“More,” she whispered, now understanding precisely why those in romance novels begged for release. Her entire world had reduced to one agonizing need: orgasm.
Finally, one blunt fingertip parted her bush and lightly stroked the tender flesh. At the jolt of sensation, Pippa jerked.
“Your pussy is dripping wet,” murmured Finn in her ear, before nipping the side of her neck. He sounded idle, but underneath her bottom his cock was stone-hard.
She quivered, her hands gripping the blanket. “That is f-factually correct.”
“Would you like to come?”
“You know I would.”
“Then beg,” he rasped, his thumb circling her clitoris. Nudging it. Making her soaked pussy burn, until at last he cupped her mound, almost possessively.
Pippa closed her eyes, so near to orgasm she could scarcely breathe. “Please. Please…Oh!”
His free hand clamped over her mouth just in time to muffle her shriek of joy as the heel of his hand pressed her clitoris and his middle finger shallowly penetrated her entrance, setting off a wild, exhilarating internal explosion.
Finn. Finn had made her come. In a curricle. Under a tree in Hyde Park.
And it had been better than she’d ever imagined.
Romance novel characters were absolutely correct: giving the person you loved an orgasm was a triumph. A marvel. A wonder that deserved no less than full trumpet fanfare.
As Pippa trembled and panted in his arms, Finn continued to stroke her clitoris, although delicately now. His composure hung by a thread; he was torn between strutting about like a rooster and informing all and sundry that he’d just made his lady come, and groaning in pain because his cock was about to burst through the fabric of his trousers.
“Finn,” she breathed, turning her head to rub her cheek against his. “That was…satisfactory.”
He froze. “Satisfactory?”
Pippa laughed. “If I say it was splendidly incomparable, the greatest event in the history of the world, what do you have to aspire to next time?”
Wicked woman.
What would the comte do in such a situation? Or the reclusive laird for that matter?
Make her come again, of course.
Decision made, Finn began to circle her clitoris with greater purpose. While Pippa thought he’d been teasing her earlier, he had in fact been learning her body by touch alone, where she was especially sensitive, whether she preferred a lighter or firmer touch. It did add spice to the occasion, feeling but not seeing, especially out here in the fresh cool air with the birds chirping and the Serpentine flowing nearby.
It was also a torture though; for when the blanket moved, he caught the scent of the sweet pussy currently soaking his fingertips. His mouth watered to feast, to lick and suck and plunge his tongue inside her until she came in his mouth. But a curricle really wasn’t the best location for that. Too cramped and high off the ground.
Rather perfect for his fingers to work some more magic, however.
“Something wrong?” he asked, when Pippa whimpered.
She tilted her hips in an unmistakable gesture. “I…ah…”
“Say it.”
“I find myself needing another orgasm. Is that unfair? You haven’t had any…ooooh…and your cock is so hard.”
Finn gently eased two fingers inside her pussy, a fraction deeper this time. “Not at all unfair.”
Pippa gasped. “I like this very, very much. Could you push your fingers deeper still? Apparently, there is a spot there…mmmmmm.”
He tsked. “I’m going to have to cover your mouth again, aren’t I?”
“Anything. Do anything. Just don’t stop.”
With one hand resting over her mouth to muffle sounds, he rocked the fingers of his other hand back and forth, penetrating further. Now, what was the movement they did in the novels? Beckoning?
Finn stretched his fingers, exploring her tight channel. Then frowned as he felt something different, almost a rough patch within the silken clasp of her pussy. Experimentally, he pressed with one fingertip. “There?”
Pippa bucked against his hand. “Mmmmfff!”
It seemed that was indeed the spot.
Settling into a rhythm, he moved his fingers in and out, nudging that tiny rough patch each time. Pippa began to writhe on his lap, but his arm across her breasts was too secure for her to fall. Then she arched with a sobbing cry and her pussy clamped around him like a vise, the waves of her orgasm pulsing and rippling and gripping his fingers in a most satisfactory way.
