Pleasuring the Lady (The Pleasure Wars) (15 page)

“You make me…
weak
,” she moaned, for he was parting her gown now, opening a great expanse of flesh to his tongue, his lips, his rough fingertips.
 

And as he touched her, she also realized she had been sleeping until he put his hands on her at the masquerade. And now she was awake and she wanted more and more of him.

He unhooked two buttons at a time now, slipping his hands beneath her chemise to caress her skin.

“Be weak to me,” he urged as he slipped those hands through the loose folds of her gown and touched her bare breasts beneath her chemise. “Lose control for me. Give me all that you are and all that you desire and I swear to you, you will never be sorry.”

He pulled her back against his chest, his thumbs strumming her sensitive nipples, his mouth against the side of her neck. Portia’s vision was beginning to blur, the room spinning as she spiraled into a fog of desire.

“Yes,” she panted. “Anything you want. Anything.”

He pushed the dress away and it pooled at her feet, leaving her in only her short chemise that just brushed the top of her thighs. Without her drawers, her naked backside pressed against the front of his trousers and she felt the outline of his hardness against the smooth globes of her bottom.

He returned his hands to her breasts, this time on top of the silky fabric. He began to massage in slow circles, dragging the chemise across her nipples with purposeful slowness. Deep within her she felt an ache growing, a deep and driving need that throbbed between her legs and made it hard to breathe, hard to think, hard to do anything except grind back against Miles in some ancient, ingrained need to be possessed.
 

He grunted as she moved against him and then he dragged her back even harder to mold her to his body.

“Careful,” he whispered close to her ear. “Be certain you know what you’re doing.”

She almost laughed. She had
no
idea what she was doing—she had only a few explicit suggestions from Ava and her own heated wants to guide her. But even though Miles told her to be wary, his rough tone and the way he sucked along her neck told her she was doing something very, very right.

She took a deep breath and rolled her hips against him once more. He cursed beneath his breath and spun her around to face him, crushing his mouth against hers as he backed her toward the bed on the opposite side of the room.

Her heart raced as her backside hit the edge. She reached a hand back and steadied herself as he pulled away from the searing kiss and stared at her.

“I’m going to enjoy this,” he murmured as he reached up and stripped the buttons of his shirt open in one swift motion. She gasped as he shrugged the fine linen fabric away to flutter to the floor behind him.

Though she’d had far more experience in the past few days than ever before in the male form, nothing could have prepared her for this. For Miles, standing before her, shirtless.

He was a god, crafted from marble, made in the image of something utterly perfect. He had broad shoulders, muscles rippling down his stomach and trim hips that disappeared into dangerously low-slung trousers. He was lean and strong, and she had the strangest urge to drag her nails down his skin, to lick him like he was icing on a cake, to rub on him like a cat begging to be petted.

He reached out and put a finger beneath her chin. “Close your mouth, wife.”

She blinked for the first time in what felt like a long time and shook her head in sudden embarrassment.
 

Of course she would make an idiot of herself, staring at a man who was so far above her that she never would have even shared a hint of a chance with him had he not been forced into this position. His perfection reminded her of that fact and now any boldness dissipated from her body and left her shifting with uneasiness.

“How disappointed you must be in your bargain,” she whispered, fighting the urge to cover herself, to turn her face away. It was
only
the agreement they had made about the protection of her mother that kept her rooted in her spot.

His brow wrinkled. “Why on earth would you say such a foolish thing, Portia?”

She shrugged, trying to downplay how silly she felt, how much this moment was a reminder of cold reality.
 

“You are beautiful,” she whispered. “You could have any woman in London, probably any woman in the world. And I? I am a spinster who never was more than passably pretty in certain lights. What a step down for you.”

He caught her chin, tilting her face up so she couldn’t look away. His eyes bore into her with an intensity that was equal to the leaping, glowing fire behind him.
 

“You listen to me, Portia. I cannot tell you that I longed for you for years as we passed each other in ballrooms. Or that men drooled at the mere thought of being by your side. To tell you those things would sport with your intelligence and I would not dare to do that.”

“Thank—” she began in sarcasm, but he cut her off with a sharp look.
 

“But the moment we touched at that masquerade, you lit a fire in me. A desire to possess you that has not diminished even when I learned your true identity, even when I wanted that need to fade. When I look at you now, I see a woman I want to claim. To fuck, which is a term you will come to understand very well over the next few weeks.”

She blinked. He was looking at her so intently, and there was no denying the wild, animal truth of his words. He was almost out of control, which was a state she had never seen him in, not over all the years they had known each other.
 

He
was
wild for her, and that made her tremble as much as his touch did, for it was unexpected and flattering and arousing beyond measure.
 

She swallowed, then lifted her hands. She slid her fingers beneath her chemise straps and let the scrap of silk fall away. She stood utterly naked before him and refused to be mortified in the face of his focused regard.

“Show me now what that word means,” she managed to whisper past the sudden lump in her throat. “I want to know. I cannot think of anything else. It is madness and only you can end it.”

“No,” he said, unfastening his trousers and letting them join the pile of discarded clothing on the floor around them. His thick cock thrust against his stomach, proud and ready for the next part in their strange courtship.
 

“No?” she squeaked, staring at his member with wide eyes.

“No, I cannot stop the madness,” he explained. “I can give you release from it momentarily, but it could take a very long time to fully clear it from your mind, from your veins, from your body.”

