Chapter 3 #2
“I know,” she muttered, but before she could think any more about it, she pushed off from the top.
The slide down was a heart-stopping blur as her satin skirts sent her sailing along the well-polished wood. The air whipped her hair back, tugging some it loose from the pins and making her gasp. Her pulse raced and the speed made her delightfully giddy.
All too soon it was ending. She saw Nev’s face register surprise as he moved into a position right below the bannister as if to catch her. Then she reached the bottom and vaulted into him. He staggered back, but she’d gained too much momentum, and they both went crashing to the floor.
For a second, she lay atop him, stunned into silence by the impact. Then realizing he was perfectly still beneath her, she pushed up onto her elbows and peered into his face.
“Nev?”
He didn’t so much as blink.
Her heart raced. Surely she hadn’t killed him. Then again, he’d fallen awfully hard. “Merciful heavens, Nev . . . speak to me!” She cupped his face in her hands and peered into his eyes. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to . . . Oh, Nev, I’ll die if I’ve hurt you!”
Then she felt his arms clamp about her waist. He opened his eyes and grinned up at her. “You were saying?”
She scowled, then pushed against his chest. “You wretched scoundrel! I thought I’d killed you, and here you are, perfectly well.”
“Not perfectly well.” Without warning, he rolled over, putting her beneath him. “I’ll probably have bruises upon bruises tomorrow, but I’m not dead.”
He shifted until he lay half on her, half off, supporting his weight on one elbow as he rested his free hand on her waist. “No, not at all dead,” he added as his gaze drifted over her face, then lower, to her breasts, which were near to bursting out of her dress, thanks to her corset and her awkward position.
Heat rose in her cheeks. One of his legs lay cradled between hers and he pressed it along the length of her thigh in a sensuous movement that made her suck in her breath.
That seemed to delight him. “Or perhaps I am dead,” he murmured as he bent to nuzzle her forehead. “Dead and gone to heaven.”
“I doubt that’s where you’d go,” she retorted, trying to stem the tide of emotions surging in her at his touch.
“Probably not.” He flashed her a seductive smile, staring down at her through eyelids heavy with desire. “I’m much too wicked for heaven.”
And to prove it, he ran his fingers through her already half-fallen hair until it was completely free of pins. Lazily he scattered the strands of hair through his fingers before stroking them away from her face.
Her pulse quickened. Oh, dear, this wasn’t wise at all. She should tell him to move. She should push him away.
But their bodies fit so well together. And it was exciting to have his weight on her.
That was her last thought before he lowered his head. Then he was covering her mouth with lips so warm, she thought they would melt her. They caressed and stroked with light, teasing touches until her breathing grew heavy and her heart raced.
He ran his tongue lightly along her lips. This time he didn’t need to prod her to open her mouth, for it seemed to open of its own accord, letting him plunge his tongue into the very depths, sweeping the inside with a stroke that was at once soothing and thrilling.
But he didn’t stop there. His mouth slanted over hers more demandingly as his tongue began a driving rhythm that turned her to jelly.
In a daze, she brought her arms around his waist, holding him to her.
The dear torment of his kiss so captivated her that she hardly noticed when his hand traveled down to rest on her breast or when he parted her legs even more with one muscular thigh.
She was too caught up in tasting the brandy on his breath and smelling the musky male scent of him to push him away.
He kneaded her breast through the satin of her gown, and she sighed low in her throat. She felt warm and full to bursting, like a ripe peach threatening to split its skin.
Her own skin tingled all over, alive with delicious new sensations. She seemed to be thinking on a level below consciousness, where her body acted on its own instincts, rising against him wantonly and arching into his hand in a desperate attempt to soothe the ache he roused in her breast.
And still the kiss went on, deeper and more drugging until she was practically insensible.
Only then did he drag his mouth from hers, just to move it lower, scattering kisses over her throat, the sloping curve of her neck, and then the half-moons of her breasts showing above her bodice.
He kissed the swells of flesh, his whiskers scraping the tender skin.
Then his fingers stopped their caressing motions to pull down her bodice, corset, and shift, freeing one breast for his perusal.
The chill air against her warm skin brought her briefly to her senses and she pressed her hands against his shoulders, but when he lowered his mouth to cover one pink nipple, her fingers curled into his shirt as she gasped.
