Chapter Twelve
Where a daring woman finds answers.
Percival Everard Trentham, sixth Earl of Merevale, deserved the April nomination; no man could be more worthy of the Brazen Belle’s favor.
This foolish reflection circled her mind as Isabella closed in on pleasure, the rake in question pressing her into the depths of his feather mattress with his broad body.
Their skin fused, damp with exertion, a crude, often graceless act she had never imagined could prove so astonishing.
This was leagues beyond what they had done in his office or the stable.
Her nipples tightened beneath his mouth, the pull of his suction striking deep within her core.
And when he gently used his teeth, she’d had to press her lips to his shoulder to hold back her cries.
In fact, she possibly bit him back.
Overcome with need, she reached for him, his shaft rigid beneath her fingertips.
She wanted him wrecked as well.
“Later, I’m going to come with you, inside you, so accept this now,” he whispered into her ear. “Dammit, sprite, I’ll follow, I promise.”
Nothing remained but to obey.
His mouth claimed hers as she toppled, ripples sweeping through her and back again.
Ever did not relent, stroking her to the brink and beyond, then bracing on his elbow to guide himself to her entrance in the waning seconds.
It was a masterful maneuver. She had scarcely arrived, light still flashing behind her lids, a dull roar in her ears, when he pressed inside her.
She could only murmur—yes—and bring him close, follow along, go where there were no rules, nothing but the now.
It was mindless, animalistic sounds, touch, awareness, a sharp seam of pain he soothed with kisses and murmured endearments, with the slow, steady rock of his hips as he joined himself to her.
He held her for long moments before setting himself to the task of driving her mad.
Cupping her breasts, pinching her nipples, grasping her waist, drawing her knee up alongside his hip for deeper access.
He palmed her backside and lifted her into him while she marked him with nails and teeth—and took hold of every part of him within reach.
It was effortless, like two locking mechanisms from one of her brother-in-law’s steam engines sliding into place. A subtle adjustment until it simply…was.
Then the true magic began.
No resistance, only a languid glide, hips meeting, pace unhurried, then quickening.
It wouldn’t last long—he told her twice, each a strained warning—the last given as he bared his throat above her with a rough groan, and Isabella pressed her mouth to the corded muscle as it flexed. There was no inch of him she did not long to claim, to hold, to savor, to learn, to love.
Incredibly, when he tunneled his hand between them and touched her there again, a tremor answered.
“Remember?” he asked gruffly, shouldering a bead of sweat from his temple.
“Come.” The word was new, an erotic vow, a pledge. An invitation.
Together, he’d promised.
He murmured a heated reply she didn’t catch and shifted them onto their sides, still joined in battle. Her knee rode high along his hip, drawn higher still, leaving her open to his touch. He circled her sex with deliberate insistence, and she splintered as he drove into her.
He held himself immobile at the last, permitting only a forceful, contained grind, his face buried in the hollow of her neck, breath skimming her heated skin.
It was no exaggeration to say she felt his release as her own—every shudder, every pulse, every hoarse curse. Nothing of it belonged to him alone.
For a time, the world kept its distance, and they allowed it.
Isabella participated in conversation the next morning in name alone.
Lottie suspected a megrim, and Penny was certain her sister was coming down with a sniffle.
During breakfast, Isabella answered Weston’s inquiries about a new embroidery client with mechanical civility, her gaze fixed on her teacup as she nibbled toast and jam, the taste forgotten seconds later.
Muscles she had never used were sore, a delicious reminder of the night.
The only decisive act she managed was invoking her standing as the lord of the manor’s prospective wife and instructing Ever’s staff to let him sleep after a day spent battling the fire in the tenant quarters.
Yet the moment the others departed for a shopping excursion in the village, without her on account of her supposed malady, she crossed to the west wing, mounting the stairs as swiftly as her still-trembling knees allowed.
Halting at his bedchamber door, Isabella smoothed her palm down her bodice and drew a steadying breath. Her nipples tightened at the contact, chafing against her chemise. The image of his mouth closing over them as he thrust was one she would carry to her grave.
Her body had awakened to every possibility.
She closed the door gently behind her and found Ever much as she had left him just before dawn—on his stomach, arms burrowed beneath the pillow, face turned toward the window and the gentle breeze drifting through the open pane.
He had kicked the sheet aside, and her hand lifted to her chest to quiet the sudden thud of her heart.
The sight of him, softened by sleep and washed in morning light, stirred a devastating tenderness.
