Chapter Fourteen
‘Excuse me, what ?’
‘You heard me, Claudia.’ His voice was shaky but serious. ‘This is not a flirt to me. Not in a million years.’
‘Oh, it is not? It is not ?’ Indignation blazed through her, but it was mixed with exhilaration. She strode right to him. ‘And couldn’t you just have said that, instead of scaring the hell out of me?’
‘You were scared?’ His eyes lit up with hope.
‘Of course I was, you silly man!’ She acted exasperated, but really she just felt an unimaginable relief. He cares about me. Thank God, thank God he cares. ‘Tell me, does it look like I’m flirting with you right now, you silly, ridiculous thing? I tell you my secrets! I listen to your opinion! I accept your help! I came here in a downpour for you! Do you think that’s how people flirt ?’
The grin that appeared on his face was so brilliant that the shining candelabrum above them was put to shame.
‘Oh, I—well, I wouldn’t know, would I, Claudia? You’re my first in every possible way.’
‘Yes, but surely you have eyes in your head, haven’t you? At the very least you and I have become friends ,’ the word sounded so wrong, ‘and at most we are becoming…’ the word caught her breath, filling her heart with a delicious glow, ‘in the nicest way possible…lovers?’
‘L-lovers?’ His grin widened even more. ‘You and I? Lovers?’
‘Seriously, Mr Campbell, if you think you’re going to charm your way out of this with one of your smiles—’
‘Not just with a smile.’
He closed the distance between them and made to kiss her. But before their lips could touch, he swung her round and pinned her to the wall. He caught her mouth, and he was not content with one of his shy kisses this time. His tongue lapped against hers, rough and demanding, and their teeth clashed. He took her breath away.
‘I was never angry with you, Claudia,’ he whispered urgently against her lips. His breath was laboured, the hard length of his manhood pressed firmly against her groin. ‘I just thought you didn’t care. I am just scared, my sweet.’ No one had ever admitted to being scared so sinuously. ‘Scared of how much you matter to me.’ He sought her neck, mouth open, his teeth grazing against her skin. ‘I think about you all the damn time.’ His hands descended behind her waist, he filled them with her buttocks. ‘Can’t get you out of my head. You make me want to do things I’ve never done. Source every precious thing in this town and lay it at your feet. Allow you to use me for your pleasure until there’s nothing left of me.’ He pushed his hips into hers, making her feel his erect length and grinding himself against her. ‘You want it too, don’t you, darling?’ He trailed his tongue along the low decolletage of her dress. ‘Tell me that you want me, Claudia. That you’ve wanted me since that night in the carriage, just like I’ve been wanting you since.’
‘Not so fast,’ she managed to say. ‘I also need to know something of you.’
‘Anything.’ His index finger pulled down her bodice just enough for his tongue to catch her nipple, sending a blinding pleasure rippling across her body.
‘I—I asked you—a question just now, William.’ He eagerly, distractingly lapped up her nipple. ‘I want—I want to know—why you are always pursuing women like me. Why you behave like that.’
‘Oh, that.’ He sneered. ‘I’m going to tell you someday, my sweet.’ His wet lips closed around her nipple, stealing yet another whimper from her. If he continued doing that, she would disintegrate.
‘W-well?’
‘Well, let’s just say, darling…’ he gave her a devilish smirk and his hand wandered under her skirts. His light fingers climbed slowly on her thigh, building an impossible anticipation. ‘Let’s just say that flattering certain women can get me introduced into the right circles.’ He smiled malevolently as his fingers reached her core. ‘But I don’t give a damn about them. As far as I’m concerned, you may be the only woman in this world.’ He dipped his finger in her slickness, wetting it, then he began gently rubbing her sensitive flesh. ‘I am at your feet. I wake up every night rock hard after dreaming— after dreaming of licking the plate from which you eat.’
Shock and pleasure blazed through her.
‘ What? ’
‘Oh, yes. I do. That’s what you’ve done to me.’ He kept on rubbing her bud in small, circular motions, producing a pleasure so intense that she had to hold onto his shoulders. ‘I never look at women. I am chaste like a monk. I never show a bit of skin to anyone but myself.’ He pushed a finger inside her, slowly, and he smirked wolfishly as her head rolled back in pleasure. ‘But you have blazed through my senses like a wildfire. I am plagued by images, by possibilities…As though the world existed just for our pleasure. Yours…and mine…Won’t you let me lick off your plate once? Lick it all off before you allow me to taste you …’
He pushed another finger in, making her groan. He gave her a satisfied smirk, but his lips twitched lasciviously. He was hungry for her. Desperately so.