It was so . . . so hot and exciting and daring. It seemed right to let him do this scandalous thing to her on this night, her stolen night. And he did it so very well, sucking the nipple until it grew hard as a pebble, then swirling his tongue around it, over and over . . . and over.
“You like that, don’t you, my beauty?” His eyes glittered like cut emeralds as he stared at her. With a mischievous smile, he blew a breath across the wet, puckered skin, making her clutch him to her. “Oh, yes, you definitely like it.”
“I’m very bad, I suppose.” Was this where she should tell him to stop? Could she?
Amusement danced across his handsome features. “Not at all. I think you’re very good.” He tugged at her nipple with his teeth, then closed his eyes. “Ah, yes, very good indeed.”
Before she could retort, he began to draw on her breast more roughly than before, making her cling to him. Her head fell back and she closed her eyes with a moan.
What heaven he was creating with his mouth! Now she knew how he’d gained his reputation and why “many a woman” would “grace his bed.” He knew how to make a woman quiver and tremble and ache in places where she’d never ached before. And she couldn’t bear to stop him.
She hardly noticed when he moved his hand down to the hem of her skirts, then inched them up until her thighs were exposed. But when he slid his hand between her legs to cup her most secret place and rub it with the heel of his palm, her eyes shot open. What he was doing was outrageous. Scandalous!
She loved it.
Oh, I really should make him stop.
Yet she didn’t, even when his fingers parted her thatch of hair and stroked a tight little nub there, sending fire shooting through her veins. She squirmed against his hand, her fingers digging into his shoulders as he fondled her more and more boldly.
But when his finger delved inside her, she stiffened. The intimacy of it, the shock of the caress jolted her out of acquiescence.
This wasn’t right. No matter how good it felt, she mustn’t let him touch her like this. Not if she wanted to keep her virtue.
“Nev?” She closed her fingers around his wrist to force it back from her.
He let her pull his hand away, but lifted his head from her breast, eyes blazing. “Yes?”
“I-I think we should stop this now.”
For a moment, she didn’t know if he’d understood. There was a wild light in his face, and his breath was coming hard as a stallion’s after a race.
“I said—”
“I heard you.”
She swallowed at the hard note in his voice. “Then ... then could you please get off of me?”
He closed his eyes, as if seeking for mastery over his actions. Then he bit out, “Yes. Of course.”
With a great shuddering breath, he rolled off to lie beside her on the floor. Blindly he stared up at the ceiling, his jaw rigid.
She felt bereft, shut off from him and his thoughts …
and the wonderful enticements of his caresses.
But she squelched her regret, tugging her bodice back into place and jerking down her skirts.
It didn’t matter how pleasurable he’d made her feel or how angry he was now.
If she gave in tonight, she’d hate herself on the morrow.
Still, she felt guilty for letting him touch her so intimately, then making him end it. Turning onto her side, she stared over at him. “I’m sorry.”
His words were clipped. “You’ve nothing to feel sorry about.”
“But I shouldn’t have let you—”
“There’s one thing you should learn right now, Althea.” He shifted to face her. Desire flared briefly in his eyes as he let his gaze trail over her prone form. Then he seemed to master it, and with it, his anger.
When he continued, his voice was lower, huskier.
“Never apologize to a man for giving him an inch. In the first place, any man is happy to have that inch. In the second place, if you apologize for giving an inch, the man will use your apology to take a mile. You are perfectly in your rights to stop a man from taking your virtue. At any point.”
She couldn’t believe he was giving her such candid advice. As he’d no doubt intended, his words made her smile. “Even you?”
“Especially me.” He gave a mock scowl. “Though you can’t expect me to like it.”
Thinking of how he’d just warned her away from himself, she burst into laughter. “You know what, Lord Foxworth?”
“What?”
“You are a complete hypocrite.”
He arched an eyebrow at her. “Oh?”
“No self-respecting rake would give his intended victim advice on how to rebuff him.” She stabbed a finger at his chest. “You’re a fraud. You’re not nearly as self-serving as you pretend.”
He grinned as he caught her hand, then kissed the inside of her wrist. “On the other hand, perhaps being straightforward is simply one more weapon a rake uses to seduce his ‘victim.’”
She snatched her hand back with a gasp. “Oh, I hadn’t thought of that. Such deviousness is beyond the realm of even my imagination.”