Duke of Desire

by Elizabeth Hoyt

  And he’d given her permission.

  She broke their kiss and leaned back, plucking at his coat. “Take this off.”

  Her voice was husky.

  “Get in the bed,” he said, unsmiling.

  She rose and took several steps back, but instead of immediately climbing in the bed, she began to unhook her bodice.

  He slowly stood, watching her without blinking, and stripped off his coat.

  She shrugged out of her bodice and laid it carefully on the chair.

  Her hands moved to the ties on her skirts as he began unbuttoning his waistcoat.

  He took off the waistcoat and then stood waiting as she struggled out of her skirts. She deposited them on the chair and glanced at him.

  He was taking off his neckcloth.

  She unlaced her stays as his strong neck was revealed. He began on his shirt buttons and her breath caught as the sides parted to show curling black hairs.

  She shrugged out of her stays.

  He pulled his shirt off over his head, and for a moment she simply stared at that wonderful chest. His wound was healing, she noticed absently. Soon she’d have to take out the stitches.

  She mourned that he would have a scar on his otherwise smooth skin.

  Then she bent to her slippers.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw him sit and draw off his boots and stockings.

  He paused when she lifted her chemise to untie her garters.

  She looked up to see that his face had darkened and his gaze was fixed on her thighs.

  She rolled off one stocking as his fingers moved to the falls of his breeches.

  Her second stocking came off as he slid his breeches down.

  He stood in only his smalls, the fabric over his groin tented.

  Her breath was coming faster and heat was climbing up her breast.

  She bent to grip the hem of her chemise.

  He unbuttoned his smallclothes.

  She pulled her chemise over her head and stood nude before him.

  He kicked off his smalls and she could see the dolphin tattoo on his left hip. He prowled toward her, his cock swinging as he came. It was partially erect.

  And she knew what she wanted.

  “Lie down,” she said, and she couldn’t recognize her voice. It sounded slow and languid and low, as if it were warm honey.

  She felt the place between her legs heat.

  He cocked his head at her, and for a moment she thought he wouldn’t obey her. He seemed a god of the darkness, scarred and black haired and gray eyed. He was tall and lean but with ropes of muscles down his arms and legs. A formidable creature. A creature accustomed to wielding power. Did such as he follow the commands of mortals?

  But he humored her, crawling onto the bed and settling himself in the very middle, sprawled against a pillow like an Ottoman potentate.

  She walked to the side of the bed and reached up and began taking the pins from her hair. Drawing one out at a time, letting them drop to a china dish on the table beside the bed, each making a small plink in the quiet of the room.

  He stared at her breasts and then lower, at the curls between her legs.

  She saw him swallow.

  Her hair uncoiled down her back in a mass. She shook it out, running her fingers against her scalp to relieve the tension from her hair’s having been pulled taut all day.

  Then she climbed on the bed.

  She crawled right between his spread legs and curled up there, leaning down to examine all that made him male.

  His penis jerked as she watched, and she couldn’t help a smile. Katherine had described all sorts of cocks to her. Thin ones and fat ones. Cocks with drooping foreskins, cocks that leaned to the left or the right. But even though Iris hadn’t the same experience, she still thought that Raphael must have the most beautiful cock. It lay to the side, in that line that separates the hip from the stomach on a man—or at least a lean man.

  Beside his cock was the dolphin tattoo, no bigger than her thumb. She traced the black ink embedded in his skin and then turned to what interested her more.

  His penis was straight but with roping veins outlined over the shaft. It was widest at the middle, lovely and thick, and led to a reddened head. His foreskin had drawn a little back, letting the tip peep through, wet and shining.

  She touched that wet tip with her finger and he jerked again.

  Her gaze darted to his face.

  He was watching her, his mouth in a thin line, save for where the scar curled it. He looked as if he barely held himself in check.

  She smiled, slowly leaning forward, and licked his penis.

  He inhaled sharply.

  She looked down at her prize and said, “What do you like?”

  “Anything,” he rasped. “Anything you want to do.”

  She scowled at him. “But what would you like?”

  He closed his eyes as if she tested him sorely. “Wrap …” He cleared his voice and started again. “Wrap your hand around my cock.”

  “Like this?” Oh, he was hard under the skin! She’d had no idea how hard a man could be. And at the same time his skin was so soft and hot.

  “Now pull up,” he said.

  She darted a look at him, a little alarmed, his penis pulsing in her hand. “Won’t that hurt you?”

  His lips twitched. “No.”

  “But my mouth?” She looked down again and missed the expression on his face when he sighed.

  “You can lick if you wish,” he said softly. “But you don’t have to. It’s the sort of thing courtesans do. It isn’t considered very ladylike.”

  That spurred her on.

  “Isn’t it?” she asked, looking up at him as she bent her head again.

  She caught the flare of his nostrils, his lips parting, and then she concentrated on putting him into her mouth.

  She licked all around the head, not tiny licks anymore. Broad licks with the flat of her tongue while she tightened her lips around him.

  He tasted … hm … Well, he tasted like skin mostly. But the aroma here, near the center of him, was rich. Musky and male, and she felt almost heady with it.

