The ache below had grown uncomfortably large. He undid the buckle in quick movements and pressed his hot tip against her opening.

The moment something hot touched her entrance, Liz’s hips went stiff with tension.

“Haa, Liz.”

His voice, softer than she had ever heard it, came just before he pushed inside in one smooth thrust. His blunt tip parted the tight opening, and Liz’s lips fell open.

Johann pressed his lips to the top of her head. Then he bore his hips down low and drove in again with a firm, deep push.

“Ha……”

He let out a quiet breath once he was fully inside. The inner walls gripping him made his head swim.

“Huu… Liz.”

A breathless sound came from between her teeth. Johann exhaled slowly, buried completely inside her warm, pulsing heat.

He had used every last scrap of restraint he had. Small beads of sweat had formed at his temple.

“Ah… Your Grace……”

The sensation of him pressing against her walls left Liz’s lips parted and slack. The moment her lips moved, Johann pushed in a little harder.

“Hk, ah, ah…!”

The sharp upward thrust wiped every word from her tongue. He gripped her waist firmly and drove into her with the leverage of the bed beneath them.

The overwhelming pressure caught her breath, but pleasure slowly spread up her spine. The stretch of her opening drew tight around him.

“It’s hard to hold back when you grip me like that.”

His voice was low and rough in a way that didn’t sound like him at all. His grip on her waist tightened.

“Jo, Johann? Wait……”

Liz gasped as a thrust came from below without warning. Her white body rippled each time he pushed in to the hilt.

“There’s no waiting.”

He claimed her lips before she could catch her breath. The gap between them let him push in a little deeper.

He pressed her upper body down and began to move in earnest. The impact of his body against hers rang out across the bed without restraint.

His large hand closed around her soft, bouncing chest, kneading and squeezing the give of it against his palm. The stimulation made Liz’s eyes grow red at the corners.

“Ha-uh, the feeling… it’s strange……”

“That’s you feeling me.”

He bit a mark into her swelling chest and moved faster. With every thrust, unfamiliar pleasure raced to the ends of her limbs. Pain and ecstasy blurred together, and Liz wrapped her arms around his neck without thinking.

“Huu, this is maddening.”

His low, arousal-thickened voice pressed into her burning ear.

The hand gripping her waist slid lower. He touched the flushed, swollen flesh at the point where they joined, and her vision blurred.

“Mm. Don’t touch there. Mm. I don’t want……”

“It’s soaked through because you love it.”

The slick junction between them and the sight of himself pressing into her was exposed plainly before her eyes. Johann breathed hot against her ear and whispered.

“Look at how much you’ve worked me up, Liz.”

“Mm……”

“Look at how tight you’re holding me.”

He told her plainly, deliberately, then lifted her legs and hooked them over his shoulders. From there, he snapped his hips upward.

Her small body rocked with each movement of his hips. The blunt pressure filling every inch of her inner walls made her arch.

“Let yourself feel me properly.”

He breathed hot against her ear and drove upward again. Liz was already trembling all over with pleasure. The thighs pinned against him shook and clenched tight.

The bedroom, thick with heavy breath and the scent of skin, grew unbearably hot. The rough sound of the sea outside, the faint vibration of the ship cutting through the night water, none of it existed. Only the slick sound of bodies meeting ruled the room.

The heat radiating from pressed-together skin and the sound of ragged breathing seemed to swallow every noise from the outside world entirely.

“Ha!”

Johann drove in with a force that made everything before seem gentle. His hot, thick length hammered deep into her inner walls without mercy. Pleasure detonated one after another without giving her time to breathe, and Liz’s body arched in a long, graceful curve.

“Ha-uh……”

Through the trembling, Liz looked up at Johann with dimming eyes. Their warm breaths tangled in the air between them.

“Look at me.”

Johann exhaled roughly and gripped her chin hard, fixing her gaze on his face. In his eyes, burning even in the dark, deep possession and something like obsession moved beneath the surface.

