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longing.
    She led him past the hanging carcasses to the corner of the room they used and that she kept clear for the purpose. The floor of the storeroom, like that of the shop, was covered in sawdust, and she dared not make her husband suspicious by sweeping it clean. They had to couple standing, but that didn’t inhibit them. When Marit turned to him she’d already loosed the ties of her bodice.
    Lucas put both hands on her full breasts. He stroked them gently. He’d never known such softness; only the nipples were hard. “Suck them,” she whispered. “Lucas, please, suck them. I cannot wait another moment.”
    He buried his face in her breasts, sucking both nipples, one after another. Dear God, the smell. And the velvet skin that burned wherever he touched it. She was trembling in his arms.
    “Lucas, ah Lucas … I dream about you every moment. Waking and sleeping. I live only to feel what I feel when I give myself to you.”
    He began fumbling himself out of his breeches. She started to lift her skirts. Suddenly there was a clattering above their heads. They froze. Another sound, louder than the first. Then silence.
    “It’s all right,” Marit whispered after a few seconds. “The bedroom is just above. He must have knocked something over. He drank three mugs of geneva and two of rum with his dinner. He will not wake for hours.”
    Lucas stared up at the splintered wooden planks and the rough timbers that formed both the ceiling above his head and the floor of the Jannssen’s bedroom. Ankel Jannssen was a hulking brute of a man, a drunken animal. He had no right to a woman like Marit, but he had her nonetheless. God help them. If the butcher found out he could go to law, have Marit whipped and turned into the streets with only the clothes on her back. And everything Lucas owned would be forfeit to him.
    Sweet Jesus, this was insane. Why did he continue to do it? Because even now, after that moment of stomach-churning fear, he was again hard as a rock and raging for her.
    Marit was breathing through her mouth, the tip of her tongue tracing the outline of her lips. “Lucas,” she whispered, and lifted her skirt and her petticoats, held them above her waist, and leaned aginst the wall and spread her legs. “Take me, Lucas. Do whatever you want to me. Only kiss me while you do it. Let me feel your tongue in my mouth.”
    He put his lips on hers and sucked her breath into his body. His hands were on her buttocks, squeezing the hot flesh, pulling her toward him. His cock knew where to go. It had learned the way these past three months. She began to moan. He thrust deeper into her, squeezed harder. She trembled more. Her moans came faster. The sounds she made grew louder.
    The bell on the shop door rang. “Mevrouw Graumann, are you serving?”
    They had long since decided that locking the door would arouse more suspicion than Marit’s absence from the front of the shop. Lucas took his mouth from Marit’s. She turned her face to the flimsy curtain that separated them from the waiting customer. “I’ll be with you immediately, mijnheer—a moment only.”
    “ Ja, fine. I’ll wait.”
    Marit leaned her head back. Lucas could see her face in the dim light. Her cheeks were flushed, her skin dewy with the sweat of her passion. He could smell her. She looked into his eyes. He began thrusting again. Slowly at first, then faster. She closed her eyes and bit her lips to stifle the sounds of her delight. Watching her, feeling her shiver and tremble in his arms, was the most exciting thing he had ever experienced. He finished in a burst of such indescribable pleasure it left him hungry for more, knowing full well he could never have enough.
    A moment later she’d laced her bodice and adjusted her skirts. Marit patted her hair into place and went out into the front room. Lucas heard her discussing the relative merits of pork and venison and soon after, the sound of her cleaver hacking apart the meat the customer had