Lord Savage

by Mia Gabriel

I did. But I also remembered how he’d asked me not to leave him, and I’d promised I wouldn’t. Was that only part of the Game, too, or had he simply wearied of me since then?

  “What became of all that romance in your soul?” I asked, tremulous. “I thought you wanted to lavish that on me.”

  He swung around, leaving me to stare at his back while he pretended to look anywhere but at me.

  “Do not confuse romance with music-hall sentiment, Eve,” he said, his voice raised as if to convince himself by volume as well as me. “We’re both too old to believe in the foolishness of love songs. In two days, we’ll part without any regrets or looking back, exactly as all the other Protectors and Innocents will. And it will end.”

  “And it will end,” I repeated, unable to keep the sorrow from my voice. I’d known from the beginning that I’d have Savage for only a week, and I’d assured myself that that would be enough. I’d thought I’d become a changed, modern woman. I’d believed I was ready to live as carelessly as any gentleman, and take my pleasure without a thought.

  I’d been wrong.

  I stared at his broad shoulders wrapped in pale blue, his dark hair curling over the nape of his neck, and I couldn’t begin to think of returning to London alone. How could I pretend that he’d never come into my life? How could I not look back, not remember all he’d taught me, shown me, given me?

  How could I be too old for love songs when I’d never fallen in love before?

  And yet Savage was right. This was the Game. This was what I’d agreed to, and what he expected.

  No, what he wanted. I couldn’t forget that. He was mine and I was his for two more days, two more nights. That was all, and I couldn’t dare squander a second.

  I took a deep breath, unsure of what to do next. I’d only one choice, really, and I took it.

  “Yes, Master,” I said softly. “Only two days are left for you to continue my education, Master. I still have so much more to learn.”

  I watched his head straighten, his shoulders square in the sweater. Slowly he turned to face me again. His handsome features were composed in what I now thought of as his master’s face. His jaw was purposefully set, his mouth curved in the slightest of smiles, and his eyes were heavy-lidded, as if all the world bored him. With him, it was all as good as a pasteboard mask, calculated to hide his true feelings and to reveal nothing.

  Only then did he kiss me, pushing my head back into the crook of his arm to grind his mouth against mine. It was supposed to be a master’s kiss of sensual dominance, and it was. But I could also taste his uneasiness and the chaotic energy of the emotions he refused to acknowledge, all of it proof that no matter what he might say, he wasn’t ready to part with me yet.

  All he had to do was admit it.

  Two days, I thought as I kissed him hungrily in return, only two days more.…

  ELEVEN

  “Look at that rain,” Savage said, staring gloomily out the window. He’d pulled on a pair of loose, striped linen pajama trousers that were hanging perilously low on his hips, and was sipping a cup of the tea that Barry had brought in earlier. “Damn. And here I’d planned to show you the gardens this morning.”

  “Truly?” I said, surprised. I found my costume and slipped it over my head, pulling my hair free to fall down my back. I slid from the bed to go stand behind Savage, and looped my arms around his waist. We hadn’t left Savage’s rooms for five days. I hadn’t objected, of course, but I had seen nothing of Wrenton’s famed rooms or grounds. I’d have a great deal of inventing to do if anyone in New York ever asked me for details.

  “Truly,” he said, still staring at the rain driving against the windows. “To a certain degree, that meddlesome maid was correct. I have been selfish where you are concerned.”

  “No, you haven’t,” I said quickly, a note of panic creeping into my voice. “It’s how I wished it as well.”

  “Be easy, Eve,” he said. “I’ve absolutely no intention of sharing you with anyone else. In that regard, I am entirely selfish. No, I meant that the Carleighs’ house is a pretty one, and you’ve seen almost nothing of it. The gardens are quite fine at this time of year, and there’s a charming folly with a bathing pool tucked inside.”

  “That does sound agreeable,” I said with relief. We’d enjoyed ourselves so much in Savage’s oversize tub that I could easily imagine what we’d try with more water and space.

  “It is,” he said, sipping the tea. “Besides, this far into the week, I don’t expect the place to still be overrun with nymphs and satyrs. By now their interest—and their cocks—are usually beginning to flag.”

