Temptation & Twilight (47 page)

And I don’t give a damn what Your Grace has to say about that.”

HOURS LATER, Iain sat with Elizabeth in bed. He’d taken care of her wounds, which to his surprise were not extensive, nor painful to her. He’d bathed her slowly and carefully, allowing the water to soothe her. He’d fed her, and now wanted her to rest. But she wanted nothing to do with that. She was headstrong and determined, and he leaned back against the headboard and closed his eyes, capitulating to her desires.

“Your wounds—”

“Are barely present in my mind,” she replied.

“We have much to talk about, Beth, and this—”

“This cannot wait. But our discussion can.”

“You should sleep, I’ll watch over you—protect you.”

“Sleep is the last thing I wish for,” she murmured.

“What is it you wish, then?” he asked, his voice thick.

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“To make a future, Iain. Our future. To forget the past.”

She was kissing his chin, his neck, the scent of her hair shrouding him. She had never initiated the act, not then, and not since they had renewed their affair. To have Elizabeth sliding down his body, parting his waistcoat and tearing at his shirt, was a pleasurable torture he would never get enough of. His body was straining beneath the gentle exploration of her fingers, and he wanted more.

He shouldn’t allow this, but she had her own mind. Besides, sometimes the act of love spoke louder than words.

And dear God, how he wanted to love her.

“You smell so good,” she whispered, “like man, and the woods, and sin.”

He moaned as she felt her tongue come out and lick the hollow in his throat. He wanted to guide her, to show her what he desired—but she had never done this before, never just wanted him on her own terms. And he needed this, needed to discover what she wanted from him.

“You’re so beautiful,” she murmured, her tongue snaking out to circle his nipple. “Hard, like marble, sculpted just as I remember statues look.” He couldn’t speak, could only let out a ragged breath and capture her about her neck, pulling her up and covering her mouth with his open one. The kiss was soft, yet held an undercurrent of barely restrained passion.

His hands and body wanted to take over, but he would not take this from her.

Her fingers played with the placket of his trousers, and he held his breath, waiting to feel it open, to feel the heat of Elizabeth’s body pressing into his as his cock was freed. She touched him, and he shuddered as the caress of the shirt he had given her to wear raked over the swollen, sensitive tip. She slid lower, kissing a trail along his BOUND GALLEY EDITION March 23, 2012

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chest, his abdomen, his navel, and lower, to where his cock stood out rigidly, waiting.

She clutched him, wrapped her fingers around him, and he watched, groaning at the sight of it, the way she pumped her little fist, the way his tip glistened.

Lick it….

When she did, he tossed his head back, but refused to close his eyes. Watched, instead, Elizabeth’s tongue play with him. His cock jerked, once, twice, seeking entrance into her mouth. Which she obliged, taking him in deep, pleasuring him with her hands and the swirl of her tongue until he was forced to at least lower his eyelids in pleasure. But he could not stop watching her, the play of her lips on his sex, the way her hair brushed his thighs, the expression of pleasure—and love—on her face.

“I’m so damn selfish,” he growled as he pulled the sleeves of her linen shirt down her arms, revealing the swollen mounds of her breasts. “I couldn’t bear it to not see you like this, sliding down my body, lips moving over my skin. If I couldn’t see you,” he whispered, “bare breasted, kneeling between my thighs, I would go mad.” He would never tire of her, her breasts, the way they looked, felt, tasted. Brushing his fingers through her long black hair, he slid the heavy mass over her pale shoulder, allowing nothing to mar the view, nothing to cover her.

Her face was tilted up, her eyes closed, and he cupped her, watched as he moulded his hands to her breasts, kneaded, parted, pushed together, only to slide his palms down and capture her nipples between his fingers. Tugging, he watched her tongue come out and wet her lips, with a soft whimper, followed by another swipe of her tongue. He caught the moisture on his thumb, brought it to her nipple, wetting it.

“If I couldn’t see this,” he growled, “I’d die.” BOUND GALLEY EDITION March 23, 2012

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“You wouldn’t,” she whispered, her voice so husky.

“Aye, I would. I’d die a thousand deaths if I could never see you again. If I couldn’t hear the sweet sounds you make as I pleasure you. If I couldn’t taste that pleasure.”

Pulling her up, he suddenly crushed her to him, bury-ing his face in the crook of her neck, feeling her hair, silky and fragrant, against his cheek. His eyes were stinging, his body trembling as the force of his words struck a deep chord inside him.

“Iain?”

He couldn’t answer, just burrowed deeper into her neck as the sting in his eyes grew more unbearable. Oh, God, there was wetness, and a huge, gripping pain in his chest, and an unbearable sound, a sob, coming from someplace deep and dark inside him.

“Tell me what it is!”

He couldn’t. Couldn’t form the words. Where they had left off all those nights ago, in her room, when they had spoken of truth, haunted him. He wanted to be more….

So much more.

Tilting her face back, he looked into her eyes. They were unfocused, unable to settle on his face. And the same terrifying feeling stole over him once again. An acute fear—a final, painful realization—that her world was one of utter blackness. At last he realized the mag-nitude of her blindness. He couldn’t imagine never seeing her again.

It was like a death, the inevitable conclusion when someone was gone. Why it should hit him now, after all these years, he could not fathom, but it was there, and finally he understood her private hell. He’d told her he would die without sight. Selfish, arrogant bastard, concerned with his own needs, his own perversions to watch BOUND GALLEY EDITION March 23, 2012

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himself pleasure her, to study her as she accepted him, to watch their bodies joined. How carelessly he had said that, not thinking of Elizabeth and what she would die for. What she wanted in this life.

