Cheryl Holt (23 page)

“Fuck me with your hand.” And he ushered her to his shaft, once again.

She took on the erogenous chore, and her firm grip was magic. In a half-dozen lunges, he tensed and emitted a haunting groan. Hot liquid spurted across her abdomen and fingertips, purging him, then he shuddered and sank onto her, collapsing fully.

His breathing was labored, heavy and erratic, his heartbeat
thundering against his ribs, beating furiously with her own. He didn’t speak—perhaps he couldn’t—and for once, she was glad of the silence. Words failed her.

Nothing had prepared her for how personal the moment would be. She felt he’d bared his soul, that he’d exposed himself as he never could with another, and she held him close. Eventually, he mellowed, but he was motionless, his forehead pressed to her breasts.

Abruptly, he sat up and moved to the edge of the bed, showing her his back.

His legs were unsteady, and he fortified himself then proceeded to the tub, dipping a washing cloth in the water and returning to her side. He avoided her gaze as he conscientiously cleansed his seed away, then threw the cloth on the floor. When he faced her again, in an unguarded moment, she witnessed vulnerability and loneliness.

A wave of protectiveness flowed over her, and she needed to provide comfort, emotionally as well as physically. She opened her arms in welcome, and he joined her willingly, resting in the crook of her neck. Much as one might a young child who’d been scared or injured, she nurtured him and, as she rifled her fingers through his thick mane of hair, she couldn’t help thinking that this was where she wanted to always be, where she belonged.

Gradually, she noticed that he was developing another erection, and shortly, his cock was stubborn and intractable against her belly. He started kissing against her nape, sending chills down her spine, then he abandoned his safe perch, trailing down her chest, to a breast, and her breath whooshed out when he closed over the extended crest. Like a babe, he suckled against her. Gently at first, then more fervently, he increased the tension, until he had her writhing and squirming.

“What are you trying to accomplish?” she managed to gasp.

“I’m pleasuring you.”

“It doesn’t feel
pleasurable
.”

“It will. Trust me,” he commented encouragingly. “The
sensations are new, so they seem foreign to you, but they’re customary.”

“I don’t know what to do.” She hated that he was in charge.

“You don’t have to
do
anything,” he contended, laughing softly. “Just relax while I dally.”

Relax?
Was he mad? How could she relax when a man the likes of Michael Stevens was on top of her and nursing at her breast?

He kissed across her cleavage to her other nipple, and he toyed ruthlessly until it was raw and irritated. His hand idly trailed down her stomach. In a pattern of agonizing circles, he descended lower and lower, never falling quite far enough.

Finally, he sneaked inside her drawers and honed in on the spot his thumb had located earlier. At the same time, two fingers glided into her cleft, and momentarily, he had her hips flexing in an infuriating rhythm. She strained toward an unknown goal—if the cad would just point her in the proper direction, the journey would be so much easier—and she teetered on a ledge of desire, needing to leap off but not confident of when or where.

“What’s happening?” she spat out, scarcely able to find the air necessary for communication.

“Have you never touched yourself like this? In the night? When you’re alone?”

“No . . . never . . .”The information delighted him, and she could sense that he was grinning. The presumptuous rogue!

“You’re going toward a peak of pleasure. As I did.” He delayed the tempo, just when she was burning for it to multiply, and, cognizant of the havoc he was wreaking, he chuckled again. “The first time can be scary. But I promise that it will also be wonderful.”

“I don’t know . . . how . . .” She couldn’t elucidate, couldn’t implore, couldn’t talk.

Oh, when would this torment cease?

“Your body knows.” As though supplying confirmation,
he rubbed where all sensation seemed to be centered, and she arched up and would have flown off the bed if he hadn’t been hindering her escape. “Close your eyes, and I’ll take you where you want to go.”

“I’m afraid,” she whispered.

“Don’t be. I’m here with you.”

“Michael . . .”

He paused. “Say my name again.”

“Michael!” she wailed, on the brink, frightened.

