But he would not. Until she capitulated, he would exercise every last remaining shred of his restraint. She would say his name before he would take her mouth again. Of that, he was certain.
“Kit,” he reminded her as he inhaled her sweet, shocked exhalation. Tucked it into his lungs, along with her delicate feminine scent. Lavender. Woman. Delicious. “Say it.”
“What will you do if I don’t, Duke?” She raised a brow, challenging him.
But she was breathless. And beneath his questing finger, her lip remained pliable. His thumb slipped inside her mouth, catching her lower lip and dragging it down. “What do you want me to do, Duchess? You do know you are mine, do you not? What will happen between us is inevitable.”
She nipped him with her teeth, employing just enough bite to get his attention, to make him sting. “What will happen between us is you returning to your hunting expedition, Your Grace.”
She didn’t trust him.
He reeled back on his heel, studying her as the truth hit him smack in the chest. And he could not blame her, could he? He saw their union as she must see it, a bloodless transaction after which she had been abandoned. She could not know the true motives behind his abrupt departure, even if she suspected them. The timing had been wrong for them. The danger of the outside world all too real.
“Whatever happens, one thing will not alter,” he assured her, for it was the only promise he could make. “I will always be your husband, and you shall always be my wife. Now call me by my name, damn you. Kit. Say it. I can use your name. Why cannot you utter mine?”
She inhaled sharply at his suggestion that she didn’t trust herself with such an intimacy. “Kit,” she said suddenly, and her hands, which had been free at her sides until that instant, were in his hair, kneading, tugging. She pulled his face down to hers, opening her mouth, and he groaned, accepting her onslaught. Welcoming it. “Kit.”
“Yes.” Their lips clashed. Hungry. Starving. Open-mouthed, tongues seeking and lashing, teeth gnashing together. It was the least polished and most arousing joining of lips and tongue he had ever experienced.
He had to have her. Needed to be inside her, but thanks to the Fenian bullet that had almost claimed his life, that would have to wait.
Instead, he allowed the driving desire he could compensate to rule his mind. He yearned to taste her. To sink his tongue into her mouth. So he did. His tongue lapped at hers, and he sucked her nectar into his mouth, ate at her lips. Nibbled and licked. Their kisses vacillated between voracious, open-mouthed and hungry, and slow, languorous, worshipful. It was a decadent dichotomy of vicious onslaught and slow seduction.
He groaned, she moaned, and he allowed his body to sink into hers, pressing her against the wall. His cock ground into her lower belly, the friction torturous after so many weeks of illness and being unable to feel even a bloody shred of enthusiasm for shagging. His enthusiasm had returned, and if he thrust into her now like a young lad giddy with the knowledge he was about to touch his first quim, it couldn’t be helped.
Damn. She was so soft, and she smelled so sweet, and her mouth was fucking delicious. He could savor her like the finest dessert, kissing her until his lips went numb. He could kiss her all bloody day.
But he was greedy. Starving for her. And he hungered for more.
His fingers found the buttons running down the front of her bodice, stylishly placed off center, and worked them free. He wanted her skin, wanted to dispense with any and all impediments to his mouth on her nipples. The bodice gaped. He parted it, shoved the sleeves down her arms. Tore his lips from hers to kiss down her throat, burying his face in the seduction of her silken skin. With one hand, he undid the knot on the back of her corset, plucking at her laces to loosen them. With the other, he opened the first few closures on the front of the undergarment.
“Kit,” she said his name on a breathy sigh, and then her hands, those hands that had seen so much work, that bore calluses not even time and a life of ease would remove, moved down his back.
The clever glide of those hands—tentative at first, and then with greater urgency—did powerful things to him. And when her nails bit through the fabric of his robe, he almost came into her bloody skirts right then and there. Stifling a groan, he opened his mouth on her neck, sucking. Here, she tasted every bit as sweet as she did elsewhere.