  I smiled, resting my cheek against his bare shoulder. “I doubt anyone will be outdoors today.”

  The rain had turned the wide front lawns into a sea of murky green, and blurred the trees with the gray skies into a single soggy horizon. Silvery puddles collected like little seas in the long gravel drive. Raindrops splattered hard against the window glass, making me grateful to be snug indoors.

  “Not without a raft,” Savage said philosophically. “We’ll simply have to find other ways to amuse ourselves inside the house, that’s all.”

  “I’ve never known that to be a challenge, Master,” I said, slipping my fingers down his flat belly and inside his trousers to close lightly around his cock. At once it began to stiffen and grow beneath my touch, a certainty I never tired of. “Not for us.”

  “Hardly,” he said. He finished the tea, striving to appear nonchalant as he put the empty cup and saucer on the table, but the porcelain clattered against the wood and his breathing was quickening. It was clear he was enjoying the easy rhythm of my strokes, and he pushed against my fingers.

  “No, Master,” I purred, pressing my breasts against his side. He’d given me so much pleasure that I loved the chance to be able to give it back to him like this, and watching for the subtle changes in his expression.

  But, to my surprise, after a few moments he gently lifted my hand to stop me.

  “Not that, not yet,” he said, kissing the back of my hand. “I’ve other ideas for this morning.”

  “Have you now?” I asked, disappointed, yet intrigued. Whenever I thought we’d exhausted the possibilities of our bodies together, he’d always suggested some intriguing new position or technique. I wasn’t sure whether it was his imagination or his experience that was so boundless; I preferred to think it was his imagination, inspired by me.

  “I do,” he said, again staring out at the rain. “There’s plenty to entertain us in other parts of this house. I was considering the gallery on the upper floor. I trust you have an appreciation for art?”

  “Of course,” I said, a bit indignantly. I appreciated art as well as any lady in New York, and had accompanied my husband on the dutiful trudge through the museums of Florence and Rome on our honeymoon. And didn’t I make my annual contribution to the Metropolitan Museum each year to prove it? “Just because I’m an American doesn’t mean I’m a hopeless philistine as well.”

  “Then you are certain to enjoy Carleigh’s collection,” he said, smiling as he rang for Barry. “He and his ancestors have amassed a rather extraordinary group of pieces. A small group, to be sure, but choice. There’s a selection of cinquecento engravings that I believe you’ll find particularly … inspiring.”

  The gleam in his eye told me these would not be the same type of Italian pictures that were being collected by the wealthy gentlemen of taste in New York, the sad-eyed Madonnas and weeping saints.

  “I promise you’ll find me to be a model connoisseur,” I said. I was curious, and determined not to be amazed or shocked by whatever it was he was going to show me. “You’ll see.”

  “Indeed,” he said, his smile widening as if he were party to some wicked secret. “Ah, Barry, here you are. Send for Mrs. Hart’s favorite dressing gown. I’m sure her maid will know which it is.”

  “I’m to wear my own clothes?” I asked, startled. I’d become so accustomed to wearing either the filmy Innocent cost
ume or—more usually—nothing at all that the thought of again wearing my own silk dressing gown, heavy with lace and rich embroidery, was almost shocking.

  “Not real clothes,” he said. “Only the dressing gown, with nothing beneath. I don’t know who we may encounter in the halls, and while I’m taking you upstairs to the gallery, that is the extent of my generosity. I intend to remain thoroughly selfish where your person is concerned, and share not even a glimpse of you with another man.”

  “Thank you, Master,” I said softly. He might have regarded his small gesture as being selfish, but to me it was another sign that I meant more to him than his role as my Protector required. “I am grateful.”

  “You might not be quite so grateful, Eve, when you learn what I’ve planned,” he said, turning toward the table beside the bed. “I want you on the bed now, on your stomach with your legs spread as widely apart as you can make them.”

  Obediently I climbed onto the bed and lay on my stomach as he’d ordered. I’d become very good at obeying him. I’d learned that the consequences of disobedience were too painful to ignore, just as the rewards for obedience were so delicious that I’d have been a fool to run counter to his orders.