The cliff beckoned and, when he latched onto her breast and suckled adamantly, she jumped, sending herself into freefall. She was shattered, undone, and careening through the universe. A voice called out, with an extraordinary kind of ecstasy, and she vaguely recognized that it was her own, then his lips were on hers, silencing her by capturing her wild cry of joy.

The frenzy persisted for an eternity until, sequentially, she commenced to reassemble. Sanity and reality returned, and she was in Michael’s bed, in Michael’s arms.

She dared a peek at him, and he lingered over her with a look that could only be tenderness. There was a hint of male pride there, as well, at having reduced her to such a wanton circumstance.

“Much better,” he murmured, and he kissed her cheek.

“Yes.” She endeavored to shift away but didn’t get far. His weight still pressed her down. “What was that?”

“An orgasm. The French refer to it as the
petit mort
, the little death.”

“Well . . . they’ve surely got the right of it.” She lifted a hand and let it fall with a heavy thud. “My bones have melted. I can’t move.”

“You don’t have to. Just rest for a bit.”

“Then, what?”

“We’ll do it again.”

“You’re joking!”

“I’m not.”

“My heart would quit beating.”

He kissed her once more. “It will get better.”

“More intense?”

“Absolutely. And quicker to achieve the more you’re with me.”

“I’ll never survive.”

“Perhaps not.”

He urged her over so that her back was spooned against his front. One arm lay under her head, a muscled, intriguing pillow. The other was over her torso, his fingers making lazy loops on her stomach and hip.

Her perception was heightened—the bristle of his bodily hair, the heat of his cock on her bottom, the smell of their mingled sweat and sex—and everything appeared more extreme and profound.

A yawn emerged; she was too tired to hide it, and he drew a blanket over them, sealing them in a snug cocoon.

What next?
The vexing interrogatory flitted by, but she was elated, exhausted, and too fatigued to dwell on the future.

She slept.

When she awoke, she brooked only a minor instant of alarm while she sought to recall where she was, but the episode swiftly passed, and the scandalous memories flooded in.

Where he was concerned, she’d developed an elevated awareness, and she could sense him in the room, studying her. A light aroma of tobacco tickled her nose. He was smoking—a tidbit to tuck away in her limited collection of the Michael trivialities she’d gleaned. Her eyes fluttered open, even as she pondered how they would interact now that their sexual escapade was terminated.

He was in a chair by the window, but as distant as if he’d been all the way beyond the ocean in America. He was dressed only in a pair of trousers, his hair was swept off his forehead, accenting the cut over his eye, and he watched her impassively. A half-empty glass of brandy sat on the table, and he was holding a cheroot, the butt aglow, the smoke curling upward. Behind him, she could see outside.
The shadows had lengthened and much of the day had passed away.

On seeing her stir, he snuffed out the cigar, but he didn’t say anything.

She came up on one elbow, her cascade of auburn hair tumbling over her shoulder. The blanket drooped, baring a breast, and his brow rose in nonchalant disinterest. Their bedplay had been engaging and exotic when he’d been participating, but now, as he frigidly stared with no deference displayed on his beautiful face, she felt absurd.

Clutching at the quilt, she posed the only query that seemed to matter. “What time is it?”

“Almost five.”

Unnerved, she speculated as to whether he’d napped at all, or if he’d enigmatically assessed her, wishing she’d rise and retire, but not quite rude enough to wake her and insist.

From her perspective, the romp had been the most resplendent, fabulous ever; from his, nothing out of the ordinary. In all likelihood, he regularly wasted his days in sexual frolic, and she’d merely been lumped in with the scores of loose women with whom he cavorted.

Troubled by her musings, she strove for levity. “I guess you wore me out.”

“
Fucking
will do that to a person.” He nodded toward the bed. “I fetched your robe.”

“Thank you.”

It was draped on the bedding, and she couldn’t stifle a thrilling rush at the thought that he’d visited her bedchamber. For some reason, the notion of him invading her boudoir, searching through her armoire and examining her belongings, was fascinating.

“You’re going to miss tea,” he remarked casually, “so you need to bathe, then go down for supper. We’ve been here for quite a spell, so it’s important that you put in an appearance.”

So, he
was
eager for her to depart. How disappointing!

