To Tame A Countess (Properly Spanked Book 2) (12 page)

He had to wait in his bonds while she went to fetch a sip of water from the pitcher on the nightstand. He deserved this, probably. “Teachers,” indeed. A hardened, sadistic lecher like him didn’t deserve to bask in her innocence. She returned to her place between his legs and leaned down, her thick auburn hair tickling his stomach and thighs.

“If I do something wrong, let me know,” she said.

“I will. Just think of it as a sweet you’re sucking on.”

She wet her lips once more—ah, so luscious—and then she licked very slowly and delicately around the head of his cock. Pleasure shot down his shaft, mixing with the heat of her closeness. “Yes,” he said in a rasp. “Continue like that for a bit.”

She had no idea what she was doing to him, he was certain. No idea of the teasing torment. Otherwise, she would not be so blithely cruel. He clenched his hands with the effort to keep them in her loose bonds. He wanted to grasp her head in his palms and drive between her hot, wet lips. She opened her mouth and sucked him in sweet little pulls. “No teeth,” he managed to say past the haze of hot sensation. “Rudiment number two.”

She obediently used only her lips and tongue. She had less than a quarter of his length in her mouth, but it felt like heaven.

“If you can take more of me…” he suggested. “Don’t be shy.”

She took a little more, but not much. Even so, it pushed him to the limits of his control. If she continued with these hapless, innocent ministrations, this would be over in less than a minute. “You don’t only have to lick my cock,” he said. “You can caress me other places as well, to draw out the pleasure. You remember, the way I did to you?”

She leaned back and looked up at him with a shy smile. Damn, if his cock didn’t jump again. She spread her hands open on either side of his navel. Her fingertips traced over the tensing ridges of his muscles. “You look so…interesting here. And you feel so strong. Mmm.”

It took all his strength to lie still and let her handle him. What in God’s name had ever possessed him to let a woman tie him up? He was going to shame himself in a moment and spurt all over her face. She bent and kissed him on the stomach, and then he felt her tongue run along the furrow of a muscle. He gripped the headboard so hard the bed shook.
Please.
It was on the tip of his tongue. When had he ever begged for sex, begged for pleasure without just taking it?

Once she’d taken her time teasing him to madness by licking his torso, she sat up again, looking pleased and lusciously rumpled. As he gazed at her, lights exploded in his brain.
Oh, no. Pain. Excruciating pain.
She’d just given his balls a hell of a whack. “Oh, God. No,” he gasped. “No slapping in this, Josephine. Rudiment number three. Never slap a man’s balls.”

She looked at him indignantly. “You slapped me between the legs.
Several
times.”

“It’s different with men.” He took deep breaths, processing the throbbing pain. “You must trust me on this. Men do not respond the same way women do. No more hitting that area of my body. Ever.” Deep breaths. Eventually it would stop hurting. At least now he could hold off a bit longer.

“Are you all right?” she asked guiltily.

“I’m fine.” He closed his eyes and laid his head back. “Make it feel better, darling. Stroke me and kiss me in your sweet way.” She did, reaching up now and again to massage his clenching muscles. After a while, she kissed up his torso and opened her teeth against his nipples. She didn’t bite him very hard, the way he’d done to her, but he made appreciative sounds while trying to hump her leg.

“Do all married couples do this on their honeymoon?” she asked.

“Oh yes, everyone,” he lied.

As much as he would have liked this decadent misery to go on forever, he was fast reaching the limits of his control. He sucked in a breath as she teased the head of his cock with her tongue.

“Stop. Untie me. Quickly, love.” She obeyed him with a worried look. “No, you haven’t done anything wrong. I only want to finish things in a more traditional way.”

As soon as his hands were free, he tumbled her beneath him. How sweet and brave she was, and how utterly game for anything. He would have to be careful not to push her too far. She flinched when he pressed his cock to her opening.

“Does it still hurt?”

“It’s only a little tender,” she said. “It’s all right.”

“I’m going to try something.” He rolled off the bed and crossed to a chest, and rummaged in the topmost drawer for what he wanted. He used this slick, aromatic oil for all sorts of purposes, most often the introduction of his large organ into very tight female spaces. He applied it to his cock, then carried it to the bed and drizzled a good bit of it between Josephine’s legs. “This will soothe you and make it easier,” he said. “But if it still hurts, you must tell me so.”

She gazed up at him, half kittenish, half afraid. “What if it only hurts a little?”

Good lord, he wanted to fuck her to pieces. He wanted to fuck her inside out, and then all over again. “Then you must decide what to do, if you wish to stop me.”

He was bursting to be inside her. He ached beyond any ache he’d ever felt. It took an excruciating amount of control to hold himself over her, and press his cock inside her inch by meager inch while watching to be certain he didn’t hurt her more than “a little bit.” But the oil seemed to ease her sufficiently. She spread her legs and opened her arms and held onto him.

“Oh,” she said. “That feels very warm and fine.”

He could say nothing for long moments. The feeling of being inside her after the wait, and the teasing, and the bondage—he could barely catch his breath as sensation rocked up to his chest and down to his thighs. Heavy need weighed in his balls. He tried to be slow, to bring her along with him, but her wildness sapped his control.

“You’re full of me, aren’t you?” he growled. “You like me inside you, filling you up.”

“Yes. Oh, how lovely it feels.”

She clung to him tighter, so her breasts were crushed against his chest. His hands were slippery from the oil. He massaged her back and her bottom, and squeezed her tensing cheeks. Then he dipped his fingers between them and massaged her bottom hole, slipping the tip of his finger inside.

