Grey's Lady (6 page)

She let her arms drop to her sides, too vexed by his words to let the matter go. “What are you suggesting?”

“You enjoy provoking me,” he said. “But you should be careful what you ask for.”

She felt her eyes widen. She certainly couldn’t deny the surge of what definitely felt like victory to see him so affected. Good Lord, he was correct.

He started walking forwards.

“What are you doing now?” she asked, moving backwards by necessity.

“Easy now.” He slowed and motioned behind her.

She put a hand back, touched the wall. “I asked what you think you are doing.”

“I am done talking.”

“What the devil does that mean?”

“This,” he said thickly, lowering his head.

Her throat dried. He was correct. She had provoked him. His cool, controlled reception in bed had driven her insane. It was so unfair that she should burn with such uncontrollable fever while he could turn his longing on and off at will. She had wanted to provoke his emotions.

Well, she’d got her wish and then some. From the tenor of his voice and the tightness of his hands upon her, she knew his kiss would be savage. Swallowing forcefully, she closed her eyes and braced herself. Excitement pooled in her belly, dark and hot.

He touched her lips with his—warm, tender, coaxing her. A moan forced itself up but she held her breath, stifling it. His tongue flirted over her lips, a seductive promise that filled her with hunger. She refused him entry, digging her nails into her palms to keep herself from reaching up and clasping his broad shoulders.

He moved lower, kissing her throat, pressing her closer, crushing her breasts to his chest. Abraded by the starched crispness of his linen shirt, her nipples hardened to painful little points. She had to breathe. There was simply no choice. She released her breath in a low, mewling moan. To her horror, she couldn’t stop herself from rubbing her breasts against him, seeking more of the sensation that was driving her insane.

He lowered his head, blazing a trail of fire with his lips over her collarbone and down to capture a pebbled nipple. His tongue circled the stiff peak—hot, sweet moisture that melted every bone in her body. Her head fell back against the wall. Another mewling, pleading sound escaped her and her hips thrust forward, her cunt pressing against his well-muscled leg of its own volition.

He suckled her and she clutched his head, moaning uncontrollably. The weight of his erection pressed against her belly, making her achingly aware of how empty her cunt was. Her channel clenched and her honey flowed, drenching her, preparing her for him. For his hardness, his bigness.

He lifted his head and cold air hit her nipple with painful effect. A plea for his return rose to her lips, but she bit it back. Balling her fists, she resisted reaching out for him.

The conquest should have been hers. She should be on her knees at this moment, with his cock nestled in the back of her throat, driving him mad with pleasure. Imprinting herself indelibly on his memory for all time. Instead, she was the one quivering with overwhelming need.

She hated him for this. Indisputably, she did.

“Beth, you’ve a choice to make. You can go and get dressed and I’ll see you sent home”—he set his hand at the base of her throat—“or you can stay where you are and be thoroughly fucked against this wall.”

At the power he displayed, heat pulsed through her body with such stunning force that nothing else mattered. There would be ample time, later, to hate him.

“Look at me, Beth.”

She opened her eyes. For God’s sake, must he talk her to death? Why didn’t he just do it?

“What’s your choice?”

The nervous flutters in her belly escaped as a laugh as he backed away. The unhurried motion of his fingers moving along the buttons on his fall set her trembling with anticipation.

“Now, Beth,” he said, as he worked the last button undone.

He came for her.

She gasped and backed against the wall.

He cupped her bottom, lifting her away from the wall—lifting her up until her legs rode over his arms. Instinctively, she wrapped her arms tightly behind his neck. Pray God he didn’t drop her. Fear tingled through her, heightening the excitement as he throbbed against her wetness.

“Plead for me,” he breathed.

“Yes, you arrogant bastard, fuck me. Now. For God’s sake,
now
.”

He nipped at her earlobe. “Use my name.”

“Fuck me, Grey, please fuck me har—
ah!
”

Hands on her bottom, he pulled her wet heat down onto his cock. Hard as iron, his erection filled her, stretched her. The suddenness, the sweet satisfaction of it made her cry out. He lifted her until he came all the way out. The loss of fullness and pressure was devastating and she tried to push down, but he held her firm. Then, ruthlessly, he pulled her down again, reawakening all the intensity of that earlier moment. Delicious pleasure made her weak and she went limp as she felt a shudder pass through his body.

