Chapter Nineteen #2
The door opened just enough for Alistair to slip through. He was already dressed, impeccably proper in his morning coat and cravat, but his eyes were anything but proper.
"I couldn't wait until tonight," he said, crossing to her in two quick strides. "I had to see you, and I had to touch you….Just to make sure that last night was real."
"It was real." She reached up to straighten his already-perfect cravat, just for the excuse to touch him. "Though I confess I've been wondering the same thing."
"Let me prove it to you."
He kissed her deeply, thoroughly, his tongue sliding against hers in a way that made her knees weak. His hands found the buttons she had just finished fastening and began undoing them.
"Alistair, we can't. The servants…"
"They are all downstairs preparing breakfast. We have twenty minutes." He pushed her dress off her shoulders, letting it pool at her feet. "I can do a great deal in twenty minutes."
He proved it.
He backed her against the door and dropped to his knees before her, lifting one of her legs over his shoulder. She gasped as his mouth found her center, his tongue tracing patterns that made her see stars.
"What are you…"
"Shh." His breath was warm against her most sensitive flesh. "You'll have to be quiet. Unless you want the entire household to know what we're doing."
She bit her lip, stifling the sounds that wanted to escape as his tongue worked its magic. He licked, sucked and teased, finding every spot that made her tremble, building her pleasure with devastating precision.
When she came, it was with a muffled cry, her hand pressed against her mouth, her body shuddering against the door. He stayed with her through it, gentling his touch as the waves subsided, pressing soft kisses to her inner thighs.
Then he rose, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and smiled—a wicked, satisfied smile that made her want to drag him to the bed and never let him leave.
"Seventeen minutes," he said. "I believe that's a new record."
"You're insufferable."
"You love me anyway."
"Heaven, help me, I do."
They developed a system.
A book left on a particular shelf in the library meant meet me tonight. A flower in a certain vase meant the music room at midnight. A specific phrase at dinner: "The weather seems likely to turn" meant I need you. Now.
It was dangerous. Reckless. Everything Eliza had spent her life avoiding.
But she had never been happier.
***
Some nights after Christmas, the manor was hushed and blanketed in frost, the corridors dim save for the faint orange glow of a dying fire. Midnight had come and gone, and the house was asleep.
But she was not.
She moved through the quiet hallways with quick steps and a quicker pulse, her slippers nearly silent against the rugs. Her cloak clung close around her as she reached the door to the music room.
It was already ajar.
Alistair sat at the pianoforte, the sleeves of his shirt rolled back to reveal the strength of his forearms. He was playing—soft, slow notes plucked with only his right hand. The left hung useless at his side, his fingers twitching in time with the melody.
He looked up when she entered.
And that look… That look made her breath stutter in her lungs.
"Lock the door."
His voice was quiet but rough with hunger. A command, not a suggestion.
Her fingers fumbled at the latch, the metallic click sounding impossibly loud in the silence.
"Come here."
She moved to him slowly, her heart hammering, her thighs clenching with nervous anticipation. The air felt thick between them, as if something vital and wordless had already begun.
When she reached him, he turned on the bench and pulled her forward—sudden, unhesitating—until she was standing between his knees.
Then, slowly, deliberately, he guided her down onto his lap.
Her breath hitched.
Her skirts rode up as she straddled him, the cotton bunching indecently around her thighs. She tried to adjust, to preserve some illusion of modesty, but he stopped her with a firm hand on her hip.
“No,” he murmured. “Let me look at you like this.”
Her knees bracketed his thighs, and she could feel him hard beneath her, even through the thick fabric of his trousers.
He let out a slow exhale, his eyes roaming her face as though he were trying to memorize it. Then his hands returned to her hips, sliding under the hem of her gown to palm the soft curve of her rear, and he ground her gently against him.
She gasped.
He did it again, more deliberately this time, rubbing her against the thick ridge of him through both their clothes.