  That probably wasn’t ladylike, either.

  She popped her lips off the head and kissed down the ropy shaft, tonguing him, mouthing him. She wanted to shove her nose right into the black hairs at the base, but she thought that might be too much, so she licked up the other side of him, making him quite wet.

  His hips jerked and then stilled as if the movement had been involuntary.

  She glanced up and saw that he’d thrown an arm over his eyes.

  “Dear God,” he muttered. “You’re going to kill me.”

  Which made her giggle.

  He looked at her under his arm and groaned, letting his head fall back to the pillow. “Can you …?”

  “Hmm?” she hummed a question around the head of his cock. If she was very careful with her teeth she could suckle him.

  “Oh God,” he moaned. “Just … rub up and down with your hands. Please. God, please. And keep sucking.”

  He sounded as if he were in duress, and it made her press her thighs together.

  She did as he asked, using both hands to squeeze and pull his shaft, all the while tonguing and sucking at the head.

  His hips began to move, thrusting gently, shoving his cock in and out of her mouth.

  She glanced up and saw his head tilted back, the tendons of his neck drawn taut, and suddenly his hand was in her hair, pulling, trying to make her move away.

  But she didn’t want to. She had such power now and she was drunk on his taste and scent. She sucked strongly, moving her hands up and down that gorgeous shaft, feeling as he thrust his cock against her tongue.

  He groaned as if he were in pain and his hips shuddered.

  And she tasted hot, bitter liquid in her mouth.

  Semen. His semen.

  She swallowed without thinking and then winced, but since it was done she decided not to worry about it. Inste
ad she gently touched his cock. It was reddened and still rather hard.

  “Come here.” His voice was brimstone and gravel.

  She glanced up and saw him watching her, his eyes half-lidded, and something in her gave a leap. It wasn’t sensual. It was sort of a thrill of affection for him.

  Or possibly more.

  She rose and went to the table, trying to be sophisticated and not care that she was nude. There she took a long drink of the not-very-good wine, refreshing the taste in her mouth.

  She turned, the glass still at her lips, and his eyes were on her, nearly glowing. He held out his hand.

  She swallowed and went to him, climbing into the bed and lying down next to him. Hesitantly she laid her cheek on his shoulder—his good shoulder.

  But then his fingers were under her chin, tilting her lips up to meet his.

  He kissed her openmouthed as if he would devour her.

  “Straddle me,” he whispered against her lips, and sat up against the headboard.

  He pulled her into his lap and trailed kisses down her throat, making her nipples peak with the sensation.

  One hand came up and cupped her breast and then he was drawing her nipple into his mouth, sucking strongly.

  Oh. Oh, that was lovely.

  Her head lolled against her shoulders as he moved to the neglected nipple and suckled it as well.

  Both of his wide hands were on her hips now, squeezing gently. Then he lifted her and repositioned her with one leg between his.

  With his knee cocked up between her thighs as she straddled him.

  He guided her down so that she was pressed against him, his knee right in her softness, her lips spread on him.

  Her eyes widened.

  “Rock,” he said, watching her.

  She grasped his thigh and slowly rubbed against him, her breasts trembling.

  “Do you like it?” he asked, looking quite sinister.

  “Yes.” She licked her lips. “Yes, I do.”

  “You look like you like it,” he murmured low. “Your cheeks are rose pink and your lips are red and swollen.” He stared down to where she was wantonly rocking against him. “And you’re wet. I can feel your slickness on my skin. Are you close?”

  She shook her head. “I … I don’t know.”

  “Have you ever pleasured yourself?” he asked.

  And she opened her eyes wide in shock. She never … To discuss aloud such things!

  His eyes were knowing, as if he’d seen her, lying in her virginal bed long ago, fingering herself.

  “Show me,” he growled. “Show me what you do.”

  She swallowed and trailed her right hand down, burrowing her middle finger into where she was hot and wet.

  Oh! She couldn’t catch her breath. Doing this in front of him as he eyed her dispassionately. As he ordered her to display herself for him. She was on the point, so close, so close, her finger working faster and faster as her scent rose in the air between them.

  Her mouth opened wide and her hips stuttered against him, sweet heat flowing through her, infusing her limbs, making her light-headed.

  He caught her and drew her against him, pressing kisses into her mouth as he murmured, “So beautiful. So beautiful.”

  He sat up to pull the covers over them both and then he took her into his arms as he lay back down.

  The fire crackled and the few candles still lit guttered and she thought, as her mind began to drift, that perhaps her feeling for her strange, dark husband might be more than just affection.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Rock King retreated into his tower, and when he came out again, he wore a strange sort of armor. It was entirely black and seemed to be made from a sort of thin rock. The armor lay on his body like jagged slabs, reflecting no light, and clinked like dry bones as he moved.

  “You may stay in my tower while I am gone,” he said to Ann, and then turned to the north.…

  —From The Rock King

  The next night Raphael glanced out the carriage window as they jolted into the outskirts of London.

  He cast a glance at Iris. Her face was delicate in profile, lit now and again by lanterns on the shops outside. She’d been quiet but seemingly happy for the ride today, spending some time reading from Polybius.

