For a moment, he looked as if he might refuse. Then laughed and released his grip on her hips and held up his hands. Trust. Her insides fluttered wildly. Heat built between her legs. Was there anything so sensually exciting?
She tied his wrists together, not tight, but close enough that he could not slip free, then pulled the free ends through the metal eye, forcing him to lean back with his arms above his head, just as she had seen in the picture. “There,” she said, sitting back to admire her handiwork.
He raised his knees to support her back, cradling her in his lap, rocking his hips, his eyes full of mischief.
“Rogue,” she said, realizing what he was up to as he lifted and rotated his hips. “It is for me to give and you to receive.”
He grinned unapologetically.
She rose to her feet, giving him a good eyeful of what would be his reward if he behaved himself, then made as if to climb out of the tub.
His grin turned to a frown.
“Be good then,” she said. “Put your knees down and open your legs.”
With a groan that bordered on laughter he did as she bid.
She stepped between his feet. Never had she seen him so vulnerable, or so beautiful. Had she ever really looked at him? At the beauty of his body? She always felt a little restrained. He’d treated her with so much respect, she hadn’t wanted to spoil his good opinion. His chest was wide at the shoulders, but whipcord lean and firm, each muscle delineated. The water lapped over the ridges of his abdomen, softening their outline as he breathed raggedly. Below the water, his flat stomach narrowed to lean flanks adorned by dark crisp hair and his maleness. The shaft stood proud and dark above the water, his stones nestling in the crisp curls of hair. She licked her lips.
He drew in a quick sharp breath of anticipation. Would he like her mouth there? Wasn’t it dreadfully wicked, something she’d only heard whispers about? Was that where she would start? Her gaze flicked up to his face. His expression was just a little tortured as he stared at the place between her thighs, but not the slightest submissive.
She knelt between his legs, pressing his thighs wider with her knees and watched his focus slide up her belly to her breasts and then to her face. She curved her lips in a sultry smile when their gazes met.
“Have you looked your fill?” he muttered, tugging at the cords, no doubt testing how well they would hold.
“Have you?”
“Never,” he uttered darkly.
She loved that deeper note in his voice, the edge of roughness behind the veneer of civility. Waves of desire rushed through her veins. Longing mixed with pleasure. She leaned forward and brushed a kissed on the engorged head of his shaft, feeling the silky slide of it with her tongue. Taut, like a bowstring, energy held in check, he stilled.
She slid her mouth down his length, licking and tasting, supported on one hand, while the other played with his stones. His panting groan filled her ears and she felt a jolt of lust, more powerful than anything she had ever felt before. She licked her way back up to the head of his shaft and took him in her mouth, sucking and licking, savoring the feel of him against her tongue. The buck of his hips as he tried to take more than she was ready to give, along with its accompanying splash of water made her glance up.
His face was flushed. His expression torment laced with bliss. His gray eyes flickered like molten silver as he stared upward. Was he so close to the edge?
She released him and sat back on her heels, looking up, seeing them reflected in a prism of mirror above her head. Delighted, she ran her hands over his body and watched the play of water and light and the elegant lines of his body and the soft curves of hers.
“Don’t stop,” he said, pushing up with his hips.
She glanced down and raised her brows.
“Please,” he added. “Lizzie, don’t tease.”
Still commanding. And heaven help her, she wanted to obey, because she loved making him happy. But that wasn’t her role tonight. Tonight was about discovery.
She walked her hands up each side of his body, felt his erection against her belly as she moved forward, her gaze fixed on his chest. One of the ladies in that picture had her mouth on the man’s nipple. She knew they were sensitive to her touch, but had never thought to use her lips and tongue.
She tried an experimental lick. The smattering of curly hair was rough against her lips and tongue. The small bud tightened instantly. Delightfully responsive. He made a purring sound in his throat. Interesting. She licked the other one, then sucked. His hips jerked, almost tipping her off his chest into the water.
She looked up with a frown.
“I wasn’t expecting it,” he said, laughing at her. “I’m sorry.”
Because she’d never been very bold in bed. She’d let him take the lead. A flush of embarrassment rose to her face. She’d accused him of being dull, but perhaps that was all her fault. She’d been a widow with very little experience, and he’d always treated her as if he feared she’d break.
And she might have in those early days.
Not any longer. She returned to nipping and licking and suckling, gauging his pleasure by the twitches and flickers of his skin and the tortured moans and breathing, until she knew exactly what sent him beyond the edge of reason.
