by Mia Gabriel
“Yes, Master,” I whispered hoarsely. “I—I feel it everywhere.”
“Where?” he asked. “Tell me.”
“In my—my lower parts,” I said. “Like last night.”
“Then make yourself come, Eve,” he urged. “Don’t stop. Remember last night, and frig yourself until you spend.”
“Oh, Master, I do not know if—”
“You can, Eve, and you will.” He reached out and yanked the sheet and coverlet from the bed, baring the rest of me to his view. “Your quim’s so red and open already. You’re nearly there now, aren’t you?”
I nodded, not trusting my voice. Slowly I slid one hand down my belly and through the thicket of chestnut curls, to the part of me that I’d only truly discovered last night.
My quim, that was what he’d called it, another forbidden word I’d heard but never spoken. I was slippery and swollen, and I shuddered as I explored by touch and sensation.
I rocked forward onto my knees and spread my thighs, opening my lips and building the tension further. I found the small nubbin that had been so electrifying last night, and even the most grazing of touches was almost too much. Gently I pressed the pads of my fingers over it, making tiny dancing circles, and squeezed my eyes shut to block out everything else. I was shaking, shuddering, and gasping for breath, my entire core gathered and knotted and begging for release.
“Almost there, Eve, almost there,” Savage whispered hoarsely, now close beside me. “Push your fingers inside and feel how tight you are, tight and ready for me.”
His voice sent me over the edge, and everything that had been wound so tightly inside me flew apart. I cried out with release, my legs turning so weak that I toppled backward against the pillows. I gasped for breath and twisted voluptuously as the last contractions shuddered through me, lost in pleasure.
Lost, but not for long. I felt the mattress sink and dip as he climbed onto it beside me. Still breathing hard, I opened my eyes, not daring to hold out my arms in welcome again.
But this time there was no question of his leaving: I’d only to look into his eyes as he rose over me to see that. All semblance of gentlemanly restraint had vanished from his face. His usually elegant features were fixed and hard, his eyes dark with lust. He’d stripped away the robe, and as he loomed naked over me, he seemed at once harshly primitive and supremely beautiful.
My gaze lowered to his cock, the veined length as hard as if it had been carved from wood, the head broad and purple, and for a fleeting moment I wondered if I’d be able to accommodate him.
He kissed me once, his mouth slashing roughly over mine as if he wanted to devour me. I threaded my fingers into the black silk of his hair, and opened my mouth wide to deepen the kiss as he pressed me into the mattress.
Though my last climax had barely passed, I was desperate for him, my need and excitement making me tremble. I knew I was supposed to wait for him to lead me, but I couldn’t.
“Please, Master, now,” I whispered into his ear. “Now.”
He made a wordless growl and nipped the side of my throat. Then he reared back, grabbing me by the hips to center me on the bed. I spread my legs wide in encouragement, and shamelessly offered my still-swollen and wet quim to him. He took his cock and guided it between my nether lips. He took one quick shove to settle himself in my notch, then buried himself deep, to the end of my depth.
I cried out, not from pain but from wonder. I was so slick that he’d entered me easily, stretching and filling me in a way that I’d never imagined.
It was what I’d wanted, what I needed, and what I’d never had, and, heaven forgive me, I never wanted it to stop.
I lifted my arms to encircle his shoulders, and he seized my wrists and pushed my arms over my head, pinning my hands there. Yet, I felt freed, not trapped, as if my whole being were now centered on the place where we were joined. He ground his hips against mine, and I answered instinctively by curling my legs around his waist.
“My god, but you’re tight,” he said, groaning as he slammed into me, filling me again and again. “I could fuck you forever.”
“Then try,” I said raggedly. “I—I wouldn’t stop you.”
“You wouldn’t be able to,” he said, his breathing harsh. “You’re so damned hot, Eve, you’ve made me like a bar of iron.”
He growled into my shoulder, still holding my hands over my head as his cock worked inside me. With each thrust his cock dragged over my sensitized channel, and I felt myself tightening around him, drawing him deeper. I was close to spending again, and I couldn’t keep back the sharp little cries that matched the rhythm of his strokes.
