“No!” Seth protested, reaching for her again.
She continued to dodge him. As if she could bear some sympathy embrace now!
“Yes,” she insisted, unable to keep her voice from rising. “You know it to be true more than anyone.”
Now it was Seth who drew back. “What do you mean by that?”
She shrugged, but felt anything but dismissive of what she was about to say. “That is why you picked me for your conquest, is it not? Because I am a widow who cannot be ruined? One who would never dare ask for more than whatever you briefly offered me?”
His face actually crumpled in pure horror. “Isabel—” he breathed.
She couldn’t hear him. Not his explanations or his lies or, God help her, his confirmation of her accusations.
“I want to go,” she said as she tried to move past him.
He sidestepped to block her. “No,” he said. “Isabel—”
“Oh, please let me go,” she murmured as the first tear escaped her eyes and slid down her hot cheek. “I can’t bear to have you feel sorry for me. Or to see me the same way she does, the way the others do, even the way Hartley did.”
“How do you think I see you?” Seth demanded as he caught both her arms and held her in place.
She looked up at him as another tear fell. “Damaged.”
He was silent for a long moment and then he shook his head. “Sweetest Isabel, the last thing I see when I look at you is damage. Anyone who does is a fool. I see you as beautiful.” He leaned down and kissed away her first tear. “Delectable,” he murmured as he kissed away another.
She shook her head even as she buried it in his shoulder. “I am not.”
He bent to kiss her ear. “You are. And I want you to see it. To see yourself as I see you.”
With gentle fingers he cupped her chin and let her look up at him. “I know I said tonight that you would choose something from the book to explore, but I would like to give you something. It is in your book, and I think it will help you.”
Isabel shivered as his questing fingers stroked down the curve of her throat.
“Seth,” she whispered.
He nodded. “Please. Please stay with me and let me show you how I see you. Let me prove to you that your being a widow or being, as you continue to put it, ‘damaged’ has nothing to do with why you are here with me now.”
She held her breath. God, how she wanted that gift he offered. She needed it in a way she had never acknowledged before. And she found herself nodding before she could talk herself out of the agreement to stay with Seth another night.
He took her hand and drew her into the bedroom. Before he released her hand, he lifted it to his lips and kissed it.
“Stay here.”
Isabel nodded as she watched him walk to the small dressing room attached to the bedroom. He was gone for a moment, but when he returned, he was carrying a large, wood-framed, full-length mirror. Her brow furrowing, Isabel watched as he positioned the item at the foot of the bed they had been sharing since their affair began.
“I don’t understand,” Isabel whispered.
He motioned to the mirror. “I told you, I want you to see just how beautiful you are when I make love to you. I want to show you that you aren’t flawed, as you claim.”
Isabel stared. What he described was a whole new level of intimacy. Facing herself, facing exactly what she was doing… She wasn’t certain she could stand it.
“And what if I don’t like what I see?” she asked as she turned toward him.
Seth smiled as he wrapped his arms around her and drew her against the warmth of his chest. “Isabel, trust me. There is nothing more beautiful, nothing more exciting. Please.”
It was the please that did her in. Looking up at him, with his arms cradling her, making her comfortable and warm and safe, she couldn’t imagine a scenario where he would do something to hurt her or make her feel less than worthy.
“Yes,” she said.
His smile widened as he bent his head to kiss her. She parted her lips and wrapped her arms around his neck, clinging to him. She had kissed other men, of course. Hartley, and one boy before she came into Society. None of those kisses were anything like this.
Seth took her away when his lips met hers. Just that touch cleared her mind, stole her breath and made her quiver from the inside out. There had been times when she had lost all track of time when they kissed and wasn’t sure when they parted if they had been standing together for a moment or an hour.
This was one of those times. When Seth broke away from her, she felt dazed and off-kilter and she clung to his arm until the world stopped spinning.
He drew her forward until they stood beside the bed. Isabel stole a quick glance at the mirror, but quickly forgot her nervousness when Seth turned her around and began to unbutton her gown. As her dress loosened, he bent his head and pressed his lips to the bare flesh he revealed there.
Isabel sucked in her breath at the sensation, leaning back almost against her will and flexing her hips against his out of pure instinct and desire.
A correct instinct, it seemed, for Seth growled out pleasure and pushed her gown away. He continued kissing her even as he moved her, turned her and finally withdrew from her, his breath short.
“Open your eyes,” he whispered right against her ear before he darted his tongue out to tease the flesh there.
Isabel gasped with the sensation and did as he asked. To her surprise, she found herself positioned directly in front of the mirror. He stepped behind her so her back was to his chest and let her look at herself. When he knew he had her attention, he slipped his hands beneath the thin straps of her flimsy chemise and pushed the fabric off her upper body, leaving her naked from the waist up.
Isabel blushed, fighting embarrassment at seeing herself like this. After all, a lady wasn’t taught to do these things, which made that naughty book that told women to embrace their desires all the more interesting.
