Chapter 15 #2
Yet he remained maddeningly deft of touch, greedy in his withholding—managing to touch her with nothing more than fleeting brushes.
Until he had stripped her bare.
How arousing.
How humbling.
August smoothed his palms along her arms.
Reflexively, she angled toward him, opening herself.
She longed for this.
He dipped his mouth near the hollow of her shoulder.
“Beautiful,” he whispered.
When spoken like that, she could almost believe him.
“Liar.” Her protest trembled.
“Yes,” he murmured. “But not in the bedchamber.”
A gasp escaped as he scooped her up and carried her to the waiting bath.
He lowered her into the heated water.
Not a word did he speak.
He tended each part of her—the same tender touch a nurse might use on her charge.
He slicked the sudsy cloth over her arms, then down her back in strong circles that bathed and massaged at once.
A wave of disappointment washed over her.
Pathetic.
Here she lay, lusting, and he couldn’t be more detached.
Still, desiring him as she did, his careful hands set her afire.
She gnawed at her lip, fighting the urge to lift her hips.
Then he moved the cloth away.
Her hips sank, giving her away.
“Give me your leg, little kitten.”
The command reminded her who held power—of this moment, of her life, of her future.
Weak and willing, she obeyed.
He worked his way from the arch of her foot up to her calf and thigh, rubbing knots loose.
Utterly spellbound, she didn’t realize he had finished until he whispered against her ear.
“Good girl.”
Her heavy lashes fluttered open.
August glided a damp finger from her ear to her jaw, claiming her gaze.
“I’m going to wash your sweet cunny now.”
That wicked word made something simple feel sinful.
She slunk lower under the water.
“My Meghan is shy,” he said, sounding pleased and surprised.
But she had as much as advertised her innocence—and a rake like the Earl of Culross would devour her.
And she was all too happy to be devoured.
“Tell me, my love…”
My love.
The subtle shift in his endearment—possessive now—marked her as his.
She melted.
And I am his. I have always belonged to him.
“Has there ever been a hand other than your own here?”
As if there could be any doubt what he meant, August skimmed his fingers through the small nest of curls between her thighs.
A moan slipped out. She shook her head.
“Hmm. What about your maid?”
She shook her head again. “No.” Too shy to meet his gaze, she braced for scorn.
“Usually, I would be quite pleased by the thought of a young lady’s maid stroking her mistress to release,” he remarked, as if commenting on the weather.
“That is rather naughty of you, August,” she said, frowning. “Why would I ever do that?”
August’s eyes flicked about her face, and she wanted to see whatever it was that made him look so long, and in the way he did now.
“You wouldn’t,” he said softly. “Strangely, Meghan, my love…” His voice dropped an octave, grit roughening it.
“I find I don’t want to share this sweet spot—not with anyone. Not even a maid.”
Her chest hitched. “That is lovely,” she said softly. “I…think?”
“Do you know what I’m going to do after I clean you, Meghan?” he whispered.
“N-no.” But she dearly wished he would tell her.
“I’m going to clean you. And when you’re sparkling clean, I’m going to make this cunny sloppy with come.”
“That is g-gooood?” she moaned, as he moved his fingers inside her. It sounded delightful.
It was delightful.
August chuckled, his deep laugh, rumbling like the timbers of his craft as it shifted.
“Mmm.” Meghan sank her fingers into the bath and covered his hand with her own. “Y-you are not allowed to leeeave.” Meghan arched, lifting forward to push herself against him.
“Would you like to come?”
Meghan whimpered. “Yes!” she rasped. “Please!” Water sloshed around the top. It slid like a wave and soaked August.
He groaned.
She started to apologize, but he pressed his fingers against her sensitive place in the way she needed. “How pretty you beg,” he panted. He slipped the cloth between her legs, stroking her clean.
“Now I’m going to touch you and make you come—screaming my name.”
He laid his palm over that aching place.
She cried out.
His fingers slid inside, then withdrew, then stroked forward again—slow and steady. The feel of his touch, the splash of water spilling over the edge, brought her higher.
Moaning, she lifted her hips to his rhythm as it grew faster. Her naughty movements sent the filmy water lapping over the edge and onto the floor.
“Please,” she begged.
“How wet you are,” he rasped.