“Touch me, darling.” His lips moved against her skin as he licked and sucked and bit gently. His mouth worked in concert with his hands as they slid inside her parted corset to cup her full, heavy breasts through the thin barrier of her chemise. Her nipples, hard as diamonds, prodded his palms.
What he longed for the most was those work-roughened hands of hers gripping his cock, milking him until he came. Or her mouth. Fucking hell, the idea of her supple lips wrapped around his erection, swallowing him down her throat, sucking him dry…
He had to stop thinking of it, or he would spend here and now, emptying his ballocks into the silk faille of her skirts. His thumbs rubbed lazy circles over her nipples, teasing them, and the pounding of her pulse against his mouth, coupled with the swift intake of her breath, told him all he needed to know.
She wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her.
“Georgiana,” he murmured into the mesmerizing dip where her throat and shoulder met. How had he failed to notice how utterly enthralling that sacred space was on a woman before now? Or was it just her that made it so?
He dragged his mouth along her collarbone, inhaling the decadent fragrance of her, lavender and rose and Georgiana. So good. So bloody, bloody good. Her hands traveled the expanse of his back, her nails raking up and down on either side of his spine as if she were a feline and he was her scratching post.
He damn well loved it. She possessed an inner carnal nature, his angel, and he meant to explore it to the fullest. When he was healed enough to bed her without fear of re-injury, he would lock them both in a chamber and fuck her for days. On her back. On her knees. Bent over a chair. On the floor. Astride him.
Devil take it. He nibbled her collarbone once more before kissing a new path to the fullness of her breast. She was larger than he had imagined, and it was a glorious discovery to make. Her tight-laced corset and perfectly fitted bodices concealed the fact that she had high, lush breasts that would have been the envy of any courtesan. Almost disproportionately large in comparison to her waist, though not the delicious ripeness of her hips, which he had noticed the day she’d been dressed in her ridiculous garb of men’s trousers.
The woman had a body made for sin. Made for him. And he intended to acquaint himself with it as often as possible.
“Kit, I…” Her words trailed off as his lips found and closed over one pointed nipple through the fine fabric of her undergarment.
He sucked.
“Ah.”
Bit.
“Oh.”
One hand caught the ribbon- and lace-trimmed décolletage of her chemise, tugging it down until her breasts were bared to his feverish gaze. He drank in the sight of her. Full, glorious breasts and pointed rose-pink nipples transfixed him. Fuck, she was beautiful. More beautiful than he deserved.
He wanted to say something polished, to whisper sweet nothings to her, to woo her. But in that moment, nothing would come from him save a curse. “Damn it, woman. You are a goddess.”
“I am no goddess,” she whispered, her cheeks going scarlet, hands leaving his back to flutter over her breasts in a pique of shyness, shielding herself from him. “I am all too mortal, all too fallible.”
He shook his head. “I don’t believe it.” To him, she was a sort of Proserpina, only he could never give her up for half the year. He could never give her up, ever. Not even for a day. The realization was sobering. Jarring. Kit could not focus upon it for a moment more. “Do not hide yourself from me, love.”
“This cannot be wise.” She kept her hands where they were, shields of sorts. “We do not even like one another.”
“I like you, wife.” Grimly,
he pressed his rigid cock against her once more. “Can you doubt it?”
“That is not like,” she argued. “That is rudimentary, as base as—”
Kit kissed her, swallowing any further arguments to the contrary of his purpose. He took her mouth. And it was long, and slow, and burning, that kiss. A promise of all that was yet to come between them. When she was once more clinging to him, all her frets effectively forgotten, he took her hands in his and removed them from her breasts. “You are the most glorious, gorgeous, perfect woman I have ever seen, and your beauty glows from the inside out. There is nothing base or rudimentary about what I feel for you.”
As the words flowed from Kit, they surprised him. He was not given to sentiment. But he could not deny the way he felt for her. The way she made him feel. It was rare and all-consuming, and in this moment of stark need and desperate truth, he could acknowledge that nothing in his life—no other woman, no other mission, no manner of torture or internment, no injury—nothing could have prepared him for this.
