathless tenderness. “Yes. And…was it for you?” she asked, worried.

“Yes.” Only the one word, but there was a wealth of unspoken pleasure in it.

She was beginning to feel self-conscious, and he seemed distant all of a sudden, as if he were withdrawing. Had he satisfied his hunger for her and now he was looking for a way out of what could become an embarrassing situation? Did he regret what they’d done? He had old-fashioned ideas about sex, after all. In fact, so did she, but they hadn’t helped once he’d started kissing her. Her love for him had betrayed her into his bed.

“Blake, you don’t…I mean, you don’t think I’m easy…?” she asked suddenly.

“My God!” he exclaimed. He reached over and turned on the light, blinding her with stark illumination and embarrassment.

She fumbled for the cover, scarlet faced, but he stayed her hand.

“No,” he said quietly, his eyes as solemn as his face. “Look at me, Meredith. Let me look at you.”