Folly (8 page)

“Eleanor. Open your eyes. Good.” God, she was lovely. Even
reflected in the mirror. “How does it feel?”

“W-what?”

“Knowing your cunt is open, exposed.”

“I-I…” She could offer no more, nothing but a deep groan.
Ethan was gratified at the knowledge that she was so close to completion she
could barely form words. Because frankly, he was running out of restraint
himself. There was only so much a man could take.

But still…

He leaned closer. Because he really wanted to see this.
“Slip your hand between your legs.”

She quivered, swallowed. Obeyed.

“Good.” His heart thudded. “What does it feel like?”

“Warm. Wet.”

“Yes. It’s warm and wet because you’re aroused. Aren’t you?”

“Y-yes.”

“Can you feel that hard ball there?”

“Yes.” A whisper, but barely.

“That’s called your clitoris. Can you say that?”

“Cl-clit…clitoris.”

“Rub it.”

She moaned at his words. Then moaned again as she sank
deeper, into her furred nest, between the swollen lips protecting her center,
and found her pearl. “Ethan…”

“Keep rubbing. Do it slow. Now, with your other hand, rub
your nipple.”

“I-I can’t.”

“You did it earlier. Never say you are refusing to do it
now.”

She whimpered and lifted her hand. He watched with avid
interest as she explored her breast, traced a tentative path to the crest and,
through the lace, stroked.

Her eyes flew open. “Oh my.”

“What is it?” He perched on the edge of the bed. “What did
it feel like?”

“The lace…is rough.”

“Do you like it? The rough lace?”

“Y-yes.”

Yes. He knew it did. He bit back a smile. She was panting
now, hips wriggling ever so slightly on the bed. “Do it again.” She did. “And
again.” Yes. She arched her back and cried out, but it wasn’t a cry of
fulfillment, it was a cry of desperation.

“Ethan. Ethan. Please.”

“Please what?”

“Please help me. Help me come.”

A flash of triumph washed through him, but it was quickly
followed by a searing ache that settled in the region of his hard, tight balls.
The desire to mount her racked him. He fought it back. Scrabbled for control.

“Eleanor, I do love it when you beg.”

She wriggled again, fervently stroking her cunt, plucking at
her breast. “Please!”

So tempting. He tightened his fingers into a fist.

Discipline. This was about discipline.

He had it.

He was certain of it.

He swallowed heavily. “You can make yourself come, my little
one.”

“I can?”

“Yes.” And he would watch. “Arch up your hips. Yes. That’s
nice. Now slip inside.”

“I couldn’t.”

“You can. And you will.” He tried to be stern but his tone
sounded somewhat pleading, even to his ears. Dear God, he wanted to see this.

He leaned forward and watched as her finger, slender and
slick with cream, slipped into her cavern. He shuddered.

As did she. “It’s not enough. It’s not enough!”

“Two. Try two.” She did. Her groan of satisfaction quickly
turned to frustration. “Three. Three. Try three.”

She shifted her position, arched her body even more and did
so, fucking her sopping cunt in a frenetic rhythm. All the while, the other
hand tugged at her swollen nipples, one after the other. She was wild, she was
crazed. She was coming.

It was written on her face. The relief. The bliss. The
release.

He didn’t remember undoing the placket of his trousers but
he must have, because before she’d finished with the first of many tremors, he
was on top of her, cock in hand. The second she vacated that coveted cavern, he
was
in
, thrusting past the tight, tense walls.

She constricted on him as she came, massaging and caressing
his length, sucking at it as he withdrew until he thought he would lose his
mind to the pleasure of it. He shoved in again and again and yet again as she
quivered and cried out and squeezed him in a mindless frenzy.

“Yes,” he huffed as he jammed himself deeper and deeper
still. His cock throbbed intensely. His balls were tight nuts pulled up between
his legs. The burn, the ecstasy welled within him. It was entangled with a deep
sense of satisfaction, of vindication. For he had made her beg, made her come.
He had tormented her and not given in.

“Who has discipline now, my little one?” he growled into her
ear.

“Ah, Ethan,” she cried as she came again. “Who cares?”

They fell asleep after their tryst, and no wonder. They’d
barely slept the night before. When Eleanor awoke, warm in Ethan’s embrace, the
sky was darkening. They’d slept the afternoon away.

“Oh dear,” she murmured and attempted to slip from the bed.

His arm tightened around her.

“Why is it you are always trying to escape my bed?” His
words were harsh but he said them on a laugh.

“We need to dress for dinner. It must be close to six.”