All hail explicit romance novels and their wonderfully detailed scenes. He had wanted very much to learn how to pleasure a woman, but not visit a courtesan to be instructed. To know that he could make Pippa come, make their play enjoyable when he wasn’t at all the experienced rake that she thought him to be, well, he’d never been more relieved in his life.
Finn carefully withdrew his fingers from her pussy and took his hand away from her mouth to instead stroke her cheek. “Satisfactory?”
Pippa made an unintelligible sound. “I think you may have graduated all the way to acceptable.”
“I’m humbled.”
“In a few minutes, when my wits return, I should like to touch you.”
Yes. If his cock got any harder, it would snap in half.
“Would you now?”
“Yes please,” she said, interlacing her fingers with his, and he actually thought his heart might burst.
Was there a chance? That Pippa might fall in love with him in return and make this pretend betrothal a real one? His foolish heart certainly thought so. It was already planning a wedding and pondering locations to rent a townhouse so they could both escape their family homes and the associated bad memories. With a large library, naturally, to shelve all their romance novels and her Latin textbooks.
Eventually, Pippa wriggled off his lap so she sat beside him on the leather seat. Then she lifted the blanket and stared pensively at the outline of his straining cock. Thankfully his betrothed didn’t lower her spectacles and peer over them, if she’d done that he probably would have come in his trousers without a single touch, and that would be hellishly embarrassing.
“What would you like to do, Pippet?”
She hummed as she removed her gloves. “Unfasten your trousers. May I?”
Finn nodded, then silently counted backward from twenty as Pippa fumbled with the buttons on the flap of his trouser fall, her knuckles brushing his engorged length. At first, he thought her nervous, but when she did it a third time, his gaze narrowed. “Having trouble with the buttons, are we?”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, my lord,” she replied, fluttering her lashes as she trailed the knuckle of her right index finger around the bulge.
He gripped the side of the curricle. “I’m hanging by a thread here.”
Pippa cupped him and gently squeezed. “Good. I don’t recall any mercy shown to me. In fact…I had to ask nicely.”
“Pretty please may I have an orgasm, Lady Pippa? My very own betrothed?”
Her lips curled in an exceedingly naughty way. “I shall certainly give your request serious consideration.”
Then, with a flick of her fingers, she attended to the buttons with no trouble whatsoever and finally freed his aching length from its fabric prison. Finn might have swooned in pure relief, but she proceeded to stroke him from his heavy balls to the swollen tip of his cock and he groaned instead as a trickle of pearly moisture bathed the head.
He’d not considered death by denied orgasm as a way to depart this realm, but it might in fact be possible, the way his heart was threatening to beat right out of his chest.
Pippa was touching his cock.
And it felt so damned good he wanted to roar in triumph.
“Yes,” he gritted out, as one of her soft hands tentatively closed around the girth.
“Good lord,” she said. “I cannot quite make my fingertip and thumb meet. You have a very thick cock, just like the comte
…I must say, I always snorted at the satin over steel description, but it is quite accurate. Far more helpful than a Latin textbook at least. Should I rub? Or squeeze some more?”
Finn’s eyes nearly rolled to the back of his head when Pippa did both, squeezing his cock and gently rubbing her thumb back and forth across the dripping head. “Like that. Just like that.”
“Hmmm. Seed has an earthy scent. Interesting.”
He might have laughed at such a bluestocking comment, but what she was doing felt too good, a series of up and down movements he recognized from a memorable scene in The Highland Marauder.
“I will come…harder than the laird,” he warned, battling valiantly for control. The alternate pressure and release of her grip around his throbbing cock was damned near perfect. “Do you…do you have a handkerchief?”
“Yes,” Pippa replied, sounding mildly insulted. But she reached for her reticule with her free hand, opened it, and retrieved a neatly folded square of linen.
“Drape it…around the end. Fuck, Pippa. What you’re doing is…splendid.”
Like a true heroine, she gripped his cock just a little harder. Finn braced himself against the curricle seat and groaned, mindlessly thrusting against her hand, harder and harder, until he reached a point of no return. One of her hands closed over his mouth, muffling the sounds of ecstasy as his cock erupted, spurting seed into the handkerchief with the force of a goddamned geyser.
