“There is a book,” she said softly, beginning again. “That I found. And it has pictures of…well, of men and women together.” Evan’s eyes grew wide and understanding passed over his face and she moved forward with a smile before she continued, “And they show them doing things…well, it’s like what you do to me.”
“What I do—”
“When you touch me,” she explained further.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh.”
She swallowed hard. Now came the more difficult part. “I-I told you before that I knew I wouldn’t marry. I accept that. But what I feel when I’m with you, I would like to feel that more.”
“Oh,” he said again, and turned his face.
She shifted. Had she gone too far? She couldn’t tell. Evan was breathing hard and he refused to look at her.
“You don’t know what you’re saying,” he said slowly.
She shook her head. “I told you, I saw a book.”
He glared at her. “Josie, a book is not that same as doing the things in the book.”
She folded her arms “Please don’t treat me like a child.”
He laughed, but there was little humor in the sound. “Trust me, I am not. But you’re speaking of ruin, Josie. And I can’t do that. I won’t!”
“You can only be ruined if someone else wants you to be untouched,” she argued. “And no one does, I assure you. Eight horrible Seasons have proven that beyond need or any other proof. So to me, ruin sounds…” She glanced back at the grass where they’d lain. “Ruin sounds wonderful.”
He squeezed his hands into fists at his side. “Josie, please stop.”
Her lips parted and she stared at him. Earlier she had said he didn’t want her and he had claimed he did. But now she wasn’t so sure. After all, she was throwing herself at him, absolving him of guilt, demanding he act on his proclaimed needs and he refused.
So perhaps he was only placating her by pretending. Perhaps once he touched her, he remembered what she was. What he was. And that he could have someone so much better.
She blushed. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I was very stupid.”
“No, not stupid,” he said, lifting a hand to her before dropping it away like he couldn’t, or didn’t want, to touch her.
“It is stupid to think you actually do want me. That you aren’t just being kind in dismissing me.” Tears had begun to fill her eyes and she blinked in the hopes she could escape him without him seeing them. “I can walk home. We aren’t far and—”
He moved on her so swiftly that it was as if he was in one moment standing by the lake side and the next he had her crushed to his chest, his eyes bright and on fire.
“Are you mad, Josie? Since you arrived all I have thought about was you. Since I touched you, all I have dreamed about was you. And right now all I want in this world is you.”
His mouth came down again, this time hard and demanding, and she was forced to give him what he wanted. He drove his tongue into her, proving his desire, stoking her need. She lifted onto her tiptoes and dueled with him, tasting his desire and letting it merge with her own.
She had no idea how long they stood that way, his arms around her, his hands squeezing her closer, his tongue claiming her the way she wished he would in other ways. But when he broke away, she felt bereft.
He stared down at her in his arms and his wild eyes gentled slightly. “Yes, I want you, Josie,” he whispered. “But I can’t…hurt you.”
“But—”
He shook his head. “You say you’ll never marry and I see that you believe that to be true. If we went too far, we could be forced to wed.”
“I would never force your hand.”
He frowned. “Well, even if that were true, the option to marry well could be taken from you permanently. You would be damaged.”
“I’m already damaged,” she said, thinking of the pitying stares, the ways she was ignored, the sometimes panicked looks when young lords were forced to dance with her. “So I don’t care.”
“But I do.” Evan stroked his thumb over her lower lip with a shuddering sigh.
She shook her head. She could see he had set his mind to this course. She wasn’t tempting enough to turn him from it. But her entire body ached in a way it never had before.
“Please,” she whispered. “Don’t leave me wondering.”
She leaned up and kissed him once more, this time soft, this time gentle. She felt him stiffen, then relax into her exploration. And then he pulled away again and it felt like she was being torn to pieces.
“I can…do things…” he said, resting his forehead on hers.
She drew back. “Do things?”
“To satisfy you,” he said, his voice rough and deep and seductive. “Without stealing your future.”
Her eyes went wide. “How?” she whispered.
He molded her to him as he lowered her back to the grass. “I’ll show you.”
She settled into the sweet-smelling lawn and watched as he took a long, deep breath. Like he was surrendering. Then he placed his hands on the hem of her skirt and began to push it up.
She tensed as he revealed her legs, turning her face so she didn’t have to watch him. She didn’t want to see his face if he was disappointed by her body.
He lifted the skirts up and up, pushing them to bunch higher and reveal calf, thigh and finally her hips. He left the dress around her waist and began to touch her thighs, massaging her, parting her legs wider to reveal herself to him.
“God, you are more beautiful than I imagined,” he murmured, almost more to himself than to her.
She looked down at him, perched between her legs. Her sex clenched and her heart stuttered. He found her beautiful? She had never considered herself so. Oh, she was no longer the awkward, pudgy girl she’d once been. But she was no lithe wisp either. She had curves, ones that did not exactly fit the fashion of the day. God, how she hated an empire waist.
But here was Evan, touching her, sending fire along her skin, pooling heat and wetness between her legs and he said she was beautiful.
She felt like it for the very first time.
“I’m going to touch you,” he whispered.