For her.
Georgiana’s expression softened, and he sensed her determination wavering. “Kit.”
“Do you want me?” he asked. It was all he needed to know.
Say yes. Say desperately. Say you cannot go another bloody moment without succumbing to this mad fire burning between us.
She bit her lip for a moment, searching his eyes. “You know I do.”
Thank fuck.
He kissed her again, swift and hard. One hand caught her skirts, bunching them, raising them, and the other found her breast, cupping it. Toying with her nipple. He sank his tongue into her mouth as he lifted her skirts the rest of the way, to her waist. With his good hip, he pinned the hem of her skirts in place, leaving nothing but flimsy stocking and drawers-clad legs on display for him.
He was going to make her spend. Regrettably, it would be with his fingers alone, for his wound would not allow him to sink to his knees and worship her as he wished, and neither would it allow him to pound into her body against the wall as his aching cock longed to do. This would have to suffice.
Kit kissed her everywhere. Lips, chin, jaw, ear, throat. She was so sweet. Her every breathy exclamation spurred him on. So responsive. So glorious. He kissed down the bare curve of her breast, his fingers slowly traveling along her inner thigh. He took her nipple in his mouth, worked his tongue over the tip, licked and sucked and abraded the tender bud with his teeth until she cried out, writhing against him.
He had her precisely where he wanted her.
Higher still his touch wandered, over eyelet and frill, into heat and sweet feminine warmth. She was so damn hot. His fingers found the slit of her drawers, slipped inside to swipe her seam. Once, twice. Her wetness coated him, trickling onto his thumb. Soft, feminine sighs guided him as he circled her pearl.
Her hips bucked. Heaven. She felt so bloody good. He could happily spend eternity right here in this moment, the musk of her arousal perfuming the air, his fingers working her slick pussy, her nipple in his mouth, the decadent sounds of her cries filling his ears. It was too perfect. She was too perfect. He half expected this moment to shatter, for him to wake alone in his bed in the darkness, only to find it had all been a dream.
But no, it was real. She was real, and nothing had ever felt so right or so good. He increased his pressure to the sound of her breathy gasps as they grew more desperate. Her body tensed and he knew she was close to finding her release.
“Kit, I…please…oh.” Her husky voice almost undid him.
He took her other breast in his mouth, sucking hard on the tight bud of her nipple, his fingers playing her clitoris. Her breathing came in uneven bursts, her heart thumping a wild staccato he felt against his lips as he released her nipple to kiss his way back to her mouth. Her nails dug into his back. She was at the precipice.
“Come for me,” he ordered against her mouth before claiming it once more in a long, drugging kiss.
And she did, thrusting into his hand, shaking and quivering as the ripples of her pleasure undulated through her body. He swallowed her cries, fed her his tongue the way he longed to give her his cock, taking his time to draw out her release for as long as possible.
When her last shudder subsided, he broke the kiss. Her pupils were dilated wide, the cinnamon flecks in her eyes brighter than ever, her lips thoroughly swollen and darkened from his kisses. A tendril of hair had escaped her coif and her cheeks were rosy. She looked well-loved and sated, and his cock twitched as he took in the glorious sight of her.
If he were a painter, he would capture her just like this: the flush of desire on her creamy skin, her bountiful breasts on display, lips parted. For a beat, he thought he would commission just such a portrait, and then he realized he would have to kill any other man who ever looked upon her thus.
“Oh my,” she whispered, her breathing still ragged, her gaze flitting to his and then away.
“Yes,” he said darkly, for he still sported a cockstand that was hard as a lump of coal and he could not satisfy it in the manner he wished. “Oh my indeed.”
The stabbing pain in his thigh chose to return with a vengeance in that moment, reminding him that he had been too long on his feet. Reluctantly, he withdrew his hand from her, allowing her skirts to fall back into place.
