A mortified gasp escaped her lips as she jerked her gaze back to his finely molded chest. Had she no decency? She’d been staring at him down there and wondering…
His knowing smile only made it worse. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever seen a man undress before.” He stripped off his linen shirt and dropped it.
She shook her head. Although she’d seen men naked to the waist—the pugilists at Bartholomew fair always went shirtless—she’d never seen one so close, not even Papa. And what she saw made her throat go dry. Ian wasn’t as brawny as those pugilists, but she’d always found their bulging muscles repulsive. His muscles were whipcord lean, but sharply defined. There was no mistaking the power in them that had enabled him to carry William up three flights of stairs without a murmur.
“Here.” Catching her hand, he pressed it against his chest. “Why don’t you do more than look?” The stark need in his face called to her. “Touch me, Felicity, the way I touched you that night. I’ve dreamed of having your hands on me.”
She needed no further invitation to mold her fingers over his muscles, feeling the steel under the hair-rough skin as he tensed at her touch. She wanted to feel it all—the wide expanse of his chest, the ridges of his ribs, the taut sinews at his waist. And touching him provoked the shameful stirrings she’d felt before…in her breasts, in her loins. A familiar moistness formed between her thighs, certain evidence of her loose character. She squeezed her legs shut, but that didn’t assuage the ache between them.
As if he sensed her agitation, he began using his hands on her as well, though not where she wanted them. He threaded his fingers through her loosely pinned hair, shaking it free of its pins, then smoothing it out over her shoulders. Next, he stripped her down to her chemise and drawers.
He ran his hot, eager gaze over her body. “I’m glad you don’t wear those abominable corsets,” he growled as his hands swept lightly over her ribs. “When we’re married, you must wear nothing but your chemise when we’re alone.”
The outrageous thought excited her, then alarmed her, for it was too much like the painting of her sultan and his scantily clad paramours. “We shan’t marry,” she said stubbornly. “I won’t let you add me to your harem.”
“Harem?” He chuckled. “I have no harem, querida. You’ll be my wife, my only wife. You might as well get used to the idea.”
She yanked her hands from his chest, but he caught one and pressed it to the center seam of his pantaloon trousers. “Here,” he rasped. “Touch me here.”
Something hard moved beneath her fingers, and she gasped, struggling to pull her hand away, but he wouldn’t let her. “You have only to walk past me,” he said tightly, “to make me feel this. I’ve never wanted any woman as much as I want you. Never.”
“Not even—” She started to say “Cynthia Lennard,” then caught herself, loath to mention her in such an intimate moment. “Not even Miss Greenaway?” she finished lamely, though she now doubted the woman was his mistress.
“Definitely not—I never give her a moment’s thought.” A warning flickered in his eyes as he bent his head toward her. “But you? You I’ve thought of constantly since the day we met.”
He took her mouth with an almost angry need this time, his tongue stabbing deeply, his lips hard on hers. The bulge in his trousers thickened, and he ground it against her fingers. When his hand left hers to roam her breast, she found herself willingly squeezing the hot, hard length, reveling in the way it pulsed beneath her touch.
Tearing his lips from hers, he muttered, “My God, you’re torturing me.” He hauled her up in his arms and stalked to the bed with her. When he set her down on the edge, she scrambled to her knees, suddenly all too aware of where he’d placed her and why.
But before she could scoot away, he caught a fistful of her chemise to halt her. With a rakish smile, he dragged the flimsy muslin up her legs to bare her thighs. “Oh, no, querida. It’s my turn to torture you.”
Alarm coursed through her, for his foreign endearment reminded her that beneath the manners and dress of an English lord lay a half-Spanish and even half-civilized spy, with secrets so deep even the keenest gossips couldn’t root them out. And this was the man she wanted to bed her! Had she lost her wits?
Then he slipped his hand inside the slit in her drawers to cover the dark triangle between her legs, and she froze. Half-civilized? He was completely uncivilized!
“Ian, you shouldn’t…” she whispered as she clutched at his wrist in a futile attempt to prevent him.
