Chapter 27
Charlotte Tolliver was not entirely sure she remained upon the earth.
There had been, surely, some displacement.
Some divine rupture in the ordinary arrangement of the universe.
One could not possibly endure such a thing twice in succession and then be expected to remember one’s own name or address, or the existence of anything else at all.
Good God. Good God.
Lottie stared at the ceiling, chest rising and falling, and then—hazily, lazily—flicked her eyes towards Jasper Deverell, who had reduced her to such a state.
He sat back on his heels beside her, one hand braced upon the bed, his shirt open at the throat, his hair disordered, his breath coming rather harder than his smug expression deserved.
His gaze was fixed upon her with an intensity that made something low in her belly give a dangerous little flutter, despite the fact that she had only just survived what felt like the collapse of an empire.
Then her eyes drifted lower, to the very prominent strain against the front of his breeches. Oh.
“Do you,” she asked softly, still half-dazed, “need relief too?”
Jasper’s jaw flexed. “That is not part of the forfeit.”
“No?” She arched one brow, propping herself up on one shaky elbow. “But I am here, am I not?”
His eyes darkened.
Lottie, who had discovered within the last several minutes that she enjoyed pleasure exceedingly, allowed her lips to curve. Teasing and velvet-soft, she whispered, “Please... let me.”
For once, Jasper Deverell appeared to have misplaced his tongue.
When he finally rose to his feet and reached for the falls of his breeches, Lottie watched him with bold, flushed defiance… right up until he freed himself.
She gasped audibly, and her hand flew to her mouth.
Jasper froze. “Charlotte.”
“What?” she squeaked.
“Have you…” He looked at her face, then down, then back again with dawning astonishment. “Have you never seen a cock before?”
Lottie bristled at once. “I have four sisters, I shall have you know.”
He blinked, his cock still in his hand. “That does not answer the question in the slightest.”
“I am saying that, having four sisters, my opportunities for viewing gentlemen’s privates have been limited. Benedict is years older than I am. We were not exactly bathing together.”
Jasper stared at her, his expression hovering somewhere between horrified amusement and a man only now realising he ought, perhaps, to have asked several questions before removing his breeches. “I thought,” he said carefully, “that you were not exactly innocent.”
“I am not,” she snapped, though her cheeks had turned scarlet.
“No,” he said slowly. “Plainly not. And yet you have never seen one? What, precisely, is your working definition of innocence, Miss Tolliver?”
She groaned and dropped her face into her hands. “Oh God.”
He stepped closer, voice softer now. “Lottie… am I the first man to touch you like that?”
“No!” she said quickly, before wincing. “Well. Yes. By some measure. But that is not—”
His mouth parted. “You mean to tell me you are a virgin—”
“I am not,” she said with full Tolliver fury.
He paused. “You are not a virgin,” he repeated, as though the words had become a puzzle box in his hands, “but no man has ever touched you?”
“Correct.”
“And you’ve never even seen—”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” she cried, throwing up both hands before collapsing backwards onto the bed. “I have had one in me, if you must know. But no, I have never had a man’s hand between my legs, nor seen his cock, if that completes your anatomical survey.”
There was a long pause, in which Jasper blinked slowly. “I see.”
“You do not see.” Lottie let out a strangled groan and threw a pillow over her face. “Marchmont,” she said, muffled. “It was Marchmont.”
When she peered out from beneath the pillow, Jasper’s face had gone very still.
“It was only twice,” she said, hating the smallness in her voice.
“And it was not what I would call instructional. I did not even—” She flailed a hand.
“I did not see anything. He kept most of his clothes on. The first time, he was in a hurry, and it was… rather brief. The second time was in the dark.”
Jasper made a sound somewhere between a scoff and a growl.
“And he certainly did not do any of what you just…” She waved one hand vaguely towards the machine lying on the bed. “That. So no, I am not some wide-eyed debutante. But apparently, I have managed to miss the tour.”
She finally sat up, chest rising and falling, her hair a wild halo of indignation.
Jasper said nothing, but very slowly, he tucked himself back into his trousers—which, really, was long past due.
“No,” Lottie said suddenly, sitting up straighter, her voice clear and ringing with that peculiar Tolliver certainty that always preceded mayhem. “I want to see it.”
Jasper blinked. “I… You… Pardon—what?”
“I want to touch it,” she said firmly. “I am tired of being treated like a child. I am a woman, Jasper, and I do not care in the slightest if it is not proper. I want to know what it feels like.”
He stared at her for a beat too long.
She tilted her head. “Well? May I?”
He exhaled slowly, tension radiating from every part of him. “If you keep talking like that,” he said, voice rougher than before, “this is going to be over very quickly, and you shall be describing me as very brief to your next gentleman.”
She smiled. “So… I may?”
Jasper nodded once, though she noted his mouth had fallen open.
She reached for the front of his trousers again, and this time, he did not stop her.
When she freed him and took him into her hand, her breath caught once more.
He was thick in her palm, hot and heavy, and flushed dark at the tip.
She stared at him with a kind of mesmerised reverence, as though she had unearthed some sacred relic and was not quite sure if she ought to kneel or run screaming.
“Good Lord,” she whispered.
Jasper gave a hoarse laugh, bracing one hand against the bedpost. “Charmed, I’m sure.”
She ignored him, for curiosity had taken over.
Her fingers curled around him slowly, not entirely sure how tightly to hold him, nor how much pressure to apply.
She watched his face as she experimented: the tightening of his jaw, the way his lashes lowered, the sudden jerk of his body when she found a rhythm that pleased him.
A strange thrill moved through her. It was not the overwhelming, helpless pleasure he had wrung from her, but something more astonishing. He was at her mercy. He was trembling because of her hand.
The discovery went straight to her head. “Does it…” She swallowed, her voice softer now. “Does it feel good?”
He laughed, breathless. “God, yes, it feels—” He cut himself off with a sound that was not at all noble.
Lottie’s eyes widened, for he was beautiful. Candlelight slid over the line of his jaw, the open collar of his shirt, the hard rise and fall of his chest with every pass of her fingers.
“Show me how to give you pleasure,” she said.
His eyes opened. “Lottie—”
And then, quite plainly, it was already too late.
“Oh, hell,” he gasped.
She startled but did not pull away.
His whole body seized, a strangled groan tearing from him as he spilled over her hand, hot and vivid and so startlingly visible that Lottie could only stare, breathless and wide-eyed, as he shuddered through it. She had never seen anything so indecent or satisfying in her life.
When it was over, Jasper remained braced before her, his hair fallen over his brow and his whole person marked by the shock of what she had done to him. He was gorgeous, standing there with his cock still bare and his breath unsteady.
“That was…” she began, then trailed off. What was it?
“Fun,” he offered, still a little breathless.
She lifted her gaze to his. “Yes. It was.”
He reached for a cloth to clean himself, then gestured vaguely to her discarded cloak. “Do you need assistance sneaking out again, or shall I bribe Gibbons?”
Her heart dropped for a moment, because, of course, he did not wish her to stay. Whyever would he? And besides, she could not stay even if he had offered. “I shall manage.”
She rose, though her knees were still somewhat unreliable, and straightened her skirts with hands that trembled only once.
Her hair was escaping its pins. Her cheeks were hot.
Her body felt loose and strange and newly inhabited, as though she had not returned quite the same woman who had entered this room.
“Lottie,” he said suddenly.
She paused, but he only smiled, gentle and maddening and impossible.
“I meant it. That was fun.”
She nodded, and before either of them could say anything honest, she left.