Chapter 13 #2
“May I?” he asked, with so much intensity that she felt the words thrum through her.
When she looked up, she saw his hand was hovering along her side, as though he longed to touch her but felt the need to ask for permission.
This warmth now was not merely the heat of lust, but something deeper. Affection. Respect.
“Yes,” she whispered, and with a groan, he slid his palm along her side, reaching her back, then the curve of her backside, bringing her hips against his.
A hard ridge pressed against her stomach, and she looked up at him questioningly, her fingertips pulsing with the force of her heartbeat. Her hand was still pressed against his stomach.
“That is how much I want you, Thalia.”
His other hand reached her breast, fingers finding the slight rise of her nipple and running back and forth over it, until the sensitivity made her head spin.
How could such a simple action, performed over clothes, feel so good?
“I want things no gentleman should want from a lady.” He moved to her other breast, and she whimpered. “And you are a lady, Thalia. No matter what you believe about yourself.”
“I don’t feel like a lady here,” she said, and his dark eyes traveled over her face.
“Do you consider that a bad thing?”
“Here, I am just a woman. And you are just a man.” She brought her other hand atop his on her breast, holding him against her. “An artist should know… She ought to know about the things she sculpts.”
“Mm.” He leaned in, brushing her cheek with his nose, and she trembled. His hands, the strength and heat of his body, were all that held her together. “Passion.”
“Yes.” Her voice was so breathy, she felt rather than heard the words. “Passion.”
He brushed his lips across hers, kissing her slowly, reverently, his tongue sliding across the seam of her lips. He pulled back. “What do you want?”
Everything.
That was the honest answer, but she feared it revealed too much of herself.
“I want to know what you want that no gentleman should,” she countered.
His hand slid up from her breast to her throat, lingering there long enough that she could feel her pulse pounding against his fingers, long enough that she knew he held all the power here.
Then he reached her lips, tracing the shape of them, pressing against the seam.
She opened her mouth, letting him in, welcoming him with her tongue.
He groaned. “I want to taste you,” he said into her mouth. “Everywhere.”
Everywhere.
“Then do it,” she said, half shocked at her daring.
“Here?”
“Put a chair in front of the door. No one will know.”
The moment she looked into his eyes, she knew she had won. He wanted her too much to resist for the sake of her reputation, and that was the true victory.
“Lie before the fire,” he commanded, his voice dark and sinful.
As he propped a chair before the door, she did as she was told. Carefully, she lay down on the chaise longue by the leftover heat from the dying embers. Maxwell came to take his place beside her, kneeling and putting her ankles on his thighs.
She felt as though she was dreaming, watching the way he wrapped his hands around her ankles, slowly sliding them up her calves, pushing her dress up her legs as he went.
The world was tinted with red from the fire and the flickering candles, and she knew that when she finally returned home, nothing would ever quite feel the same again. She felt as though with every passing second, he reached inside her and altered the chemistry of her very body.
His fingers grazed her garters at the top of her stockings, and Thalia bit her lip, tilting her head back so she could look at the ceiling. Candlelight danced across the ceiling as Maxwell’s fingers dipped under her stockings and against bare skin.
Without intending to, she let her legs fall open, her skirts falling in the dip between her legs, concealing her to his gaze.
She had never known hunger until this moment. Never known passion. Never known lust.
“Have you ever sculpted scenes like this?” he asked, his fingers grazing bare skin.
She gasped. “No.”
“You should. Remember this, Thalia. I want to see the end result. I want to feel your desire.”
Her desire was so potent, she risked drowning in it. Her lungs burned, her blood pounded, and every muscle in her body quivered with tension as he raised her skirt to her hips, above the tilt of her thighs.
Air toyed around the delicate, slick flesh. She could feel her heartbeat there, too, as he looked wordlessly at her. Unable to bear the silence, she tilted her head so she could see his expression.
Dark eyes, a mouth pinned shut. His nostrils flared as he inhaled slowly, and then he leaned down to kiss her.
Slowly, methodically, as though they had all the time in the world.
His body pressed against hers, and his head flared through her, sweeping down to her core with every press of his lips and slide of his tongue.
She was going to ignite.
“Touch me,” she gasped.
He broke free, a wicked grin creasing his face as he slid back down her body, pressing his mouth to the inside of her knee. Then his stubbled chin brushed her inner thigh.