“Let me touch you the way you touched me.” Black eyes glittering, he cradled the secret place in the juncture of her thighs, then began fondling it, rotating his palm in slow, tempting ways she’d never dared to touch herself.
Excitement and shame burned up through her body together, and she closed her eyes, wishing she could hide from him. Any minute, he’d feel the embarrassing dampness between her legs and despise her for it.
“My God, you’re so warm and wet, so ready for me,” he said roughly, but without a hint of disdain.
Ready for him? What could he mean? Then he slid his finger inside the passage made slick from that indecent wetness, and she knew.
Her eyes flew open. “Wh-what are you…” She trailed off as another of his fingers joined the first, driving in and out of her in heated strokes that made her squirm. “Oh, Ian…heavens…Ian…”
Only the fickle firelight illuminated his features, which shone triumphant and mysterious, and lent an unearthly quality to what he did with his fingers….
His wicked fingers…tempting and plucking at her, coaxing her to sway forward on knees gone weak.
He caught her with his other arm, his breathing as ragged now as her own. “Felicity, you do know…how a man makes love to a woman, don’t you?”
“Like…like this,” she whispered.
“Not quite like this.”
Taking her hand, he flattened it against the bulge in his tight trousers, which seemed larger than before. “This is what I want to put inside you, the way my fingers are inside you now.”
“I-I know,” she choked out, absurdly pleased he would take the time to explain it.
“You mean you’ve done this before?” he rasped, a note of incredulity in his voice. His fingers delved even deeper inside her with a silken stroke so delicious she arched against his palm.
“Wh-what?” She couldn’t think, could barely register the question. The wild fluttering between her legs now pulsed like the beating of her heart, and his fingers only increased the tempo. “Oh…no…I-I haven’t…Lord Faringdon’s son described it…told me once…what he wanted to do…to me. But I didn’t…let him…”
His jaw tightened. “Lord Faringdon’s son is a dead man.”
At the sight of his thunderous expression, she couldn’t prevent the giggle that bubbled up through her throat. “Y-You’re jealous.”
“Not at all. You see, I have you and he doesn’t.” Still, he gave her a possessive kiss that nearly shattered her. It matched the possessive thrusts of his fingers, heightening the throbbing between her legs into an unbearable ache.
Which is why the sudden withdrawal of his fingers made her whimper in disappointment beneath his mouth. He ended the kiss with a chuckle. “Don’t worry, querida, your cravings will be satisfied. And so will mine, thank God.”
He sat down on the bed to drag off his boots, then stood and peeled off his trousers and his stockings as she watched with disgraceful interest. How did he know that she craved something? How did he know what it was, when she didn’t even know herself?
Then he jerked off his smallclothes, and she uttered a distinctly unladylike oath. The instrument that sprang proudly from between his muscled thighs was thick and rigid. That was what she’d been fondling? Oh, my Lord.
“Take off your chemise,” he ordered. When she stiffened at the command, he added in a softer tone, “Please? I want to see you. All of you.”
When she still hesitated, transfixed by the sight
of his naked member, he stepped close and caught her chemise in his hands, pulling it over her head in one swift motion. With sudden shyness, she sank back on her heels and crossed her hands over her chest.
“Don’t, querida. You’ve nothing to be ashamed of.” He drew her arms away from her breasts, and his eyes turned molten as they feasted on her body. “Nothing at all. Your body would make Venus cry with envy.”
Such poetic words from a man who hid his thoughts so well—yet he wasn’t hiding them now. Admiration shone in his face, sparking a most improper pride in her. As a young woman, she’d cursed the female attributes that drew unwanted attention to her when she’d accompanied her father. But now she relished them, because they made Ian want her.
God preserve her, she’d fallen far.
And he clearly meant for her to fall farther still. His mouth caught hers in a heart-stopping kiss, and his hands were all over her, fondling her waist and breasts and thighs with such expert care that she cooperated eagerly when he shifted her back to lie prone on the bed. Then he knelt between her legs, looming over her like some brooding creature of the dark, every inch of his body taut with his need.