She lifted her face to his. He was breathing heavily through his nose as he fought for control. Her insides were so tight, so needy of him, she could scarcely breathe herself. She leaned over and took his mouth, cupping his beard-roughened cheeks in her palms, wooing the mouth that had brought so much pleasure to her in the past, giving back all the joy he’d brought her, until she was breathless.
Panting, her breath mingling with his in the warmth rising from the water, she broke the kiss. Raw emotion filled his expression. Longing. Desire. Lust. He no longer tugged at the ropes; he seemed content to submit to her will, but with a pride that was all his own.
She desired him more than life itself. But he would never be hers. No matter how much she wanted to keep him, it would be wrong.
Thinking to untie him, she leaned forward for the ropes.
His mouth clamped on to her breast. Suckling. She gasped at the shock of pleasure arcing between womb and nipple, cradling his head to give him better access, first to one breast then the other while he arched his back to press against her mons. The water sloshing around her female flesh only added to the sensations swirling through her body.
Mindless, driven by the cravings of her body for him deep inside her, the means to bring her to the fulfilment she needed more than anything else, she reached between them and guided his hot rigid shaft to her entrance.
With a wild cry that echoed around the chamber, she drove herself onto him as he thrust upward. Fullness. Pleasure. A beckoning completeness. A joyful if bittersweet end to her life as a courtesan.
She rode him hard, and heard his groans of pleasure. She slowed the pace and watched his face soften and fill with delicious wanting. She gave herself up to the bliss of his body deep within hers and let thought go where it would, while the pleasure rocketed to unbearable heights. Their bodies, familiar yet so different tonight, took them over the brink into bliss. Their shuddering climax, held back for so long, went on and on until she flew apart.
A shattering bliss that she had never before experienced.
Exhausted, she collapsed against his chest. His slipped his wrists from the ropes, something she vaguely realized he could have done at anytime and cradled her gently. He had submitted to her, not because of the ropes, but because he wanted to. What more could she ask?
Kissing her forehead, stroking her back, he murmured his approval. His heart thundered in her ear and echoed in the water.
And when she could breathe again, he sat up with her in his arms, rising to his feet like a mighty Poseidon rising from the ocean and carried her to a stool where he wrapped her in towels, while the water ran through the hair on his strong lean legs in rivulets to puddle on the floor. He patted her dry, helping her into a
black silky robe. He shrugged into one of royal blue. She felt blissfully warm and pampered and so delightfully sated, she yawned.
“Up with you, sleepyhead,” he said and once more picked her up and carried her through a mirrored door she hadn’t noticed.
The chamber beyond was of the palest green, painted with seaweeds and exotic-looking fish. The bed was carved to look like a shell. Yellow rose petals on the coverlet looked as if they were floating on a blue sea. As he set her down, their perfume rose up around her.
“I was wrong,” she said dreamily. “I do like yellow roses. And I will never see them without thinking of you.”
“So I would hope,” he murmured, stretching out beside her and lifting her head onto his shoulder, holding her close against his side.
She stroked the lapel of his robe. “Thank you for a most wonderful evening.”
He tensed at her words, but said nothing.
“I suppose it is time to leave,” she said regretfully, gazing at the underwater scene. There were mermaids in here, too. And mermen. In naughty poses. She tried not to sigh.
John looked down at her, nestled against his shoulder. He toyed with the ends of her lovely golden hair spread across his chest in long silky strands, steeling himself not to feel guilty.
“Apparently there was still some warmth amid the embers,” he said casually.
She must have heard something in his voice because she sat up with a frown. He piled the pillows behind her back.
She looked a little suspicious. Perhaps even nervous. Good. She deserved to be nervous.
“It was wonderful.” Her eyes misted. “But we cannot go on as before.” Her voice caught and he saw pain in her expression along with the attempt to be brave. “Our time is over. Surely you understand?”
Satisfied he caused her as much pain as she had caused him, he shrugged coolly. “I have no intention of asking you to return as my mistress.”
She swallowed. “No. Of course, not. What was I thinking?” She looked down, running rose petals through her fingers. “I was unkind. I suppose.” She took a breath as if she had an obstruction in her throat, and shook her head as if she wanted to speak but could not.
A twinge of guilt twisted in his chest. He had never seen her so distressed. He slipped out of the bed and stood looking at her, her fingers trailing through yellow blooms, a faint color tingeing her cheeks from their lovemaking, her hair in lovely disarray around her shoulders.
He had never seen her look more beautiful. He squared his shoulders. “I owe you an apology, Elizabeth.”