And yet, behind her discomfort was something else. Her desire. A feeling heightened by watching as he covered her breasts with each hand and began to gently massage the sensitive flesh there.
She gasped, and her head came back to rest on his chest. She stared as he rubbed and teased and stroked, making her nipples even darker and their peaks even more pronounced.
She couldn’t help but move her hips again, stroking her backside against him in a mute demand for his cock buried inside of her. If he was moved by that request, he didn’t give her what she desired. Instead he pressed her breasts together, lifting them so they were even more fully on exhibit.
Isabel blushed at the sight of herself on display. She rarely took time to just look at her own body. That sort of scandalous thing had been discouraged her whole life and now she sometimes didn’t even see herself in the morning until after her maid had finished with her.
But really seeing herself in such a vulnerable position… Seth was right, it was arousing. He was so dark in comparison to her pale skin. Clothed where she was naked. His tan hands held her delicately, gently, and yet when he brushed his thumb over her nipple, her knees buckled and began to shake.
“You are so responsive,” he murmured, his voice rough as he repeated the action with his opposite thumb. “I think I could make you come just by touching you like this. Should I try while you watch?”
Isabel swallowed, taken aback and swept away by the low, dangerous, sensual tone of his voice. Her sheath pulsed with empty wetness at the idea he presented.
“Nod,” he ordered.
She did as he had asked and bobbed her head once in the affirmative. She stared as he moved around her body to stand before her. He angled her so that she could still see herself in the mirror when he dropped down to his knees in front of her.
“Seth,” she murmured.
He didn’t answer, but pressed his lips to her breast and sucked her nipple deep into the warm, wet cavern of his mouth.
Isabel cried out as intense pleasure made its
way through her. He cupped her backside and pulled her tight against him, stroking her bottom through the thin fabric of her drawers.
“Watch,” he said before he bent his head and sucked harder.
Isabel forced herself to look, and what a picture she saw. An erotic image that put any of the ones she had seen in The Ladies Book of Pleasures to shame. And like the women in that book, her expression was taut and filled with pleasure that was intense and never-ending.
Seth sucked and sucked, the intensity of his touch bordering between pain and pleasure, and she watched as her hips rocked. She rubbed against him, reaching for that spot that would bring her relief from the building wall of blinding need.
His fingers held her backside tightly, and it was when he slipped one past the globes of her bottom and lightly brushed her most forbidden area through the silk that separated them that the pleasure exploded. She rocked against him, overwhelmed by the wonder of what he had just done. She had never orgasmed without some kind of touch to her sex, and he had just made her come with the brush of his mouth and the tingling touch of his fingers.
When her hips slowed and her breathing moved from pants back to real inhalations, Seth got to his feet. His mouth covered hers with a gentleness that touched her. He had given this moment to her as a gift. But she was greedy. She wanted more.
She grabbed for his shirt and wrestled with the buttons. He drew back with a surprised smile.
“Not through with me?” he asked as he caught her wrenching fingers.
She shook her head, overwhelmed by an animal desire to feel him inside of her. “Not yet. I want you.”
He stared at her for a long moment and then he went to work on his own clothing, tearing at the fabric with as much urgency as she had earlier. She shoved at her remaining clothing, kicking it away.
Within seconds they were naked together, and Isabel groaned as she put her arms around him and felt his warm skin, his firm muscles, his hard erection pressed against her pelvis. His mouth was hot on hers, demanding and filled with desire.
She waited for him to pull her to the bed, but instead he spun her around and she found herself facing the mirror once again. Only this time she was fully exposed. She gasped as his hands slid to her sex and he opened her, displaying her lewdly. She couldn’t look away as he fingered her damp folds and made little explosions of desire rock through her yet again.
Then he bent her over and she felt him glide home within her in one long, heavy stroke. Isabel stared. She had seen this type of claiming before, in the book that sat untouched on the side table. And she had longed to feel it, though she hadn’t yet expressed that desire to Seth. Now he curled his beautiful naked body around hers and rotated his hips until her throbbing sex twitched to life with need and pleasure.
He took her in long, steady strokes, fondling her clitoris with his fingers as she watched him in the mirror. She could hardly breathe as she stared at him taking her, felt him taking her and she exploded with pleasure once more. She watched herself come, rocking back, her face filled with strain and relief at once. She watched him as well, staring at her in the mirror, his expression taut with all he was holding back in order to give her pleasure.
But the moment she came, he grunted, his thrusts increasing and his face darkening before he let out a cry and she felt the hot burst of his release fill her.
The stood together like that for a long time, their bodies still united, staring at their reflection in the mirror.
“You see,” he panted as he brushed sweaty hair away from her face. “You are beautiful.”
Isabel squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. She felt beautiful when she was with him. And whole, at least until the moment that he loosed his seed within her without fear of creating a child. That was the reminder that she was indeed broken, no matter what he said to the contrary.
But she couldn’t bear to have that thought ruin the gift he had given to her tonight. So she put it away. For now.
“No,” she whispered as she turned her face to press a kiss to his jaw. “This is beautiful. We are beautiful.”