She felt open, exposed fully beneath him, but the sensation vanished when he bent his head to suck first one breast and then the other. The fluttering between her legs began again, more urgent and piercing this time. He read her body only too well, reaching down to soothe where she ached with clever, pleasing strokes of his fingers. Only when she writhed and groaned beneath him did he part her secret lips with his hand and guide his member inside her.
The intrusion shattered her exquisite pleasure. “Good Lord, Ian!” The part of him pressing into her was larger and harder than she’d imagined. “You can’t…it’s not…” She started to say “right,” but realized that wasn’t true. It felt right, having him inside her like this. Invasive and unfamiliar…but right.
“It will only hurt a moment,” he promised, inching farther inside. A shock of hair dropped over his brow to shield his eyes from her, but the fierce set to his mouth made her worry that he might be having a bit of trouble himself.
“Is it supposed to…I mean—”
“Yes.” He flashed her a pained smile. “You’re a virgin, Felicity. And the first time a man enters a virgin, it’s like…breaching a wall.”
The battle metaphor didn’t exactly comfort her. “You ought to know.”
“Actually…” He paused in his movements, a spasm of both torment and pleasure crossing his face. “I’ve never had a virgin.”
“Well, you have one now.” She wriggled back and forth, futilely trying to find a comfortable position beneath him.
“Not for long, with you doing that,” he growled, then thrust boldly forward.
A pinch of pain made her gasp, then was gone. But now he was planted so deeply inside her she dared not breathe, much less move. It wasn’t an entirely unpleasant sensation. Still, she would have thought there was more to lovemaking than this. “Ian…is this…are we…done?”
“Done?” His shoulder muscles were strained taut from the effort of holding himself off of her, but he managed a smile. “Oh, no, querida. Though I think we can…safely say the wall has been breached.”
He drew out, then pushed in again, and the motion was so intimate, so intriguing that her eyes went wide in surprise. God preserve her, there was more. His slow, careful movements enchanted her, though they seemed to cost him some effort. Indeed, when his head swooped down and his lips seized her breast, his mouth plundered and drew hard on her while his lower body still only coaxed.
But his patience soon had the desired effect as her body began to adjust to his size, and then even relish it. The exotic yearnings he’d roused earlier returned with a vengeance, making her writhe beneath him and clutch at his waist to get more, feel more, have him deeper inside her.
He needed no more encouragement than that. Increasing the pace, his body thundered rampantly above her, inside her. The bed shook with the force of his thrusts, yet she urged him on with low, wanton moans.
He dragged his lips from her throbbing breast to whisper, “Querida, you’re mine. Mine only.” The leaping firelight made his midnight eyes and urgent expression seem almost demonic as he rocked wildly against her. “I won’t let you go now. Not ever.”
She shook her head from side to side, wanting to deny his claim even as she embraced it. Like a sultan possessing and never being possessed, he held her in thrall with silken chains.
But oh, how sweet the chains. The more she struggled, the more she grew entangled in them until she couldn’t think except to think of him, couldn’t breathe without breathing him in. He’d invaded her and now would conquer her, too. And she welcomed the conquest, damn him. Welcomed him inside her, as he’d known she would.
The ache rose again in her loins, pounding in her heart, driving her to buck beneath him. “Good…Lord…Ian…yes…yes!”
“Let it come…” he ground out. “Let it come, Felicity.”
The unexpected explosion wracked her, ripping a cry from her lips as her body pulsed around him. Seconds later, he drove himself to the hilt inside her and cried out in Spanish, words she didn’t understand but comprehended all too well, for they mirrored her own exhilaration.
For a moment, he hovered over her with eyes closed, his head thrown back and his lips still parted on their cry. Then the unholy glimmering of the fire revealed an intense satisfaction that crept over his features, softening them…erasing the tension that had kept his brow rigid until now.
“Ah, querida,” was all he whispered before he withdrew, then rolled off to sink beside her on the bed. Tugging her on top of his spent body, he curved his arms around her to plaster her to him from chest to loins.