“Mmm.” He tugged her closer and nibbled on her shoulder.
“I’m not hungry for food.”

“Dear heavens. I’m beginning to suspect you’re insatiable.”

“I feel that way when you’re around.” His hands began to
wander. A telltale stirring against the curve of her bottom portended a late
arrival at dinner.

“Ethan. We must dress.”

He stilled. “Are you giving me a command?”

She turned to him. The light in his eyes was difficult to
interpret. Was he angry? He’d never lost his temper with her. Not yet. She so
didn’t want to learn he was like Ulster after all. She swallowed.

“N-no.”

“I think that was a command.” He sat up and threw the covers
back, revealing the body of a Greek god, rippling muscles dusted with dark
hair. He was fierce, dark and alluring.

No. Definitely not angry. She relaxed a tad, but only a tad.
Her body tightened again at his next words, but in a very different way. “Do
you know what happens to a slave when she gives her Master a command?”

Eleanor licked her lips. “N-no.”

He loomed over her, easing her back onto the bed. “He
punishes her.”

“Oh. My.”

Was that a lustful shudder coursing through her body? Again?
How on earth did he do it?

“And you’ve been naughty. You deserve a punishment. Don’t
you agree?”

“I…”

“Don’t you?”

She dropped her gaze “Yes.” Heavens. Could she take him
again? So soon? Her body ached in so many ways, in so many places. But she
loved each and every ping. So much nicer than…

No. She wouldn’t think of it. She wouldn’t.

She would focus on Ethan.

On now.

“Are you ready for your punishment?”

She nodded. “But…”

His brow darkened. “But what?”

She stroked his chest. Rather fascinated by the taut, silky
muscles, she became distracted.

“Eleanor.”

“Yes?”

“But what?”

She blinked. What? Oh. Yes. “But it’s almost dinnertime.”

His grin was wolfish. Twin shards of lust and fear engulfed
her. But it was a delicious kind of fear. “I know. Your punishment will last
through dinner.”

Her brow wrinkled. What on earth could he have in mind?

“Stand up. There. By the nightstand.”

She did so, and he scooted over to sit on the edge of the
bed, facing her. He was just at breast level, couldn’t resist a quick nuzzle.
She moaned as the nuzzle became a suck, then a nip. She put out a lip when he
stopped, when he sat back and reached for something on the nightstand.
Something she hadn’t noticed there before.

“What is that?”

He held it up, a length of…was it lace?

“Where did you get that?”

“Madame Fourtenouy’s, of course.”

“You bought lace?”

“Yes.” He folded the length in half and then reached around
her waist. When his hands came back into view, he held the looped end in one
hand and the loose ends in the other. The length of lace belted around her
back.

“What are your doing with th—” He passed the strands between
her legs. They nestled between her cunt lips and slipped inside to rub against
her clitoris. “Oh my.”

He stood and stepped behind her and she tipped her head,
desperate to see what he was doing. In horror, she watched as he threaded the
loose ends into the looped end and pulled tight.

The sensation of the rough lace scraping against her tender
center was intense. And four strands of lace rubbed at her. He tugged on the
ends, testing. A welter of sensation, of insanity flooded her body.

“Do you like that?”

“Ethan. It’s positively wicked.”

“Do you like the lace?”

“Do I what? Well, yes. I suppose.”

He grinned. “It matches your dress.”

“It matches my… Whatever are you talking about?”

“You’ll see. Hold this.” He handed her the long loose ends
of the ribbon. “No. Hold it tight.” He yanked the reins tightly and she sucked
in a breath as agony—ecstasy—sliced through her again. Dear heavens. “Hold it
tight.” His tone was commanding, indomitable, determined. When he was convinced
she was holding the lace with sufficient tension, he paced to the center of the
room and retrieved her dress. He returned to her and dropped the garment
unceremoniously over her head.

“But Ethan. My chemise.”

“You don’t need a chemise tonight.”

Eleanor blanched. No chemise? But what would protect her
nipples from the thick, rough material of her gown?

Oh. Oh mercy.

She whimpered.

“Hush now. Hand me the ribbon and put your arms in the
sleeves.” She did, but slowly, ever cognizant of the bombazine against her
sensitized skin. When she had the dress on, Ethan threaded the lace up the back
of her dress and pulled it tight. She winced. “Here.” He handed her the strands
again and deftly began doing up her buttons. When he finished, he walked her to
the mirror. She couldn’t help noticing how each step was an agony. An agony of bliss
and torment.

She walked slowly.

He tracked each movement like a starving man tracks a rabbit
in his path.

“Watch me in the mirror. I want you to see.”