He’d been right: this wasn’t lovemaking. This was too powerful, too demanding, too insistent for mere love. This was fucking, and I couldn’t get enough.
He was moving faster now, harder, pounding into me as droplets of sweat fell from his chest. His handsome face was contorted with concentration and effort.
“Come with me, Eve,” he said, thrusting long and hard with his climax. “Fuck me now.”
My torrent broke an instant after his, squeezing and milking his cock as he spent into my core. I cried and twisted beneath him, riding the waves of pleasure to their end.
As good as last night had been, it paled beside this. Everything did.
“Thank you,” I managed to say, panting beneath him. “Thank you, Master.”
“No,” he said, and that was all. Nothing more. It wasn’t exhaustion that made him silent, or the way he still was laboring to recover his breath. I could see that. This was different. Something inside him had changed, leaving his blue eyes shuttered against me.
He released my hands and pulled free of me. I caught my breath as his still-hard cock slipped from my body, leaving an emptiness I hadn’t expected. But there was no doubt that he’d come inside me: his seed mingled with my juices to spill from me, warm and sticky.
“Here,” he said, handing me a handkerchief that he’d taken from the bed table. “Use that.”
I wished he’d kissed me, or said some little endearment, but that, apparently, was not what a Protector did. The handkerchief was the finest Belgian linen, neatly pressed and marked with his family’s crest embroidered in one corner, and almost too good to use for such a tawdry purpose. There was a neat stack of them on the table, at least a dozen, a convenience I hadn’t noticed last night. I supposed it was good that he was prepared, and yet somehow that tidy stack seemed like a little too much preparation. Did he truly plan to fuck me all day, and all night as well?
I cleaned myself as best I could. My wrists burned now where he’d held them, and I flexed my fingers to make the blood return to my hands.
“Are you all right?” he asked. He was lying on his back, watching me rub my wrists. “Did I hurt your hands?”
“Not much,” I lied. “They’ll feel better soon.”
“I didn’t intend for that to happen,” he said, looking at my wrists and not my face. “None of it.”
I shrugged, and smiled, trying to lighten his mood.
“I didn’t mind, Master,” I said. “In fact I rather liked it. All of it.”
He smiled bitterly, but without any humor. “A rotten sort of master I’ve turned out to be, eh?”
“Oh no,” I said quickly. “Not at all.”
“Oh yes.” He sighed, lifting up the sheet. “Lie beside me, Eve, so I may sleep.”
“Yes, Master,” I murmured. I shoved my tangled hair behind my ears and carefully laid my head on the pillow beside his.
“Not like some infernal stone effigy,” he said, shifting to his side to reach for me. “Here. Beside me, so I’ll know where you are.”
He pulled me close, drawing my bottom against his hips and his cock and keeping his arm around my waist.
“Like this, Eve,” he said. “Like this.”
I couldn’t tell if he was being affectionate, territorial, or protective, though I supposed it didn’t really matter. Whatever the reason, I liked lying this way wit
h him, liked feeling small and safe against his powerful body. I listened as his breathing slowed and the tension eased from his body into sleep. Carefully, so that he wouldn’t wake, I slipped my fingers into his so our hands were clasped.
And then, at last, I slept beside him.
SIX
This time when I woke, I knew exactly where I was: in Savage’s bed, with him still soundly asleep beside me. From the path of the sun through the windows, I guessed it must be the middle of the afternoon, and I smiled, thinking how wonderfully indolent and sensual it was to still be in bed with a man at this hour of the day.
Carefully I sat upright to gaze down at him. We’d separated as we slept, and he now lay curled on his side, away from me, with one hand flung out over the edge of the bed and the other pillowed beneath his cheek. With his face relaxed, he looked much younger, almost boyish, his features softened and his hair tousled.