  I could hear him digging through the table’s drawer behind me, and my heart beat a little faster, trying to imagine what he’d find there this time. Could it be the ivory dildo again, or the oil that had heated my skin, or the handcuffs that he never had used, or some other plaything altogether?

  “This won’t work,” he said, his disapproval clear. “You’re not nearly open enough for me.”

  I tried to spread my legs more widely, stretching my hip joints, but that didn’t please him, either.

  “Not like that,” he said impatiently, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Come here beside me.”

  I sat up on my knees and nestled beside him, smoothing my hair back behind my ears. In his palm were two perfect spheres of gold about an inch in diameter, connected by a length of gold chain.

  “The Chinese call these ben wah,” he said, holding them out for me to see. “I had them made especially for you.”

  I studied the balls in his hand, pleased that he’d thought far enough ahead to procure them. He’d even had my initials monogrammed on the side of each sphere, swirling letters etched into the gold. But what exactly were they for?

  “Thank you, Master,” I said, finally deciding they must be a gift of jewelry. Presuming that the chain was some kind of bracelet, I reached out to wrap it around my wrist, but he pulled it back, out of my reach.

  “No, Eve,” he said patiently. “The first place the balls must go is in your mouth. Open for me.”

  I opened my mouth and he popped the balls inside, where they lay heavily on my tongue. Tentatively, I shifted them against the insides of my cheeks, making them bump against each other. There was something shifting inside the balls that made them jostle and quiver when touched, and I felt the vibrations reverberate on my tongue.

  “Make them as wet as you can, Eve,” he said, watching the balls bulge against my cheeks. “You’ll want them that way when I push them into your sweet cunt.”

  I couldn’t smile, with my mouth so full, but my eyes brightened with anticipation. I doubted he’d have much trouble with my quim accepting the balls, either, whether they were wet with saliva or not. I could already feel the moisture gathering between my legs, the telltale warmth of arousal blossoming low in my belly.

  He patted his thigh. “I want you here, Eve, with your face to the floor,” he said. “Lie across my legs with your ass in the air.”

  With the gold balls still in my mouth, I draped myself across his thighs as he’d ordered, my bottom raised and my head forward, my breasts falling forward and my hair hanging down like a curtain.

  He didn’t like that, and impatiently gathered my hair in one hand and shoved it over my other shoulder so he could see my face. With his hands on my hips, he pushed me a little farther forward until I was at last arranged to his satisfaction.

  “There,” he said, his breath quickening as he flipped the hem of my costume up to bare my bottom and all else besides. “Now spread your legs for me.”

  I didn’t need to be asked twice. I’d come to love being shamelessly open to him like this, displaying myself so that he couldn’t mistake his effect on me. It felt like the most primal kind of seduction, without words or subtlety, as if Savage were not just my lover but my mate.

  “Beautiful,” he whispered, his palms gently easing my thighs farther apart. “There’s nothing a man likes more than seeing a woman’s sex like this. Red, aroused, juicy, like a ripe fruit begging to be tasted.”

  He slid his fingers along my seam, teasing me before he finally parted the lips of my quim. With the knuckle of his forefinger, he pressed lightly on my pearl, circling it with exactly the right amount of pressure. I gasped, nearly letting the balls drop from my mouth, and he chuckled.

  “What a waste it is, Eve, for me not to take you when you’re this close,” he said, his voice low and rough with desire. “You’re tempting me in every way possible, and there’s nothing I want more than to bury my cock as deeply as I can in you. But not yet.”

  He cupped his hand beneath my mouth. “Give me the ben wah balls.”

  I opened my mouth and the balls dropped into his hand. I’d already guessed where they would go, but I wasn’t prepared for the sensation of having him slowly push first one sphere and then the other deep inside me, with the chain left to dangle outside my body.

  Although the balls slipped easily into my channel—they were much smaller than Savage’s cock—he stirred them lightly with his finger, making them knock against each other. I whimpered as the vibrations rippled inside me, and automatically I clenched around the balls, my muscles striving to hold them tight.

