Chapter 25
Ellie writhed under his touch as Dorian’s lips closed around her nipple. One of her hands shot to his head, spearing through the rough silk of his hair, while the other went to his shoulder and grasped him tight.
A moan rose from her throat as her body felt like a box of Roman candles, ready to shoot off. The feel of him inside her body was familiar and alien at the same time.
“You’re divine,” Dorian whispered in her ear before he kissed beneath its hollow. “So beautiful.”
Her back arched as another finger entered her, and the pressure inside made her head spin with swirling pleasure. She felt him press hard against her inner thigh, and her body trembled at the thought of his thickness inside her.
“I need you, Evelina.” He sounded breathless as if he were holding back a growl of pure need.
She framed his face, “So do I.”
Levelling up on his knees, he grabbed beneath her knees and pulled her into him. Gently, he wrapped her legs around his middle and leaned in. He loomed over her, but instead of feeling overwhelmed, Ellie felt sheltered and safe below him.
Her eyes held his as she felt him notch his weeping head to her entrance. “I’m yours,” she whispered.
With a groan that seemed to surge from the depths of his soul, he began to breach her body. Ellie jolted at the incursion, the strange feel, and the exquisitely tight stretch of him… inside her.
She let out a soft breath that Dorian must have interpreted as pain because he slowed immediately. His pupils were blown wide, dilated, a thin room of gold edging out the black.
He held himself still. “Should I stop. Am I hurting you, Ellie?”
“No…” she gasped, flexing her hips. Her intimate muscles still resisted his thickness, but she wanted nothing more than to feel all of him. “God, no. You feel… right. So perfect....”
His brows were knit tight as he inched in. Her eyes invariably screwed tight as old wives’ tales of the brutal pain of losing her maidenhead reared in her head.
She let out a long moan as he drew out of her and pushed back in with a snap of his hips. There was no dramatic tearing like she’d feared. The tight pinch began to fade almost instantly as her muscles softened and stretched.
“Devil and damn,” he groaned, while flexing his hips. “You’re so tight, my sweet…”
She pulled him down to kiss him, the hot mating of their tongues was slow and sensual as his hips began shallow thrusts inside her. The sensation of having him inside her, after all the teasing he had taunted her with for so many nights, thrilled her.
“Please,” she breathed against his lips. “I want… I want…”
“More.” He bucked his hips, jolting her with bliss.
“More,” she moaned.
His thrusts were still shallow, but grew deeper with every pass. Whimpers left her parted mouth as he drove in and out. When he met her flush, her body jolted as if shot with lightning.
“Deeper, Dorian,” she groaned. Scrambling at his back, she held on tight. “Please.”
He pushed her knees back, and before she could fully register the new position, he drove inside her at an angle that made her see stars. Her breath punched out of her chest, and pleasure incinerated her inhibitions.
His thrusts came faster, harder, and only then did she realize how desperate he was and how much he’d been holding back. Every other thrust took him deeper than he’d gone before.
Her fingers dug into his skin, her head rolling against the pillow as his possession tested her very limits. Instinctively, her legs circled his hips to draw him closer. “I—I…”
“God, yes.” His eyes smoldered into hers. “Come for me, Evelina. Come for me, now.”
The aching pressure built and built, and then… the release took her by surprise, and she came on a sudden blissful cry. Dorian’s mouth slammed over her, a gratified groan reverberating through his body just as he exploded inside her.
He surged into her once, twice, burying his face in her neck. His harsh groans were in her ear as he shuddered, thrusting deeply, drenching her insides.
His head was still tucked into the crook of her neck while he caught his breath. Ellie rubbed the back of his hair— the short, damp hairs showed his exhaustion.
Dorian gently pulled from her and lay by her side, before drawing her against him. Sated, she leaned on his shoulder, shifted to her side, laid an arm over his chest, and tucked a leg in-between his. Silence settled over them like a warm blanket.
“Evelina…”
“If you are going to make a fuss about taking my maidenhead, please don’t.” She nuzzled into his stubble. “Lest I find something hard and bang you over the head with it.”
A throaty chuckle left him. “I will not say another word.”
“Good,” she snuggled against him and drifted into blissful oblivion.
Dorian woke with Evelina still wrapped around him, his nose crushed against her temple. It pained him to pull away, but from the angle of the sunlight on the door, it was heading to noon. He needed to speak with Benedict about the attack last night.
He slipped away from her and kissed her forehead in a parting gesture as he went to wash. It was only when he was rinsing, he remembered that he had not used a prophylactic last night. The box of French Letters was back at the estate, and he rubbed his face in nervous agitation.
What if he had gotten Evelina with child before she was ready? As a matter of fact, he was not ready either. Besides, nothing of the sort had been in their contract.
Dressing quickly, he stepped out of the closet to find Ellie still asleep, only this time she was clutching his abandoned pillow instead of air. While fixing a cufflink, he perched on the edge of the bed.
“Evelina…”
She stirred but did not wake. He reached out and shook her softly. She peeled an eye open. “I have to go to the club to meet with Rothwell.”
She sat up and took the sheet with her. Ruffling her hair, she pouted. “I suppose I’d slept out the small time we had together.”
His lips curved, “Don’t worry. I’ll be back tonight.” Reaching over, he cupped the back of her head and drew her in for a kiss. “Take care of yourself until I get back.”
“Be safe too,” she implored.
“When I return, I’ll teach you how to defend yourself,” he promised while standing and pulling his jacket on. “Take as much rest as you need, I may be back late.”
Not even five minutes after he’d set foot in his office at The Labyrinth, Benedict was ambling inside with a grim expression coating his visage. Instantly, Dorian got on his guard.