‘Well, my sweet?’ He slid his fingers in and out, angling them a bit, figuring out what made her feel good. ‘Nothing to say? Not calling me a good boy? It may be for the best. I don’t feel like being good today.’
He adapted his motion to her every twitch, her every whimper, until he found just what worked.
‘Y-you—oh, William—’
‘What’s that?’ His thrusts became more deliberate and confident, making her moan loudly. ‘Oh dear. More still?’
He was not hesitant anymore, and her pleasure became waves, billowing waves radiating from the motion of his fingers, from his voice, from his scent.
‘You filthy—sly—clever—charming—’
‘Go on, go on darling. You know I’m terribly vain.’
‘—roguish—’
‘Go on.’
But she could not.
Her opening tightened around his fingers. Her pleasure built up, and up, and up.
She held onto his neck as he gave a last few, decisive thrusts.
Pleasure spiralled through her.
Then her body contracted and shuddered, and her release coursed through her like a torrent.
She collapsed against his chest, shaking, gasping.
He pulled out his fingers, making her cry with loss.
‘Claudia?’
‘Mmm?’
‘Watch me.’
Holding her gaze, he began licking his fingers clean, wantonly, his eyes murky with desire.
‘You wanton thing—’ she gasped, ‘aren’t you supposed to be a virgin?’
‘A virgin, yes.’ He finished licking his fingers clean. ‘But not innocent. And now come here to me, in my arms. Where you belong.’
He wrapped his arms around her, and he kissed her forehead so softly that it almost made her cry.
‘I’m so sorry for losing my temper,’ she whispered against his neck. ‘You had all the right to ask questions. You can ask me anything. It was just too much, on a day like this. And I’m sorry about your desk. It never happened before, I swear—’
‘ I don’t give a damn about my desk. I have been waiting to see this side of you for so long.’ He lifted her chin. ‘And I am in awe of you. In awe. For all you do. For all you are. Do you understand?’
‘Awe is such a solemn thing. I am not a goddess. I am just a woman.’
Mischief flickered in his eyes, never far from the surface, in every moment.
‘Shall we see about that?’
He dropped to his knees.
‘William?’
He placed a finger on his lips, demanding silence.
Then he bowed, deeply, his brow to the floor.
The next thing she knew was that his lips were on the round little bone of her ankle.
‘W-William!’
‘Hush.’
He kissed her shins through the fabric of her dress. Then both her knees, reverently, his palms cupping them. He lingered there. Kissing. Massaging.
‘I am in awe of you, Claudia. Of every bit of you.’
He kissed the side of her thigh. He lingered there too, his mouth moving on the soft fabric.
And all that Edward had wanted to crush and destroy came alive under his worshipping touch. She dared to run her hand through the gold of his hair. It was so soft and wavy, an inordinate luxury. He exhaled softly.
He kissed the flesh of her hip, his breath hot and a little laboured. He moved towards her core, warm with satiated lust. Not for long, if he kept on doing that. A kiss on her core. On her belly button. He stood. There were more kisses just below her breasts, stealing a sigh from both.
‘William—’
‘Hush.’
Her nipple. A playful hint of teeth through the fabric.
Then his breath tickled her collarbone.
The column of her neck.
Her throat, her chin, her jaw. The corner of her mouth.
Both eyes.
Then her ear, an occasion to whisper to her:
‘Goddess. Woman. I don’t care which. I just want to be allowed to worship you. Yes. I want us to worship each other until there’s nothing left of us.’ He swallowed and took her hands in his. ‘Tell me that you want it too, Claudia. Tell me that you’re coming upstairs with me.’
‘Yes.’
He smiled a little nervously and kissed her lips.
‘Then let’s go and get you out of these wet clothes. That bath is waiting for us.’
***
The moonlight caught the haze over the bathtub. William sought her mouth again in a slow kiss, his feather-light fingers trailing down her back, undoing the buttons of her dress. Smooth, delicate hands. The hands of a clever rogue, removing the pins from her hair until her long hair flowed freely in waves. He easily figured his way around her garments, until each of them pooled at her feet and he raised his gaze to embrace her naked body. His Adam’s apple bobbed as his gaze heated everything it touched. Lust was not fire in William’s eyes. It was a blue-black ink, the quiet purr of a panther.
‘Undress me, Claudia.’
She felt for the mother-of-pearl buttons of his butter-soft shirt, undoing them one by one, exposing his round, golden shoulders, the lean bulges of his muscles, and his nipples. She dropped his shirt to the ground. She dared to look at him, and she withdrew with a gasp.
There, before her, was not a human.
