Chapter 10
As Viveca stared down into Blaze’s impossibly gorgeous gray eyes, she was, at last, able to be honest with herself.
This was what she’d come here for.
Yes, there was their bargain.
But that agreement spoke nothing of deeper motivations.
To be alone with this man.
To have his attention.
To have him.
Yet something stood in the way.
A distance that needed to be bridged.
Though it was only six or so inches from her body to his—all her hand had to do was move a little to the right to touch his—it might as well have been six miles for all she knew about how to bridge it.
For here was the thing: In terms of her lived experience—and all the books she’d read on myriad topics didn’t qualify—she was an innocent.
“No well-read young lady is a complete innocent,” he repeated. The low rasp in the back of his throat did things to her insides. “Are those just words, milady?”
He stood, more of an unfurling of his long, rangy body, his eyes gone dark and opaque with the flare of his pupils. Those eyes were unknowable.
Actually, that wasn’t entirely true.
She could read one thing in them—intent.
“How do you mean?” Even she could hear the way her voice had gone breathless.
“Do you intend to back them up with action?”
She felt almost overwhelmed by him—his energy…his intensity—the meaning beneath his words clear.
If this were to go anywhere, the first touch had to be hers.
She’d always followed the logic of the mind, but what he was suggesting was an entirely new logic.
To let her mind go and let desire take the lead.
She lifted her hand and touched trembly fingers to his face, the stubble of his jaw raspy against her fingertips. His eyes lost none of their intensity as her hand slipped around to the nape of his neck and pulled his mouth to hers.
His lips were firm, yet soft as he returned the kiss, one of his large hands stealing around her ribcage to her back, pulling her body toward his, a groan releasing into her mouth.
Intoxicating.
A word bandied about to describe the heady effects of a kiss. She’d thought it hyperbole, the license artists took with words and emotions. And though she’d experienced that very effect in Vauxhall Gardens, it had been her first kiss. Of course, it would’ve been intoxicating.
But here she was in the throes of her second kiss—and it was no less so.
Her other arm slid around his neck, her body swaying forward, her tongue sliding across his bottom lip. A sigh lush with pleasure both taken and promised escaped her.
Of a sudden, he broke away, eyes bright and questioning. He was slightly panting. “How far do you want this to go?”
She knew what he was asking.
She wasn’t that innocent.
“If not all the way, then here’s a good place to get off this ride.”
This ride.
The idea pricked and provoked desire.
What a way with words this man had.
“Oh,” she said, grabbing his cravat and tugging it loose, “I’ll be staying on this ride until I’ve had my fill.”
It was only when a wicked smile echoed within his expressive gray eyes that she heard the double entendre.
Then it was only the matter of a few seconds until they couldn’t get enough of each other.
He pushed her skirts above her knees and stepped between, wrapping his hands around her bottom and sliding her to the edge of the table.
He bent his head and took her mouth with his in a kiss that was deep and slow and utterly, utterly exhilarating.
“Want a taste of what’s to come?” he rumbled against the cup of her ear.
He took her hand and brought it down…down…down to his manhood—long, thick, hard.
She’d always thought her body an entity complete unto itself.
Now she knew differently.
She’d been missing this inside her.
Impatient hands set to work undressing him—pushing the coat off his shoulders…unbuttoning his saffron silk waistcoat…tugging loose that cravat… “Why must we wear so many layers of clothing?” burst from her in frustration. “The ancient Greeks had the right idea.”
“What’s that?” he asked against her throat before he sucked the sensitive flesh into his mouth.
Viveca gasped, then moaned, her nipples gone impossibly taut. “They wore togas,” she managed to say.
“I never knew I wanted to be an ancient Greek until now.” His fingers were working the buttons of her spencer. “How many buttons are on this blasted coat, anyway?”
“Twelve.”
He might’ve growled, but she hardly noticed for her hands were too busy freeing his shirt from his trousers. She shifted back to allow him to lift it over his head and fling it away.
The sight before her eyes provoked a gasp.
“Blaze…”
He cocked his head.
“You’re magnificent.”
All those muscles on his shoulders, arms, chest, and stomach… Indeed, a gasp was the only correct response to the sight.
He chuckled. “And to think you haven’t even seen the main attraction.”
A sudden laugh startled from her. She’d always viewed what went on between men and women as utterly serious, but with Blaze she saw how it could be fun.
