BOUND BY THE EARL

by Alyson Chase

  Making sure the Carrick Bend knot lay flat between Amanda’s shoulder blades, he rolled her onto her back. He adjusted a cable under one arm before he was satisfied. With the remaining tails, he bound her wrists together and tied off the rope.

  Her hands were held together at chest level, in prayer pose. Her hips were turned and her legs bent to one side. The rope crossed between her breasts, circling around each plush mound, before disappearing to her back. The harness lightly squeezed the soft skin of her breasts, plumping them, framing them. It was the prettiest picture Julius had ever seen.

  Red rope. Creamy skin. Dark hair spilling everywhere. He couldn’t stop the groan that tore from his throat.

  She was a masterpiece. He trailed his fingers over her skin. “You’re beautiful.”

  Her smile was dreamy. “I’m glad you think so.”

  “That isn’t an opinion.” Picking up the linen condom he’d pulled from his box, he tied the contraption around his cock. His fingers fumbled on the bow. He hadn’t been this eager to slide into a woman since he’d been a lad.

  Gathering up Amanda’s legs, he held them against his chest, both of her feet dangling over one of his shoulders. His free hand found her folds. He pressed his thumb between her lips, and slid it up and down, from her entrance to her nub. Her desire slickened his skin, but it wasn’t enough. Not for what he wanted. With two fingers, he slowly plunged in and out of her channel.

  Her heat almost scalded him, and his cock demanded entry. But he needed her to be completely ready. He gently rubbed the inside of her sheath, searching for that spongy bit of flesh. A breathy moan rewarded him. He added a third finger easily, her body pliant and ready.

  Lining his erection up to her entrance, Julius held onto her legs with one hand and gripped the knot between her breasts with his other. Using that as leverage, he pushed his way inside, his mind going white with pleasure.

  ***

  It didn’t seem possible that anything could invade her peace. Cocooned as she was in silk, her mind had drifted, swept along to a place where she was warm and safe and carefree. But Julius was a force that couldn’t be denied. He steadily filled her until she felt the hair on his thighs scrape against her bottom.

  She blinked, and all the warmth wrapped around her body arrowed to her core. The hand between her breasts tightened, pulling her chest up, arching her back. Her dreamlike state disappeared and a wonderful reality took its place.

  She laced the fingers of her bound hands together and relaxed into his hold. There was nothing else she could do. With excruciating slowness, Julius tunneled in and out, using her harness to pull her body into his thrusts. The bonds cradled her. Every muscle in her body could relax without fear that she’d make a wrong move. The rope held her together. Kept her under control. There was no chance that she’d panic, lash out, and hurt someone.

  Her mind clouded briefly with memories but she pushed them away. They were easy to forget with Julius providing an all-consuming distraction.

  His eyes were closed, and she watched him without embarrassment. The sunlight caught his hair, and a few strands of gold glinted in the chestnut locks. A reddish tinge dusted his high cheekbones. A bead of sweat rolled from his temple down his bruised eye and across the faint scar on his cheek. Julius dug his teeth into his lower lip as he bottomed out.

  Every move he made was deliberate. Every inch of rope lashed across her skin artfully placed. Her only experiences had been with cruel men, usually in their cups, who casually took what they wanted and stumbled away. His focus, his discipline, was intoxicating.

  He slammed his body into hers, and she felt a pinch deep inside. He rammed into her again and held himself deep. The nip of pain rolled into need.

  He stared down at her through heavy-lidded eyes. “Focus on the moment. I can see your mind going in a hundred different directions when there is only one thought that should be in your head.”

  She stifled a whimper as he hit that spot again. It felt like he was driving into her womb, and every nerve inside her screamed in delight. “What thought is that?” she whispered.

  “How fucking good this feels.” He let go of the knot at her chest and circled the tip of one breast with his finger. The hard peak ached, and she tried to arch into his touch. The ropes wouldn’t allow it.

