Chapter 3 #3
“Easy, His Royal Highness,” Joshua soothed as the warmth of his body moved to touch the back of hers, and the motion had the opposite effect on her.
Her breath caught as his hand came around her waist and pulled her back against his front.
His fingers splayed across her stomach and she nearly moaned with the pleasure of every part of his body touching hers.
His scent heightened her desire as her head fell back against his chest and his body engulfed hers.
Even through the barrier of their clothing, the experience was intoxicating.
The horse calmed. Her hand shook and Joshua’s lips brushed her neck as he ducked down below the brim of her bonnet and whispered in her ear, “He won’t hurt you, trust me.”
That was the problem. She did trust him. She didn’t trust herself. It would be too easy to fall into this man’s arms and lose herself to the passion. The security. And then everything she had worked so hard to earn would be his. Not hers. His. Just like it had been with Richard.
She pulled away and stumbled. The horse yanked its head back and Phoebe strode toward the sleigh where she rigidly awaited Joshua to assist her up.
He talked to His Royal Highness a bit longer and then strolled to her side, not once giving any indication that her abrupt departure dissuaded him from his goals.
He lifted her into the seat and asked, “Would you like to drive?”
“Me? I’ve never driven a conveyance in my life. I’ve never even ridden on a horse.”
“Truly? Not even as a young girl?”
“Never. I was learning how to become a lady.”
“But ladies ride all the time.”
“My mother did not want my complexion to break out in more spots.” It had become second nature to protect her nose from the outdoors. Her mother had cursed her ivory complexion and auburn coloring, which seemed to create more and more spots with each passing year.
Joshua’s gaze traveled to the freckles on her nose and cheeks. “Those spots have captivated me for over a decade. Looking at your face is like gazing up at the stars. One could get lost in the beauty of its divine decree.”
She blushed. No one had ever said anything so beautiful to her in her life. A snowflake fell and melted against her cheek and Phoebe looked toward the sky. Another landed on the tip of her nose and despite everything she was feeling, she smiled.
“I bet I can catch more snowflakes on my tongue than you can,” Joshua challenged as he pulled himself up into the seat next to her and threw a fur blanket across her lap.
“That’s a silly game,” she replied.
“How can you say something you’ve never played is silly?”
“Because just the thought of us driving down the road with our tongues sticking out sounds childish, or at the very least scandalous.”
He flicked the reins. “Like something the cousin of the scandalous sisters would do?” He inquired. She eyed him as they left the castle behind and he tilted his head toward the sky. Then he opened his mouth and stuck his tongue out.
Joshua had his tongue stuck out as if there was absolutely nothing improper about such a display in front of his employer, let alone a lady.
She stared at him, amazement and something she couldn’t identify washing over her.
She had seen many men act without a care for propriety, especially when it came to their behavior around scandalous women, but Joshua had never done anything so unaffected or frivolous in their entire acquaintance.
The innocence of the act contradicted his raw masculinity and it was…
Mesmerizing.
He looked over at her and grinned, his tongue still sticking out in the cold air without a single flake caught. “Will you not join me in my endeavor?”
A snort escaped her lips and she covered her mouth, giggling through her glove at his awkward pronunciations. “You’re talking with your tongue sticking out.” Incongruity made her comment sound like a question.
A snowflake landed on his tongue and he celebrated with a whoop, his joy completely infectious. “You try it.”
“I couldn’t.”
“You could.” He stuck his tongue out once more and she couldn’t resist. She tilted her head back and opened her mouth.
Almost instantly a flake landed on her eyelash and her lip at the same time.
She blinked several times as she licked her lip.
“I did it,” she announced her voice full of a childlike wonder she didn’t recognize.
Joshua scoffed. “Not only did you cheat, but you also didn’t really catch one.”
“I did too, right on my upper lip.”
His gaze dropped to her mouth and she couldn’t stop her tongue from tracing across her skin where the snowflake had fallen.
“You’ll never catch a snowflake like that,” he rasped, his voice holding a huskiness she’d only heard once before, and she knew, without a doubt, she wanted so much more than a kiss on this sleigh ride.
“You must stick out your tongue and catch it.” Still his gaze did not leave her mouth, as if the enticement to corrupt her into acting so wantonly was the most deliciously wicked thing he’d ever done.
And she was drawn by the potency of that desire.
It was there in the dark depths of his gaze, the tautness of his jaw, while his lack of concentration on the horse displayed a natural ability to guide the sleigh as if it were no chore at all.
He was masterful. Commanding. She did not want to disappoint this man who waited with bated breath as if her sticking out her tongue was the most erotic display he could ever wish to see.
Slowly, deliberately, she moistened her lips, tracing them one at a time.
His nostrils flared as her teeth sunk into her lower lip and she slowly released it before leisurely sticking out her tongue bit by bit.
Despite wanting to witness the intensity of his passion, she closed her eyes and savored the moment as she tilted her head back in pure abandon.
She’d only surrendered to temptation once in her lifetime.
In her library. With him. Joshua made her want to carry on as if the world was hers, and not the other way around.
This unrestrained freedom did not belong to women of the ton, and despite all her shocking and outrageous house parties, Phoebe had never once participated in such an unspeakable display of impropriety.
He did this to her. For her.
She let the silence of the snowfall engulf her.
The sleek runners of the sleigh, slicing through the deep snow.
The clop of the horse’s hooves mingled with the animal’s heavy breath as it created a symphonic beat with the jingle of the sleigh bells that announced the coming of a new age for her.
An age where she let down her guard and enjoyed the small gifts of life she’d never been allowed to acknowledge.
A small frozen dewdrop splashed on the warmth of her tongue, and then another, larger than the first. A smile spread across her face, and strong gentle fingers caressed her jaw, gliding upward into her hair as she was pulled toward Joshua.
Her hand immediately grasped for something to hold onto, anything to give her stability in this unsettling new reality of truly wanting to give herself to another.
Her palm found the only thing that could possibly give her the security she needed—a powerful, muscular thigh.
Lips crushed hers and she gasped, her eyes popping open to see Joshua up close and personal.
The strength of his fingers flexing through her hair was intoxicating.
Like a drug too potent to resist, his tongue took advantage of her shock and delved into her mouth, caressing her own with a carnality she had dreamt about for months.
To say she relaxed into his embrace would be a lie.
She melted into it with as much pent-up passion as he.
They combusted as one, their bodies aflame with desire, her eyes falling closed once more as her bonnet dropped from her head.
His kiss grew bolder, deeper and she reveled in the heat of their passion.
He was everything she had ever dreamed a lover could be.
Giving. Wild and unrestrained. In any other lover, it would have been unsettling. With Joshua it made her bold.