She settled against him with a long sigh and laid her cheek upon his sweat-dampened chest. A lovely contentment spread through her exhausted limbs. She could hear his heart thunder in her ear, feel his slowing breaths riffle her hair.
No wonder he’d been so confident he could seduce her into doing his bidding. Seduction was a potent weapon indeed. It certainly explained the vast number of fallen women running around London.
If only she could stay here like this…with him…could delude herself that a marriage between them might work…
She groaned. If only was for children who played pretend, not for young ladies who wanted more from their husbands than financial security and babes sired in lust. Ian hadn’t once spoken of love. How could he? He didn’t even know what it was, having never known it himself.
A draft chilled her naked skin, and she shivered. Ian stretched out a hand to grab the coverlet, then pulled it over them and tucked it around her shoulders with such tenderness, it made her want to throw all caution to the winds.
Yet nothing had changed.
No, that wasn’t true. Everything had changed. Now she had the most pressing reason of all not to marry him. If he made love like this to her every night, he would reduce her to a drooling, lovesick slave in a matter of weeks, while he continued to hold his heart—and his soul—in reserve. That possibility was too horrible to contemplate.
Pushing up off his chest, she stared down into the relaxed face of the most maddening—and tempting—man she knew. “Ian,” she began.
“Shh,” he murmured, pressing a finger to her lips. “We can talk later.”
Beneath her she felt him stir again, and her heart fluttered like a flirtatious coquette in response. Drat the man, it wouldn’t be a matter of weeks. Days, more like.
Oh, who was she fooling? She wanted to be his lovesick slave this very minute.
With a self-satisfied smile, he drew her head down to capture her lips, and as he began to kiss her with lazy enjoyment, she melted all over him like butter spread on toast. Very well, she thought with a sigh when heat shot from his mouth through her body and straight down to her loins. She might as well seize one more chance at doing this with him tonight. There’d be plenty of time tomorrow for breaking the chain
s of slavery.
Chapter 17
The city is always rife with rumor, but it takes a perceptive individual to sort the truth from the merely titillating. Lord X is just such an individual.
LADY BRUMLEY, QUOTED IN AN ADVERTISEMENT FOR THE EVENING GAZETTE,
DECEMBER 23, 1820
Lying in Felicity’s bed wide-awake, Ian heard a distant clock chime the hour. Two o’clock in the morning already. With a sigh, he nuzzled the scented hair of the woman who slumbered in his arms. It was time to wake her, but not so he could make love to her. He shouldn’t even have done it twice, with her newly deflowered.
But if he’d hurt her the second time, she’d certainly hidden it well. He would never have dreamed that a woman with such firm ideas about morality could take to bedding so enthusiastically. Lusty wench.
His own quenchless fever stirred him erect once more, and he groaned. There’d be no more satisfaction this evening even if she could endure it. Tonight he must preserve the proprieties, to spare her embarrassment at the hands of her neighbors. If he stayed, they’d be sure to notice his carriage in the street come morning.
Yet he couldn’t bear to disturb her peaceful sleep. With waking would undoubtedly come remorse—Felicity wasn’t the sort of woman to happily embrace her ruin. No matter how much he told her it was inevitable, she would blame herself.
And then him.
He grimaced. Well, he’d have years to make it up to her, years of long winter nights in the master bed at Chesterley and lazy summers making love in the gazebo while the scent of roses sweetened the air….
Damn it, he was hard again. Would he ever be able to think of her without having his cock shoot to attention? Bedding a woman was supposed to take the edge off desire, not sharpen the need to a fine point. Yet he wanted her now, and he would want her a hundred times more before they even reached the altar.
Footsteps sounded in the hall, and he froze. Who prowled about at this hour? One of the boys? Bloody hell, Felicity would be mortified if her brothers discovered her like this. When the steps halted outside the bedchamber door, he groaned. Touching his mouth to Felicity’s ear, he murmured, “Wake up, querida. You must wake up.”
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