One Good Earl Deserves a Lover (32 page)

And she would not let it go.

“It’s your first night, as well . . . your first night in six years.” His eyes darkened, and she saw the promise of pleasure in them. The way it tempted him. “Let it be me, Jasper. Let it be mine. Please.”

His thumb moved, stroking over the tip of her breast, sending a thread of pleasure through her, straight to the place where his hand lay—an unbearable temptation. She gasped, and he kissed her once, thoroughly, before pulling away. “I have tried to resist you from the beginning. I have failed each time.”

“Don’t succeed now.” She whispered the plea. “I couldn’t bear it.”

“I never had a chance,” he replied, turning her in his arms, spreading her thighs wide and pulling her over him until she straddled his waist, her bare bottom pressed against the hard evidence of his arousal beneath his low-slung trousers. He reached up with one strong hand . . . one of those hands she’d loved for what seemed like an eternity . . . and pulled her down, ravishing her with his kiss—long and lush, making her ache everywhere—her breasts, her thighs, that soft place between them.

She rocked against him, and he tore his mouth from hers with a hiss, throwing his head back to reveal the long cords of his neck, straining with pleasure. When he returned his gaze to hers, it was heavy with pleasure. “I am going to ruin you, Pippa. I shall show you pleasure you’ve never known, the kind you’ve never dreamed. Over and over and over until you beg me never to stop.”

The words rioted through the dark, deep parts of her . . . the ones that ached for him. “I am already there,” she said. “Don’t stop.”

He smiled, his hands coming to her breasts, rolling their tips between his fingers until they were hard and aching. “I wouldn’t dream of it.” He pulled her to his mouth, taking her with lips and tongue and teeth until she was beside herself with sensation.

The human body was a glorious thing indeed. “Jasper . . .” she whispered, fascination and pleasure and desire packed into his name, and he released her from his grasp with one long, lovely suck, replacing his mouth with one finger, circling the straining tip with torturous slowness.

“You get so hard here . . . aching for me. For my mouth.”

Two could play this game. She rocked against him. “You, too, get hard, my lord.”

He pressed up against her once, twice, until she sighed her pleasure. “You make me hard, my little scientist.”

She could not resist. “I should like to inspect that fascinating occurrence, if I might.”

He took her hands in his, moving them to the fall of his trousers. “Far be it from me to impede your research.”

Her fingers played over the hard ridge of him, and she found herself quite desperate to see him. To feel him. To be with him in every way she could. But the protocol of this particular situation escaped her. Tracing one button, she met his wild eyes. “May I . . . ?”

He exhaled on a laugh, “I wish you would.”

And she did, unbuttoning his trousers as quickly as she could—ever too slowly—revealing him, hard and long and— “Oh, my,” she whispered, unable to stop herself from spreading the fabric and reaching for him, stroking the long, firm length of him until he groaned softly and she paused, uncertain, looking up at him. “Is it . . .”

“It’s incredible,” he whispered, his hands joining hers, showing her how to touch him. She watched the play of fingers on flesh, loving the soft steel of him. “The first time I met you . . . in my office . . .” he panted the words as she fisted the length of him. “I wanted your fingers on me. I couldn’t stop looking at them. I was obsessed with them.”

She met his gaze, reading the desire in his eyes. “They’re crooked.”

He kissed her, wild and wicked. “They’re perfect. I’ve never felt anything so close to heaven.” One of his hands moved, settling at the core of her, fingers sliding deep with shocking ease. “Except this.” His thumb moved, finding that wonderful spot. “This is closer to Heaven.” Circling over and over, again and again. “This might
be
Heaven.”

She lifted to afford him greater access, to allow his fingers to stroke deep, and she agreed, her breath coming faster, pleasure rocketing through her on wave after wave of sensation until she lost her strength, and her hands fell away from him, bracing against his chest as she gave herself up to it.

“You’re so beautiful,” he told her, “so soft and slick and utterly perfect.”

She couldn’t stop the cries he pulled from her, the movements of her hips, the way she pressed against him, begging him for the pleasure he’d shown her before . . . the pleasure he’d taught her to find and claim. He slid a second finger into the core of her, and she arched back, adoring the sensation.

