Tempted by the Viscount (A Shadows and Silk Novel)

by Sofie Darling

  “I did.”

  “Did it stay with the ship?”

  “It’s in the other room.”

  “The other room?” His meaning caught up to her. “Your bedroom?”

  He nodded once, a curt affirmation.

  “Is your bedroom the same as this room?”

  “Very similar, yes.”

  She could have left it at that. But she didn’t want to. A closeness to him that she couldn’t account for stole through her. This room wasn’t only a world apart, it was the world within him, and she would know more of it. The feeling transcended simple curiosity. She felt on the edge of something new. She felt on the edge of knowing the very essence of the man.

  “May I see it?”

  A hard beat of her heart thudded in her chest. He didn’t have to say yes. After all, her request fell well outside the bounds of propriety. But what did Society have to do with her and Lord St. Alban?

  “Certainly, my lady,” he said, his tone formal, or as formal as a man clothed entirely in a bath towel could manage. He managed it quite well, actually. “But you will have to excuse me while I clothe myself in something with a little more . . . fabric.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Jake turned on his heel and strode through the open doorway, making a straight line for his dressing room. He’d just conducted an entire conversation about Japanese utility chests clad in nothing but a strip of cotton. He’d never blushed a day in his life, but if the heat suffusing his body from head to toe was any indicator, he was now.

  What was he thinking? Allowing that woman access to his bedroom?

  He tore off the towel, grabbed the first pair of trousers at hand, and yanked them up his legs. Next, he had his arms through a white lawn shirt and over his head. He’d skip the cravat, no time for intricate knot tying as he must return to his guest.

  But the real question was this: what was Lady Olivia Montfort—Olivia—doing in his private rooms? He mustn’t let her duck the question again.

  The moment he slid open his dressing room door the question fled to the Outer Hebrides. Connective words refused to link the images together: Bedroom. Bed. Floor. Hands. Knees.

  Olivia. The very thing of beauty who would surely lead to his undoing.

  At the sight of her upturned bum, an instinct—instinct surely passed down from generations of medieval warlord ancestors—to drape her skirts across her back, and take her then and there, surged through him on a wave of unslaked thirst. What in the world was the woman trying to accomplish? His undoing?

  He cleared his throat and in doing so hoped to clear his mind. It didn’t work. He must say something. “Have you dropped your reticule?”

  An honest laugh floated on the air, tinkly and joyous, and at complete odds with the dark seed of lust sprouting inside him. When she sat back on her heels and twisted around to reply, delight lit up her entire being, and another layer of his desire unfolded.

  “I didn’t bring a reticule with me.”

  His mind conjured up that word again. The one that described what he most liked about her when she allowed it. Unbound . . . and vulnerable.

  A gentleman didn’t allow himself to think in such a base manner about a lady. The gentleman and the medieval warlord battled for dominance.

  She would be unbound, and he would be undone.

  “I was investigating how your bed is constructed. I’ve never seen its like,” she said, oblivious to the struggle waging within him. “I don’t have much experience with beds other than my own.” Another melodic laugh sounded.

  Her bright mood infected him, and he felt a smile of his own unbind, even if his stubborn medieval hunger hadn’t abated a whit. “It’s called a platform bed. You see them in the Scandinavian countries.”

  “From above, it appears to be floating.” Her smile turned sheepish and charming. “I had to see if a spell was cast upon it.”

  She rose to her feet, and he took a seat on the other side of the bed. Oh, how he liked the way she looked in this moment: hat askew; cheeks flushed; unwary, uncool, uncollected smile curving her Cupid’s bow lips. Utterly kissable lips, he’d learned from recent experience. Lips he would like to taste again. The bed wasn’t the only entity in the room that had a spell cast upon it.

  “While I like the simplicity of the Japanese bedroom, it consists of little more than a futon spread on the floor,” he explained. For some reason, surely self-destructive, he wanted her to understand him. “The wizened sailor in me prefers sleeping above ground.”

  “I would hardly describe you as wizened, Lord St. Alban.”

  “Jake,” he cut in. He wanted to hear his name, his real name, on her lips.

  “Jake,” she repeated softly. Her smile took on a knowing quality. “There isn’t a woman in London who would describe you that way.”

  If they’d been surrounded by the glitter and pomp of a ballroom, and she’d spoken those words to him, with that particular smile lifting the corners of her lips, he would have sworn she was flirting with him. But, given their history, he wasn’t sure what to make of her words. Only this: they made his insides feel as light and variable as a fall leaf released to the four winds on a blustery day.

  “Well”—He tried to ignore the feeling—“this bed is a solution to that problem.”

  A wicked laugh escaped Lady Olivia . . . Olivia. “And which problem is that? That too many women find you irresistible? I know women, my lord, and I’m of the opinion that your bed might only exacerbate the problem.”

  “It addresses,” he replied, his voice a husky register out of his control, “my particular desire to sleep at an elevated level, my lady.”

  What he really wanted to say was, And you, Olivia? Can I count you among those women who find me irresistible? Might my bed exacerbate that problem for you?