She turned and saw he had indeed buttoned her dress, but the
lace emerged from the gap under the bottom button. It hung down like a tail.
She was stunned to realize he had taken great care to find a ribbon that
matched her dress exactly. The tail appeared to be a natural accoutrement of
the costume.

He took the ribbon and deftly threaded it through the bottom
buttonhole, effectively anchoring it there tightly. He glanced at her to be
sure she was paying attention and gave the tail a tug. Delight sliced through
her as the lace tightened, rubbing the whole of her slit, including—dear
heavens—the suddenly tender pucker of her ass.

She nearly came. “Ethan. I can’t do this.”

“You can. You will.”

“But Helena…James…”

“Won’t know what’s going on. Not unless you let on.” He
leaned closer, whispered into her ear. “And you won’t let on. Will you?” His
hand came up to her breast and he stroked her. The unfamiliar sensation of the
rough fabric against her throbbing nipple made her moan. “Will you?”

“God. I hope not.”

God, help her. Help her to control herself.

Help her to not come at the dinner table with Helena and
James and Uncle Andrew looking on.

Chapter Seven

Dinner was a torment. Although, Ethan reflected, probably
more so for Eleanor than himself. But his torment was fairly sharp.

They’d made their way together down the stairs to the
drawing room—she mincing—to join James and Helena for a pre-dinner drink.
Eleanor had hesitated to take the chair Helena offered, then winced as she sat.
Ethan watched with an eagle eye. So he didn’t miss the glare she sent him.

When they moved on to the table, Ethan had suggested they be
informal and skillfully arranged to sit to Eleanor’s left. Thus it was no
challenge to allow his hand to drift to his thigh, skate below the tablecloth
and over behind her back. To find the ribbon.

To tug. To tighten it. To tease her.

He loved playing with her, as Uncle Andrew—who came to the
table late—babbled on about the challenges of researching ancestry, or some
Darlington forbearer, or the intricate details of consanguinity.

Ethan wasn’t bored. Not at all. For he was watching
Eleanor’s face.

He loved watching her face. The way her lips would part when
he applied a little pressure. The charming pink tide on her cheeks. The tremble
of her fork.

And every so often, he would tug harder. Short, hard strokes
that would have her gasping for air.

She never met his gaze. She didn’t dare. But he stared at
her all the same.

He was thankful for the long tablecloth. For the
scintillating discussion of long-dead Darlingtons. Because it kept the others
occupied. And oblivious to his pounding cockstand.

By the time dessert was served, a frothy something or other,
he was ready to leave the table. He was ready to leave the table and take his
woman up the stairs to his room and fuck her until she screamed.

But it was not to be.

With horror, he saw Darlington stand, heard those hideous
words. “Shall we repair to the library?”

“Ah yes,” Uncle Andrew gushed. He half stood but was
forestalled by a heavy hand on his shoulder. “Just Pennington and I, if you
don’t mind, Uncle Andrew. We have some things to discuss.”

The way Darlington’s attention flicked to Eleanor then back
to Ethan did not bode well.

“Don’t be long, James,” Helena said with a smile. “We’ll
have tea waiting in the drawing room.”

Darlington merely grunted in response.

Ethan followed his friend to the library, where James
abruptly gestured to a pair of chairs by the fire. “Sit.”

Ethan glanced longingly at the assortment of decanters on a
low table by the desk. “Are you not going to offer me a brandy?”

“Sit.”

He sat.

Darlington, as was his way, didn’t prevaricate. He came
straight to the point. The point being: “What is going on between you and
Eleanor?”

Heat crept up Ethan’s cheeks. “I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t play dumb with me. Helena may not have noticed the
way you were watching her throughout dinner, but I did.”

“I was watching her throughout dinner?”

“Like a wolf. I didn’t like what I saw. Do not toy with her
affections, Pennington.”

Ethan bristled. He didn’t like being warned off his woman,
not by any man. “Mind your own business.”

“This is my business. Eleanor is Helena’s dearest friend. If
Eleanor is hurt, wounded by the biggest rake in the ton, Helena is wounded. I
will not countenance it.”

“I’m hardly the biggest rake in the ton.”

“You were.” Darlington tried not to fix his gaze on Ethan’s
scar and failed. “And don’t you dare try to play the innocent here, Ethan. I
see what’s going on. You’re seducing her.”

Ethan couldn’t hold back his snort. He wasn’t seducing her.
Oh, it had started out like that. But now, she was seducing him. Glance by
glance. Kiss by kiss. Fuck by fuck. Holy hell, he could barely think of
anything other than burying himself inside her. Even now, in Darlington’s
library, in the midst of a
bona fide
scolding more suited to an errant
schoolboy.

