Perilous Risk (14 page)

And hadn’t she felt so tired, so weary…so
numb
for quite a while now.

As though she were dying inside from lack of excitement in her life.

But she didn’t want to make an impassioned decision. Couldn’t bear to make a mistake. Not after going so long without this. Without any man. Yet, he wasn’t just any man. His appeal was too dangerous.

For all she knew,
he
was dangerous.

He leant down and put his mouth close to her ear, his breath blowing heatedly against her neck. “After all these years, are you really going to deny me?”

Even with her eyes closed, she saw the handsome face. The gorgeous, strong male body. And those things made her body sing with arousal and ache with longing. However, she could be strong against temptation. She
would
be strong…

She opened her eyes and tensed her muscles, steeling herself to give his chest a stout push, to tell him no.

But then, in the depths of his dark blue eyes, she caught sight of that quiet, serious-minded young man she had known. She felt the warmth of his compassion and remembered the joy of their companionship.

He had given her so much then. A weight seemed to lift from the centre of her chest, replaced by such warmth there…she felt her face contract with a sense of compassion for him. He wanted her just as much as she wanted him. She had hurt him without meaning to, all those years ago when she had left with Donald.

She touched Stephen’s face and traced her fingers over the prickliness of the slight, dark stubble there.

“No,” she said softly. “I’ll not deny you.”

Stephen ventured farther beneath her skirts. Rebecca was too set in her ways to wear anything as useless and confining as those newfangled drawers for women. He slid his hand along her stocking until he reached the garter. A plain garter and woollen stockings! Inwardly, she cringed. Oh, how she wished she had worn something silken with lace and rosettes. Something wickedly enticing such as she would have worn years before.

He brushed the bare skin of her inner thigh and sent tingling sparks upwards. She caught her breath. His eyes glowed warmly. She smiled at him.

“Are you wet for me, sweeting?”

The deep timbre of his voice seemed to pulsate deep into her bones, and another wave of those tingling sparks shot through her belly and lower. A gush of wetness spilled out over the inner lips of her cleft. Her inner muscles clenched and almost unbearable desire flashed through her loins. She bit her lip and nodded.

His fingertips glided slowly upwards.

She caught her breath again and her heart’s beat came so hard, so fast, it seemed it must burst. A moan tore itself up her throat and she arched her hips.

And still he moved slowly, holding her gaze.

With his other hand, he cupped her face. “You have always been so dear to me.”

But he leant closer. His eyes intoxicated her.

His mouth touched hers. Warm. Gentle yet firm.

Her mouth trembled beneath his but she clung to his body. And clung.

His scent, woodsy, spicy. She remembered. Oh God, she remembered…

He opened his mouth and flicked his tongue over her lower lip. Sensual, oh so wickedly sensual.

Fire scorched through her sex, her belly. She bucked her hips and screamed with the intensity. Or rather she would have, had the sound not been immediately swallowed by his kiss. With her next breath, she realized that the exact moment he had licked her lip, he had also brushed her straining nub with his fingertip.

Her heated blood throbbed mightily in that little button but he had moved on to explore her intimate folds. “Yes, very wet,” he said breathily.

She arched her hips, unable to keep herself from beginning to writhe. Oh dear, sweet heaven. She wanted to come. Now.

It would only take a few additional brushes of his fingers directly on her nub. But he didn’t seem in a hurry to do that again. Instead he withdrew his hand.

She whimpered and implored him with her gaze. “Please…”

Her voice carried, soft as goose down.

He grasped her hem. His expression hardened, became cold, forbidding.

Thrills raced through her body. Oh, oh, oh, she couldn’t bear it. Just couldn’t.

He jerked her skirts up to her waist.

His sudden action and the shock of cool air made her gasp. Stephen rolled away from her again, partway. His stare riveted on her.

She drew her knees together whilst hugging her arms across her breasts, gripping her shoulders. She was no shrinking virgin to feel overly bashful about her nakedness. But then, it had been a long time since she’d been with a man. Did he see the differences in her body compared to a younger woman’s? The increased softness of her breasts and belly? The faint marks that carrying Edwin had placed there?

When the time came, would he find her breasts too small?

A small, hollow pang of hurt swelled in her chest. She bit her lip and drew her lashes down, trying to hide the desperate way she searched his features for some sign of his thoughts.

The only hint of expression on his face was the tightness of his skin drawn over his cheekbones, the hardness of his jaw. What did that tell her? It could mean a good many things. Her throat grew taut and dry.

He released his breath in a long, low whistle. “You’re even more beautiful than I had imagined. Your legs, your long—“ he slid his hand along her thigh. “—gorgeous legs.”

She swallowed tightly. God, did he really mean that? Or had he simply found the one thing he could say something kind about? She swallowed again.

He was so handsome, he could have any woman. Young women. They would all throw themselves at his feet and beg, plead, debase themselves for his least attention.

What did he need with a woman like her?

“Spread your beautiful legs for me.”

Rebecca’s gasp echoed in Stephen’s ears. Soft, sultry, eminently feminine.

He couldn’t stop staring at her nakedness.

Lust throbbed in his cock and he suppressed a groan.

Who would have guessed such a petite woman would have such long, shapely legs?

He let his gaze linger at the apex of those limbs. At the triangle of hair a shade or two darker than the hair on her head. He traced his fingertips over it and found the texture soft and fine. He found himself becoming transfixed by her incredible beauty.

He shook his head to clear it.