  She focused on a point beyond his shoulder and gasped. “Oh, it’s lovely. So intricate, yet subtle.”

  She’d spotted the funa-dansu, and he was enchanted, thoroughly and irrevocably, by her.

  Without a consideration for the relation of their bodies to one another, she moved between his place on the bed and the funa-dansu to run her fingertips across its intricate geometrical pattern of ironwork overlaid onto smooth keyaki wood. Seeking a wider view of the piece, she backed up by slow increments until her skirts brushed against his knees.

  She assumed she was pressed against the bed. He knew it. Just as he knew he must extricate himself from this situation. He’d let matters progress too far. Settled on a direct course of action, he stood, attempting to slide out of her way before she realized her mistake. It was what a gentleman would do.

  The point became moot when her spine stiffened and her body went ramrod straight, accomplishing nothing more, or less, than to press herself full-length against the front of his body. It was entirely possible that she felt the outline of his stubborn erection through her muslin skirts.

  He held himself stock still and awaited her direction. But there was no question in his mind of how this would end. The medieval warlord had won the battle.

  He only waited for her to realize it, too.

  Chapter 15

  Tiny, electric waves of shock rippled through Olivia, sudden lust licking quick at their wake.

  The instant she’d set foot in these rooms, finding Lord St. Alban wrapped in nothing but a length of cotton, she’d known how this day would end. After all, wasn’t this what she’d come for?

  Except she hadn’t expected it to feel so immediate, so real, yet so fantastical. As if she’d been granted permission to conflate reality with this morning’s dream.

  She closed her eyes and sank into his long, hard body with all the resistance of a wildflower swaying to the uncertain rhythm of a summer breeze. Her fingers reached up over her shoulder, seeking out the back of his hea
d, drawing his lips to the crook of her neck, to the exact spot his phantom lips had touched this morning in her dream. An exhalation of his warm breath skittered across her skin, and her nipples tightened into hard buds of anticipation.

  Would his lips never touch her?

  A soft groan vibrated in her ear, and, at last, his lips met her neck as his hands reached around her waist, his scent intoxicating her with its hint of the exotic and unknown. She was irrevocably lost to the spell of this room. And this man.

  It wasn’t enough to feel him; she would see him. Her lips longed to make contact with his. She found his hands and loosened his grip enough for her to turn in his arms. Facing him, she braved the moment, inhaled, and met his eyes.

  She didn’t need confirmation of his desire. That was pressed against her. She needed to know that she wasn’t the only one lost to this insanity between them.

  He reached up and tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear, the gesture intimate and tender. The sort of gesture that could undo her. He was giving her time . . . time to change her mind.

  Well, that wouldn’t do.

  She lifted to the very tips of her toes, and still her lips didn’t reach his. A smile, knowing and sensuous, curled about his mouth. “This is madness.”

  The words whispered across her lips, the promise within them raising goose flesh and emboldening her to say, “Not nearly mad enough.”

  That knowing, sensuous smile firmed with intent as his head canted to the side and golden lashes lowered to brush against high, angled cheekbones. He pressed forward and touched his tongue to the upturned “O” of her lips, soft, slippery, delicious.

  How she wanted to take him in. How she wanted him to let her.

  At last, his lips touched hers, a fleeting, tender brush. So tender that she wondered for a wild moment if the passion she’d felt was all her own wishful thinking. Then, in the way a levee will break from too much pressure built up behind it, his kiss deepened, and his fingers tightened about her waist, drawing her body into the long length of his, crushing her into him. A heady, breathless feeling swelled within her. She felt . . . Claimed.

  Instinct, sudden and animalistic, took over as her greedy fingers snaked inside his shirt and brushed across the expanse of his flat stomach. On a wave of audacity, she found the laces of his trousers and made short work of them. Hot, rigid flesh met her hand, and desire streaked through her as she slid her fingers along the velvet column of his shaft.

  A wild, unfettered groan erupted from him, breaking their kiss. His lashes flickered open, and his serious gaze pierced her. “Again,” he demanded.

  She tightened her fingers around him and again stroked him, up and down his length. Wordlessly, he gathered up the folds of her skirts, handful by linen handful, cool air caressing exposed calves . . . thighs . . . quim . . . A ragged rumble escaped him. “Have you any idea how exquisite is your sweet, wet slit?”

  She gasped at the vulgarity of his words. At the ache they provoked along her vulgar, wet slit. He pressed forward, the hot, insistent length of him grazing her, his lips brushing against her ear. “What do you want?”

  A heartbeat later, she spoke the one word that could propel them into a realm she understood only at its most rudimentary level. “This.”

  He fell to his knees before her as if in worship, and she transformed into a being created purely for lust. His tongue touched her thigh, and a shudder ripped through her. “I’m not sure my legs can—”

  He stroked his tongue across her skin, and she gasped, aching and hollow, wanting and needing more. He met her gaze across the trembling expanse of her body. “Support you?”

  He reached around and cupped her bottom, bracing her against the onslaught she craved, all the sensation in her body concentrated into the point where his tongue touched her skin. It was everything and not nearly enough as his mouth inched higher, closer, pushing her to the limit of her tolerance. Her body screamed for what he offered and withheld. His tongue on her, branding her with its fiery mark, was all that mattered. It was all that would ever matter.