"Do you feel that?” he asked, his mouth brushing her ear. “That’s what you do to me. Every time you laugh. Every time you walk into a room and don’t even glance my way. Every cursed night when I lie in bed and imagine this.”
Her lips parted on a soft whimper.
“Alistair…”
He kissed her—harder than before. Less restraint, more want. His tongue teased her mouth open, and she clung to his shoulders, rocking against him as he ground her down again, harder now, his own breath catching.
Her body began to move of its own accord, finding a rhythm against him that sent sparks through her abdomen. The friction was maddening—her thin cotton drawers soaked through, clinging to her center, dragging against him with every press of his hips.
"That’s it," he rasped, lips dragging along her jaw. "Use me."
And she did.
She rolled her hips against him with growing desperation, the hard line of him perfectly positioned, the seam of his trousers catching her right where she ached the most. The pleasure wasn’t sharp yet, but it was building, slowly and steadily, the kind that made her dizzy.
He groaned when she rocked harder, and his hands tightened at her hips, guiding her, helping her move against him.
"My goodness, look at you," he muttered. "So wanton…. So beautiful.”
“Only for you,” she whispered. “Only for you.”
His hand came up to cup her breast, thumb flicking over her nipple through the thin linen of her chemise. She gasped, arching into the touch, her hips losing rhythm from the overwhelming sensation.
"Shhh," he soothed, pressing her back down against him. "Not yet. Let me draw it out. I want to see how much you can take."
She whimpered at that, because she was already close, so close. Her hips jerked helplessly against him, and he kissed her again, swallowing her breath, his tongue teasing while his fingers toyed with the tie at her neckline.
The chemise slipped from one shoulder. He pushed it down further, baring her fully to the cold air and his burning mouth.
He bent his head and took her breast into his mouth, suckling with a low moan as she cried out, shivering from pleasure and exposure. The press of his tongue, the scrape of his teeth, the sheer wickedness of it…
It sent her careening closer to the edge.
And still he rocked her against him, letting her chase her climax shamelessly in his lap.
“Alistair, I…”
He didn’t let her finish.
With a grunt, he shifted them both, standing and guiding her backwards until she was seated on the bench and he was kneeling between her spread legs. He yanked her drawers down and off in one motion, then bent his head and kissed her inner thigh, trailing open-mouthed kisses up until…
“Oh,…!” she cried out, jerking when he licked her.
He took his time then, tongue slow, thorough, maddening. She twisted her fingers into his hair, torn between pulling him closer and begging him to stop before she exploded entirely.
When he finally pulled back, his lips were slick, and his voice hoarse.
“I want to be inside you.”
She reached for him with shaking hands, and he rose, freeing himself from his trousers with urgency. Then he lifted her, guiding her back onto his lap—and this time, there was no barrier between them.
He held her gaze as he lowered her onto him, inch by inch, until she was full; so full that she gasped.
He hissed through his teeth, gripping her waist.
“Ride me,” he said again, but this time it wasn’t a command. It was a plea.
She began to move, still trembling from the edge he’d held her on for so long. This time, the friction was wet and slick, the stretch intense, and the pleasure so deep it nearly hurt.
Their bodies moved in tandem; his hips rising to meet hers, his hands dragging her closer, his mouth on her breast, her throat, her lips.
The pianoforte jangled beneath them as she moved faster, chasing the release she’d been denied. And when it came, when her body locked, trembled and clenched around him, he followed with a strangled moan, shuddering as he spilled into her.
They collapsed into each other, breathless and dazed.
For a long time, they said nothing.
"We're going to get caught," she said.
"Sooner or later, someone is going to notice."
"Let them notice." He pressed a kiss to her temple.
"We'll be married soon enough. What's a few weeks of scandal?"
"Easy for you to say. You're a duke."
"And soon you'll be a duchess. Anyone who dares to speak against you will answer to me." She believed him. That was the remarkable thing. She believed him completely.