  Julius retained the power of his thrusts but slackened his pace. He’d plow into her, and then ease back so slowly she thought she would scream.

  He toyed with her breasts, pinching the nipples, grabbing a full handful and using that to hold her in place. Fire licked beneath her skin, threatening to consume her from the inside out. It felt like she was about to burst. The ropes held her together.

  The slide of his shaft on her inner walls was delicious torture. She needed it to end. She wanted it to go on forever. “Julius,” she pleaded, her voice hoarse.

  “Need something, mouse?” He traced the seam where rope met flesh as it curved around her side. “If you want something, all you need to do is ask.”

  Amanda turned her face into the pillow. She’d let Julius do unspeakable things to her body and was enjoying every one of them. Why was voicing her desire so difficult?

  She tried again. “Make me feel like you did the other day. Make me come apart. You owe me several rewards.”

  “That was more of a demand than a request.” A lazy smile curled his lips. “But your wish is my command.”

  He glided his fingertips down her side to her hip and then around to the apex of her thighs. With her legs tied together, he had to work, but his thumb finally made its way to her bundle of nerves. He circled her clit and thrust into her. Circle and thrust. The friction built to a desperate frenzy, and Amanda clasped her fingers together in earnest supplication. She prayed for the exquisite agony to end.

  Julius filled her in a steady pace, keeping her pleasure on his schedule. She coiled tighter, and tighter, until she had nowhere left to go but over.

  Arching her neck, she moaned as the pulses of bliss crashed through her body. A sharp nip on her calf brought her back from her stupor.

  Julius kissed the reddened bite mark. Staring down at her, his eyes glittered with the hunger of a wolf presented with a fawn. He pulled out of her body, his shaft still hard. “The rope work on your body is one of my favorite patterns. Do you know why?”

  Amanda’s breath hadn’t returned, so she shook her head.

  He pressed her knees towards her face, and the ropes around her legs stretched and tightened as her calves met the back of her thighs. “Because it gives me the option for another position.”

  And before she could even wonder, he rolled her over until she knelt on the bed, her hands pressed tight against her breasts, her forehead resting on the pillow.

  “What …?” She tried to look over her shoulder, but fell off-balance and planted onto her cheek.

  “Careful.” Julius skimmed his palm over her bottom and found her wet opening. He eased two fingers in and out. “Before we go any further, I want you to tell me if anything is hurting.”

  “Hurting?” She needed more than his fingers. She didn’t know she could want so soon after her crisis, but she did. “Nothing hurts. Now Julius, please.”

  He chuckled and removed his fingers. “I think we’d better do this without distractions. You can still wiggle your toes?”

  She checked and nodded.

  “Good. And nothing is pinching at your shoulders?” His fingers slid under the edges of the harness at her back. He tugged gently at different sections, each pull causing the silk to rub against her flesh. It was like hundreds of fingers were caressing her skin at once. She moaned.

  “The ropes are fine.” She wriggled her backside. “You know where your attention is needed. Stop making sport.”

  “The mouse might be getting a little too demanding,” he said, but there was a note of approval in his voice. “But if you insist, I’ll stop making sport, as you say.”

  The bed shifted, and she sensed him moving behind he
r. Something cool and smooth prodded at her entrance. Julius pressed, and the object glided smoothly in.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  “You held it earlier.” Julius twisted it and slowly plunged it in and out of her body. “What you thought was a doll. The small one. How does it feel?”

  “Too small.” She frowned at Julius’s chuckle. “And a little cold.”

  “It will heat up in no time.”

  The scrape of glass on glass met her ears. Something drizzled on the flat of her lower back before running down between the cheeks of her bottom. The oil.

  Julius followed the path of the liquid, his fingers brushing past her tight ring of muscles. Amanda froze.

  “Relax.” The piece of jade in her channel eased in and out as Julius rimmed her other opening with his thumb. “Has any man ever taken you here?”

  She shook her head, her forehead rubbing against the coverlet. Did men take women there? She’d never even thought it a possibility. Why would anyone want to? “Are …” She licked her bottom lip. “Are you going to?”

