Chapter Twenty-Six
Eden spent the rest of the day awash in contentment. Tha?s’s embrace had filled his heart.
Christ, but he liked her. Her insistence on candor made her so easy to talk to, and she was a surprisingly soft person, underneath all her sexual bravado and brazen jokes. He had not been able to speak so openly of his feelings about his family to anyone, even Anna. He protected his sister from his own pain, so that he could be a strong shoulder for her sadness about losing her parents so young.
He would miss his friendship with Tha?s when they parted. He knew that once he was married it would no longer be appropriate for him to have a relationship with a woman of her reputation. When they said goodbye, it would be for good.
The thought made him rather melancholy.
He should drag himself away from his work and spend more time with her while he had the opportunity. Not only because he needed to learn everything he could while he had the chance but also because he enjoyed her. He could not remember liking anyone’s company quite so much in ages.
So he made a simpler supper than usual—a spring soup with vegetables Hattie had brought from her garden—and did not return to his study after they ate.
“Shall we retire early?” he asked Tha?s when he joined her in the parlor after tidying the kitchen.
She brightened. “Are you eager for your lesson?”
“I’m a bit apprehensive,” he admitted. “But I trust you to look after me.”
She looked pleased. “Thank you, Alastair. Look after you I shall.”
They went to the bedroom, and she asked him to help her undress.
“You could do this for your wife,” she said. “It’s more intimate than leaving it to a lady’s maid. And certainly more pleasant for a girl than struggling to get out of a gown and stays all alone.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said. He had a feeling that a woman with a greater sense of modesty might not be as eager as Tha?s to let a man untie her ribbons and look upon her in her stockings. But he wouldn’t argue. Now that he knew how to do it, he enjoyed undressing Tha?s. It was like unwrapping a gift. Or perhaps more like peeling an orange. You knew what would be under the rind, but the fruit was so soft and round and fragrant and juicy that it was a heady pleasure each time.
Once Tha?s was nude she twirled around for him. “Like what you see?” she asked.
“So much,” he answered, for if she could stand here naked without a care in the world, he could at least be honest.
“Enough to give us a hug?”
He smiled at the reference to their moment in the garden. “I’ve been thinking about hugging you since the last time.”
She opened her arms, and he stepped into them. She wrapped her hands beneath his shoulders and rested her head on his chest, above his heart. He hesitated for a moment—it was all so much—but then wrapped his own arms around her, letting his hands fall to her waist.
She sighed contentedly. “I love how tall you are,” she said. “You make me feel like a tiny, little thing.”
He kissed the top of her head. “You are a tiny, little thing.”
She snorted. “I’m an ample, buxom woman. Not even short.”
“You’re short to me.”
“What else am I to you?” She stepped back, so he could have a look.
“Beautiful,” he said. “Perfect.”
“Well, that goes without saying. Be more descriptive.”
“Curvaceous. Pale and peachy, but with the most striking red hair I’ve ever seen.”
“You like my ginger locks, eh?”
“I love your ginger locks.”
Especially, he did not say aloud, the thatch between her legs.
“What else do you love?” she asked.
“Your breasts.”
She gently lifted them and squeezed them together, making a feast out of her cleavage. “These old things?”
“How dare you call them that? They’re magnificent.”
“Touch them, if you like them so much.”
He stepped toward her and cupped the sides of them, gently, as she had done. She sighed. “Your touch feels good.”
He took her at her word and caressed every contour of them. He’d never touched a woman this way—exploring her, looking at her, taking his time.
He noticed that her nipples had gone hard, and he brought his thumbs to them.
“That’s the best part,” she said. “The nips go straight to the pussy.”
He froze at the coarseness of her language and also at the idea of touching her most private feminine part. But then he relaxed. He was here to be talked to like this. To imagine such things.
“Is that so?” he murmured, stroking her nipples with more pressure.
“Mmm,” she said. “Would I lie to you?”
He hoped she wouldn’t. It sometimes felt like in her bluntness she was the first person who had ever been completely honest with him. Granted, her honesty sometimes veered into unpleasant truths, but few people ventured to deal so candidly with men as rich and powerful as himself. It was as refreshing as it was unnerving.
“You can pinch them a little,” Tha?s said. “Not hard, mind.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then be gentle.”
He pinched her nipples as delicately as he could, and she sighed.
“Harder than that, if you please.”
He increased the pressure. “Ah, that’s nice. But do you know what would be even nicer?”