“God,” he breathed. His cock throbbed within her as he held still, then he lifted her and pulled her down, again and again, with excruciating slowness.

Just when she expected him to tire and rest, his movements built in speed. Over and over and over. Fucking her like no one else ever had. Using her. Controlling her. Providing her with the sensation of flying wild and free.

After a long interval of mindless sensation, she made an abrupt landing against the wall, her heart hammering so loudly she couldn’t hear his panting breaths, though she felt them convulsing his body. He shifted and thrust, his pelvic bone making intimate contact with her nub. White-hot sparks of pleasure exploded within her. He covered her mouth with his as she cried out.

His thrusts came shorter and faster until, with a sudden, sharp inhalation, he withdrew. He pressed his cock to her belly, surging as warm wetness jetted against her.

An immediate sense of loss assailed her. She clutched his shoulders and sobbed softly. Her relaxed internal muscles tightened with a wistful regret because he had not spilled himself inside her, leaving her all saturated and slick with his seed, marked and claimed. As his.

What madness.

He braced her against the wall. Moments passed with nothing but their panting breaths. Her cooling sweat made her shiver and his lips grazed her temple. He murmured something. Against her belly, he remained hard. She hadn’t known it could be so for a man.

“Let’s lie down,” he said. Tightening his grip on her bottom, he carried her to the bed and laid her on it. He moved away and stripped his clothes off. Naked, he looked somehow taller, leaner, his shoulders and chest wider, his hips narrower. As he approached the bed, his face was all angles and hardness in the waning light filtering in through the curtains.

“Where did you learn something like that—like what we just did?” she asked, watching as he reached under his pillow and pulled out a linen towel.

He sat beside her and began wiping his seed off her belly. “You don’t really want to know.”

His light, teasing tone practically begged her response. “Yes, I do.”

He grinned and a devilish light entered his eyes, making him look positively boyish. Then he shook his head and folded the towel over to a new, dry side and wiped her upper thighs.

“Are you going to tell me?” she demanded impatiently.

He traced circles over her stomach with a fingertip. “From a Russian princess, years ago, when I was not much younger than you. She liked to play games, too.”

“Princess? Ha, she was not!”

“Well, now, she said she was…and if she wanted to be a princess to me, who was I to gainsay her?”

A princess indeed. Beth bristled all over. “Well, you needn’t sound so pleased about the matter,” she blurted.

She wished she’d bitten her tongue clean through rather than said that.

He laughed softly. “Why do women ask questions they don’t really want answers to?” He lowered his head and kissed her belly. “Don’t fret yourself. You’re more beautiful than any princess I’ve ever seen.”

He found her navel with his tongue, flicking and teasing. She gasped as renewed lust flashed through her. But the import of what he’d just told her sank in. “You’ve really been to Russia?”

“My father sent me all over the world as a supercargo. I had to learn things they don’t teach at Harvard.”

“Like how to fuck a princess?” Her words came out all snappish and inside she cringed.

He laughed and tossed the towel aside. “No, I don’t think he intended that. The only things my father approved of were working and making a profit. I know he took an early evening at least once, or else I’d not be here, but other than that his only pleasures were the counting house and the Exchange.”

“What did your mother think of that?”

His eyes grew shadowed. “I don’t know. She was a very frail lady and kept to her rooms. She died when I was six.”

Her heart contracted with sympathy and she suddenly wanted to embrace him and crush his dark head to her breasts. To offer him solace more tender than passion. Her mouth went dry and her belly fluttered with pure fear at this emotion. She quickly changed the subject. “I have never been further than Baltimore.”

“If these damned wars ever end, perhaps I’ll take you for a tour of Europe.” He trailed his fingers over her quim. “Would you like that?”

“Yes,” she said.

He looked up at her, his eyes glittering with passion. “Then consider it a promise.”