  Madness.

  His tongue flicked across her quim, and the world as she knew it folded onto itself a million times over until it ceased to exist. All substance beneath her feet, at her back, above her head, became light and air and black and void all at once until it was only she and he at the center of the universe.

  The nascent ache inside her sex became a full-on assault of greedy nerve endings as his tongue languorously stroked her before turning into butterfly flickers focused entirely on the one place she existed in the universe, stripped down to the essence of herself. “Jake,” her voice cried out on a note, low and primal. She didn’t recognize the sound as her own.

  Her fingers wove through, then clutched at his hair, and her body tensed, suspended on the edge of a sensation that provoked, teased, taunted her . . . just out of reach . . . her sex swelling into a glorious blossom on the verge of effulgence.

  All she needed was one . . . “Oh,” she moaned . . . two . . . “Please,” she begged . . . three . . . “More,” she demanded . . . flicks of his talented, capable tongue, and her back arched before her body shattered and she cried out. The universe reversed itself and unfolded, expanding to an infinity that stretched beyond her wildest imagining on a wave of pleasure that crested over and over again, transforming her into nothing more than a heap of tingly nerve endings.

  His gaze caught hers from his place below and held as he rose to a stand, corded muscles flexing and releasing effortlessly. He angled his head forward, and her eyes drifted shut in pleasure when his mouth found the sensitive cup of her ear. “Lie back. I would see you better.”

  Desire flared hotter as she stepped back and did as she was told. Skirts bunched above her waist, again her gaze found his. She felt no shame at this exposure, his eyes, nearly black with desire, taking in her bare legs, her bare sex. Hunger for more of him was all she felt.

  Even after the universe had opened its secrets to her, she wanted more. And it was everything.

  “You steal my breath away,” he said, his voice a ragged whisper.

  A surge of womanly confidence buoying her, she came to her knees before him and loosened her bodice, shrugging it off until it lay draped loosely over her hips. His pupils dilated at the sight of her, spiking her desire higher.

  She leaned forward, bringing her breasts into contact with the front of his shirt while her hands trailed lower until they arrived at the open fastenings of his trousers. His manhood strained in anticipation of her touch. “This,” she whispered as her fingertips glided across his pulsating member, “is what I really want.”

  Her sex quivered with the want, the utter need, to take him inside her. Impatiently, she pressed her body into full contact with his. It mattered not that they were partially clothed, reduced as she was to this need to join their bodies.

  With one hand she pulled him forward before pushing him back onto the bed, his body laid out for her like a feast. A feeling of power, heady and bright, overtook and guided her. She swung her legs around to straddle him, positioning herself above him, her fingers reaching down and encircling his long, hard shaft. A sharp hiss sounded through his teeth, ratcheting her desire higher, her gaze locked onto his, the tip of his swollen shaft poised, ready, at the opening of her sex. She’d never felt so empty in her life.

  It was slowly and deliberately that she lowered herself onto him, inch by divine inch, until she held as much as she could take, but not all he had to offer. A moan ripped through her, and her eyes fluttered shut from the absolute hedonistic bliss of it. She might have stayed like this forever, luxuriating in the delicious pain of her body stretched to its limit, but he had other ideas.

  His hands gripped her waist and began sliding her up and down his rigid length, releasing another wave of pleasure through her. Oh, the pleasu
re . . . it was endless. She felt limitless.

  A rhythm to their motion established itself as their bodies moved in unified desire. The now familiar tension in her sex began winding tight, but this time she sensed the same tension coiling his body with every stroke and thrust. She glanced down to find his piercing eyes closed, his beautiful features taking on a quality of abandon, unexpected and strangely intimate. It did something to her insides completely at odds with the uncomplicated liaison she’d sought today.

  She let the thought fly away as she closed her eyes and felt. Him. Inside her.

  “I’m not sure how much longer . . .” his voice trailed off as he cupped her breasts and squeezed her puckered nipples between his fingertips. Her back and neck arched, pushing her breasts forward. Raw desire spiraling higher, his hands returned to her waist, and the easy slide became a demanding thrust.

  A bead of sweat trickled between her breasts. The muscles of his stomach contracted into hard, defined segments when he lifted his head to catch the salty bead with his tongue on an upward thrust of his hips, his manhood encased to the hilt in her sex.

  Again, she cried out. This time with more ferocity, their mutual need escalating. Her legs took over the hard, relentless rhythm. His hand cupped her bottom and stabilized the motion as greed for more, again overtook her.

  “That’s it,” he said, his words a muttered staccato. “Oh, yes.”

  Again, the glorious tension found and teased and licked at her until . . . until it had toyed with her enough and allowed her release, her sex a fluttery pulse around his hot, rigid shaft.

  His fingers reached beneath her chin and tugged, a silent demand. His eyes locked onto hers, and she couldn’t look away. Even as he thrust inside her, the slick length of him sliding in and out, the most exquisite pain . . . the most exquisite pleasure . . . his gaze held her in its thrall.