She nodded. “You’re already touching me.”
He smiled, wolfish, but also gentle. “No. I’m going to touch you…” He trailed off and tugged at the slit in her drawers, parting the fabric and revealing her sex. “Here.”
She stifled a gurgling moan and relaxed back against the grass. She shut her eyes and waited, waited for his hands. Only it wasn’t his hands that descended upon her. She felt the steaming heat of his breath at the apex of her thighs instead.
Her eyes flew open and she struggled to her elbows to watch as he placed a hot, wet, open-mouthed kiss against her sex.
What followed that kiss could only be described as a shockwave. Her entire body rippled, her hips lifted and she cried out at the intimacy of the caress and her intense desire for more of the same. He didn’t disappoint and dropped his lips to her again. Only this time he stroked his tongue along her length, licking the moisture of her desire away in one sweep.
“Oh God,” she moaned.
“Indeed,” he growled in return. Then he didn’t talk again, for he dove into her like a man ravenous.
He stroked her flesh with his tongue, swirling the rough surface against her tender folders, then spreading them apart with his fingers to reveal more and more. She lifted into him, grinding her hips in time to his strokes as she reached for pleasure.
He gave it to her in powerful measure, sucking at her, tasting her. And finally he dragged his tongue across the pearl of her pleasure, the place she had found herself years ago. She didn’t know what it was called, but when she rubbed it, she felt a flutter of sensation like nothing she had experienced before.
With Evan’s attention, the pleasure was more than a flutter. It was a torrent, a thunderstorm, an earthquake.
“Please,” she panted, dropping her hands to his hair, lifting h
er hips in desperation. “Please, please.”
“You shall be pleased, I assure you,” he grunted before he sucked that bundle between his lips. He scraped her gently with his teeth and she cried out. She was so close to something, something she didn’t fully understand, but she wanted it so desperately she might have given up breath itself to find it.
Luckily he didn’t require that sacrifice. He swirled his tongue around her once, twice, and suddenly her body began to shake out of control. She cried out as electric shocks of pleasure tore through her, starting at the little bundle that he sucked and spreading through every fiber of her being.
She thrashed at the power of her release, her fingers tugging at Evan’s hair, her legs shaking, her body weightless as she writhed. It felt like the moments stretched to an eternity, until she was spent and panting, until she could no longer move. Only then did he kiss her one last time, then prop himself to his elbow on his side as he stared up at her.
“Well,” she panted as she pushed at her wrinkled skirts to cover herself. “That was something.”
He laughed, then helped her bring her skirts back down to her ankles. He rested his hand there, the casual touch nearly as intimate as his earlier ones.
“Well, you said you wanted to experience pleasure. I hope I have obliged.”
She nodded. “I’ve never felt anything like it. Even when I touched myself.”
His eyes fluttered shut. “Oh dear God.”
“I’m sorry, is that—”
“No,” he interrupted, his voice strained. “I’m just trying to be a gentleman and not picture it.”
“Oh.”
She looked at him while he had his eyes closed. He really was the most handsome man she’d ever known. And he’d done such things to her! But as her gaze flitted lower she realized that his…his member was swollen against his trouser front, rather like the members of the men were in the pictures she’d seen.
“Er, but you are not satisfied,” she said, pointing without looking as heat filled her cheeks.
He peeked at her. “No, I’m not. Though pleasuring you was quite fulfilling. But you needn’t worry, Josie. I have ways of resolving this issue on my own.”
“How?” she asked, examining the bulge again from the corner of her eye.
“I will take myself in hand later. And likely think about your taste, the sounds you made when you came.”
“Came?”
“Found release,” he explained.
“And you will take that…that thing—”
“My cock,” he interrupted.
“Oh. Your cock in hand, and what will you do?”
“Stroke it,” he said, leaning closer. “Until I find release as you did.”
She shivered at the words and was surprised that her body throbbed anew with his description. “I-I would like to see that.”
His cleared his throat in what seemed like discomfort. “It is getting late, Josie. We should go back or else your mother will truly worry.”
She nodded. “But…but perhaps another time?”
“Do you want to do this again?” he asked.
She bit her lip. “Yes. I want to feel like this if I can.”
He seemed to ponder that request for a long moment, then he leaned over her, caging her against the grass with his arms. “So do I,” he whispered, dipping his head to kiss her.
She melted into him, tasting an earthy flavor on his lips that she realized was her own. She reached up to thread her fingers through his hair, to draw him deeper, but he pulled away with a shake of his head.
“You shall not seduce me, Miss Westfall. As tempting as you are.” He pushed to his feet and offered her a hand to rise. “Now, let us go.”
She followed him to the phaeton and let him help her up. She settled into her seat as he joined her and off they went, back toward her home as if nothing had just happened between them. But it had. Every jolt of the carriage reminded her of that. Every side glance at the man beside her.
They rode in companionable silence to her mother’s home and he helped her down. He offered her an arm to take her to the door, but she hesitated.
“Evan?” she whispered, uncertain of what to say without sounding foolish.
“Yes?” His dark brown eyes held hers evenly.
