Chapter 9 #2
“No?” Kayden's fingers began loosening the stays of her corset. “I think it has performed rather nicely thus far.”
It was an unimaginable relief to let her ribs expand.
The corset was not such a terribly uncomfortable thing as she had expected it to be when Lottie and Eleanora had introduced her to it, but there were moments at which she had wondered if dancing in such a contraption was an entirely wise choice.
Little wonder some of the women had come so near fainting after some of the more vigorous numbers.
He turned her, and opened the fastenings up the front of the corset, catching it as it fell and laying it in the chair with the other things.
Mya took a deep breath and let it out again on a pleased sigh.
“Glad to be rid of it?” Kayden asked, the smile on his face saying he knew quite well that she was.
She didn't answer. Only reached down and pulled the chemise she had been wearing beneath it over the top of her head.
Kayden's eyes darkened as she threw it aside, not bothering with the chair for it.
He stepped back into her space, curling his hands beneath the weight of her breasts and brushing his thumbs over her nipples.
Mya gasped as they peaked under the touch.
Her ribs and stomach were marked with the indentations the corset's boning had left behind.
Kayden ran his hands along them, and she shivered with the ticklish sensation of the barely there contact.
When his fingers reached her waist, Kayden stripped the drawers off, and Mya kicked them to the side, left only in her stockings and garters. She reached to loosen them, and Kayden stilled her hand.
“Those stay,” he said, lips tilting into a crooked smile.
“Oh, they do, do they?” Mya's eyebrows lifted. “And what if I wish them to go?”
“Then you will break my heart,” he replied instantly.
She laughed, and left the garters alone.
Kayden lifted her, hands around her waist, and set her on the bed.
Mya leaned comfortably back on her hands, relishing the warm air of the room sliding over her naked skin.
He, of course, did not have nearly so much clothing to remove as she had, and it was a matter of only moments before he was naked entirely.
He looked the way he had in her dream. Not just a little, as though she had guessed at what his physique might be under the suit, but exactly. The slope of his shoulders. The width of his hips. The... She flushed a little at the mental comparison and shook off the thought.
“You turn such a pretty shade of pink,” Kayden said as he knelt on the bed, his hands curling around her thighs and drawing her in close to him. “Whatever is going through that lovely head of yours?”
“You,” Mya answered truthfully.
Kayden looked entirely too pleased with himself at the answer, and she rather wished she hadn't given it, but there was nothing to be done about it when the word had already left her lips.
“You are quite a pleasure to regard, yourself,” he said, leaning down to brush his lips over the shell of her ear and making her breath hitch as his blew warm over her skin. There was a tension in his voice that said he was trying not to laugh. “I think we make a handsome couple.”
Mya hooked a leg around his hip to drag him closer. “Stop admiring yourself and do something useful, would you?”
“As you wish.”
In the next moment, he was pressing inside her, groaning against her neck as he filled her with a long, slow thrust. Mya echoed the sound, spine curving and toes curling, arching up into the weight of his body against her own.
He felt familiar. Like her body knew his.
Like safety, and warmth, and pleasure burning its way through the core of her.
They moved together in an easy rhythm, and Mya let herself go.
She met him each time he rocked down, moaned his name without care for who might hear.
It didn't matter. All that mattered was Kayden—on top of her, inside her, all around her.
Her nails raked lines down his back, and Kayden hissed pleasure and pain, answering the sting with a bite at the curve of her throat, where it would be hidden by the high collar of her everyday dress.
“Mya,” he growled, picking up the pace. “Mya... Damn.”
“Yes.” Pleasure dragged her eyelids down, but she didn't let them close, kept her gaze fixed on his face. He was looking down at her too, with a hungry intensity in his dark eyes that made the pleasure shared between them somehow stronger. Sharper. “Yes,” she said again. “Kayden.”
He moved faster still, and harder. Mya could hear the headboard of the bed rocking against the wall, and was once more grateful for the deserted wing they shared. Kayden traced her jawline with his lips, and found her mouth with his.
They rocked like that, wrapped around each other and pressed together at every possible point. It was perfect. Damn perfect. It was amazing. He was amazing, and Mya couldn't think past him and the way he felt. The way they felt together.
He was getting close. She could feel it in the way that his rhythm faltered, knew the way that his breath came in quick pants. His fingers stroked over her waist, her hip. Mya felt the pleasure building at her core, and kissed him hard. Hungry.
They went over the edge together. She cried out, and Kayden muffled a gasp of her name against her shoulder. His hands curled bruisingly tight over the curves of her hips.
Slowly, the hands holding her went lax and fell away. Kayden rolled to the side to avoid putting all his weight down on her, and they lay side by side in the rumpled sheets, both of them panting, and grinning at nothing.
“Useful enough for you?” Kayden asked at last, turning his head so he could watch her profile.
“I would say that I am satisfied with your performance.”
“'Satisfied?' Is that all?”
“Mmm.” Mya stared up at the ceiling, pretending to consider her answer. “I am not sure. I think it might require a repeat performance, to test the results.”
Kayden laughed, and an arm slid beneath her and pulled her to him, her head against his shoulder and her body wrapped around his. “You are a cruel mistress.”
“Cruel? Not in the least. I am only demanding. I wish to make sure that you are giving me your best.” She tipped her head back to look up at him. “A gentleman must always offer his utmost, after all. “
“This gentleman is going to show you a thing or two in a moment.”
Mya sniffed. “I should like to see you try.”
“Is that a challenge, my lady?” Kayden asked.
He didn’t wait for her answer. As it turned out, he had a thing or two to show her after all.