Happy warmth suffused her and she laughed, pretending for a moment that he meant it and they had a future together. That they could build a home together based on love and comfort. Her secret dream. She had never known who her own father was and her mother had died giving birth to Beth. Denied a home by her mother’s legal husband, Beth had grown up under the care of her mother’s employer, a very proper Philadelphian lady who had seen to Beth’s material needs and education but held herself at an emotional distance.

Beth had reconnected with her older half-siblings once she’d come of age and she’d worked hard to prove herself working in the family shop. But she still felt a stranger amidst their rowdy brood most of the time. She’d never felt at home anywhere. She suspected she never would.

“When do you have to leave?” he asked, his hand moving low along her stomach.

“I should return at nine.”

“Then we still have time left.” He stroked her nether lips with feathery motions. “How many times can you come, Beth?”

“I don’t know…twice…three times, maybe, on the odd occasion.” Well, she
had
come three times during the act—once.

“No.” He slid his fingers into her slick channel. “I mean, how many times can you come before you can’t come any more? Before you’re exhausted and can’t move?”

“I don’t know,” she said, laughing at his question. How could there even be time during a fuck to come more than three times?

“Didn’t you ever wonder?”

“Uh…umm…no.”

“It is a question that I’ve pondered often in the time that I’ve known you.” He moved his fingers within her until her hips were dancing in tune with their motion. “I propose that we spend the remainder of the evening finding out.”

He pressed a kiss to the centre of her cunt, right on her most sensitive nub, and she gasped. Then he took hold of both her ankles, pulling her legs about his waist with such haste that she gasped. He stroked his tanned hand over her pale inner thigh, with painful slowness, to the soft hair at her juncture. He traced the plump outer cunt lips, parted them, then rubbed his cock against her throbbing bud in slow, silken circles.

 “Please…” She grasped his shoulders, seeking to pull him up level with her. “Please, be inside me.”

He slid to her entrance. “Is this what you need, Beth?”

“Yes…” Her breath caught, for he was filling her. “Oh God…yes.
Yes!”

He took her then, the fast, furious pace driving her into a vortex of ecstasy.

When she opened her eyes, his lips were moving on her breasts, his tongue laving her nipples. He was still hard and pulsing within her…and it began all over again. And again. Unending. He taught her a whole new meaning to the word ‘stamina’. He kissed and petted and fucked her until she couldn’t come any more.

Until she couldn’t move.

And she had no idea how many times. Numbers and pleasure did not seem to be compatible in her brain.

However,
he
hadn’t come. He lay panting against her ear, hard and pulsing within her. He wrapped her hair around his hand twice, held her head up and kissed her with such ardour it felt like he was sucking her breath away.

“I don’t think I can get enough of you.” His voice was charged with passion and somehow, she’d no idea how, it wrung an instant, heated response from her. She wanted him, needed him as if she’d never had him.

“Come inside me this time,” she said.

“Are you sure, darling?” He caressed the hair off her forehead. He took her hand, kissed it, then pressed it to his cheek. His eyes shone like silver stars.

“I am.” She panted with desire. “Just this once. Mark me, claim me. Inside.”

His face sharpened and he withdrew. “Roll over.”

She rolled over, pulled herself up on her knees. He slapped her buttock once, and again, harder, the sound cracking in the chamber. Then he thrust inside her and she arched backwards to take him in, pushing against him until his cock touched the mouth of her womb. He groaned. Her hair brushed her back as he swept it aside. His hand encircled her throat, his breath tickling her nape.

“Beth, oh, Beth—I am going to fill you full of myself.” He nipped lightly at her neck. “I’ve come inside no other woman in eighteen years.”

The possessive timbre of his voice made her catch her breath.

He gave a harsh shout and his whole body shook against hers. His cock jerked within her…and he had not withdrawn. He was claiming her, filling her full of himself. Just as he had promised. Her internal muscles clamped down and she bent her head all the way down, stuffed her face into the pillow and screamed.

Her legs collapsed a moment before he fell against her back. Cold air hit her neck as he lifted her damp hair away. His lips touched her neck. “Damn, Beth, damn.” He lightly nipped her flesh. “Oh, damn.”