He placed a hand on her shoulder and eased her back onto the bed. She went willingly, staring up at him as he took a place beside her. His mouth lowered and then there were no more words to be said. Only the taste of his tongue, the feel of his hands as he trailed them down the length of her body until he cupped her sex just as he had done so many times before. Her body knew what to do with that act and she arched against him in the hopes he would breech her with his talented fingers.

He did not. He merely massaged the aching entrance to her slit as he kissed and kissed and kissed her until she lost all track of time and place and consequences. He shifted until he lay over her, still kissing her. She had no feeling of fear, even when he stroked the swollen head of his member over the wet entrance to her body.

“Portia,” he whispered.

She forced her eyes open and stared at him through a hooded gaze. “Yes?”

“Are you a virgin?” he asked, holding her stare with an unreadable expression.

She swallowed. Even still, he doubted her. Doubted everything she had said. But she still wanted him, wanted this. She nodded.

“I am.”

He pursed his lips. “Then forgive me for this. It will be better the next time.”

He fitted himself at her entrance and then slid forward, breaking the seal of her innocence in one quick movement. She gasped at the unexpected and intense pain which shot through her being. She clung to his arms, digging her nails into the flesh as her body spun with pleasure and pain, desire and fear mixed together in a confusing, intoxicating brew.

Through it all, he remained utterly still within her, watching her as she struggled with the new sensations.

“Breathe,” he said softly, smoothing her hair from her forehead with the back of one hand.
 

She did as he suggested and sucked in a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself. As seconds passed, the pain subsided and left her with only a feeling of intimate fullness. Miles was inside her. They were one body. One being.

“Are you ready for more?” he whispered, holding her gaze evenly.

She nodded, though she didn’t really know what she was saying. She wasn’t prepared, she wasn’t certain, she wasn’t anything but filled with foggy excitement that finally she was truly wed. Finally, she was not a sad little spinster, doomed to stand in a corner for the rest of her days.

He thrust his hips in a gentle circle, and she tensed. But to her surprise, the pain she had felt at his initial breach had faded to nothingness. When he moved, there was instead a flutter of pleasure in her loins much like that when he pressed his fingers—or better yet, his tongue—inside of her.

“Do it again,” she whispered, squeezing her eyes shut so she could block everything out but the sensation.

He cursed beneath his breath and thrust again. Then again. Over and over, being sure to press his pelvis to hers every single time. She arched beneath him as pain was forgotten, everything was forgotten but the heady intoxication of this act. Her body quivered as she lifted her hips to meet his, her breath came in gasps and then uncontrollable sighs, and finally there was an explosion of powerful pleasure that started where their bodies met and careened through the rest of her body, filling her every nerve, cresting all the way to her fingertips as she jerked beneath him and wailed out his name again and again.

His continued to thrust through it all, though his strokes grew more erratic, harder as her crisis reached its crescendo. Suddenly he groaned loudly and she felt his seed spill hot within her clenching body.

For a long moment, he remained there, his forehead pressed to hers and his body still joined with hers. But then he flopped back against the coverlet beside her, panting as their bodies parted. She lay there, staring at the ceiling and simply enjoying the tingling aftermath of what he had done to her.
 

She looked at him from the corner of her eye and immediately the desire he had quenched with his skilled seduction began to build again.

“You were right,” she whispered, shaking at the boldness of what she was about to say.

“Right?” he asked, his own breath short as he rolled on his side to look down at her in the firelight.

“You told me earlier that you could ease the madness of my desire, but not quench it entirely.” She smiled at him. “I want more, Miles. I want to do it all again.”

Chapter Twelve

Miles stared down at Portia, her eyes still wide and innocent, her words most definitely not so. She had been untouched, just as she had claimed. He knew that to be true, for he had felt her body give when he slid home inside of her, he had seen evidence of her pain both in her reaction and the light staining of blood on his sheets.

Still, she was so responsive, so open to sin and seduction…he had to wonder if he
was
the first man to have pleasured her in some way, even if she had never been penetrated.

Yet even with those questions in his mind, her words, her demand rang in his ears and made his body stir.

“You must give me time to recover,” he said as he stroked his fingers between her breasts. She sighed at the touch, shutting her eyes as he traced the smooth lines of her flesh gently.

“How long?” she asked without looking at him.

“Demanding little minx,” he chuckled. “Not very if you keep up this line of questioning.”

“Good.” She snuggled closer and rested her head on the crook of his shoulder. “While we wait, perhaps we could talk about something.”

He tensed. How many lovers had wished to talk after making love? It had never been something he looked forward to.
 

“What do you wish to discuss?” he asked, caution in every word.

She kept her eyes shut, though blood pinkened her cheeks ever so slightly. “Our—our bargain, my lord. I made you an offer and now that you have claimed me, I would like to know what it entails.”

He cleared his throat. Now
this
was a topic he could embrace, if only to see what her reaction would be to his shocking responses.

“I think it is a fair question, my dear,” he said. “And now that you have been, as you say,
claimed
, it does seem as good a time as any to open the floor to it.”

Finally she looked at him through hooded lids and said, “You said you would introduce me to pleasures I had never imagined. That you would take me beyond my boundaries. What will that entail?”

He cleared his throat. “Portia, when you went to the masquerade, you saw what people did there. Out in the open for everyone to see, they played in pleasure.”