He shook his head.
“Your mouth on them.”
Oh dear God, the effect those words had on him.
He lowered his head, lifted one of her breasts, and kissed it. “Like that?”
“Yes. Good lad.”
He did the same to the other breast.
“Let’s go to bed,” she said. “So you can take your time and explore me all you want.”
She spread herself out in the center of the bed and beckoned him with nothing more than her eyes.
“Your assignment,” she said, “is to learn my body. Study me like you would a map. Use your eyes and hands and mouth. Let your wants guide you. And if you aren’t sure if I’ll like something, just ask me.”
He nodded, and she closed her eyes.
Without her gaze on him, he felt a bit more confident.
He returned his attention to her breasts, lowering his mouth to kiss one. Up close, she smelled even more of that spicy scent. He wanted to burrow his head into her neck and inhale her. Which, he supposed, was reason enough to do it. He put his nose to the hollow of her throat.
“You smell so good,” he said.
“So do you.”
“Me? What do I smell like?”
“Yourself. And there’s a lesson there.”
“What do you mean?”
“You should like the way your lady smells. And not just her perfume. Her skin. It’s a sign that you’ll be good in bed together.”
“Well, there’s no way of knowing that until I’m in bed with her. I can’t just go around sniffing necks.”
“You can kiss her wrist.”
“Men have been shot for less.”
“Don’t do it in range of a pistol.”
“I’m serious. There is no way of knowing what my wife will smell like until we’re married.”
“If you can’t find a way to be close enough to get a good whiff of her, you probably don’t want her badly enough to wed her. Let that be a warning to you.”
He was not going to argue this point. Tha?s was here to teach him about sex; the intricacies of interacting with perfectly bred young ladies was more his province than hers. He went back to kissing her breasts instead.
It was remarkably enjoyable. He took his time, tasting her skin. Basking in her heat. Letting his hands roam. He ventured his way back to her nipples.
“I want to kiss them. Is that... Would you like that?”
“Yes,” she said. “I like it all.”
He put the pink peak into his mouth and laved it with his tongue. When she sighed a bit, he ventured to lick, then suck.
“You’re doing wonderfully,” she said softly. The encouragement was heady. He moved his attention to the other breast.
“Do you know what would be nice?” she asked after a fashion. “If you went lower with that mouth of yours.”
Obediently, he allowed himself to wander to her stomach, kissing his way down, down, down until he reached her hip.
“Why’d you stop?” she asked when he hesitated. She put her hand to the skin just above the hair guarding her womanhood. “This bit is quite sensitive. It wants a bit of love.”
He mirrored her fingers with his own, stroking her softly. She shivered under his touch.
He loved that shiver.
“Now your mouth,” she said.
He kissed her there, and she shivered again.
“Do the same thing to my thighs,” she said.
He put his lips to the soft, soft skin. Her smell was stronger here. It drove him mad. Madder still when she opened her legs a bit, to give him access to her inner thighs.
“When you kiss me there, it’s a tease,” Tha?s said. “Gets a girl imagining your mouth between her legs.”
He’d been imagining just that and feeling like a cad for it.
“That’s something a woman wants? A man’s mouth between her legs?”
“Not all women want the same thing. And your wife might be shy at first. But if you know how to eat a pussy, it’s among the finest skills you can have. Drives a girl wild. Numbs her bloody brains.”
He wasn’t sure about numbed brains, but the idea of driving Tha?s wild was deeply appealing. He was already hard as a rock, and his loins clenched right in that place Tha?s had said was sensitive.
Which was good information. If the sensations in her body paralleled his, then perhaps he could use his own desires as a guide.
“How would I...” He could not bring himself to say the words kiss your pussy, and he did not want to be japed at for calling it something more formal, like labia.
Luckily, she knew what he meant.
She always knew what he meant.
“Have you ever seen a pussy?”
“Well, yes. I’ve had sex.”
“You’ve been inside one. But have you looked at one?”
“Not... closely,” he admitted. He had books on anatomy and had ventured to pore over the female parts. But that was not the same as... this.
“Well, let’s have a look, shall we?” Tha?s said. “I’ll teach you how they work.”
She spread her legs wider, and the thatch of hair parted to reveal something more beautiful than he could have imagined. It was a much pinker color than her skin, richly toned like her nipples, except glistening. Her folds reminded him of orchids.