A small iridescent bubble floated between her eyes. It landed on the tip of her nose.
August kissed it away with a pop.
That place he stroked throbbed and ached. Meghan dug her fingers into the side of the tub. “Au-August?”
“I want you to come for me, siren.”
The dark circle at the center of his eyes threatened to devour the blue.
He touched that secret spot within her and she gasped.
“August!” she sobbed. “Please. Please…!”
“Please stop?” That smile she loved was there in his question. “Or please don’t stop?” he purred.
He knew what she wanted, but logic and pleasure were so twisted up that her words were too tangled in her mind to come out.
The rough growth on his cheek brushed her skin, marking her as surely as any brand.
“I am cruel, Meghan mine,” he said harshly, “but also capable of great benevolence.”
Meghan panted. Yes, she did know that to be true about him.
Then he leaned down, took her nipple into his mouth, and sucked deep. Meghan bit her lip and kept biting.
Her eyes were so heavy. She wanted to close them and just feel all of this. But she needed to see him more.
Meghan raised her lashes.
Her heart stuttered.
August’s features strained from the intensity of emotion she did not recognize. So foreign it scared her.
That pulsing was so great. It called to her. And she lifted her hips into it but did not want to leave from whatever this was. What? What? She wanted to beg for him to explain. But he had stolen her words. Reduced her to fragments and fragmented thoughts.
“You are…the most beautiful thing I have beheld in this world, Meghan.” He charted her face, the way he did oceans. “I would trade the seas for you.”
Tossing her head back, she screamed his name. “August!”
She shattered. Who knew breaking could be so wonderful?
Bucking and thrashing in the bath, she screamed his name. Meghan sobbed. “Yes. Yes! Yesss!” He held her, and she clung to him, riding his fingers. Riding this thunderous tide.
A blinding white light burst behind her eyes.
“I love you,” she wept.
She waited for August to weep.
How had the entire world not already erupted in sobs at such splendor?
And then, with a final gasp, Meghan sagged against the side of the bath.
August placed a tender kiss along her brow. That kiss was so gentle, so sweet, that it brought tears to her eyes.
Meghan lay replete against the back of the bath. Her breath and lungs and thoughts tried to meet in some measured plane.
When she could finally breathe, she opened her eyes—to find August watching her.
“August,” she murmured.
“Yes, love?”
“I am in the clouds.”
She felt his breath against her brow. Felt his smile. Felt his kiss before his lips touched her skin. Felt all of him.
“Are you in them?” he asked. “Or coming down from them?”
“Mmm,” she said tiredly. “Both?”
He chuckled. “It cannot be both, and since you are not certain, I must deliver you to the clouds once more.”
In one sweeping glide, August lifted her from the bath.
There went the rest of the water.
She curled against the whorl of curls on his chest, rubbing her cheek against him. She really did love them very much.
She loved him more. Her throat worked rhythmically.
August set her down like she might break and there could never be another Meghan.
Straightening at the bedside, August stared at her.
She knew because she felt it, but her eyes were on him and his trousers.
And the moment he shoved them down and kicked them aside and revealed his length.
Tall? So tall as it jutted high from amidst a sprig of golden curls that his root touched the flat of his belly.
Tall? Meghan swallowed slowly. Or was it long?
Either way, it was very, very thick. And…
She stared at him longingly. Sorrowfully too, because she felt sad of a sudden.
No, not sad. Sad described losing a snowball fight. Or leaving one’s book out in the rain.
Sorrow. Sorrow fit. It was reserved for death and tragedy and…
August rested a knee on the mattress, giving her a little jostle.
Meghan’s throat closed up.
When one was in the clouds, it was easier to live in the clouds and not see the ground below.
But she’d begun the descent, and her feet had grazed the earth enough.
August came down over her. He framed her between his arms.
She loved it here.
She truly did.
He lowered his mouth.
She wanted his kiss. She really did. She stared at his lips.
Another spasm moved over her heart.
“August?” she asked, just before he brushed his lips to hers.
He took that kiss anyway.
Sighing, she allowed it.
“Yes, Meghan?” he murmured, sucking on the shell of her ear.
She enjoyed that too.
She didn’t want it to end.
Tears threatened. “Did you do this with my sister?”