Darlington’s eyes narrowed. “What on earth did that noise
mean?”

“What noise?”

“Ethan—”

“Perhaps she enjoys my attention.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe that’s the point of
seduction.”

Ethan grinned. “Indeed.”

It was unfortunate the word came out in just that tone, for
it rather enraged Darlington. Lifetime friend or not, he looked ready to kill.
“Damn it all to hell, Ethan, leave her alone. She’s suffered enough and I won’t
have her heart broken again under my roof.”

This caught his attention. Ethan sobered. “What do you mean,
she’s suffered enough?”

James flushed. “Come on, man. She was married to Ulster.”
Something in his expression told Ethan he was hedging.

“What do you know?”

James snorted and scrubbed his hand over his face. “Enough.”

“What?”

“Damn it, Pennington. It’s not my place to tell you. It’s
not my place to tell anyone. She told Helena these things in confidence.”

A hard ball formed in Ethan’s belly. Yes, he’d known she was
married to Ulster. And he knew Ulster was a right bastard. But judging from
James’ reaction, he’d been a damn sight more sinister than Ethan could ever
have dreamed. He thought of Eleanor, her beautiful body, her beautiful sweet
soul at Ulster’s command and something lurched inside him.

“If he hurt her…”

James sprang from his chair and paced the carpet. “Of course
he hurt her. Every day. He brutalized the woman.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ask her yourself.”

“That son of bitch. Why, I’d like to—”

“What? What are you going to do? He’s dead, Ethan. The only
thing that remains of him is his effect on Eleanor. She doesn’t need another
man like that in her life.”

Ethan leaped to his feet. “I’m nothing like Ulster!” A
bellow. Probably audible throughout the house. He didn’t care.

James dropped into his chair. “I know. I know. I’m sorry
Pennington. I am. But you know what I mean. She deserves a gentle, loving man—”

“I’m a gentle, loving man.”

James tipped his head and made a slow study of Ethan, from
tip to toe. He didn’t need words to clarify his thoughts.

Ethan put out a lip as he took his seat. “Well, I can be
loving and gentle.”

“I’m sure you can.” James sighed. “But you’re not the man
for her.”

“And who the hell are you to make that decision?”

James swallowed a laugh, coughed on it. “It’s not my
decision. It’s Helena’s.” This, he said as though the Regent himself had so declared
it.

“What has Helena got against me?”

“Well, nothing, I’m sure. She’s just picked out someone else
for Eleanor.”

A bitter taste flooded Ethan’s mouth. “Who?” he spat. “Who
has she ‘selected’ for Eleanor?”

“Haversham. He arrives tomorrow.”

“Haversham?” That pup?

“Helena says he’s a sweet boy.”

“He is a boy. She needs a man.”

“What she needs is a tender touch. When have you ever been
capable of that? When have you ever been interested in that?”

Ethan shifted in his seat. He didn’t like this scrutiny of
his character. He didn’t like it at all. What was worse, he didn’t like the
sudden discovery that he, himself, didn’t care for his character all that much.

James sighed. “She needs a husband, Ethan. Someone who will
love her and take care of her. Someone who can…”

“Make up for Ulster?”

“Exactly. And you, my friend, are not that man.”

The hell he wasn’t.

Ethan watched James rise and leave the room. He remained,
however, in the library, glaring at the fire. He remained there until Uncle
Andrew toddled in, talking to himself, disturbing Ethan’s dark peace. With a
sigh, he rose and left, making his way to the drawing room, where Eleanor, and
tea, awaited.

He paused at the door and took in the scene. James and
Helena on one divan, and his Eleanor on the other. They were laughing and
chatting and sipping from delicate cups. Although, he noticed, Darlington had a
brandy. It was a charming domestic scene, one that caused a funny flip in his
heart. Soon there would be a child at Darlington’s knee. A little girl who
looked like Helena, or a boy with Darlington’s golden locks perhaps.

He glanced at Eleanor.

She could be with child, even now.

His child.

The funny flip in his heart dropped to his belly.

Dear God.

He’d been working to give her that child. He’d been working
diligently.

To give her a child he could never claim as his own. A child
who would be Ulster’s heir. A child who would live and grow up in Ulster’s
mansion, surrounded by Ulster’s family.

The thought made him ill. But he wasn’t sure if he was more
disturbed by the thought of never claiming his son, or that the child, and
Eleanor, would be beyond his reach then.