  It baffled him still that the lady sitting across from him, so upright and prim, was the same woman who had taken his cock into her mouth last night.

  When he’d woken this morning, her soft limbs entangled with his, he had spent long minutes simply gazing at her in wonder. Her lips were a dark pink and parted softly, and her eyelashes lay against her cheeks like moth wings. She was beautiful and she was determined and he hadn’t thought that marriage to her would result in this intimacy. He’d wanted her near, true, for he was a selfish, wicked man, and he didn’t particularly like the dark that he lived in. She was to be company—nothing more. But it seemed he’d deceived himself, both about the power of her lure and about his own savage desires.

  The last thought made him uneasy.

  Had he frightened her? Had his lovemaking over the last two nights been too … carnal? Too crude for her?

  He grimaced, looking away from her. He hadn’t much experience with gentle ladies, truth be told. Not with a face like his.

  Not with a past like his.

  When his baser instincts could no longer be put off, he bought his relief.

  But if he had shocked or repulsed Iris, perhaps that was for the best. She wouldn’t be so quick to seek him again, which should make his own resistance easier.

  Except that even now he found himself leaning infinitesimally toward her as if his body, having once tasted of her fruit, now not only understood hunger, but could be satiated by her and her alone.

  He closed his eyes.

  He’d practiced self-denial before and he could do it again. Giving in to this lust was dangerous. Not only because she was dangerous to him and to what he knew about himself and about his blood, but because her allure interfered with his mission.

  It was as if she’d spellbound him like a fairy-tale hero lulled asleep by some fay creature for a thousand years. He was in danger of forgetting the real world and all he owed it.

  He couldn’t let that happen. He was in London to find out who Dockery’s friends had been. Who had ordered him to assassinate Raphael.

  To discover and destroy the Dionysus.

  “We’ve reached London,” she murmured, interrupting his thoughts.

  “Yes.”

  She glanced at him worriedly. “You know I must contact Kyle and my brother as soon as I can.”

  He had a base urge to keep her to himself, but he knew she was right. “Naturally, but I suggest you wait until tomorrow. It’s already late tonight.”

  Her brows knit over those blue-gray eyes. “By now Henry must have had word from Hugh that I was kidnapped. I wouldn’t be surprised if all of London knows. I should think it would be best to tell him I’m alive and well as soon as possible.”

  He had a fleeting wish that they could’ve stayed at the abbey.

  But that was folly—both because he couldn’t keep her hidden forever and because he had a duty. “Then write them both letters tonight and I’ll escort you to see your brother tomorrow.”

  “What shall I say to them?” She bit her lip, hesitating. “I think the truth won’t do for Henry, at least. If word gets out that I was at an orgy, it will hardly do my reputation good, duchess or not.”

  “No.” Nor would it do to announce his involvement in the Lords of Chaos. If he made the secret society known, it would end his chances of infiltrating them. “Very well, what story do you suggest?”

  “I think we cannot avoid the fact that I was kidnapped,” she said slowly. “After all, the news of it would be everywhere by now.”

  He inclined his head.

  “But perhaps … you rescued me? Not from the Lords,” she added hastily. “But from highwaymen. You rescued me and brought me back to the abbey. And then you r
ealized that my reputation would be in tatters and proposed marriage.”

  “How chivalrous of me,” he drawled.

  She cocked her head, a smile twitching at her lips. “Well, that’s more or less what you actually did. You insisted on marriage to save me. So yes, it was indeed quite chivalrous.”

  He glanced away from that little smile. It wouldn’t do if Iris started having romantic notions about him. He was no fairy-tale prince—far from it.

  The carriage was pulling into the square where his family’s London town house lay.

  “We’re here,” he said quietly.

  Chartres House took up the entire north side of the square, a solid mass of dark-gray stone, intended to impress or intimidate anyone who saw it. He’d spent very little time here as a child, which meant that Chartres House hadn’t the same memories as Dyemore Abbey.

  That, at least, was a blessing.

  The carriage rolled to a stop.

  His duchess turned to him. “This is it?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I’ll show you in and then I must go out again.”

  Her brows snapped together. “Why?”

  He stifled his impatience. “I have business to conduct.”

  The carriage bounced as the footmen jumped down.

  “You’re not going to investigate the Lords now, are you?” She looked almost fearful. “Raphael—”

  The door was flung open and Ubertino bowed.

  Raphael couldn’t help but be grateful for the interruption.

  He descended the steps and held out his hand to help Iris from the carriage. “Welcome to Chartres House.”

  She tilted her head back to survey the massive house before her. “It’s … quite large.”

  “My grandfather wasn’t a man who believed in parsimony.” He tucked her small hand into the crook of his elbow and led her to the front door.

  Standing there was a tall, spare man in an impeccable wig and silver-and-black livery. “Your Grace, welcome back to Chartres House.”

  “Thank you,” Raphael said as he ushered Iris in. He looked down at her, watching her examine the entrance hall. “This is my butler, Murdock.” He glanced at the butler. “Murdock, my duchess, your new mistress.”

  The only surprise the butler showed was in a single blink. “Your Grace.” Murdock’s bow was so low his nose nearly swept the floor.