“The most important part to know about is this,” she said, putting her hand to the nub at the center of herself, between her lips. “It’s a lady’s precious pearl. And if you touch it in a way she likes, she’ll come until she cries.”
She took his hand and placed it there. “Rub it a bit,” she said. “Get a sense for it.”
He massaged her lightly. “That’s nice,” she said. “Perhaps a bit firmer with the pressure.”
“How much firmer?”
“Hmm. Push gently until I stop you, and we’ll see.”
He did as instructed, using his first two fingers. After a second or two of going very, very slowly, she sighed. “Ah, right there. Just like that.”
He froze in place, not wanting to ruin whatever she was feeling.
“Now, if you wanted to make me come, you’d have to move your fingers back and forth to find a rhythm.”
“If I wanted to? Now?”
“Have a go.”
He began to move his fingers.
“Side to side, then up and down, like you’re drawing a circle,” she said.
He fumbled a bit, and her hand came on top of his to demonstrate the motion she desired.
“Ah, there we are,” she sighed. “Like that.”
He kept at it, watching her intently, wondering how long it might take to make her orgasm and what that might look and feel like. The idea of it made him want to come. Which was a relief, after his last two failed attempts.
“Once you have her in a rhythm, try going a little faster. See if she likes that.”
He sped up the motion, and she gasped.
“A bit too fast, love. Try halfway.”
He did and she sighed. “Ah, that’s it.”
She undulated her hips a bit, subtly meeting his movements.
“Now, she might want a little more,” she said breathily. “For you to slide down a little, toward her slit.”
“Like this?” he asked, moving his hand lower. She breathed in sharply.
“A girl might like that, yes. A finger moving in her pussy while you play with her pearl.”
He found this complicated, initially. “I’m not sure I understand.”
“Watch me,” she said.
She put her own hand to her womanhood and demonstrated how to move around her folds, inside and out.
“Now you try,” she said.
He noticed she had grown more slick. “You’re wetter,” he said.
“Aye. The more a girl is wanting, the wetter she becomes.”
He slid his fingers in her juices reverently. It slayed him that he could help make this transformation in her body. That there was empirical evidence he was doing something right. “I love this,” he said.
“So will your woman.”
He wished she had said So do I. She was the only woman he wanted to do this to.
And he wanted to do more.
“You said it would feel good if I used my mouth,” he said. “Should I... try that?”
“Ah, he wants to be an advanced pupil,” she said.
Really, he just wanted to taste her wetness, lick her pearl, trace her slit with his tongue. He could imagine it now, the heat of a mouth on an inflamed place. He could imagine her doing it to him.
He wanted her to do it to him.
But he wanted this more.
“How should I start?” he asked.
She lifted her knees up and widened her legs even more, so she was completely open to him.
“Lick her the way she liked you to touch her,” she said.
He put his lips gingerly to her flesh. She was hot, tasting of salt and something fresh and sweet, like grass.
The best thing he’d ever tasted.
“Oh, fuck,” he said, without meaning to. He hated to curse.
But maybe this fucking warranted it.
“You like that?” she asked breathily.
“Tha?s. This is... I don’t... It’s shocking. It’s the nicest thing I’ve ever felt.”
She ran her fingers through his hair.
“You’re going to have a very happy wife, if that’s the case.”
“Can I... can I kiss you there?”
“You may kiss me all you like.”
He pressed his mouth fully to her wet flesh and slid his tongue up and down. He kissed her pearl like it was her tongue, passionately, moaning into her. He was conscious of the pressure of the bed against his cock, and he had to shift his hips away from it because he was likely to burst with just the slightest stimulation, and he didn’t want to stop this.
Especially because she was rocking her hips with him, making heart-stopping little noises, murmuring his name.
Remembering his lessons with his fingers, he gave her more pressure. And then he remembered she’d liked it when he lightly sucked her nipples and decided to try that, very gently with her pearl.
She cried out when he did it.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“That was the good kind of noise,” she said. “Do that again.”
He did, and she closed her legs around his head and began to pulse beneath his mouth, crying out, “Oh Christ.”
He kept doing it as she bucked against him, making the most delicious noises, noises he could not mistake for pain now that he knew what her pleasure sounded like.
As she shook, he began to tremble, his cock seizing. He desperately pressed it down onto the bed and made a rutting motion, too overcome to care that he was fucking a counterpane, and as he came he moaned her name into her pussy.
Tha?s. Tha?s. Tha?s.