Chapter 13
That was all the permission Sebastian required.
He closed his hand around Red’s and drew her toward the staircase, his stride unhurried but purposeful.
She followed with a soft, breathless laugh that curled about his senses far more pleasurably than it should.
For one disorienting instant, the sound called to mind Miss Darcy Whitley’s unguarded laughter at Vauxhall Gardens, softer and freer, yet possessing the same bewildering power to unsettle him.
Sebastian frowned. It had irritated him to become so acutely aware of the soft curve of Darcy’s figure as she moved, the delicate arch of her throat when she turned her head, the quiet, curious glances she cast toward him when she believed herself unobserved.
Such awareness had been both unwelcome and wholly inconvenient.
Sebastian tightened his jaw, forced the recollection aside, and lengthened his stride.
“Are we racing toward some rare performance, my lord?” she asked.
“I mean to have you in my arms,” he replied without apology, glancing back at her, “before you recover the good sense to change your mind.”
She scoffed, and the sound pleased him in a way that was becoming dangerously compelling.
It was unlike him to be so readily ensnared by a woman, yet he wanted to draw that sound from her again, to provoke it and coax it into something softer, more yielding, then kiss her once more and take whatever breathless response she might offer into his own mouth, until even that sharp little scoff dissolved into something far more intimate and wanton.
He said nothing further. The corridors were crowded, the air thick with heat, perfume, and the low murmur of indulgence.
They passed through the press of patrons, masked ladies with flushed cheeks and gentlemen whose gazes lingered too boldly, until the ballroom opened before them in a vision of excess.
Light spilled from several chandeliers, glinting upon polished floors and silks of every shade.
Music swelled from the orchestra, the violins lifting into a waltz familiar in form yet wholly transformed in execution.
Here, nothing was restrained. Couples moved with a freedom that would never be tolerated within polite society.
Hands lingered in places that invited far more than propriety would allow.
Bodies curved closer, breath mingling, laughter low and suggestive.
It was not merely a dance but an invitation to debauchery.
Beside him, Red gave a soft gasp. Sebastian looked down at her, his gaze sharpening as he took in the delicate flush that spread across what little he could see of her face beneath the mask.
Smiling, he drew her into his arms. She came against him with a startled stiffness, her hands for a moment before settling uncertainly upon his shoulders.
He closed the distance between them deliberately, until no space remained in which to pretend at propriety.
She trembled as though the force of sensation alone might undo her. For a moment, Sebastian wondered if she might indeed faint.
How innocent are you, Red?
The thought should have amused him. Instead, it roused a hot, carnal hunger. Sebastian shifted his hold with quiet deliberation, one hand settling at her waist while the other guided her fingers between his.
“You wished to learn,” he murmured. “Attend, then.”
“I thought you meant to teach me privately first,” she whispered. “Everyone is staring.”
He stilled for a moment, studying her. “You truly wish to be alone with me, held this close, while I teach you the waltz?” A faint, knowing curve touched his mouth. “I find this unexpected boldness most appealing. Come, then. I have a private room on the third floor.”
“No!” Her neck flushed a deeper shade of red. “I will learn here.”
A flicker of amusement stirred within him. “Afraid you might succumb to my charm?”
“Yes.”
The quiet admission struck him forcefully. How disarmingly honest you are.”
When their gazes met, he caught the heat of sensual awareness in her eyes, bright, unguarded, and impossible to mistake. A faint frown touched him as he realized he had never truly noticed her eyes before, or how remarkably pretty the warm brown appeared behind her mask.
“Do not mock me,” she said softly, her gaze searching his.
“I give you my word,” Sebastian murmured, a peculiar jolt stirring within his chest at the vulnerability she revealed. “Follow my lead.”
“I may stumble,” she said, her voice unsteady, her hands tightening upon him.
“I shall catch you.”
“Then I shall trust you, my lord.”
The music carried them forward, and he moved with it, drawing her into the rhythm before she could succumb to her nerves. At first she followed with tentative steps and uneven breaths, fierce concentration sharpening her gaze.