“I—thank you for today.” She couldn’t help the heat that flooded her cheeks and likely made her look like a tomato. “I realize it probably meant very little to you, but it meant a great deal to me.”
He stared at her for a long moment. “It meant something to me,” he admitted as he released her.
“Did it?”
He nodded. “Goodbye, Josie.”
“Goodbye,” she said as she stepped into the foyer. But as her mother’s butler, Mr. Charles, shut the door behind her, she was not allowed a moment to gather her thoughtsMrs. Westfall flew out of the parlor, hands clasped before her as if in prayer.
“I wondered where you were,” her mother gasped.
Josie tilted her head. “I’m sorry, Mama, I didn’t mean to worry you.”
“Worry me? Posh, you were with a Woodley! How could I worry?” Mrs. Westfall caught her hands and all but dragged her into the parlor. “Now tell me everything that happened! Everything, don’t leave out a moment.”
Josie gripped the back of a settee to steady herself as images of her afternoon bombarded her. Thoughts of Evan’s kisses, all of them, melted her insides and made her ache for more.
“There is little to tell,” she lied. “We went to visit the tenants as I originally planned and then we took a-a stroll around the lake before we came home.”
Mrs. Westfall shook her head. “Oh, no. I think there is more to it.”
Josie froze. “You do? What do you mean?”
“He is courting you!” her mother crowed.
“Courting me?” Josie repeated, and tried not to laugh. What Evan had done to her didn’t count as courting by any definition. “I don’t think so.”
“Why else would he take you out today? And keep you out so late?” Mrs. Westfall grinned. “Oh, this will be perfect. You will be married and we will be tied to the Woodley name. A wonderful fit for everyone involved.”
Josie pursed her lips. Her mother truly did not understand the relationship she was developing with Evan. Of course, neither did she. She had certainly never guessed he would be so kind to her, nor that he would touch her in such wonderful ways.
It was almost enough for her to hope again. To want something again. Something she had put aside years ago.
And she feared those desires might only lead to heartache.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Evan let out the air in his lungs as he burst through his chamber door and locked it behind him. The room was all but spinning as he moved to the bed, braced himself on the edge and fumbled with the buttons on his trousers. His cock swelled against it, and as he lowered the flap and the warm air hit his sensitive skin, he hissed out a sound of pleasure.
The entire ride home he had been consumed by memories of Josie’s kiss, Josie’s sweet and innocent desires, Josie’s cries of pleasure. And his need had grown with every mile. God, he had nearly turned around, burst into her house and had her right there and then.
But he couldn’t.
So he was left with this.
He took himself in hand and stroked over his sensitive skin. Josie had asked about this act, her green eyes wide and bright as she stared at the outline of his erection. What would she do if she saw him do this?
He began to stroke faster, his eyes fluttering shut as he pictured Josie sprawled naked before him, watching him pleasure himself. Better yet, Josie crawling toward him, wickedness in her stare as she took him in hand herself.
He groaned at the images in his mind, coupled with the frantic thumping strokes of his hand.
But Josie touching him wouldn’t be enough. He wanted to be inside of her. Some way. Any way. Would she let him press his tip past her lips? Would she swirl her tongue around him like
the most experienced bawd? Would she take him all the way to her throat and suck until he could hardly see straight?
He stroked harder at the image, but it still wasn’t enough. Because in truth, he didn’t want to play games with Josie. He didn’t want to tease her and be teased. He wanted to claim her. He wanted to open her legs wide and slide inside her heat, feel her ripple with pleasure around him as she finally understood that book she had described earlier. He wanted to feel her wet heat squeeze him, take him, until he couldn’t stand it anymore and he spent.
As that thought exploded in his mind, his body also found release. Hot seed spurted from him and he groaned out Josie’s name as he sagged across his bed.
When the world had stopped spinning and he flopped onto his back across the coverlet, he shook his head. When he had first approached Josie, he had been opposed to it. He didn’t want to face her hate. Then he had wanted to know what she knew about Claire.
But now everything had changed. He wanted her. And he was drowning in it. He could only hope he wouldn’t lose everything before this was all over.
“Where did you go yesterday?” Gabriel asked as he entered the study where Evan had been hiding.
Evan let out a long sigh before he turned to face his brother. “What do you mean?”
“Well, you left the house in the late morning and went straight to your chamber upon your return in the evening. You even skipped breakfast with Mother and me.” Gabriel shrugged. “I merely wondered.”
Evan gritted his teeth. He had been avoiding his family on purpose but had very much hoped they wouldn’t notice his absence quite so keenly since he had very little answer for it. What was he to say? That he spent the day with Josie and had spent the night indulging in erotic fantasies about her?
“I-I was out.”
Gabriel had begun moving across the room, but at Evan’s tone, he stopped and turned to face him. “Out.”
“Yes, that’s what I said. Out.” Evan folded his arms. “Why? Is that not allowed anymore?”
“And who were you out with?”
“I’m the older brother,” Evan said, hoping to distract Gabriel. “Aren’t I the one who is supposed to interrogate?”
Deceived Page 8