“What is it?” he asked, forgoing the social convention entirely.
“The constables beat another confession out of the prisoner,” Benedict muttered. “He said he was ordered to kidnap Harriet. I was simply in the way.”
“Me too,” Dorian sighed, rubbing his face. “But why would my uncle want Miss Harriet?”
Benedict shook his head. “I have no idea.”
Leaning in, he braced his elbows on the table and steepled his fingers, thinking. Why would his uncle need Ellie’s cousin? Who would have a reason to kidnap her?
Not Edgar. Sterling. The two have a connection.
“It’s a way of getting to Evelina,” Dorian grunted.
“My uncle and Lord Carrington are in each other’s pockets, deep pockets at that.
I have no doubt about it. They want Harriet to get to Ellie,” he said.
“Since I stole her from under his nose, I know he wants her back. I should have expected that he would never let her go so easily.”
Dorian felt Benedict’s gawk before he saw it and cocked a brow. “What?”
“How did you steal Ellie?” Benedict asked.
His lips tightened at the overly casual manner Rothwell spoke about Evelina. To be fair, they had known each other for a long while and had certainly formed a rapport in that time, but it still felt disrespectful to him.
“Her relatives were about to trade Evelina in for a social elevation,” he said vaguely. “I was not going to let that egregious act happen.”
“But—” Benedict looked troubled. “How did you know about that in the first place?”
“I was—” he sighed, “—am a colleague of Carrington. We have mutual interests and shares in each other’s businesses, but recently I have been pulling away. He is not taking to that kindly.”
“But what can Harriet do for him?” Benedict huffed. “Be Ellie’s replacement?”
“With how hell-bent her aunt and uncle are in elevating their social station, I do not doubt they would second-think selling their own flesh and blood away like a sacrificial lamb,” Dorian shook his head in disgust. “They are bleeding money like a dead carcass and require a windfall immediately.”
“Mayhaps we contact the relatives then,” Benedict offered. “Harriet is staying with my sister today. I do not know how long I can keep her there, though.”
Rubbing his forehead, Dorian murmured, “Carrington is the key, but I cannot—I do not know how to attack this yet.”
“And I am afraid if I send Harriet back to her people, she will be in danger as well,” Benedict exhaled. He hunched forward and rested his forearms on his thighs. He drew in a long breath. “I never did betray you, you know.”
Dorian shook his head. “It doesn’t matter right now. We need to figure out how to keep both of them safe—” He slid an eye to Benedict. “Is Harriet as stubborn as her cousin?”
“I’ve only known her for a little time, but she is a tad headstrong, yes,” Benedict nodded. “Do you know where your uncle is?”
“No,” Dorian said, aggravated. “I have been looking for years, but nothing.
“As for now, keep Harriet confined in your home. I will confront Sterling in the interim. He will not give up anything, but at least it will make him know we are not playing in the shadows,” Dorian said. “It will give him pause before we plan our next move.”
“I’d be more secure if I had a plan myself,” Benedict replied. “I would not forgive myself if I failed to keep her out of harm's way.”
While sending for a pot of coffee, Dorian shrugged. “You could do what I did and marry her.”
Cocking his head to the left, Benedict asked, “See, I do not know if you are jesting or not.”
“That’s simple,” Dorian leaned back in his chair. “I never jest.”
By the time Ellie did drag herself out of bed—the cocoon of Dorian’s lingering scent and warmth had coaxed her back into blissful sleep—she made for the washroom, filled the tub, and made to wash her face in the interim.
After a splash, her lashes fluttered open, and an odd sight met her peripherals. There were some curious dots of… ink…. around the washing basin. Pressing the fingers into the liquid, they came away pale reddish on her fingers.
“What is this?” She sniffed it. “Oil? That's curious.”
Dismissing it, she washed her face to wake herself up as the tub filled. When it did, she took a long, soothing bath and thought back to last evening.
For once, she was the one who had seduced Dorian and taken what she’d wanted. She had not yet had the chance to tell Dorian why she’d needed him so dearly, but hopefully he would return early enough for her to do so.
“How do I tell a man who is so averse to the very notion of love, that I have fallen in love with him…” she wondered aloud, while trailing her fingers through the water.
“How do I tell him that seeing him in mortal danger made me so afraid that I could lose him forever, that all I wished to do after was give myself to him?”
Gently rising from the tub, she dried and dressed, then went in search of something to eat. Dorian had stored the food from last night well enough that she could make a plate and eat at a window seat.
The turn of the lock had her jolting up, the twinge of fear soon fading as Dorian stepped through the door. He didn’t remove his coat. “We’re heading home. Are you—” he paused. “—feeling well?”
She stood and brushed her hands off. “If you’re asking if I regret it, the answer is no, I do not.”
“Evelina, the contract we made did not cover this,” he cautioned. “And I was careless last night. I did not use any measures to make sure you did not start increasing.”
Licking her lips, Ellie considered what to tell him. And how to tell him. “Dorian, I do not want an annulment or some other dignified separation. I realize this must be very inconvenient for you, but I… have fallen in love with you.
“Yes, you are surly, yes, you are stubborn, and yes, you have more secrets than the Sphinx, but somehow, I find that those very negligible and irritating traits are precisely what I love about you.”
Dorian’s face blanched, as if his worst nightmare had suddenly been realized before his very eyes. “Evelina, there are some things I need to tell you before you… run away with this notion.”
“One of your many secrets,” Ellie guessed. “How many are there?”
“The most important ones?” he declared. “Five.”
“And how many of them are about me?” she asked.
He gave her a humorless smile. “All of them.”