  “Eventually.” He drizzled more oil above the crease of her bottom. And this time, after circling her rim, he eased a finger inside.

  Every muscle in Amanda’s body tensed. The sensation was too foreign, and her mind scattered.

  “I promise you will enjoy it. Maybe not at first. Your body needs to become accustomed to it. But it can be very pleasurable for both men and women.” Leaving the jade buried in her sheath, he circled her clit with one finger and worked her bottom with the other. “Will you trust me to make this good for you?”

  Her body shuddered. “You don’t fight fair.”

  “No, I don’t.” He added another finger into her back channel and increased the pressure on her clit. She wanted to jump out of her skin. How could her body feel so good and so uncomfortable at the same time? “Well,” he said, “do I have your permission?”

  “Yes,” she said, the word a moan.

  “Good girl.” His hands left her body, and she whimpered in frustration. When he removed the jade, she felt so empty she wanted to scream.

  His finger found its way between her thighs again to circle her clitoris. At the same time, she felt the smooth head of the object press at her rosette.

  “Easy now,” Julius said. “Just relax.”

  She tried. She really did. But her body was coiling in anticipation of its coming release. Her flesh burned as Julius pushed the column past the ring of muscles. It hurt, not too badly, and not enough to ask him to stop. She bit the coverlet pressed to her face and clasped her fingers tightly together.

  The forward pressure stopped, and Amanda was left with a feeling of fullness, a strangeness to which her body didn’t quite know how to adapt.

  Julius groaned and ran his hands, slick with oil, over the cheeks of her bottom. He tapped the end of the column, and sensation shot through her.

  “Your arse filled with my jade. Your body bound with my rope.” He took a deep, shuddering breath. “Absolute perfection.”

  In one smooth glide, Julius filled her sex. They moaned in unison.

  He dug his fingers into her hips and took off like a racehorse. He pounded into her, and Amanda knew he wouldn’t be pulling out of her body this time until he’d found his release. She was tied up like a package wrapped in string, and Amanda welcomed the idea that she was his present. His to use. His to enjoy.

  Each time he bottomed out he nudged the end of the jade, and it felt like every opening was being taken. Blood pounded at her temples, and her head spun. It was too much sensation, too many nerve endings firing at once. Her brain couldn’t process if it was pleasure or pain. But cutting through the muddle was a deep, clawing need. She pressed her thighs together, desperate to relieve the pressure.

  Julius grabbed the rope at her back, jerked her body into his hips. The ropes across her breasts tightened. Her skin chafed. Her lungs squeezed. Amanda opened her mouth to scream but no sound emerged.

  Julius grunted. The sound of their flesh slapping together filled her ears. He thrust faster, harder, and she broke.

  Waves of pleasure came crashing down. Her muscles pulsed around Julius’s cock, around the hard jade, and Julius’s tempo faltered.

  He plunged once, twice, and with a groan held himself deep within.

  Amanda wanted to scream, to whimper. She wanted to pound her palms into the bed or claw Julius’s back. Her mind was overwhelmed with the glut of emotions, and her body flooded with contradictory sensations. Too breathless to make a sound, unable to move, she did the only action left available. She cried.

  Julius slid from her body and eased her to her side. The bed dipped as he crawled off. He returned moments later and untied the knots that held her. The rope at her hands fell away first, and Julius chaffed each palm, rubbed each arm. The harness around her back and chest slipped off, and Amanda sucked in her first deep breath since the silk had touched her skin.

  Rolling Amanda to her stomach, Julius drizzled more oil across her back and kneaded her muscles, his fingers smoothing away any lingering soreness.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She nodded. She turned her face to the side, her cheek resting on the soft pillow.

  “It can be quite affecting, being bound.” He brushed his thumb under her eye. “But sometimes tears can be a good thing.”