He was Mercury, the god of trickery and thieves. Not as bulky as Mars or Jove, but lean and muscular. The moonlight glided on his body with reckless abandon. It pooled on his razor-sharp cheekbones, on every delicious bulge, on his ribcage, on the taut surface of his abdominal muscles, where they sloped into his breeches. He offered himself to her gaze with the smirk of a vain, young god.
There, naked before her, there was none of the shyness. He knew that he was godlike. That he could have her. Or any other woman. Why, any man too. At his feet, eager to please him, begging to be allowed to please him. Beautiful like an angel, chiselled by the Devil himself to wreak havoc in the heavens.
‘Who’s in awe now, darling?’ he exhaled vainly.
He held her gaze, then he teased her by trailing his hand down his bare chest, tilting his head back. Sinful. Wanton.
‘Watch me, Claudia.’ He smirked confidently. ‘Watch me want you.’
He reached for his breeches, unbuttoning them slowly. He held her gaze, drinking up the way her breath quickened when he pulled out his manhood. It was fully engorged, veins trailed down its shaft, its head swollen and wet. Her eyes widened, her mouth parted. It drew a wicked grin on his lips.
He stripped himself naked and basked in her gaze. He brushed his thumb against its swollen head. All her body was aglow with need again, the heat between her legs begged for a touch, for some comfort. He cupped himself and looked at her, watching how his body made her lips part with anticipation.
‘So, Claudia.’ He cocked his head to one side, one finger under her chin to tilt her head up and inspect her face. ‘What’s this thing I hear, that you are not a goddess, but just a woman ?’ He raised an eyebrow, a flash of irony in his murky pupils. ‘In that case, it’s your turn to worship.’ He released her face with a sigh, a whimsical god toying with a mortal. ‘On your knees, darling.’
A glowing, exhilarating heat flooded her body, a joy too boundless to be contained. Her wants. Her needs. Herself. Acknowledged. And he knew the pleasure it gave her, because his eyes glinted recklessly.
Yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes.
She sank at his feet, kissing his knees, his thighs, and up, up, towards—
‘I’ve wanted to do this to you for so long, William. Since that night in the carriage.’
He laughed quietly, and a hand materialised on her chin just as she was about to press her mouth to his manhood.
‘Now, that , darling, you really shouldn’t have given away.’ He forced her to look up. ‘Because if you want it that bad, I won’t deny myself the pleasure of hearing you beg.’ His voice descended to a sinuous purr. ‘Yes, darling, beg me for a taste.’
***
Claudia. Naked. At his feet. Her hair long and wavy to her waist.
Yes, he was toying with her a bit, for every uncomfortable night she had given him.
But he was also about to die.
Her eyes were murky. There was no longer anything civil in them, nothing refined. She was raw instinct and she wanted to claim him. She looked at his manhood, licking her lips, and his member responded to her closeness, aching to be satiated. If she didn’t do it now , he would end up spending without being touched, like the other day.
He grabbed her face and held it gently but decisively in his hand, forcing her to look at him.
‘ Beg. ’
‘You vain, vain thing,’ she growled, making his hair stand on end again. ‘Are you the same man who spent when I called him a good boy?’
‘What did I tell you? Don’t feel like being good today. Beg .’
‘This is the first time I hear of a virgin asking a woman to beg him for—’
‘—I know what I’ve been offered for this. And yet I’ve never given myself to anyone. The honour is worth begging for, don’t you think?’
‘Oh, you’re vain .’
‘Claudia?’ He raised an eyebrow.
She bit her lip and that alone risked getting him over the edge.
‘Let me taste you, William. Please . Allow me. Tell me exactly what you want from me. Or don’t tell me at all. Do what you please. But I am going to die if you don’t let me taste you.’
‘Oh, that feels good,’ he exhaled.
He sinfully glided a hand down the length of his shaft and cupped himself, holding himself for her to worship.
‘Go ahead, darling. Just give me your lovely tongue. Nothing more.’
‘ Anything .’
He ran a hand through her hair and guided her to his shaft.
The instant the tip of her tongue appeared, wet and rough, on his sensitive, swollen tip, he lost quite a bit of his smugness.
Actually, all of it.
I’m not going to last.
‘Not smirking anymore, William, dear?’ He would never get used to the huskiness of her voice.
‘Quiet.’
He pressed her head against his shaft, and she laughed softly against it.
Then she began licking him. Ravenously. Almost joyously, as though it brought her a blessed relief.
And it was more than he could withstand.
Within mere instants, everything was pleasure, everything was agony, and his manhood tensed desperately, aching, aching—
She trailed her tongue all the way up and eagerly took his tip in her mouth, warm and wet, suckling.