She drew the sheet past the wound at his lower back, her attention straying without apology.
He was a study in lean strength and strapping elegance, in masculine beauty, and she didn’t chastise herself for staring.
He had stated before their second encounter that she might look as long as she pleased. Touch, taste him at her leisure.
He’d consented happily to her hunger and her curiosity.
Her sigh slipped free before she could stop it. The faint scratch bisecting his shoulder blade sent heat to her cheeks, awareness gliding low and slow between her thighs. Dazed, she wondered whether she’d marked him anywhere else.
“Water, please,” he rasped, turning his head toward her as he rose to his elbow with a groan. So beautiful. Disheveled hair, a crease pressed into his cheek, stubble dense enough to be called a beard, enough to lend him a shadowed, almost sinister cast.
Isabella turned to the sideboard, poured a glass, then grabbed an apple, a slice of cheese, and bread from the basket he’d stocked the night before. They had never gotten around to eating, had scarcely ventured beyond the bed, the desk, the settee.
He observed her the entire time with a gaze that was drowsy but sharp. She had the distinct impression that despite his experience, he was not quite sure what to make of this.
Or her.
He eased himself against the headboard and took the glass, his arm shaking as he swallowed.
It was a manly effort, full of gusto and uninhibitedness, the sheet pooling in an inviting fold at his hips.
He brushed a drop of water from his lower lip with the back of his hand, his emerald gaze never leaving her. “What time is it?”
“Nearly noon,” she said, handing him the bread and cheese. For reasons aside from watching him lounge about in the nude, she was enjoying this.
As he chewed, his gaze roamed the chamber. The pillows they’d knocked from the settee when he bent her over it were back. The quills that had hit the floor when he plopped her on the desk had been returned to the dented can. His trousers and drawers lay folded on the top shelf of his wardrobe.
“Almost as if you were never here, except for the scent of us clinging to the air, the bedding.” He dipped his head and sniffed his wrist. “My skin.”
“Ah, um,” she whispered, at a loss for any suitable reply.
He grinned, pure mischief, and pried the apple from her hand, dislodging the sheet at his waist. The cream silk slipped, revealing the dark thatch between his thighs. Unfortunately, it was not low enough to expose the rest.
Sitting back, he took a vigorous bite of the fruit, making no effort to cover himself. “If you keep staring at me like that, Isa darling, I’m going to have you on your back in less than sixty seconds. Your eager consideration is eating me alive.”
Indeed, his arousal was visible, straining beneath the sheet.
Daring him, Isabella crossed to the door and turned the key, unhooking her bodice on the return. “We have at least two hours. They’ve gone into town, even the children. And I told the staff to leave you for the day.”
Ever snorted a laugh, raking his hand through his hair. “That was supposed to be a warning, sprite. Not encouragement.”
“Why pose a challenge about something I want?”
“Have it your way, then,” he said softly, dropping the half-eaten apple to the floor.
He reached for her the instant she came within reach, his arm sliding around her waist to pull her atop him. He tasted of apple and stunned affection, of something dangerously like hope, and the kiss deepened swiftly, the world falling away.
The encounter lacked finesse, his usual expertise surrendered to desire.
He shoved aside the lacing of her bodice and licked her nipples through the linen of her chemise, unconcerned with removing her gown.
Instead, he pushed her skirt to her waist and reached between her thighs, his touch leaving her breathless.
He coaxed her to the edge more than once with ardent whispers, kisses, and strokes before settling her more firmly astride him.
“Ride me, sprite,” he murmured, his eyes going a deep, mossy green.
She shook her head, uncertain, blood pulsing through her veins as her vision narrowed to him and only him.
Bunching her gown at her hip, he guided her. “Like this.” He positioned himself at her entrance, a ragged moan roughening in his throat as she lowered herself. The sensation of claiming him, of control, defied description.
“Close your eyes, don’t think,” he whispered as he lifted his hips, repeating the motion until they found a cadence.
The position struck tender places the others had not, and Isabella soon found herself crying out, lowering until she lay across his chest, grinding as he had done the night before, desperate for connection and release.
“That’s it,” he whispered, his tone dark. “Turn me inside out, Isa.”
Her mouth found his, her hands braced on his shoulders, fingers tangled in his hair. He gripped her waist, and near the end, she watched him watching her. The long glide, the impact, skin to skin, the force of two bodies in motion.
The arrested expression on his face was all it took to carry her over.