So, this is what it feels like.
The first press of his tongue felt like condemnation and salvation all at once.
This was not the sort of thing proper young ladies did, and she knew that by indulging, she was throwing away her dubious claim to respectability.
If anyone ever discovered she had been here, or the things she had done, she would be forever ruined.
But ruin could not occupy her mind when his mouth was on her.
This was liquid pleasure, an overwhelming assault on her senses that made her bite the side of her palm in an attempt to keep quiet.
He systematically undid her, unspooling all the threads that held her together as he sucked and licked.
His fingers dug into her thighs as he held her legs open for him, and all she knew was sensation.
The scrape of his stubble. The wet heat of his tongue, the way it pressed against her most intimate places. And pleasure, building, building. She writhed under him, and he held her in place more firmly, somehow knowing what she needed.
She gripped his hair, sliding her fingers through the soft tresses, her fingernails scraping his scalp. With all the thought left to her, she traced the corded muscles of his shoulders, committing them to memory, his skin like velvet under her questing fingers.
At every juncture, he knew what she needed, and it was impossible to deny.
Every passing second brought her closer to the brink.
Sensation tightened inside her, forming a ball of heat in her lower stomach.
That strange heat built. She was going to explode, to fall apart, to disintegrate into a thousand tiny pieces.
“Maxwell,” she whimpered.
He moaned again, pressing the sound against her like a kiss. Like a brand. “Thalia.”
It was the sound of her name on his tongue that tipped her over the edge. Pleasure slammed into her with such force that it set her adrift, severed her from reality. All she knew was white. The waves of heat and light washed through her until even her fingers trembled.
Maxwell gripped her hips now, holding her tight, murmuring reassurances as she lost herself to a new world. Only when she came back into her body, and the room swam back into focus, did she realize that he had done this.
She reached for him, digging her fingers into his hair, needing to know he was real.
“What just…” Her voice failed her. “What just happened?”
“That was your climax.” He kissed her again, but she was so sensitive, she squirmed away from him. He chuckled, but the sound was dark. “It is the greatest form of pleasure.”
“It was…” She didn’t have the words for what it was. “I just… Thank you.”
“Mm.” He rose on his knees, hands on her waist, and drew her down to him. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world to press her lips against his and kiss him, tasting herself. “You have no need to thank me, Thalia. I enjoyed it almost as much as you.”
“Did you—”
“No.” He kissed her again, and she fancied she could feel his hunger in the scrape of her teeth.
There was a hollowness in her, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him closer.
A candle flickered out.
“Maxwell,” she whispered. “I want…”
Everything.
The word was too great to say, but she felt the enormity of it hanging over her. She wanted everything, to lose what remained of her innocence here, in this room, to the sound of the popping embers and distant laughter of the party in the background.
She wanted him to lie her down and open her up again and teach her what pleasure could be. He knew, she knew he did.
But he paused, moving back to look at her. His mouth turned down slightly, and there was a frown in his eyes.
Instantly, she knew he would not agree to everything.
Shame washed over her, made all the worse for the contrast between it and the boneless pleasure she had just experienced.
As though he felt her emotions as strongly as she did, he reached up to gently cup her face, stroking her cheekbone with his thumb. “You know why we can’t.”
“Because it would be improper?”
“If I am ever to have you in that way, Thalia, it will not be here, where anyone might walk in on us, and where there is a ticking clock counting down the minutes until we must leave.”
Ah. Yes. If they were to get back to London without being discovered, they would have to leave soon.
This was not reality. She had stepped into a different world for a second, but she would have to return soon. And when she did, it would be easier if she had not given herself to him here.
“I understand,” she said, and rose, letting her skirts fall over her legs.
He had not removed her stockings, and so to outside eyes, she looked perfectly respectable. And if it had not been for the stickiness between her thighs and the door he had opened in her mind, she might have felt the same, too.
The Duke stood slowly. Then, he placed one finger under her chin and raised her face to meet his. “I will not forget this,” he told her, fiercely, and kissed her again. The forceful slide of his tongue assured her, indeed, that he would not.
She would not. In this, they would be equal.
Then he broke away, and she knew it was over.
“Come,” he said, his hand finding hers. “Let me take you home.”