He also seemed much larger, spread out across the bed and occupying most of it, and I remembered with what ease that large and beautiful body had bent my own to its will, and how pleasurable it had been. Simply admiring him like this was enough to launch the first fresh flickers of arousal low in my belly, and I thought ruefully how my body must be longing to make up for years without any passion.
He’d called me greedy last night, and I couldn’t deny it. I was greedy for sex, yes, but mostly I was greedy for him.
But before I could think of coaxing him into any further acts in the Game, I’d something far more urgent to tend to. I eased myself from the bed, trying not to wake Savage. There was a light wool throw folded on the chest at the foot of the bed, and I wrapped myself in it as a makeshift dressing gown while I went to find the water closet.
I opened and closed the bedroom door as quietly as I could, my bare feet making no sound on the polished wood floor of the hallway. I hoped I wouldn’t meet Barry, for talking with him would be sure to wake Savage. The first door I tried led to a storage closet, but the second one opened to a very grand bathroom indeed, with diamond-patterned windows, tall mirrors, gray marble walls and floors, and an oversize marble tub in the center of the room.
All in all, it was at least double the size of the bathroom given to me, perhaps even larger. I didn’t object. The size and the quantity of marble made this bath a chilly, echoing place.
Swiftly I tended to my business. As I washed my hands and then my face, I couldn’t help studying my reflection in the mirror over the sink. Of course my hair was a shambles and I’d no rice powder or rouge left on my face, but I hadn’t expected to see how my lips were still swollen and red from his kisses, or the way my eyes were heavy-lidded with sleep and wantonness.
Did fucking always leave its mark like this? I’d never seen such a face stare back at me in the mirror, and it was so different from my usual demeanor that it was unsettling. If I were strolling down Fifth Avenue and met Mrs. Astor or Mrs. Vanderbilt, would they be able to tell what I’d been doing?
I grimaced, wrinkling my nose, and tried to pull the tangles from my hair. Innocent or not, Savage would have to part with me long enough to let Simpson brush and dress my hair, or else—
From behind the bedroom door came the sound of shattering glass, of a crystal tumbler being hurled against a wall.
“Eve! Eve!” Savage shouted. “Where the devil is she? Barry, you dog, so help me if you let her leave!”
So much for not waking him, I thought, and quickly opened the bathroom door, meaning to go to the bedroom to reassure him.
But Savage was already there, pushing his way into the doorway as soon as I opened it.
“My god, Eve,” he said, grabbing me by the shoulders. “What are you doing in here?”
I jerked free, backing away and clutching the throw around me as if it were armor. “What do you think I was doing?”
“I told you specifically to stay with me,” he said, biting off each word. “I told you not to leave.”
“And I didn’t,” I said defensively, mystified by his outburst. “You told me not to wander about the house, and I haven’t. I didn’t think I needed your permission to come here to—to wash my face.”
He raked his fingers back through his hair, clearly struggling to control his temper. His expression was dark as storm clouds, his bare chest heaving with the force of it. Yet, anger wasn’t the only emotion on his face. To my surprise, I was sure I saw something very much like fear there in his eyes as well. What could a man like this—powerful, rich, titled—possibly be frightened of?
“I didn’t wish to wake you, that was all,” I said, calming my voice to help soothe him. I’d had experience with intemperate men: my father had flown into rages for seemingly no reason, and I’d learned that quiet explanations worked better than raging in return.
“You said you hadn’t slept last night,” I continued. “I didn’t want to disturb you.”
He tied the sash on his robe with quick, purposeful movements. “You left me, Eve.”
“I left the bedroom, not you,” I said, “and I was coming back directly.”
He kept calling me Eve, clinging to the Game. Perhaps that was the key. I longed to reach out and put my arms around him in comfort, but didn’t. Despite the physical intimacy of what we’d shared, I sensed he’d still rebuff me, and so I kept to words instead.
“Wasn’t I here at the door when you opened it, Master?” I continued, striving to sound reassuring. “When you opened it, didn’t you find me on the other side, waiting for you?”
It was working. The anger had faded from his face, and what was there now was only a usual male fear of looking foolish before me.