Except…this desire she felt was serious, too—most serious.
“You know,” she said, “if you don’t get on with it, I might think you’re all talk and demand my money back.”
“We can’t have that now, can we?”
His arms tightened around her and before she knew what was happening he’d lifted her off the table and her legs were instinctively wrapping around his waist. He carried her to the settee and lowered them down, until he was on his knees and she was perched on the edge of a seat cushion. “You are something, Viveca.”
“You’ll have to be more concrete,” she said. “Adjectives, please.”
“Beautiful, but you’ll know that.” He unbuttoned her dress and slipped it over her head, leaving her in chemise, stockings, and slippers.
His eyes roved over her, slowly, appreciation flaring in those gray depths.
“Delectable.” He leaned in and kissed her mouth…
her neck…pushed a chemise strap off her shoulder and pressed his lips to her breasts, kissing that tender flesh.
She moaned, and her head arched back.
He licked. “Sweet.”
“It sounds like you want to eat me up.”
He chuckled. “We’ll get to that.”
White-hot desire shivered and shimmered through her.
He continued his progress down her body—kissing her…licking her…a little suckle here…a little bite there. He lifted her leg and pressed his mouth to the inside of her thigh, that delicate flesh nearly overwhelmed by the velvet touch by his tongue—but not so overwhelmed to not want more.
His gaze met hers across her body. “Now, let’s see if you’re as delicious as you look.”
He dipped his head, and his intention became instantly clear as the slick velvet of his tongue ran along her slit.
She gasped. She would’ve squirmed, but she didn’t want him to get the wrong idea and stop, so she held very, very still and let pleasure ripple through her.
She hadn’t known anything could feel this good.
His tongue firmed at the tip and found a spot…
oh…a long moan escaped her, her head arching back into settee cushions, one arm thrown back and the other reaching down, her fingers twining through his hair, grabbing hold.
He chuckled against her and, oh, that felt exquisite, too.
She might’ve thought this was the limit to the pleasure a body could experience.
But she would’ve been wrong.
For as his tongue flicked against her, a feeling built inside her that felt both of this pleasure and at odds with it, at once. A feeling that teased just out of reach. A feeling impossible not to follow. But how…oh, how did one follow?
But as his talented tongue pleasured her, a knowledge born of instinct came to her.
One didn’t follow this feeling; one gave over to it.
All she had to do was feel, and Blaze would deliver.
She knew it.
She trusted it.
Then it was another flick of his talented, capable tongue, and a fuse lit her world into sudden flame and a flash banged behind her eyes, a drawing inward that held her suspended, then a sudden explosive release.
She cried out as her quim quivered and pulsed against his tongue.
She was a being consumed by light—a being now of light…
at one with the stars, as if life before this instant had been darkness and now, she was reborn, illuminated.
Her eyes opened, and down her body—which, impossibly, looked its same self—she met Blaze’s eyes. “The first time you ever felt that?”
No mistaking the self-satisfaction in those gorgeous gray eyes and in the gravel of his voice.
A sated smile found its lazy way to her mouth. “Oh, yes.”
“And it felt as good as you thought it would?”
Her breathy laugh provided all the answer needed.
“That’s what I thought,” he chuckled.
He settled back, so now she saw him properly.
Of a sudden, her body wasn’t as sated as it thought it was three seconds ago.
She’d had release—and yes, it was glorious.
But she hadn’t had him.
She angled forward and slid off the settee to join him on the floor, then hooked her hand behind his neck.
“Isn’t it you who says turnabout is fair play?
” she murmured into his ear, then pressed her mouth to the tender flesh of his neck, his pulse a hard, alive throb beneath her lips.
Down his body, she trailed kisses—those strong shoulders…
the light fuzz on his chest…her tongue grazing across one nipple, then the other…
the rippled muscles of his stomach… All the while she felt his gaze intent upon her as he watched, and she gloried in it.
At last, she reached the band of his trousers.
Her fingers flicked the buttons of his falls open, one by one, the shaft beneath superfine long and hard.
The last button came undone, and there was his length in all its tumescent glory.
She didn’t hesitate as she angled so she could drag her tongue up that long, hard, hot length.
Oh, thick, too. He groaned and uttered, “Ah, now, that’s a girl. ”