She looked up then and he saw the sheen of tears. Dammit. He hadn’t intended to make her cry.
“No,” she said. “It is right that you should go.”
“I don’t mean that. I have not treated you well.” Damnation, this was not easy, not with her looking at him wide-eyed and confused. “When you came to me, a noble lady, you were so gentle, so fragile, it never dawned on me you could have more earthy desires.” He closed his eyes briefly. “I put you on a pedestal and worshipped you instead of treating you like any other woman.”
“John, you were wonderful, considerate. I could not have asked for better.”
Always generous. Always giving. “Yes. But it can be so much more, like tonight, not sparks, but fire and flames.”
She smiled sadly. “You need to secure your line. You need a wife.”
“Yes. I do.” He dropped to one knee beside the bed, captured that restless hand in his own, crushing the petals, inhaling their scent. “Darling Elizabeth, my heart, my love, will you do the honor of giving me your hand in marriage?”
“John, no! Please, don’t do this,” she whispered so low he could barely hear the words.
“Lizzie,” he said softly.
She bit her luscious full lower lip and he resisted the temptation to kiss it, fought the growing arousal beneath the robe. She met his gaze. “It isn’t possible. I’m not respectable. You need someone worthy of your name. Someone younger.”
It was now or never. “I won’t take no for an answer. I love you, Elizabeth. Being the other half of a staid old married couple with you will be the greatest joy in my life.”
Looking into her startled eyes, he was sure he saw joy amid the surprise. He prayed he did.
“I mean it. Lady Elizabeth Bentham, I love you with all my heart. I want only you for my wife.”
“What would people say?”
He smiled at her, seeing the longing in her eyes, and hearing it in her voice. “Do you really care what others think? Or are you saying you don’t love me?” He held his breath, the dull ache around his heart sharpening with each passing second.
Tears welled in her lovely eyes. “I love you too well to let you do this.”
“Dear Lizzie, I swear to protect you and love you all the days of my life. And on each anniversary of this day, we will come here, or somewhere like it to renew our vows, with bodies, hearts and souls and never again will I take our love for granted. Nothing less will do. I want children with you. Grandchildren. You are the only woman for me, the only woman I have ever loved. Will you forgive the idiot who kneels before you and accept his promise to love you and cherish you all of our days?”
The most beautiful smile he had seen, tremulous with tears and joy, formed on her lips. “It is wrong of me. I should not, but yes, John. Oh, yes. I love you so much. You make the dream of my heart come true.”
He vaulted onto the bed and kissed her soundly, felt her melt against him and felt contentment fill his soul.
When they finally broke apart, her breathing was rapid, but there was laughter in her voice. “And you promise we will never be a dull married couple?”
He grinned. “Well, we probably will be, when we reach our dotage. But not for years and years.” He cocked a brow and flashed her a devilish smile. “In the meantime, it seems a shame to waste all of these rose petals. There are some new things I would like to try.”
She laughed. “And there were some things in that other picture downstairs I thought looked interesting, too.”
“Were there, now?” What a fool he’d been all of this time, forgetting to treat her like a flesh-and-blood woman. He would do his very best to make it up to her now and all the rest of his life.
“My grandmother is going to be very happy,” he said and kissed her lovely mouth and forgot about everything except the woman in his arms.
The woman who would be his wife.
Enjoy more passion through the ages with the sensual Harlequin Historical UNDONE titles on sale now:
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Interested in writing for Harlequin Historical UNDONE? Send your submission to [email protected].
Ann Lethbridge has been reading Regency novels for as long as she can remember. She always imagined herself as Lizzie Bennet or one of Georgette Heyer’s heroines, and would often recreate the stories in her head with different outcomes or scenes. When she sat down to write her own novel, it was no wonder that she returned to her first love: the Regency.
Ann grew up roaming England with her military father. Her family lived in many towns and villages across the country, from the Outer Hebrides to Hampshire. She spent many memorable family holidays in the West Country and in Dover, where her father was born. She now lives in Canada, with her husband, two beautiful
daughters, and a Maltese terrier named Teaser, who spends his days on a chair beside the computer, making sure she doesn’t slack off.
Ann visits Britain every year, to undertake research and also to visit family members who are very understanding about her need to poke around old buildings and visit every antiquity within a hundred miles. If you would like to know more about Ann and her research, or to contact her, visit her website at www.annlethbridge.com. She loves to hear from readers.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0644-1
Deliciously Debauched by the Rake
Copyright © 2011 by Michéle Ann Young
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