Eventually he sank back against the seat, utterly drained and unable to string a sentence together. He’d made himself come with his hand on countless occasions. Never had it been like that.
“Finn? Are you well? Do you need a restorative caramel?”
“Yes,” he croaked, because words were difficult, but then his perfect woman slipped a sweet into his mouth as she carefully wiped his cock clean with the handkerchief.
He loved her practical nature. And her attention to detail.
Ah hell, he just loved her.
Finn sighed. “Thank you.”
“No, thank you,” she beamed. “After two orgasms I am entirely in charity with the world. Although I wonder if the horses are pondering slipping their bridles and bolting. Actually…I think I see a few curricles in the distance. We might need to continue on.”
He quickly attended to his clothing. Then climbed down from the curricle on unsteady legs and unhooked the reins from the tree branch, before returning to his seat. Pippa smoothed her hair and put her bonnet and gloves back on, then curled her hand around his arm, making him smile.
It might not yet be noon, but already this was the best day of his life.
Chapter 7
Most days, London was so cold and dreary that hope could be difficult to muster. But right now, high up in this curricle snuggled next to Finn, the whole world appeared brighter.
Pippa took a deep breath and gazed all about her. The air seemed fresher, the temperature warmer, the sun was trying to peek through the heavy cloud, and best of all, she could see joy. A pie cart owner cheerfully handing over piping hot pasties to a couple. Children laughing as they played with a rambunctious puppy. Women walking arm in arm and sharing secrets. A line of prosperous merchants purchasing newspapers from a young lad with a bulging satchel over his shoulder.
What a difference a few orgasms made.
Even now, her body still thrummed with happiness. And she understood why lovers risked all for pleasure, even in public places, although Georgiana taking part without receiving such a reward remained incomprehensible. In truth, had they not been perched up on a curricle in the middle of Hyde Park, she might have permitted far more.
Finn’s fingers warranted the commissioning of a statue as a marvel of the age. Making herself come while reading an explicit book was wonderful, but it didn’t compare to skilled fingers, neck kisses, and wicked words whispered in her ear. That had resulted in orgasms of a cataclysmic nature and needed to be repeated in the near future. Preferably tomorrow.
“What are you thinking, I wonder,” said Finn curiously, as he halted the grays to allow a delivery cart stacked high with firewood to pass.
“Statue commissions,” she replied.
“Really?”
“Well, I was thinking that, but then I remembered how disrespectful birds can be.”
Other people would have looked at her askance or enquired about her health, but Finn was unperturbed. “Tis a sad state of affairs when not even a king, saint, or celebrated warrior is immune from a passing pigeon. A statue of what in particular?”
“Your fingers,” Pippa blurted. “But in light of the aforementioned facts, an ode would be better. All hail Finn’s fingers, the delight lingers. If not again tomorrow, I’ll feel tremendous sorrow.”
His cheeks flushed. “Did you hear that breast-beating wail? That was Byron, knowing he will never pen anything so concisely elegant or heartfelt.”
“Oh, that man. Poetry is a secondary occupation to obeying his wandering cock. Perhaps if he’d invested more time in his marriage, his wife wouldn’t have left him and taken dear baby Ada with her. I hope when you marry, you’ll halt your rakish ways. Actually…I hope you’ll halt them for the duration of our pretend betrothal. If you are pleasuring me, do not pleasure anyone else.”
A long silence stretched between them and Pippa cursed her wayward tongue. She hadn’t sounded like a calm, rational woman just then, but a sharp-tongued shrew. Gah. Why was she feeling so oddly possessive of Finn?
He cleared his throat. “I hereby swear, Princess Pippet and no other. But you are right about Byron and the other bad husbands. I wanted Bliss items to add spice to bedchamber antics. But so many people are just lonely or have been badly treated in the past. Which makes me ponder: do members of the ton trudge down the duty path because they are awful, or because finding the right person is too difficult?”
