"Easy, love," he said, caressing her in a circular motion. He kissed her mouth, again and again. Kissed and fondled her breasts, and all the while kept touching her cunny.

He felt her moving away from him in spirit, even though her body lay writhing in his arms. He moved close once more and touched her face. "Sunny."

She moaned.

"Open your eyes."

Her lashes fluttered open. Her eyes were glazed.

"Sunny, it's James."

"He's here."

"No, he's not here. Not really."

James sounded so confident. Sunny clung to his shoulders, wanting to believe. But Freddy's face loomed so clearly in her mind. She could smell his scent.

"He's not here," James said again, more firmly.

"But I feel him. He's so real."

Hot, silken smoothness touched her belly. The weight of his erection. It throbbed against her.

"You feel that?"

She nodded.

"That's real," he said.

Hair tickled her leg as he put his thigh between hers, this time using it to spread her legs. He put his cock to her entrance.

She caught her breath and her heart beat wildly with anticipation.

"Do you feel that?"

"Oh, yes," she said breathlessly.

"That's the only thing real for you in this moment."

She closed her eyes and arched up, eagerly greeting him.

"Open your eyes, love."

She opened them.

He knelt between her spread legs and grasped her buttocks and lifted her hips.

A little thrill raced through her as he handled her, positioning her body to suit his need.

"Don't take your eyes off me," he ordered.

The crown of his cock throbbed against her.

Any moment and she would lose her virginity. Here, now, finally. Excitement made her weak. Almost faint. She moaned to release some of the pent-up energy.

He tightened his grasp on her and pressed into her, meeting her resistance.

He pressed harder.

She gasped and fell back against the pillow.

"Easy, love." He increased the pressure.

Her resistance gave way.

A stinging pain pierced her. Raw. Sharp.

She gripped his shoulders, aware that her nails were digging into his skin but she couldn't stop, couldn't let go. She cried out. But the pain had become more sweet than sharp.

He was sliding into her. Into her! Yes, she'd known this was how it happened, but imagining how it would feel was nothing like it actually felt. She was stretching and stretching. It didn't feel like it was possible to stretch any further. Yet, he was still sliding in deeper.

He groaned and thrust even deeper.

"Ohhh!" Her cry was mostly surprise. She hadn't imagined how utterly invaded it would feel to have a man completely inside. It wasn't unpleasant. Far from it. It was just something outside of her experience.

"Look at me, Sunny."

She hadn't realized that she had closed her eyes. She complied and gazed into his eyes.

"Does it feel all right?"

"It's very...different."

"Does it hurt?"

"No, just...different."

He rocked his hips against hers, gently. Barely.

Sweetness poured through her. She gasped in surprise.

"Doing all right?" he asked, his voice somewhat hoarser.

She nodded.

He moved within her, a strong, steady stroke. Her flesh clenched around him. Oh God, she was so filled by him. His flesh throbbed. Pressure, so much pressure. It sent waves of sensation down to the soles of her feet. She bit her lip at the intensity. The strangeness. Was it always like this?

"I think...I think." A feeling of foolishness stilled her tongue.

"What, love?" he said, his voice terse and hoarse all at once.

"I think you're too big."

He seemed to freeze, then he uttered a strange barking sound. A cross between a groan and a chuckle. "No, love. You're just not used to it."

"I am sure you're too big."

"I've had no complaints, until now."

"I just..." Her voice trailed off. Oh, didn't she sound ridiculous? She took a deep breath and tried to reframe her thoughts. "It's different than I expected."

"Shh, love, this is new to you. Just relax and let it happen. You'll become accustomed to it." His voice shook.

His whole body had begun to shake.

She could sense the coiled energy within him. She realized he was holding back on her account. That it might be causing him distress. She made an effort to lie back. To relax and accept him inside her.

"Didn't any of your wicked little romances describe how a man takes a woman?"

"They made it sound all airy and floaty. Two people merging and flying together and visiting the stars."

"And the reality is something a bit less celestial, eh?"

"It is just that it is all well and good for you to say that you're not too big, but I think you may be too big for me."

"You're resisting me."

"No, I am not."

"Yes, you are." He rocked his hips, evoking that sweet pleasure deep within her.

She gave a soft cry.

"Did it hurt?"

"No," she said.

"Then we fit together, do we not?"

"I suppose."

"Admit what's happening."

She didn't want to admit it. She shook her head.

"Admit it."

"I feel him."

"Yes, and what about him?"

"He doesn't approve."

"It's no longer his place to approve or disapprove." He pulled his hips back then thrust forward.

Pleasure consumed her, and she moaned.

"You're mine now." The words vibrated as though they had come roaring up from his depths. He tightened his hold on her hips. "Mine."

Chapter Seventeen.

You're mine now.

The words echoed in her mind. She could still feel them vibrating through his body, carrying all the energy of his emotion. His eyes shone like dark sapphires, the intensity of his passion commanding her to focus only on him. She couldn't have torn her gaze from him even if she'd wanted to.

She could still feel Freddy's presence. But now it was as though he were watching from a distance. And she could still sense his disapproval, his displeasure.

Freddy did haunt her. Really haunted her at her most intimate moments. She knew this was an irrational belief, yet she couldn't let it go. And she had never admitted this belief to anyone, not even Meeker.

James said it wasn't really Freddy at all but her own resistance. Had she really been resisting James?

Dr. Meeker had said resistance to male sexual authority was at the root of all her problems. Yet, she hadn't thought of herself resisting James. To her perception, she had been the one trying to seduce and he had been the one resisting.

James' hips jerked against hers, jolting her out of thoughts. It was a quick movement that seemed involuntary, as though his body compelled him to thrust. She gasped, her pelvis arching up just as involuntarily. He groaned then went rigid. She could feel the tension thrumming in his muscles, could feel the energy he restrained.

He cupped her face. "You're mine, the way you should have been from the first."

His voice resounded with such emotion! Had she ever imagined that he would speak to her like that? Not James Blayne, not the Rock of Gibraltar. Part of her soared to hear this passion from him. But another part of her wanted to urge him to speak quietly, or perhaps not at all.

She couldn't quite believe James' insistence that it was she who had resisted him.

Freddy was here, really here in spirit. She could imagine him standing at a distance, but he might as well have been in bed with them, for he could hear their every whispered word.

He would hear all those secrets she had kept from him.

He would know that as an innocent girl, she had wanted James and allowed him stolen moments in the garden.

That would hurt Freddy worse than anything else she had ever done.

Would Freddy then realize that her encounters with James had been the beginning of her undoing? Would he guess that James had awoken the sensualist in her, the lioness who hungered to reach for life's pleasures with both hands and take all she could? That had been the start of all the changes in her that had dismayed and disgusted Freddy. He had turned from her...

"Don't resist me." James' voice was gentleness underlain with steel.