“I doubt if anyone will miss me,” she was compelled to
report. “I’m not any more of a social butterfly than you are.”

“Your cousin knocked a while ago.”

His look was filled with inquisition and accusation, and she could picture him standing in the middle of her room, robe in hand, with Rebecca on the other side of the door. They’d been so close to detection! While she should have been frantic and appalled, she was exhilarated by the danger in which she’d deposited herself—and him.

What had come over her? The woman she’d been before she’d arrived, before she’d met Michael Stevens, had vanished.

“Did she try the knob?”

“Of course.” He stared her down. “She’s awfully determined to catch you in a compromising position. Why do you suppose that is?”

“I’ve no idea,” she responded blandly, adopting his reticence. She had no desire to discuss Rebecca, to permit the outside world, her other life—her real life—to intrude on this flight of fancy.

Keeping the covers flattened against her bosom, she battled to don her robe, not granting him a view of her nakedness. While the state had seemed normal when they’d been making love, with him imperturbably glaring at her, she was embarrassed by her nudity, and she simply felt inappropriately undressed.

She scooted to the edge of the bed, but she couldn’t take the necessary steps to leave. She was terrified that once she departed, they’d never cross paths again.

He was treating her just as he did his other lovers, as if the event hadn’t had any effect on him, and she despised his composed, nonchalant disposition. His cool reserve and taciturnity were warning her off and away. Yet, she wasn’t timid; she declined to surrender without a fight, because she craved a loving relationship with him.

“Would you like me to return after supper?”

His reply was the very worst. “As you wish.”

The aggravating response, the one he habitually utilized
to chase off his paramours, set a spark to her temper. She wasn’t some doxy! Not a woman of loose morals with whom he could randomly trifle! She was a chaste, upstanding female, who’d chosen him—scoundrel though he was—and favored him with a part of herself she never proposed to bestow on another, and she wouldn’t have her boon discarded as if she was of no import.

Stomping across the floor, she halted at his chair, their knees tangled, their feet overlapping, and he was surprised by her audacious move. Let him be!

“Stop it!” she dictated.

“Stop what?” He was plainly uncomfortable with her directness.

“Quit pretending that this afternoon was of no consequence.”

He fidgeted. “I never said that.”

“But that’s how you’re acting.” Didn’t he realize how special this was to her? “Our meeting held little significance to you, but it meant a great deal to me.” Quietly, she added, “Don’t ruin it.”

He scrutinized her, then tipped his head in acknowledgment. “I didn’t intend to discount what happened. I just assumed you’d want to be about your business.”

“That I’ve had my
fun
, and now I’m finished with you?”

“Aye.”

“Hear me, Michael Stevens: It will take a bit more than your bad attitude and rude manners to make me conclude that we’re through.”

“I see that.” One corner of his exquisite mouth hinted at a smile.

She figured that was as close as she’d ever get to an apology. There were many things about him she didn’t understand, but many things that were clear, as well. When he let his guard down, he could be tender and unselfish, though he resisted her attempts at closeness, and it dawned on her that perhaps he never became amorously attached to any female, so he’d built protective walls.

While he hoped to diminish the magnitude of their affinity,
she had other plans. He wanted her to visit him again; she just knew he did! And she would force him to say so if she had to literally drag the admission from his lips.

“Don’t treat me with the disregard you exhibit to your other lovers.”

“I wasn’t,” he lied.

“You could have fooled me.” He had the grace to blush. Without a doubt, he’d been pushing her away, but she’d spoiled his scheme by refusing to go peacefully.

“I’m confused, Sarah,” he ultimately confessed. “About you. About us.”

“So am I,” she agreed, “but I won’t deny our connection, and I won’t let you deny it, either. This is too vital to me.” She laid her hand on his shoulder. “I ask you again: Would you like me to return later?”

“I believe I would.”

Her relief was so immense that her knees sagged, and she yearned to confide so much more—to tell him how meaningful the interlude had been, how she’d been transformed—but words failed her.

She turned and walked to the door that connected their rooms, and she stepped through but, unable to resist, she stole a peek at him, grimly desperate for a final glimpse.