Until his dying breath, he would see her like this, naked, on her knees, giving to him, pleasuring him with such perfection. The last image of her would be her smile as she slipped into climax. And in her mind hers would be…

“Oh, God, I would give anything to change the past,” he gasped. “To make it so that the last thing you saw was not me walking away from you. In your memories I am forever one and twenty, and cocky, and sneering, and looking self-righteous. And I’ve changed, Beth,” he gasped, choking on a sob he could not hide. “I want so damn much for you to see how I’ve changed. To see me now. There are no lies in my eyes. No motives other than to show you that I am not the callous man I was. And that I love you…. I love you so damn much.” He was crying. The tears trickled unchecked down his cheeks, dripping onto his lips. She touched them, wiped them away, which only caused them to spill faster and harder.

“I wish… I would give up everything if you could only see me now, looking at you with such adoration and such love. But you can’t. And it breaks me…haunts me to know that you only see what I was. How I looked at you when I turned away from you and what we had.” He sobbed again, and felt the gentle press of her lips against his mouth.

“I don’t see that, Iain. I see the boy I loved. But I also see the man you’ve become. I don’t need sight to know you. Or
see
you.”

“Let me show you, Beth. Let me make you believe me.” BOUND GALLEY EDITION March 23, 2012

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He clutched her, slid down onto the bed with her.

Kissed her.

“You don’t have to give anything up,” she whispered, but he refused to listen. He stripped off his clothes, toss-ing them onto the floor. All except the cravat, which he tied over his eyes.

“No, Iain, don’t do this.”

“Shh,” he whispered as he tied it behind his head. Testing the knot, he was satisfied that it was dark enough.

He wanted to do this for her. For them.

“Really, it’s enough to know you would do this. I know how… Well, I know how much pleasure you get from watching.”

Damn, he could feel the blush in her words. And her voice… He had never really before noticed how husky and sensual it was. He was always too busy watching her, gazing at her face, those delightful breasts, her luscious body, while he thought up ways to seduce her.

“Take off the shirt, Beth.”

He heard the slide of the linen along her body, was amazed that he could hear the slight hitching of her breath. His skin felt sensitized, he could sense her so close to him, and the anticipation was unbearable.

“Climb onto me.”

She did, and his hands found her body, her curves.

Her core was hot and wet against his belly. Would he have even recognized that if he possessed sight? No, it would have barely registered, because she would have been before him, naked, and his gaze would have been hot, roving over her. But he could feel her. Beneath his hands, on his abdomen. He touched her, let his fingers slip between her slick folds, allowed his ring finger to trace the rim of her core. She felt like silk, and smelled so damn good.

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“Iain,” she panted, and he felt her body tighten, heard the excitement in her voice. “I can’t wait.” He fumbled blindly, trying to help her onto him. He laughed at his clumsiness, which made her laugh, and that seemed to make the moment even more intimate.

Not just lovers, he thought. But friends.

The slide was slow. She didn’t take him all the way in, only halfway, and he reached down between them, stroked the part of his shaft that was not inside her. Her breath caught when she realized what he was doing.

“I wish I could see you do that,” she whispered as she tightened herself around him.

Her body was making the most beautiful undulating movements, which he felt with his hands. In his mind’s eye, he saw her atop him, but he forced that away and concentrated on the senses that Elizabeth had— hearing, taste, smell.

He let her ride him a bit longer, allowed himself to be patient, to feel her sheath tighten and pull, sucking him deep.

“Take all of it, Beth,” he whispered, and he felt the incredibly arousing flush of goose bumps on her flesh.

“All of me inside you.”

This time she managed it, and he had a moment’s pang of regret that he could not see it. Another time… There would be plenty of other nights, other mornings when he would wake her and drag her atop him so he could see her loving him. How beautiful she would look in the daylight, with the sun streaking across her body and breasts. She would look like an angel then, with heaven’s sunbeam making her glow.

“Iain,” she moaned, and she reached for him, tried to find him through the darkness.

“Shh,” he murmured as his fingers brushed her lips.

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He could smell her musk on them, the way it drifted between them. She would taste of it now that he had touched his fingers to her lips, and he captured her and lowered her mouth to his. Licking, he let the dampness left by his fingers linger on her lips before drawing his tongue along them, then sweeping inside.

He had loved the taste of her before. This time it was heightened. He could see her, easily conjure up the image of when he had pleasured her, her thigh over his shoulder, his hand wrapped around her ankle, sliding up her calf as he moved his mouth over her core. She had been so beautiful and wet, and he had been watching every movement of her body, every undulation of her hips, every thrust of her breasts. He had watched from his position between her thighs, and from above, in the mirror, how he had looked with her.

But tonight he could not think of that. Would not allow himself to see her in his mind. He would concentrate only on what Elizabeth knew.

“NO WORDS,” he murmured as his hands smoothed down her shoulders and arms, then came up and cupped her breasts. “I know you use them to see,” he confessed as he pulled at her nipples, and felt them lengthen and fill between his fingers, “but I use them to hide.” She nodded in understanding. How he knew that, he couldn’t tell. Maybe it was the sound of her hair swaying, or the slight movement of her shoulders that gave it away. Whatever it was, he “saw” her, and knew that she understood.

“Don’t be afraid of the quiet, or what you’ll find in it,” he said, whispering it against her. “And I won’t be, either.”

She saw him with her fingers as they travelled over his BOUND GALLEY EDITION March 23, 2012

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body, the sculpted muscles, the taut strength, the slippery sheen of sweat as he worked for her pleasure. The cords in his neck were tight and straining, his head tossed back.

Her fingers rose higher and she touched his chin, covered with his night beard, and she shivered in his arms as she remembered how he had left no inch of her body unexplored, untouched by that stubble.

She moved her hands to his lips, to the air that moved rhythmically between them, caressing her fingers. She smelled the spice of Scotch, and the essence of her core—