She was halfway down the hall when she heard a door open behind her. Jane darted into an alcove she’d seen earlier. Waiting for the corresponding door-closing sound, she heard two more doors slide open. Jane’s mouth dropped open. How many people were out of their rooms?
Eventually the opening and closing of doors settled down, and Jane felt brave enough to venture back out of her alcove. It certainly would have been more convenient if Adam’s room wasn’t at the complete opposite end of the house. Jane made it to the T-junction where she was meant to turn left and came face-to-face with their hostess, creeping in from the right with a candle.
“Hullo,” Lady Cavendish said.
“Hullo.” Jane decided to brazen through it and made her left turn.
Lady Cavendish fell into step with her. “You’re not . . . headed to Lord Brandon’s room, are you?”
“No.”
“Lord Wesley’s, then.”
Jane didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to.
“Well, that’s lovely then. Have a wonderful night.”
Lydia Cavendish slipped into Lord Brandon’s room and closed the door.
Jane stood in front of the door that was—presumably—Adam’s. It wasn’t wise for her to stay in the hallway overlong, but she needed a moment. This was different from the boathouse. They could be discovered at any time. And that time had never been meant to be anything more than an experiment in kissing. This was a man’s bedroom. If anyone walked in on them in Adam’s room, they would have plenty of explaining to do themselves.
She opened the door and slipped inside.
Adam was lying on his bed, reading a book by candlelight. He looked up when she came in. And kept looking. The rise and fall of his chest under the thin linen of his shirt hypnotized her.
“Do you have any idea,” she asked once she shook herself free of the rhythm, “how many people are not in their rooms right now?”
“At least one,” he answered.
The tone of his voice was low. Sultry. He’d said he wanted to talk, but it didn’t sound like he wanted to talk. She stepped forward.
“Wait. I’m sorry. Stay there a moment.”
“Why?”
“Because we have things to discuss, and I’m not sure, if you come over here, that will happen.”
All the more reason to go over there, but instead she stood still. “What do we need to discuss?”
He sat up.
Jane watched his muscles move beneath the fabric. Tonight, she would taste those lines.
“I just want to make sure we’re still . . . on the same page.”
“What page are we supposed to be on?”
“The page that isn’t falling in love with each other.”
He was worried about her feelings. They’d discussed this already. Jane certainly had feelings for Adam, but she was confident in her ability to keep them reined in.
“Is that the page you’re on?” she asked. She started taking slow steps toward him.
He swallowed. “I . . . My page is . . . I’m going back to the colonies once things here are resolved. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“You’re certain? Because your aunt gave me a farm, and then she said I should leave if there was a chance I might hurt you. And I don’t want to hurt you.”
Mathilda. “She gave you Hatfield Place?”
“You can have it. I don’t—”
“No. I think that’s lovely.” Dear, sweet Mathilda. She’d given him a reason to stay, if he wanted one. A place. But he meant to leave, and that’s what he would do. “Is there anything else you wanted to discuss?”
She’d made it to the side of his bed.
Adam had watched every move. “I think that was it.”
• • •
Every step she’d made had been like a tigress on the hunt. Adam could barely swallow from how sensual it had been. And now there was no reason left to delay.
“May I?” she asked.
He nodded.
She climbed onto his bed in her nightgown, crawling forward until they were sitting next to each other. “So what happens next in the plan?”
The plan. Hell—the plan. Here he was thinking about tearing her nightgown off and kissing every inch of her perfect skin, and they hadn’t even solved the fact that she was afraid yet. It was easy to forget when she looked at him like that, but he couldn’t afford to forget. One wrong move and he’d be regretting it for the rest of his life.
“Well. Do you want to try a kiss?”
She nodded.
Adam leaned forward, putting their lips a breath apart. “When you become afraid, you must say so.”
“I will.”
He closed the distance, touching his lips to hers. Her hair was down, and he teased the ends with his fingers. She leaned into him. Her lips parted. Adam stroked her tongue with his own. Her hand moved to his thigh. The silky strands of her hair wound around his fingers, and he used them to guide her mouth, slanting it slightly. She moaned. Her hand shifted higher on his leg. Adam covered it with his own, not sure he could handle it if she kept going.
Jane stiffened. “Adam.”
He let go of her and leaned back. “All right.”
There was a storm of passion and disappointment in her face.
“I know. Don’t worry. That was good. We made it much farther that time.”
“Not far enough,” she growled.
His cock strained against his trousers. She’d wanted to touch him. Adam tried to ignore how aroused that made him. Even if they got there, they wouldn’t . . . It wasn’t going to be what his body was demanding. The sooner his manhood understood that, the better.
In the meantime, he needed to duplicate the success they’d had in the boathouse. Adam didn’t have any rope on him, but he scanned the room and saw a curtain tie that would serve. He pulled it free and came back to the bed. Jane watched him make the same loops he’d made in the boathouse.