He hadn’t thought about that. About the future. About what
would happen when this house party was over and they went their separate ways.

And for good reason. The prospect was disturbing in the
extreme.

She turned her head and saw him. Her face lit up and she
smiled. Seeing her reaction, James and Helena turned their heads as well.

His thoughts of slipping away, into the night, evaporated.
He’d been spotted.

He sucked in a deep breath and stepped into the room,
determinedly fixing a smile on his lips. He could prove himself gentle and
loving. He could be domesticated. Pleasant.

Even if it killed him.

His resolve to be gentle and loving dissolved beneath the
weight of Eleanor’s passion when, after James and Helena retired to their
suite, Eleanor followed him to his room and leaped upon him the instant the
door closed. “Oh God, I want you in me,” she wailed into his ear. She wrapped
one leg around his hip and rubbed herself against him like a cat.

“Eleanor.” He tried to untangle her limbs but she ignored
his attempts, perching up on her tiptoes and sucking his earlobe into her
mouth. He groaned and shuddered when her tiny pink tongue danced into his ear.
He bent his head lower so she could find a better angle. And God. God.

She fucked his ear with her tongue until all thoughts of the
conversation he had planned, all thoughts of gentility and domestication fled.

“I want you. I want you,” she panted, scrabbling at his
cravat, yanking at his buttons. He heard them pop and scatter all over the
floor. He knew his valet would have a conniption in the morning, but he really
couldn’t care. Because now her hands were roving over his chest, her fingers
plucking at his nipples, her nails scraping at his sanity. And her mouth—God,
that mouth—was sucking at them. Nipping and tugging and stabbing them with her
tongue.

A hand, a small, dainty,
domesticated
hand, encased
his cock. She squeezed him, rubbed him, stroked the head through his trousers.
“Ethan, please.” She fumbled at his waist, growling in frustration. “Unbutton
me. Unbutton me. Now.” She reared back and glared at him, and he hastened to
comply, making his way down the interminable row.

It gave him a moment, a moment to breathe without her hand,
her body, her mouth upon him. He had just managed to regain some semblance of
his composure, just begun to form the words he needed to say, when she spun
around, yanking the dress from her shoulders and wrenching it from her body.
The tail caught—it was still tightly laced through the bottom buttonhole, after
all—and she cried out. It was a feral sound.

Wildly, she yanked at the lace girdle, sawing it against her
swollen lips as she worked it off.

It fell from her body. Ethan couldn’t help but notice it was
damp with cream.

His brain seized at this maddening discovery. He allowed her
to grab his hand and tug him over to the bed. She put a palm to his chest and
pushed. He sat on the mattress with a thud. And she was on him, straddling him
with a knee to each side. She kissed him briefly, frantically, pushing at his
chest until he was flat on his back. He watched in speechless amazement as
Eleanor, shy, demure—utterly naked—Eleanor, took his cock in her hand and
angled it up. Up. Up. The tip, oozing with a glimmering drop of cum, nudged
against her clitoris.

She threw back her head and moaned. Apparently she liked it,
for she did it again, and again, rubbing his cock against her slick pearl,
until it was Ethan who was moaning, wild, frantic.

“In,” he growled. “In.”

She complied, arching up to accommodate his length and then
down and God. God. Oh. God.

She was hot. Scalding. Dripping wet. The slick walls of her
channel encompassed him, consumed him. His cock danced with delight. She came
to the end of him and seated herself upon him with her short hairs kissing his,
her groin flush against his.

Not sure what to do now, she stared at him. Her lips parted.
She whimpered.

He put his hands on her hips and showed her a motion. And then
another. And then he needed to guide her no longer.

She braced herself on his chest and rode him, twisting this
way and that, circling him, clutching him, fucking him. Driving him insane and
gratifying him deep to his bowels at the same time.

When she came, she was magnificent. She threw back her head
and arched her body, thrusting her breasts into his palms and grasped him in a
tight, wet grip that had him drooling, shivering, howling.

But he wasn’t finished. He wasn’t done yet.

When her crisis trailed off to occasional jerks and moans,
he flipped her onto her stomach and spread her legs with his knees. Panting,
she looked over her shoulder to watch him approach, cock in hand. Her eyes,
damp and dazed, urged him on. “Do it,” she whispered. “Fuck me.”

Holy God. That word, that phrase, on her lips… It drove him
mad.

He yanked her hips higher and plunged in, hard and deep, and
he did it again and again. His tempo and his frenzy increased, until he was
moving so fast, fucking her so wildly, he couldn’t tell where he ended and she
began.