“So tight. So wet,” he said, the wicked words making her more wanton, more desperate. “I want to be inside you when you come.”

And when she heard the words, the wicked, strange vocabulary she’d never before heard, she realized she wanted it, too. Looking down at him, she said, “Please . . .”

His eyes narrowed to slits. “Please, what, love?”

She should have been embarrassed, but she wanted him too much. “Please . . . take me.”

He swore, harsh and soft. “I cannot wait another moment.”

She thought he would roll her beneath him and made to move off him, to accommodate the change in position, but he stayed the movement, lifting her above him. Confused, she met his eyes. “Shouldn’t we be—”

“No.”

She might be inexperienced, but she knew the mechanics of the act. She placed her hands flat on his chest, feeling his heartbeat rioting beneath the touch. “Are you sure? I’ve never read anything about—that is, as I understand it, I should be beneath—”

“Which one of us has done this before?” Fingers stroked deep, underscoring his skill, and she sighed, bones turning to jelly at the long, lush movement.

When it ceased, leaving her empty and wanting, logic returned. “Well, it’s been a bit of time for you,” she pointed out.

He huffed a little laugh, the sound soft and strained and wonderful. “Trust me, my brilliant lady.” He rocked his hips—the tip of him easing into her, sending a thread of nearly unbearable pleasure through her. “I recall the basics.”

And then he slid into her with slow, thorough control, and she thought she might die from the hard heat of him, from the feel of him stretching and filling her, the sensation part pain, part strangeness, and, somehow, all pleasure. Her eyes went wide as he allowed her to sink to the hilt of him, and he froze, staring up at her, worry in his gaze. His hands flew to her hips. “Pippa? Does it hurt, love? Shall we stop?”

She would kill him if he stopped. This was the most astounding thing she’d ever experienced. All the fear and questions and concerns she’d had about this act, this moment . . . they were unfounded. She understood it now, the sighs and blushes and knowing smiles she’d seen in her sisters, in women across London. And she wanted it all . . . every bit of it. “Don’t you dare stop,” she whispered. “It is remarkable.”

She lifted, testing the feel of him inside her, and he let out a harsh, broken curse. “It is, isn’t it?” he agreed, adding, “You’re remarkable.” His hands guided her, lifting her, letting her slide up and back along his hard, hot length. “God, Pippa . . . it feels . . . you feel . . .” He lifted her again, and they both groaned as she slid back to the hilt, the pain gone now, chased away by untenable pleasure. “Is this all right, love?”

She loved him all over again for checking on her comfort, on her pleasure. She lifted herself, experimenting, repeating the movement on her own, her hands settling to his chest as she rode him. “Yes . . . it’s perfect,” she said with reverence. “It’s glorious.” She rocked against him, meeting his eyes before his attention slid down her body, his hands and eyes following the movements she couldn’t help but make.

He guided her, whispering as she found her stride, “That’s it, love . . . do nothing that doesn’t feel right. That doesn’t make you ache and want and need. Take your pleasure, gorgeous girl . . .” The whispered encouragement was punctuated by the hot stroke of his hands over her body—exploring the curves of her breasts and belly, the soft secrets of her thighs and that place between them where he was changing everything. Where
she
was changing everything. Where he had relinquished power and control and given her the chance to find her own pleasure.

He was devastatingly seductive in the way he talked to her, in the way he watched her, eyes narrow, hands stroking in time to her rhythm—a rhythm that quickly brought them both to the edge. She couldn’t stop the words from coming again, even as she knew she shouldn’t speak them. “I love you,” she whispered, looking down at him, feeling euphoric and royal and like she’d never felt before.

Feeling like she was finally, finally correct.

Even as she did the least correct thing she’d ever done in her life.

He was moving beneath her then, plunging up as she came down around him, loving the feel of him against her, beneath her, inside her . . . rocking hard and fast against him as he returned his fingers to that place between her thighs, where he seemed to know just how to touch her, how to claim her, how to destroy her. His thumb moved in quick, firm circles as she chased her pleasure—and his. “That’s it, love . . . take it for yourself . . . take it for me.”