“You’re going to tie yourself up again.”
“I am.”
She worried her bottom lip with her teeth. Adam leaned forward and kissed it.
“You shouldn’t need to do that.”
“Kiss you?”
“Tie yourself up.”
“I don’t mind.” It was an unbelievable understatement. The ties set them both free. Adam didn’t have to keep such a tight leash on himself because he knew he couldn’t do anything he shouldn’t. And Jane became delightfully bold when she wasn’t weighed down by fear.
Adam wrapped the cord around the bedpost until there was just enough length for him to lie flat. He slid down until he was lying with a pillow under his head, slipped his hands through the loops, and pulled. Jane watched the entire thing, riveted.
Once he was secured, she leaned forward. She ran her hands over the cord where it held his wrists. “At least this one is silk.”
Adam didn’t give a damn what it was made of if she kept touching him.
And she did. Jane molded her palms to his suspended forearms, the bulge of his bicep, the bunched sinew of his shoulder. She caressed his collarbone, his neck, the edge of his jaw up and behind his ear. She scraped her nails through his hair like she’d done before.
He couldn’t have stopped the sigh of contentment if his life relied upon it.
Jane leaned over him and pressed her lips to his. It was sweet and soft—a complete contrast to the urges rushing through Adam’s mind.
“May I undress you?”
“Yes.” He wasn’t certain he would survive it, but he desperately wanted her to.
The barest pressure brushed across his chest as she slipped loose the buttons of his shirt, one by one. She pushed her palms over his skin like she was smoothing out wrinkles from fabric. Dragging them up to his collarb
ones, she started a path back down, taking her time over ever ridge of rib and muscle.
By the time she got to the bottom of his rib cage, Adam was certain his cock couldn’t get any stiffer.
Jane leaned over and pressed her lips to the indent between his chest muscles. She swirled her tongue against his skin.
He was wrong.
His gasp drew her attention back to his mouth, and she covered it with hers. This time, she devoured him. No sweet, soft kiss. She claimed him with her tongue and conquered him with her insistent strokes.
Her hand was still at his waistband. Adam dug his heels into the mattress, pushing his hips up. Pushing the bulging front of his trousers into her palm.
Jane froze. Adam froze with her. She broke off the kiss and looked into his eyes. It didn’t look like fear. It looked like . . .
She closed her palm over him and squeezed.
Curiosity. Sweet, hellish curiosity.
• • •
Jane wanted to see and touch every inch of him. She hadn’t been certain he would let her, but then he’d thrust his hips into her hand.
Still, she needed to be sure. She traced her fingers over the fall of his trousers. “May I?”
“I—” She was barely touching him, but every muscle she could see was pulled taut. “Jane, I’m not sure.”
“What’s wrong?” She traced the outline of his manhood.
“God, I want you to. But I shouldn’t. Because the plan is about helping you.”
Jane leaned over, taking the lobe of his ear between her teeth. She scraped the edges as she pulled away. “I think you’re very helpful. I don’t feel afraid at all.”
She pushed the whole of her palm down the length of him in a repeated stroke.
He groaned loud enough she was certain they heard it in the next room. “Wait. Let’s just . . . Let’s slow down a little,” he said.
“How slow?”
“Let’s go back to the kissing.”
“Can I still touch you?”
He chuckled. “Above the trousers.”
There was plenty to fascinate her above Adam’s waistband, but now that she’d felt it, Jane was deeply curious to explore the bulge. Still, if he wanted slow they would go slow.
Jane sat back on her knees and reached for the hem of her nightgown.
“Jane?”
She didn’t answer. She pulled the billowy fabric up and over her body, baring all of her skin. The lump in his throat bobbed as he swallowed. When he said her name again, it was a reverent whisper.
Jane threw her leg over his hips, bringing their bodies into line. Flattening herself onto his chest, she pressed her bare skin to his. Adam’s breathing grew labored. She felt every inhale and exhale in her entire body. Her tongue snuck out, running over the puckered ridge of his nipple.
Adam surged beneath her. His erection rubbed against her spread thighs in a delicious symphony of friction. It was Jane’s turn to gasp. Mathilda had told her about what was possible—things they could do that wouldn’t result in a child—but Jane had never imagined it would feel so scintillating.
She flexed her hips, rubbing against him under her own power.
“Jane,” he groaned.
“Not slow enough?” She cut her pace in half.
The rumbling growl of his response was almost as arousing as the movement.
“Above. The. Trousers,” he managed to gasp out.
“I’m not using my hands.”
“As if that makes it any less torturous.” He was taking big gulping breaths of air and pushing his hips up in time with her motions.
Jane couldn’t fathom why he would want to stop, but he was fairly insistent about it. She scooted higher, out of thrusting reach. Moving against his torso didn’t have the same effect.
“Lean forward.”
She did as he asked. Her breasts hung down near his mouth, and he drew one of her nipples between his lips.