This was not good.

At the start of this evening, he had never intended to be so forceful with her. But her continued belief that the Earl of Ruel was the solution to her problems, her continued denial about the seriousness of the night’s events, had pushed him into a decision to dominate her and drive her into submissive acquiescence.

Yes, he’d done this many times before, it was part of what made him so good at what he did. He knew how to target people without them suspecting it, and how to exploit their every weakness.

Domination worked very well with some people and it was usually a dispassionate experience for him. A way of accomplishing a set objective and part of his duty.

Yet the lines were blurred here. He was enjoying this sense of power over a woman he had long desired to make his own. Enjoying it far too much. He had already lost his control several times in the course of the seduction.

Now he wanted, more than he’d ever wanted anything, to dive between her legs and taste her.

All right, a little self-indulgence wouldn’t spoil things.

A
little
.

But he wanted more than that. He wanted to lick her over and over until she clutched his head and screamed her release. However, he also knew once she’d come to climax, he’d have a great deal less power over her.

He’d already risked undoing everything when he’d lost control and vented his spleen over the bitterness he’d held inside all these years. No matter how irrational it was, he had carried that anger since when she had left with Howland.

Even more than that, he had resented how easily she had found a lover, an officer, an earl’s grandson no less, at Howland’s new regiment.

Stephen had disliked Ruel on sight. Intensely.

A burning pain stabbed his guts. A warning.

He took a deep breath then asked, “How long since you were with a man?”

”Since Ruel.”

At her prompt answer, his sense of vexation eased. It was very flattering how quickly and completely she had surrendered to him, once he had shown her he wouldn’t be denied. But then coldness threatened to edge its way in again. He knew full well who had trained Rebecca so thoroughly. Another pain stabbed his guts. An ache grew between his eyes and he forced his expression to relax.

“Ruel? And when was that precisely?”

“A couple of months before his marriage.”

“Really?“ As a resurgence of desire heated his blood, he caressed her leg. “That long, sweeting?”

The idea that she’d been celibate all this time was a little intoxicating. Business aside, he was still flesh and blood, a man like any other without his duties. And he was also amused at his reaction, as though he were some sort of common rutting stag.

But the whole time, earlier, as they had drunk wine and she had flirted with him, he had sensed a mask falling over her again and again.

The mask of an experienced, world-weary courtesan.

And he saw Rebecca slipping away from him, running away to hide, offering a jaded
creature
in her place.

He wanted Rebecca, no one but Rebecca. He wanted her honesty, her sweetness, her softness. And so he had become stern with her, using the skills of manipulation he’d honed over the years to strip that unwanted temptress’ mask from her visage.

And then Rebecca had returned to him, but she’d been scared of him. And that had hurt.

He’d never felt jealousy or a need to possess about anyone but her. He did vastly enjoy the novelty, the headiness of such feelings.

But he was also losing focus.

Tonight’s goal mattered. He must stay on task.

He brushed his fingertips across her mons and paused at the little bud that strained firmly against his touch.

Her intake of breath was followed by the arching of her hips.

And she looked up at him, still Rebecca and not the false courtesan.

He bent then took her legs and pulled her until her bottom rested right near the table’s edge. And then he held her arse, her surprisingly lush arse, in his hands, balancing her.

He could feel the tension in her body. She was holding her breath. He put his lips to the inside of her thigh.

Her gasp filled him with satisfaction. The light scent of her sweat, her fear this night, mingled with the muskier scent of her arousal and filled his senses. He placed a series of slow, soft kisses upon her inner thigh, making a line towards her cleft.

She released her breath and arched her hips.

That she didn’t demur, or even pretend to demur, pleased him. He couldn’t have expressed how well that pleased him so he groaned and had to force himself not to speed his pace.

He blew warm air over the soft, brown curls. A reactive shudder made her body quiver and she gripped his head. He wished he’d had the foresight to bind her hands. To make her feel more powerless and vulnerable.

“Stephen…” she said, huskily.

He parted her outer lips. Her inner folds were swollen, deeply pink, glistening with moisture. The scent of her arousal was heady. He traced those delicate petals, watching her belly draw flatter as she caught her breath. The sight of her erect nub was utterly beautiful. But he resisted touching it. Instead, he slid his finger inside her channel.

Her inner walls squeezed his digit whilst she arched her hips and her hands clutched his head convulsively. Her low, lingering moan was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard. Wetness gushed from her sex. He worked his finger back and forth and was rewarded by a renewed gush, luscious and hot.

A shudder wracked her body, making that tight silk vibrate beneath his touch. His heart beat throbbed in his erection, the need there forcing him to reach down and give himself a squeeze. Copious fluid leaked from the tip. God, his balls ached with the pressure of his seed. He was so ready to grasp her hips and thrust himself into her depths.

But he couldn’t have her. Not fully. Not yet.

He could resist no longer. He bent close and put his tongue to that straining, bright pink button of flesh.

She jerked her pelvis upward. “Oh Stephen, oh Stephen!”

God, she tasted sweet. He ran his tongue around the nub, feeling it swell a little larger, growing stiffer. He fancied he could feel her pulse throbbing against his mouth.

She brought her thighs together and gripped him. Lust pounded through his blood, swelling his cock harder and larger than he was sure he had ever been.

He laid a hand on her belly. She was growing tense, so tense. Her inner walls clenched his finger. She was already close. And she was needy from her long celibacy, he could hear it in her throaty cries.