Sebastian adjusted her without comment. His hand at her waist shifted with deliberate intent, aligning her to him, teaching her the proper position while letting his palm remain a fraction longer than necessity required.
His fingers traced the line of her back as he guided her through a turn, correcting, instructing, learning the shape of her beneath the guise of instruction.
The wickedness of it was plain, yet he did not stop. He drew her closer still, until he could feel the tremor of her breath against his throat. His cock hardened in response, desire rising with a sharpness he had not anticipated.
“I presume this is not how the waltz is conducted in polite society,” she said, her voice breathless.
The admission confirmed that she had never waltzed in a society ballroom, a curious omission for a lady of evident education.
“No,” he said. “Though I daresay the polite version is far more dangerous.”
She tipped back her head, meeting his gaze. “Do you tease me? How could propriety possibly make the waltz more dangerous than this?”
“In a ballroom there is but a breath more space between two bodies,” he said.
“When dancing the waltz, one is required to maintain propriety, to observe restraint, even as every step insists upon the opposite. You are made acutely aware of what you ought not feel and therefore feel it all the more keenly.”
Her eyes widened beneath the mask.
“It is a most artful torment. To be placed so near, to know precisely what might be taken, and yet be denied. It stokes the appetite without ever allowing the indulgence. A man is expected to dine upon air while a feast lies set before him. Tell me,” he murmured, his thumb shifting ever so slightly against her waist, “is that not the most dangerous sort of temptation of all?”
Her pulse fluttered wildly at the hollow of her throat. “I am not certain I have ever been tempted so.”
“Liar,” he drawled.
“Perhaps by a slice of chocolate cake. It haunted me through an entire night until I rose before Mama and my sisters, crept to the kitchen, and stole a scandalously large bite.”
Sebastian laughed. “You are a most unexpected woman, Red.”
Red’s gaze held his, something startled and searching within it, and Sebastian felt the answering pull.
He wanted her beneath him. The provoking image came unbidden and wholly formed: her pussy yielding to his congress, her voice breaking as she cried his name, and the slow, relentless way he would drive her toward undoing upon his cock.
The realization came without his usual languid detachment; instead, it was sharp, immediate, and possessive. Her soft fragrance invaded his senses, settling beneath his skin like a quiet, consuming fire, until he tightened his hold upon her by instinct alone.
“Will you show me your face?” he asked quietly, the question escaping him before he had resolved to give it voice.
She gave a soft, startled gasp. “Never.”
The answer ought to have irritated him, yet instead he stored it away as another small truth about the woman in his arms. She had something to lose. A reputation to guard. “Then let me hear your natural voice.”
Red stared at him, her eyes widening further.
“I have observed,” he continued, “that your pitch remains carefully moderated, never rising or falling regardless of what you say. It is deliberate. You disguise your voice not merely for me, but for everyone.” He studied her a moment longer. “I find myself curious as to why. Are you known to me?”
She did not answer, only shook her head.
A faint smile touched his mouth. “Very well. Keep your secrets. I find I am developing an inconvenient fondness for mysteries.”
He drew her into another turn, their bodies aligning once more as the music swelled.
This time, Red did not falter. She moved with him, tentatively at first, then with growing confidence that altered the very air between them.
Her body softened into the rhythm, into him, until each step seemed less an effort and more an instinctive response.
Her hand tightened slightly in his, her other settling more surely upon his shoulder, her body no longer resisting but yielding to the rhythm he set.
Sebastian became acutely aware of her warmth pressed along his length, the soft rise and fall of her breath against his throat, and the way her body curved into his as the music carried them through a sweeping turn, her skirts whispering against his legs.
He drew her close enough that there could be no mistaking his intent.
Lowering his head, he gave her every opportunity to deny him.
She did not. Instead, Red softened as she rose onto her toes to meet his mouth.
The taste of her struck him with startling force.
She tasted sweet and warm, a heady union of innocence and something dangerous blooming beneath his lips the longer he lingered.
He deepened the kiss, his control slipping enough for him to feel her answering heat, and the way her breath faltered as though the sensation overtook her as completely as it did him.
A low, rough sound stirred in his throat as he traced the seam of her lips with his tongue and then slipped within, tasting her fully.