Blushing a furious shade of crimson, she adjusted her chemise, covering herself, before struggling with her corset. He brushed her fingers aside, gritting his teeth against a fresh onslaught of pain. “Allow me.”
She swallowed, her eyes still averted, but accepted his help. With quick, efficient movements, he had her once more laced and buttoned. To look upon her, no one would have an inkling that she had just been thoroughly pleasured against a wall. But he knew. God did he bloody know.
He kissed her again, a quick peck this time lest he be tempted to lift her skirts and fuck her like the beast within him so desperately longed to do. He was not well enough for such a feat, and neither was she ready. Her expression was becoming more dire by the moment, and he sensed her need to flee.
Perhaps he had taken things too far too fast, but before he could offer her reassurance, an insistent knocking on the chamber door disturbed the silence, accompanied by the last voice he wished to hear.
“Your Graces?”
The bloody not-butler.
He cursed as a visceral sear of rage permeated his being. “Go the hell away, damn you,” he called to his recalcitrant domestic. Carlisle was going to pay for saddling him with the intrusive behemoth, one way or another. He vowed it. His gratitude toward the bastard for protecting Georgiana in his absence had a limit.
“Is the Duchess within?” he persisted, his meddlesome voice muffled by the closed door. “Lady Philomena’s kittens are growing restless awaiting her return.”
“Of course, the poor dears.” She shimmied beneath his arm and slipped away before he could stop her, taking the scent of lavender along with her. “I shall only be but a moment, Ludlow,” she called more loudly.
A growl sounded from his throat at the loss. Her abrupt defection stung, and not just because she walked away from him with such haste. But because she acted the part of good little pup, trotting after the not-butler when she should have told him to go to Hades instead.
Leveraging himself off the wall, he turned in time to find the fluffy white traitor of a feline waiting at the door, as if she was also governed by the hulking, homicidal beast that claimed to share blood with the Duke of Carlisle.
“Et tu, Lady?” he grumbled at the thing, feeling more disgruntled than he had when he’d opened his eyes to a knife at his throat. Which sin, it ought to be noted, had been perpetrated by the not-butler as well.
Clearly, this intrusion was a less murderous edition. But it was a deliberate sabotage nonetheless, of that he had no doubt, and he did not like it. Not one whit. Nor did he care for the manner in which his duchess was scampering away as though the fires of hell itself licked at her dainty heels.
He wanted her
to remain where she was, and he wanted her all to himself. The twin realizations were bad enough, but they weren’t what hit him rather like a sack of rocks to the chest. No, that sensation was brought on by a different sort of realization entirely. One that terrified and shocked.
He had feelings for Georgiana. That was the disturbing change inside himself, the warmth that could not be escaped.
Christ on the cross. Feelings! How pathetic.
He would have limped after her, but disgust kept him rooted to the spot, halfway across the Axminster, watching her take her leave. He had no idea how the devil it had happened, but somehow between his ignominious return to Leeds House and this very moment, the way he felt about the woman he had never bothered to know had metamorphosed.
He had become…he could not find the proper word for it. Enthralled? Fixated? There did not seem to be a term in the English language that could describe to his satisfaction the hold his wife had over him. She wore trousers and animal fur. She had filled his home with creatures. She had employed an animal doctor to care for him rather than a proper physician. Chickens had nobler pedigrees than she, with her dead uncle’s railroad money and nothing save her beauty and her soul-searing kindness to recommend her.
Nothing about her should make him so wild and frenzied inside.
And yet, a fierce possessiveness gripped him whenever he saw her. He could not look at her without thinking about stripping her bare and staking his claim. He had spent the fortnight since he’d first kissed her at war with himself over whether or not he dared to do it again.
Because he had understood that one more kiss would be his breaking point. That he would not be able to resist her until he had her, and having her would be foolhardy when he needed to do everything in his power to discover what had gone wrong during his mission in New York.
Her Deceptive Duke (Wicked Husbands Book 4) Page 15