  She nodded again, feeling as insubstantial as a cloud. Like she could float away. Every inch of her was numb, every inch except the strips of skin the rope had crossed. Those tingled, as though the bonds yet remained. They were invisible marks, ones she hoped wouldn’t disappear anytime soon. She drifted, content to merely exist in the moment.

  Julius caressed the entire length of her body, every toe receiving the same amount of attention as he’d given her shoulders. She barely noticed when he eased the jade from her body.

  Lifting her hand, he pressed his thumbs into her palm, and a moan slipped past her lips.

  Julius chuckled. “You like that?”

  In response, Amanda threaded her fingers through his, and tugged him down. He settled by her side, his heat seeping into her skin, his breath whispering across her brow.

  She rubbed his knuckle with her thumb. She’d never been more connected to another human being. Wrapped up in Julius’s arms, in his rope, she’d never felt safer.

  But feeling safe was dangerous. That was usually the moment before disaster struck. She needed to keep up her guard.

  She yawned. Her heartbeat slowed, like it was pumping syrup through her veins, making her sluggish and satisfied. Keeping up her guard required energy, and that was difficult to come by at the moment.

  Julius wrapped his other arm around her waist and drew her tight to his side, his hand resting on her hip. Amanda buried her nose at his neck and inhaled his scent, as comforting as her favorite cup of tea. She wouldn’t worry about any danger now, would allow herself to enjoy the moment. Her eyelids drooped low. Just this once, she’d let herself revel in the feeling of a man caring for her, not just caring what he could take from her.

  She knew thinking that Julius cared for her was foolish. Just because they’d lain together didn’t mean he had any depth of feeling for her. Men took their pleasure from women and affection had nothing to do with it. If he was a good man, he only took pleasure from willing women and did his best to give pleasure in return.

  Which was why, when she woke up alone hours later, it was a good reminder that just because Julius made her feel warm and safe, he wouldn’t want to waste his time holding her. His heart, after all, had not been engaged.

  Chapter Nine

  The afternoon’s light was waning, creating grotesque shadows on the walls of Clink Prison. The cell was spacious, as far as they went, with a small bedchamber and a larger living area, but it was still a cell. Even though the door wasn’t barred, sweat beaded on Julius’s brow.

  The past few days had been filled with highs and lows. Standing once more in a prison definitely q
ualified as a low. As did every time he’d questioned a witness to Audley’s murder. Each individual that he’d been able to track down either didn’t recognize the man in the patched cloak, or, as in most cases, hadn’t even seen him. The lack of progress in his investigation made his fingers itch to pound something. Then he would return home, and there would be Amanda. Sweet Amanda.

  The moments with Amanda had been some of the best of his life. Exploring each other’s bodies. Luring her into the garden and tasting her lips, warmed from the sun. Learning which rope she favored and which rope she never wanted to cross her body again. He smiled. His jute now lay buried at the bottom of his chest, ne’er to see the light of day until … well, until Marcus returned and Julius left his house.

  Julius held his hands behind his back, the fingers of his right hand digging into his left wrist. He wouldn’t lie to his friend about his affair, and he had no doubt there would be a reckoning between the two because of it. He could only hope Marcus would be satisfied with bloodying his nose and not put an end to their friendship. For while he and Amanda lived under the same roof, Julius knew their intrigue would continue.

  Julius loosened the knot of his cravat and fought the urge to check his pocket watch. Again. Amanda would love this debtor’s prison. A snug cell she could hide in, with enough creature comforts to live agreeably. Not for the first time he wondered how the horror of captivity could affect two people in such drastically different manners. Him, needing to be free at all costs. Her, relishing being under his control.

  He stared out the small square of a window into the prison’s central yard, lost in thought. A few of the tenants wandered the grounds. A guard at the front gate kept a watchful eye.

  Martin Dawnley shuffled out of his bed chamber, smoothing his hands down a hastily donned waistcoat. “My lord, had I known you were visiting I would have arranged for some tea.” The man looked around the cell, blinking rapidly, his cheeks ruddy with shame.