‘Oh, Claudia, you are the devil —’
He groaned like a beast as his body disintegrated in blazes of ecstasy.
He sank to his knees before her, gasping for air, staring at her wildly.
What did you just do to me?! How am I supposed to live without it when you travel back?! How can anything ever be the same again after this?!
But she just smiled a little and pulled him to her, so she could wrap her arms around his neck and press her lips to his forehead. She kept him there for the longest time, running her hands through his hair, kissing his cheeks. He felt so precious in her arms that he kept on shivering with pure delight.
‘You are such a gift, William,’ she murmured against his forehead pensively. ‘Such a gift.’
For his entire life, he had never been anything of consequence to anyone. He had been either desired for his body or despised for his origins, often at the same time.
But in her arms, for the first time, he knew he was worth cherishing. He was worth spoiling and loving.
Yes, he was just that.
A precious gift.
***
William kissed her hand softly and led her to the bath. He climbed in and eased himself into the hot water.
‘Come here, darling. No more gods and goddesses. No more playing. Just you and I, skin to skin.’ She joined him in the bath. ‘Like this, with your back to me. I’d like to hold you.’
Yes. Please.
Claudia sank into the hot water and leaned with her back against his chest. There was a suffocated gasp when the distance between them closed and their skin touched. They both tensed a little. Then she leaned back fully, warm skin against warm skin. His toned arms wrapped around her. They were all the softness, all the gentleness she had not thought she deserved. After years spent carrying, fetching, shouting, and tending to strangers’ wounds, without sparing a thought for her limits or her health, it felt like a blessing.
William kissed the nape of her neck softly. And it was too much to bear. Her vision clouded with tears. She suppressed a sob, so when she heard a suffocated whimper, she was surprised it was not hers.
William’s chest began shaking against her back. He was sobbing quietly.
‘William…’
‘Don’t look at me. I’m an idiot. I don’t know what I—’ He held her tighter, and his sobs melted into her chest, until she no longer knew where his tears ended and hers began.
‘I-I’m so sorry,’ he stammered, ‘I’ve been beaten and knifed and I slept on a damp floor for half of my life and I didn’t know—my body—You are the first good thing that happens to my body—I didn’t know—it could feel so good. I’m so sorry.’
‘Oh, William…’
She gently disentangled herself from his embrace and turned to face him. He cupped her face and wiped her tears away with his palm.
And in the bright moonlight she saw him.
A beautiful, complicated, resilient thing, with a mind sharp like a knife and a soul of porcelain.
And also, let’s be honest, a good dose of vanity and a couple of years of pent-up lust.
And she liked him a million times more for it all.
He smiled nervously, his eyes a little too shiny, but also undeniably hazy with desire, and something was pooling within her, infuriating, tender, unexpected.
Something almost inconceivable.
Something she had never felt before for any other man.
She pushed the thought away and straddled him. Their lips met and he welcomed her for another long, slow kiss. He broke it only to taste her neck, and to pull her closer, chest to chest.
‘So good, Claudia.’ He kissed her. ‘We just feel so good together.’
‘We do.’
They kissed again, slowly, feeling each other’s bodies. His smooth hands crept to her breasts, massaging them, pinching their peaks, until his manhood was rock-hard again, their kisses heated, and their hips began searching for each other. He trailed his graceful fingers on her belly, to the curls between her legs, seeking her sensitive flesh. He watched her reaction as he teased it and made it pulsate with need. He pushed a finger in, and her head rolled back.
‘You need me to fill you again, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
He inserted another finger.
Oh, Lord.
He began rubbing her bud too.
‘Stop.’ She placed a hand on his wrist. ‘Don’t make me—I don’t want to. Not yet.’
He withdrew his fingers.
‘Claudia.’
‘Mmm?’
He took her hand and guided it to his manhood, wrapping her fingers around it.
‘You need me, Claudia, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then you should take what you need from me.’
His breath was a tad shallow. He was anxious.
‘There is no pressure for you to do anything with me, William, you know? We can just hold each other if you prefer. Or kiss. Or just talk.’
‘I know. But I want to give myself to you. Only to you.’ His breath steadied and he leaned in for a deep kiss, grabbing her buttocks and pulling her to his shaft. ‘Feel it, darling, how I ache for you.’ He sought her gaze. ‘I trust you with my body. Fully. So come and take what belongs to you. Won’t you?’
‘Yes. Yes, of course.’
He breathed a sigh of relief and looked at her adoringly. And she could no longer hold back.
She took his hand and guided it to the base of his shaft.
‘Hold yourself like that for me, darling,’ she said softly.
And she lifted herself up a little to make him hers.