“Mm-uh……”

Nearly spent, Liz shivered against him in small, helpless movements. Johann took in that sweet sight as though committing it to memory, then pressed his lips to her smooth throat and dragged them upward slowly. He licked the tears pooled in her hazy eyes and whispered low against her skin.

“My wife. Duchess Liz Ashworth.”

In the dark pressing toward dawn, his lips pulled into a smile and found her mouth, soft and breathless. The sweet, skin-warm scent of her made him harden again, despite having already spent himself once.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

A long, low horn sounded through the haze of sleep, and Liz lifted her heavy eyelids. Through the wide window, morning light poured in, and the blue shimmer of the sea reflected in it danced at the edges of her vision.

Ah. The sea.

The unfamiliar ceiling instead of her own made it real at last. She was on a luxury liner. She had been abducted in the name of a honeymoon by a man who had nearly become another woman’s husband, and on top of that she had nearly died because of some nobleman she had the misfortune of knowing.

All of that in a single day, and she had still slept soundly for the first time in ages. She let out a quiet, helpless laugh at her own composure.

No reason to get up early. She rolled over, turned her head, and stopped breathing.

“It was past noon and you hadn’t stirred, so I was debating whether to wake you. One less thing to worry about now.”

Right there on the next pillow, Johann von Ashworth lay in a position of complete ease, watching her with unhurried calm.

Every trace of sleepiness vanished. Liz shot upright.

“Wh… why is Your Grace in my bed?”

At the near-shriek, Johann frowned faintly and pushed himself up with slow ease. The sheet that had been covering him slid down, and the solid lines of his body came fully into view.

Liz had only ever seen him in a suit. Her gaze caught and held. The broad shoulders she had expected, but beneath them, sharply defined muscle was carved in a way that had nothing to do with the image of a man who only knew paperwork. The impressively masculine frame was marked here and there with red lines that looked like scratches from fingernails.

Any observer would recognize them as evidence of the previous night’s activities. Liz’s mouth opened and closed.

“That… that’s……”

Johann looked down at her and spoke in a languid voice.

“To clarify first, this is my bed. You’re the one who grabbed me when I was trying to give you the room and made a fuss about sleeping together.”

Liz was about to argue that it was absurd when fragments of the previous night flickered through her mind. The kiss that had started with her drunkenly begging for one, and then the mortifying sequence of events that had gone all the way to the end.

Her face went scarlet.

What was I thinking.

She had been so cold, sipping wine slowly, and her memory went blurry somewhere around the time she finished the bottle. If she was going to black out, she could have blacked out completely. Why did she have to remember just enough to make it worse.

“Even so……”

Liz trailed off, struck speechless. Johann curved one corner of his mouth upward.

“I understand you’re startled, but even between a married couple, I’d appreciate a little more decorum.”

At his look, Liz glanced down in confusion and her eyes went wide. She had moved quickly enough that the sheet had slipped away entirely, leaving her bare.

“D… don’t look.”

She grabbed the blanket and yanked it over herself. Johann lifted one shoulder, his expression saying it was far too late for that.

“I already spent all of last night using my mouth on every inch of that body.”

Liz shook with embarrassment and thought back to the marks she had noticed on herself. Every vivid, unmistakable trace of the night. Kiss marks, handprints, a bone-deep sensitivity mixed with exhaustion.

Evidence that left no room for doubt. Her vision went dark at the edges.

“So last night, we……”

Liz wanted to find somewhere to hide from the reality she refused to accept. Johann met her eyes, and the line of his gaze stretched long and unhurried.

“I wouldn’t have guessed you’d be the type to pin me down, but looking at it now, it was going to happen eventually anyway.”

“……I don’t know what you mean.”

“Our wedding night.”

“……!”

Johann watched Liz stare at him with her mouth hanging open and broke into a clean, open-eyed smile.

“I look forward to what comes next. Wife.”