Seth smiled as he rained down kisses against her exposed throat, but she saw the flash of dark trouble in his gaze before he turned his face. In the end, only one thing about this affair was clear. There could be no “we”.
Chapter Twenty
“When a lady is put into a bad situation, she must hold her head high and never let the world see her pain.”—The Ladies Book of Pleasures
When Isabel looked at herself in her mirror the next morning, she couldn’t help but blush with muted pleasure. Her reflection in the silver full-length mirror in her chamber brought back heated and intensely passionate memories of Seth’s gift to her. She’d seen herself through his eyes, his passion. Perhaps that would last her whole life.
“You are flushed, my lady—may I get you something?” her maid asked, interrupting Isabel’s pleasant musings and bringing her back to the reality of her situation. “Perhaps a glass of water?”
“No, Polly, thank you. That will be all for this morning,” Isabel said with a deeper blush.
The girl gave her a strange and concerned look, but she bobbed out a curtsey and slipped from the room. Isabel stared at her reflection once more and calm overtook her senses.
She would allow herself to enjoy the thoughts of Seth’s touch for a moment more before she put them away until their next meeting tonight. She wasn’t given the opportunity, though. Before her door had even closed fully, a hand reached into the space created and her sister stepped inside.
“There you are!” Serena said with a put-upon sigh. “I have been looking for you everywhere.”
Isabel got to her feet and moved toward Serena with a laugh at her sister’s dramatics, then reached out to smooth one of her errant curls.
“Silly goose, I have been here all along.”
Serena shook her head. “Not last night, you weren’t.”
Isabel froze. Last night? Her sister couldn’t be saying…
“I-I don’t know what you mean.”
Serena didn’t answer for a moment, but sat down at Isabel’s dressing table. She began examining her fragrant waters and brushes just as she had once done as a young child. Finally, her sister looked over her shoulder with a little pretended pout.
“I was so excited, I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d come to your room and talk to you about it…ask you about it.” Serena sighed. “But you weren’t here.”
All the happiness and pleasure Isabel had been experiencing faded in an instant. “You looked for me in the middle of the night?”
“Yes.” Her sister sniffed a bottle as she looked up at her with all innocence and question. She had no idea what anxiety and pain she was causing with her words. “Where in the world were you?”
“I-I must have been in the library,” Isabel burst out without thinking. “Trying to find a book to put me to sleep.”
That wasn’t quite a lie. She had done that at some point during their visit.
Serena’s brow wrinkled. “Were you? I looked there too, for I know your love of books, but didn’t see you. We must have somehow passed each other in the maze of hallways.”
Panic clawed at Isabel as she stared at her sister. If Serena were to find out what she was doing in secret with their host, it would be more than disastrous.
“So, what did you wish to speak to me about that you searched the estate so thoroughly?” she asked, hoping the question would deter Serena on her quest to know what Isabel had been doing away from her chamber in the middle of the night.
Her sister smiled. “Actually, I had hoped to talk to you about Lord Lyndham.”
Isabel’s heart slammed against her rib cage with an out-of-control rhythm. Dear God, her sister already knew something. How could she know? Unless she had observed them at dinner the night before and seen the spark between them.
“Did he ask after me last night?” her sister asked.
Isabel’s thoughts faded and she star
ed at Serena in surprise. “Ask after you?”
Serena nodded, and Isabel’s heart began to sink. Her sister’s eyes were filled with girlish hopes and excitement.
“Why—why would you think he might inquire about you?” she said, hoping her tone seemed normal, though she didn’t truly wish to know the answer.
Her sister shrugged. “He asked specifically to be seated next to you.”
“He did?” Isabel asked in surprise. “How do you know that?”
“The servants talk, you know. My maid heard about what he had done below stairs, and of course she told me immediately.” Serena giggled. “There is only one reason he might ask to sit next to you and the other chaperones and that is to inquire especially after their charges.”
Isabel felt like she had just been shoved underwater. She could still see, but it was through a swirling haze. She could still hear, but all sound was far away. She couldn’t speak, she couldn’t breathe.
Her sister didn’t seem to notice her reaction. She popped up from her seat and spun around the room with a light laugh.
“Do you not think the marquis is the one of the most interesting men you’ve ever met?”
Isabel opened her mouth, but couldn’t manage anything more than a wordless squeak as she watched her sister move into the steps of a partnerless waltz.
“We danced together the other night, you know,” Serena said with a sigh. “He moved so gracefully.”
Isabel pursed her lips. She wouldn’t know that, at least not in the context of a dance. In other aspects…
“Did he?” she asked to clear her mind of the inappropriate thoughts.
Serena nodded. “Oh yes. And Sarah told me that if a man is a good dancer he will also be most proficient in his husbandly duties.”
“Serena!” Isabel barked, much more angrily than she had intended.
Her sister stopped spinning and turned toward her with a start.
“I-I’m sorry,” she whispered, her pale cheeks brightening with a blush that was anything but happy. “I was only teasing, repeating what Sarah’s married sister told her.”
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