“I want it,” she said, the honest desire hot and unbridled. “I want it for you.”

“I know.” He leaned up, sucked the peak of one breast into his mouth, worrying it with his teeth, and the sensation was all she could take—surprise and passion crashed over her, and she fell apart in his arms, her body trembling with the intensity of the moment. She put her hands to his shoulders, her eyes locked with his, blue against grey.

“I love you,” she said, the words tumbling out of her again.

The confession seemed to unlock the last vestige of his control—he clasped her hips to his, thrusting and arcing against her, taking her mind and body once more in a storm of passion. “Pippa,” he cried out, and the sound of her name hot and ragged on his lips was enough to send her over the edge once more, instantly, headfirst into an ocean of pleasure. He was there with her this time, strong and sure.

Perfection.

She fell to his chest, and he wrapped his arms around her, holding her close. “Pippa,” he whispered at her temple, his heart beating rapidly beneath her ear. “Philippa.”

The reverence in his tone made her ache, and she felt him pull away from her even as he remained inside her, closer than anyone had ever been. More important than anyone had ever been.

She loved him.

And he was to marry another.

Because of her.

She couldn’t allow it. There had to be a better way. A solution that made them both happy. She closed her eyes, loving the feel of his warm chest against her cheek, and for one, fleeting moment, she imagined what it would be like to experience happiness with him. To be his wife. His woman. His partner.

His love.

It was no longer a myth, that mysterious emotion—no longer in doubt. It was real, and it held a power that Pippa had never imagined. One she could not deny.

He was whispering at her hairline, the words more breath than sound. “You are so remarkable. I could lie here forever, with you in my arms, the rest of the world distant. I ache for you, love . . . even now. I imagine I will ache for you forever.”

She lifted her head, meeting his pewter gaze. “You don’t have to.”

He looked away. “I do. You’re my great work, Pippa. You’re the one I can save. I can ensure your happiness. And I shall. And it shall be enough.”

She hated the words. “Enough for whom?”

Something flashed in his eyes. Pain? Regret? “Enough for us both.”

It wouldn’t be, though. Not for her. She knew that without question. “No,” she whispered. “No it shan’t.”

He stroked one hand down her bare back, sending a shiver of awareness through her. “It shall have to be.”

“You don’t have to marry her,” she said, softly, hearing the plea in the words. Loathing it.

“But I do, lovely,” he said, the words soft and firm. “You’ll be destroyed if I don’t. And I won’t have that.”

“I don’t care. You could marry me. If I am able to choose the earl whom I marry, then—”

“No.” He tried to cut her off. She pressed on.

“—I choose you,” she said, her voice breaking on the words.

He held her close, kissing at her temple, whispering her name again before saying, “No you don’t. You don’t choose me.”

Except she did. “Why not?”

“Because you choose Castleton.”

It was somehow truth and lie, all at once. “Just as you choose Knight’s daughter?”

Even as you lie here with me?

His hands stilled on her skin. “Yes.”

“But you don’t know her.”

“No.”

“You don’t love her.”

“No.”

Do you love me?

She couldn’t ask him. Couldn’t bear the answer.

But he seemed to hear the question anyway, hand coming to her jaw, lifting her to meet his gaze . . . his lips.

Yes,
she imagined he meant.

He rolled her to her back on the bed, keeping them joined as he settled between her thighs and made love to her mind and soul and body with everything he had, moving in her with quiet certainty, holding her gaze with undeniable intensity. Kissing the swell of her breasts and the column of her neck and worrying the soft lobe of one ear, whispering her name in a long, lovely litany.

There was nothing brute about this. Nothing beastly.

Instead, it was slow and seductive and he moved for what seemed like hours, days, an eternity, learning her, touching and exploring, kissing and stroking. And as pleasure washed over her in lush waves, rocketing through her until she could no longer hold it, he captured her cries with his lips, finding his own release, deep and thorough and magnificent before speaking again, whispering her name again and again, until she no longer heard the word and instead heard only the meaning.

The farewell.

They lay together for long minutes, until their breath was steady again, and the world returned, unable to be refused or ignored, coming with the dawn in great red streaks across the black sky beyond the window.