First there was his tip, hot and swollen, probing her entrance. Then there were the first inches of his shaft. He gasped and uttered a low groan as she pushed down a bit. She paused, getting used to that sensation of utter fullness.
William’s eyes opened wide. She held his gaze as she lowered herself fully onto him, her thighs quivering with need. He gasped as she took every rock-hard inch of him, until she was fully impaled on his shaft.
‘Oh God,’ he tilted his head back, his hands on her buttocks, ‘oh dear, dear God. I’m going to die. There’s no way I’m surviving this. This feels so—we feel so—’
‘Good?’ She smiled at him, and she rolled her hips around a little, enjoying the sensation of complete fullness.
His eyes opened even wider as she began moving on him, propping herself up on his shoulders to lift herself all the way up, just to feel him enter her again and again, and plunging down slowly.
‘Oh, like this, Claudia.’ His voice broke. ‘Ride me slowly.’
She did, eyes open. She wouldn’t miss an instant of his wonder, of the way he sought her eyes and her lips again and again. The way tears began to streak that handsome face of his.
‘Oh, dear—heaven—’ He whispered breathlessly, taking her hands and placing them on his wet chest. ‘Now help me give you what you need. Guide me.’
‘You are exactly what I need.’
‘ Please .’
‘Your hands on my waist. Then meet me as I move, but slowly.’
He held her waist firmly and his hips began rocking to meet hers, tentatively at first.
‘Like this?’
‘Oh my—’
‘I’ll take that as a yes.’ He smiled and began meeting her as she moved, thrusting slowly but more and more deliberately. She whimpered as each thrust split her, as each thrust filled her up more. Her inner flesh clenched around him, making him groan.
‘Oh—oh you’re tight,’ he growled, losing control, pushing back to meet her hard, slowly, implacably. ‘Don’t stop. I need you to come for me—I can feel you’re so close—so damn tight around me—’
Her breasts brushed against his chest muscles as she sought each engorged inch of his, moaning, making him groan hard and beastly, riding him slowly until her pleasure leapt forward and spiralled out of control.
For a second he beheld her with utter wonder, and she was standing on a cliff over the vast stormy sea, ravished by a vertigo.
Then pleasure coursed through her body and her release exploded in a million shimmers of light.
***
William pulled out fast, growling. Then his release tore him asunder, and spurts of his hot seed lapped against his stomach. He gasped, shaking like a leaf. He pulled Claudia close and held her, possessively, ravenously, all trembling. Close, so close, as though someone had threatened to take her away.
Mine.
He may as well have died. Maybe he was dead, and he was in another world. Because a pleasure like that he had just experienced did not belong in this world.
They breathed and breathed, until their breaths steadied and she tucked his hair behind his ear.
‘Are you all right, darling?’ She said softly. ‘How was that?’
‘That was—it was—’
He said nothing. He tried hard not to be moved to tears. He did not manage.
Fucking idiot!
‘Oh, William.’
‘Don’t oh William me, I don’t need to be consoled for getting fu—’
‘—I know .’ She raised an eyebrow, silencing him, then she ran her hand through his hair and kissed him deeply. ‘It was wonderful, Will.’
His diminutive sounded lovely on her lips. She rested her head under his chin and embraced him tightly. He held her too, pressing his palms to her wet back.
‘You are good for me, Claudia,’ he heard himself say.
‘Darling…’ she just whispered, and she held him tighter.
They held each other for the longest time, listening to each other’s heartbeats, kissing softly. As though each kiss could delay their reckoning with a world that wanted to pull them apart.
‘We need to get out of here, don’t we?’ She said at last. ‘The water is getting cold. And I should go home.’
He helped her out of the bath.
‘You are not staying here tonight?’
He did not even bother to conceal his disappointment.
‘William.’ She began towelling herself pragmatically. ‘I can’t be seen walking home in the morning with my dress all wrinkled and muddy, can I?’
He hadn’t thought about that at all. Well, she had a certain experience hiding her relations from the world, hadn’t she? It stung a bit.
‘You could borrow something of Iris?’
‘It would be best if I went home, William.’
‘But will you be safe there? They may be waiting for you with St Cross.’
‘They may. Which is why I won’t be exactly home. I’ll stay at a trusted friend’s. I will show up again only when I am sure that St Cross is not around.’
‘You clever woman.’ He looked longingly at her forms as she began to dress in her muddy clothes. ‘Will you let me walk you there?’
‘Oh—Yes, of course. But just some of the way. It would be unwise to be seen together near my home.’
He sighed. Of course, she was right again.
‘As you wish. Now let me help you dress, I’ll come with you.’