“Oh!”
He chuckled beneath her. He swirled with his tongue. Pinched with his teeth. Sucked in a way that sent a spike of pleasure straight down between her legs.
“Ahh!”
Then he turned his head and did the same thing to the other one.
“Adam.” She ran her hands up his arms, over his bound wrists, and pressed her palms against his. Their fingers clasped together. She felt his hesitation—he was waiting for her to tense—but it didn’t come. Instead, she said, “Please.”
Freed from the worry, he worshipped her breasts in excruciating detail.
She was crying out loudly, searching for something she couldn’t quite grasp, when he stopped.
“Jane, if I asked you to touch yourself . . . would you?”
“I can untie you.”
“Don’t,” he said. “I don’t want to risk frightening you. Do you not want to?”
“I—” She’d never thought about it. She supposed she could. “How?”
“The way you were before I made you slow down, just without—me.”
If Jane’s skin hadn’t already been flushed with pleasure, she would have blushed.
“You don’t have to,” he said.
But now that he’d said it, she was thinking about it. She disentangled one of her hands from his and put it between her legs. “There?”
Their eyes were so close together, she could see his pupils dilate. “Yes.”
Jane nodded. She leaned forward to kiss him again, using the distraction of his lips to save her from thinking too much about what she was doing. Her finger slid easily through the slick moisture, brushing against a collection of sensitive flesh that had her saying “oh” before she realized what was happening.
“Get closer,” Adam told her.
She lowered her hips, trapping her hand between her body and the muscles of his abdomen. She rocked like she’d done before. It was so good. The feeling raced from the tips of her toes to the base of her skull. The faster she went, the less time there was without the sensation. She knew she was gripping Adam’s hand too tight, but she needed the connection to keep her attached to something real.
The pressure built, sparking and rippling through her.
Adam growled encouragement beneath her. “Faster. Harder.”
She listened. The feeling took her up—so far up. She was made of sensation, standing on the edge of a cliff. And then she fell. She shuddered against him, the feel of his hand in hers the only thing that made any sense at all. Her body lurched on its own, sending jolts of pleasure through her. It was too much. It was all too much. “Adam!”
“You’re safe. Everything is all right.”
Eventually the feeling subsided. She was still pressed against him. He was still holding her hand.
“Like I told you.” He kissed the top of her head. “You’re amazing.”
Jane hummed her exhausted approval. “I think you’re amazing.”
“Then it’s settled—we’re both be amazing. Just make sure you untie me before you fall asleep, or I will feel decidedly less wonderful in the morning.”
Chapter 18
Adam woke up with a naked Jane lying on his chest. The sun wasn’t coming through the window yet, so he took his time enjoying the feel of her soft curves pressed against him. He sifted his fingers through the silky strands of her hair. She stirred against him, mumbling in her sleep.
If things were different, Adam would fill his palms with her naked backside, roll them both over, and give satisfaction to the erection that was still pushing insistently against the fabric of his trousers. Instead, he propped his hands behind his head and softly cajoled her awake.
“Jane.”
She rubbed her cheek against his chest.
“Jane.”
“Mhmm.”
“Wake up, Jane.”
“No.”
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Adam laughed. “As much as I would like to keep you, you need to be in your own bed when everyone wakes up.”
“No,” she groaned at him again, but she pushed herself up, resting her forearms on his chest. “I don’t want to be awake.”
“I know, love, but you have to be.”
She scrunched her face into a sleepy frown. She shimmied up his body, bringing their faces close together. Her fingers framed his face, and she kissed him.
It was meant to be gentle. It should have stayed gentle, but Adam couldn’t help himself. He brought his hand up to the base of her neck and made intense, deliberate love to her mouth. It was as close to having things be different as he would get this morning.
She moved against him on instinct.
Adam groaned. “We don’t have time.”
“We must have time.”
“No one wishes more than I do that there was time. But you have to get to back to your own room.”
She pinned him with a serious stare. “Later?”
“Later.”
“And you won’t slow anything down?”
“If that’s what you want, no, I won’t.”
She nodded. “Later, then.”
Adam pulled her nightgown over from the far side of the bed and handed it to her. Still straddling him, she pulled it over her head and let it float down over her beautiful body while she shook her hair out over her back.
Jane Bailey was heaven on earth. There was nothing else to call her. Nothing else came close to the truth.
She rolled off of him, and he felt bereft. As she climbed to the edge of his bed and stood up, he almost called her back. When she turned and smiled at him over her shoulder from the doorway, Adam could swear his heart stopped beating for just a moment.
• • •
Liquid. Her whole body was liquid. And warm. It was the most phenomenal feeling—with the exception of the crashing sensation from the night before. And then waking up surrounded by the feel and smell of Adam. She didn’t want to leave, but he was right. If she didn’t get back to her own room, there would be trouble.
She’d almost said “to hell with it” and invited trouble to give her its best shot.
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