  He chuckled at my response. “You like those, don’t you?”

  “Yes—yes, Master,” I stammered. “Although the feeling is—is unexpected.”

  “Then it’s exactly right.” He gently lifted me off his knee to stand. “Better?”

  “You know it’s not,” I said irritably. Inside me the balls were not uncomfortable, but I was acutely aware of their weight and their jittery vibration as they shifted against the fleshy walls of my passage. “That is, no, Master.”

  He smiled. “You will grow accustomed to the sensations, I think, and then you’ll come to enjoy them. Take care to hold the balls tightly, too. You wouldn’t wish to have them drop out and roll across the floor, would you? Ah, here’s Barry with your dressing gown now.”

  Barry bowed and entered, my pink dressing gown over his arm and my beaded, heeled mules in his hand. He began to come toward us, but Savage put his hand up to stop him.

  “Eve, go to Barry,” he said, rising and reaching for his robe. “Walk across the room to meet him.”

  It seemed a curious request, even from Savage, but I saw no harm to it, and began walking across the room. Three steps, and I stopped, startled. As I moved, the gold balls within me moved, too, like a tickling caress from within that I’d no way to ease.

  “Go, Eve,” Savage said, knowing perfectly well what was happening to me. “No dawdling. Fetch your dressing gown and slippers. Now that we’ve decided to visit the picture gallery upstairs, I’d like to go there directly.”

  With fresh resolve, I let Barry help me into my dressing gown. I slipped on my mules, and held my hand out to Savage, trying not to think of the golden spheres, and utterly failing.

  Savage knew it, too. “Patience, Eve, patience,” he said gently as he led me through the door. “The more you can control your own response, the more intense your release can be. Consider it as another test.”

  I sighed restlessly. “Yes, Master.”

  He stopped and kissed me. “You will do it for me, Eve,” he said with unexpected gentleness, “and you’ll do it for yourself. I’d never ask you to endure anything if I didn’t believe you’d the strength to succeed.”

  I took a deep breath
and nodded, determined not to give in to the vibrating balls but to do what Savage had said. I wouldn’t fail him in something as simple as this. Besides, he couldn’t expect me to endure this all day. At some point, he’d have to remove the torturous little spheres, and then reward me as well as himself—perhaps even in the picture gallery.

  Yet, by the time we’d walked the length of several halls and up two different staircases, I was flushed and clinging tightly to Savage’s arm. I hadn’t realized the effort involved in keeping the shifting balls in place, or how I’d had to keep consciously contracting the muscles of my channel as I walked. My body ached with a kind of half arousal, desperately poised on the very edge of longing and frustration. I was grateful we hadn’t seen any of the other guests, and only the occasional footman or parlor maid who’d discreetly turned away as we’d passed.

  Now I stood with Savage in the arched doorway of a long, narrow picture gallery, and I was too on edge to care about a single one of the paintings that hung in heavy gold frames all along the walls. The rain that drummed on the leaded-glass skylights matched the relentless thrum of desire in my veins. With an agitated sigh, I sank onto one of the wide, cushioned benches in the center of the gallery and tried to pull Savage down with me.

  “You wish me to be patient, Master,” I said, unfastening the silk frogs that fastened my dressing gown. “You wish me to wait. But, oh, Master, I cannot wait, not when I have you beside me, and I can never be patient with these wretched toys of yours inside me.”

  Yet, he resisted, standing instead of joining me on the bench. “You must wait, Eve, and you must be patient, or I’ll never give you what your truly want.”

  “Then I’ll pull them out myself,” I said impulsively. “You can’t torment me any longer like this.”

  I reached between my legs to search for the gold chain that held the spheres together, intending to yank them free. But as soon as my fingers found the chain, his hand closed tightly around my wrist to stop me.

  “I decide when to remove the ben wah,” he said, his face so close to mine that I could see the darker flecks in his blue-gray eyes, and every lash around them. “I decide how long you will remain in this ‘torment,’ as you call it. You will be patient, Eve, and you will wait, because I wish it. Not you.”