“Barry!” he called sharply. The servant appeared instantly behind him, where he’d likely been lurking all along. “Barry, the lady wishes to bathe. Draw her bath at once.”
“Very well, my lord.” Barry eased his way past me and Savage, and opened the taps on the tub. The water rushed out, splashing noisily against the marble.
“If you please, Master,” I said, raising my voice to be heard over the water. “I’d prefer to go to my own room to wash, where I have my own things. I promise I won’t be gone long, and—”
“Barry, send for Mrs. Hart’s maid,” he said. “Tell her to bring whatever her mistress needs for bathing.”
He ignored me, instead striding to the tub and thrusting his hand into the water as Barry left us alone.
“Perfect,” he said, and at last he smiled. “I believe I’ll join you, Eve.”
My eyes widened. “You will, Master?”
“I will,” he said with relish. “This tub is quite large enough for two.”
I was surprised by how quickly his mood had turned around. I didn’t object, of course, for Savage like this was much better company than a furious Savage.
Perhaps his bad temper had been only because he’d awakened abruptly, combined with an aristocratic expectation to have things his way. I could understand that, for most of New York society suffered from the same conviction. Perhaps I’d exaggerated his behavior in my mind because I hadn’t expected him to act like that.
And perhaps I was simply thinking too much.
I looked from him to the tub, imagining us inside it together. It was tempting, very tempting. There was plenty of room, both for bathing and for whatever else he might have planned.
Still I hung back, keeping myself cocooned in the woolen throw. I’d always regarded my baths as a place of solitude, to relax and to daydream, and I was quite certain that wasn’t what he had in mind.
“Come, Eve,” he said, leaning against the side of the tub. Steam rose from the warm water around him, giving him an air of mystery that he didn’t need. “You’ve no reason to be shy with me. Not now.”
“I’m not shy,” I said promptly. “That is, I’m not shy, Master.”
He grinned, suddenly boyish again. “I didn’t think you were, Eve, even for an Innocent. But something is holding you back, yes?”
I said the first thing that entered my head: �
��I don’t wish to drown, Master.”
He chuckled, and closed the distance between us. I was glad; we’d been apart long enough, and watching the dark silk robe glide over his obviously bare skin made the heat gather inside me.
He settled one arm around my waist, pulling me closer. He kissed me, slowly and deeply, the way I liked it, and deftly eased his hand inside my throw to cup my breast. His thumb rubbed over my nipple, making it instantly harden, and I couldn’t keep back the small whimper of delight that vibrated between our mouths.
“You’re not thinking about drowning now, Eve, are you?” He pushed the throw farther down over my arms to bare both my breasts.
“No, Master,” I said, arching my back so that my breast pushed into his palm. “Though I do wonder if the tub will overflow.”
“It’s a very large tub,” he said, tugging the throw from around my arms. “It would take less time to fill the North Sea than that tub.”
I shimmied my hips to make the throw fall to the floor. He grunted with approval, sliding his palms along the curve of my waist to my hips.
“You’re far too bewitching to be an Innocent, Eve,” he said, more of a growl. “I’m supposed to be the one educating you, yet you’re making me forget everything I know.”
“Whatever I know, I’ve learned from you, Master,” I murmured, my breathing quickening. He eased his fingers across my notch, and I widened my stance to give him more, resting my hands against his chest for support.
“That’s a pretty compliment from an Innocent,” he said. “You do know how to play the Game. My god, how wet you are already.”
“You inspire me, Master,” I whispered breathlessly. He’d never comprehend how much of this wasn’t a game for me, but an amazing awakening. “I cannot help myself.”
“I wouldn’t want you to.” His kiss now was less leisurely and more ravenous, like a man who was done waiting. I understood, for I felt the same way myself.
Daring, I blindly hooked one finger into the looped knot on his sash so that the robe fell open. His cock seemed to spring into my hand, thick and hard for me already. The skin was velvety soft and heated in my hand, and as I slid my fingers along its length, he sucked in his breath.