“I can’t help thinking awful. Far too many generations of noble families intermarrying. Without regular doses of decent common blood, they end up like the Spanish royals. Speaking of Bliss, though…when will I get a guided tour of the premises? In the eyes of the world, we are betrothed now.”
“Whenever you like.”
Pippa gave him a hopeful look. “Now? I would love to see the special toys you make. And the romance novels you’ve imported. It all sounds exceedingly interesting.”
Unaccountably, Finn hesitated. “We’ll arrange a time. Soon, I promise. But the staff there…I can’t just turn up unannounced with a guest. Not everyone is as broad-minded about the items as us, that is why orders go to a post office box rather than the actual address. Their privacy and safety are important to me.”
She sat back in the curricle seat, trying not to feel cut to the core. Others would say Finn was being a responsible employer; as he’d said, there were many who were foolishly puritanical about anything connected to pleasure. But she wasn’t just anyone. She was his best friend and his pretend betrothed for heaven’s sake, as well as an avid romance novel reader. Did his staff really need protection from her? It wasn’t like she was going to start a protest group outside and demand a magistrate close the business for lewd and improper behavior. “I…uh…very well. If that is how it must be.”
“We’ll go soon,” he said again, flashing her a relieved grin. “In the next week, certainly. I can’t wait to show you the items, I’ve worked hard on the design aspect and we’ve had some helpful comments from users for the next batches. Our first lot of nipple clamps were far too heavy; too much lobster grip not enough pleasurable pinch. I believe your hand after Amanda’s birth would have been entirely sympathetic.”
Pippa forced a smile. “Delicate areas require a delicate touch.”
“Exactly.”
They sat in silence for the rest of the journey back to Hanover Square, and she pulled the blanket higher as a chilly breeze whipped up and delved under her pelisse with great precision.
As soon as the curricle halted in front of Kingsford House, the door opened and her father trotted out
.
“Pippa, your grandmother is looking for you. Some salon you are supposed to be attending to celebrate your betrothal?”
Her shoulders drooped. “I will be inside in just a moment.”
Lord Kingsford turned to Finn. “Knighton, I wonder if you are free to meet me at my club today? There is some important business I should like to discuss.”
“I can make time, my lord. Would two o’clock suit?”
“Perfect, lad. See you then,” said her father, disappearing back inside the townhouse.
Finn sighed. “While I am quite sure that my afternoon will be far more pleasant than yours, I don’t think anyone looks forward to a discussion of important business with a lady’s father.”
Pippa patted his knee, then lifted the blanket and got to her feet. “Buck up, soldier. He’s a kitten. As long as you talk about how wonderful I am and not the fact that you send me explicit romance novels with false covers, or just gave me two orgasms in Hyde Park.”
“Damn it, those were to be my two main topics of conversation.”
“Rake. Begone with you.”
“No farewell kiss, Pippet?” Finn said mournfully as he helped her climb down from the curricle onto the square’s graveled path.
Pippa peered at him over her spectacles. “After we tour a certain business, I will kiss you. Wherever on your person you would like to be kissed. I’m sure there is an antechamber or an office there that offers privacy.”
He groaned in a way that vastly improved her mood. “Soon. We’ll go very, very soon.”
“See that we do, my lord. Enjoy your afternoon.”
And with a jaunty wave, Pippa turned and entered Kingsford House.
“About time you returned,” said Grandmother, descending the staircase in a high-necked velvet gown as gray as Finn’s matched pair. “It would be the height of rudeness to arrive last at the salon, considering you are the guest of honor.”
Ugh. In the excitement of an outing, and the orgasmic aftermath, she had completely forgotten about it. Probably because the hostess was another of Grandmother’s cronies, rather than a friend her own age. In truth, she was treating the dowager with the caution of an ill person sniffing a new herbal elixir; the expected thunderous eruption after the soiree announcement had not yet occurred and that was highly suspicious in itself.
THE BEST MARQUESS: Wickedly Wed #2 Page 10