“Goodness. Did you mean to do that?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“I thought maybe the oil—”

“I meant to put my finger in your bottom.” As if to emphasize his words, he pressed it deeper. The oil eased the way inside her tight passage. “You’re mine, little kitten. I like to be inside you everywhere.”

“Do all married couples—”

“Yes, hush. Everything I do to you is perfectly all right.”

She gave a little gasp as he moved his finger in and out of her arse. Her hips arched in a sinuous way that drove him mad. “I can’t believe these honeymoon activities,” she said in a hushed voice. “They are so…”

She never finished her sentence, but he knew what she meant. They were so intense and risky, and so abandoned, and so magnificent. He came before she did, exploding into an oblivion he couldn’t hold back anymore, but she came too as he bucked through the aftershocks. He felt her clench around his cock and the finger buried in her bottom, and he thought how lucky a man he was, to have ended up shackled to this woman who had no understanding of propriety, or honeymoons, or what was normal between men and women.

Lord knew he himself had never really cared.

*** *** ***

Josephine ate dinner in bed with her husband on the third day—or was it the fourth? She had rather lost track of the days in their unclothed and libidinous existence.

Lord Warren had been correct on the subject of honeymoons. They were nice and relaxing, and even better, they did not involve anyone but the two of them. No eyes to judge, no gossip to worry about. Even the servants made themselves scarce, only appearing when she and Lord Warren needed to eat or bathe.

Her husband made love to her in a surprising variety of ways, and then they slept, and then they woke and talked together, and had wonderful meals like this. Fresh bread, meat and fish, cheese, wine, and fruit that he fed her in little bits. There were cakes and tea twice a day, and more cakes at night if he rang the bell for it. Sometimes they stayed too busy doing other things.

Josephine felt perpetually shocked at the things she hadn’t known about her body, that her new husband taught her with his hands and his mouth, and his own body, which was perpetually shocking as well. She had been walking around for nineteen years, the entire time capable of enormous pleasure. If only she’d realized it.

“Not everyone appreciates these things,” he said, pouring her more wine. “You see, some people, especially English people, are frightened of sex. You were frightened by things your mother had told you.”

“But those things weren’t true.”

“Your mother probably said such things so you would keep yourself decent until you were married. Older ladies will spread stories to frighten young girls for the same reason. Unfortunately, the stories are told with such regularity that women come to believe them.”

“I believed,” she said, feeling rather disgruntled about it. “I shall tell every young woman I know the truth about things, and all the ways men and women might touch each other and make one another feel glorious.”

She thought he’d be the first to agree with this plan, but instead he gave a little frown. “My dear, that would not be advisable. Only because the things we do to one another are private. They’re too intimate to share with others. Some might even find them improper, the people I told you about, who feel threatened by sex. It’s best to let each husband teach his wife what he would like her to know.”

Something in his tone made her suspicious. Had he taught her improper things? “You told me that everyone does the things we’ve done. Is that not true?”

He pushed the tray away and pulled her close, fastening fingertips about one nipple and pinching it to an exquisite peak of pleasure and pain. He had explained about that too, about intensity and sensation. “Do you enjoy the things I’ve taught you?”

She squirmed at the pressure of his pinching fingers. “Yes, of course I do. But if they’re improper…”

“That depends on whom you ask.” He released her nipple and bent to tease it with gentle strokes of his tongue. Her hips tensed, the lower part of her body coming to life as she arched against him. “But if you think they’re improper,” he said, “I won’t do them to you anymore.”

“I think…oh…” She let out a gasping breath as his fingers found the secret part of her that ached so shamelessly for his caress. “I think you had better continue to do them. If you like.”

“Do you like?” he murmured, tracing a path over and around her center. “Shall I touch you, then, wherever I please, whether it’s proper or not?”

“Oh, I don’t know…” He had a way of taking over her with pleasure and sensation until she couldn’t string two thoughts together. “You must do as you wish. I—I do enjoy it.”

“That’s what I like to hear. You must let me have my way with your body, hmm? Because I know how to make you feel wonderful.”

Yes, he certainly did. In some part of her brain, she realized he’d never answered her question about the decency of their activities. But since he was so skilled at those activities, she soon forgot to care.

Josephine turned as Lord Warren leaned over the bed. Fingers twined in her hair, and gentle teeth nipped at her lips. “It’s you,” she said drowsily, reaching to touch his cheek.

“Did you think it might be someone else?” He arched his brow in that way that always made her laugh. Then she noticed something quite strange about him. He was dressed. Not just dressed to loiter about the house or wander in the woods as he had that day, but dressed quite formally, in a deep blue ensemble with an intricately tied cravat.

She sat up, clutching the sheets to her chest, for she was still quite naked. “Is the honeymoon over?” she asked.

“Almost. But not quite. We’re going somewhere today. It’s a surprise, and I’ve another surprise for you too. Get out of bed, darling.”

She gazed at the whole of him. “You look very handsome.”

Now his brows drew together in a line. “You’re not going to tempt me back to dissolution. We’ll never rejoin society at this rate.”

All the warm, fuzzy feelings of contentment bled away. “I don’t want to rejoin society.”

“Yes, I know, but we, in particular, do not have that choice. There will be gossip after our sudden wedding at Baxter’s. We’ve got to get back to London and plan some grand, notable entertainment, and invite hordes of people to our home to see that we adore one another.” He bent down to kiss her again. “You do adore me, don’t you?”

“What kind of grand, notable entertainment?” she asked, feeling a frisson of fear.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. A ball, I suppose, with music and food. We’re on Park Street, you know, in a big house with a ballroom twice the size of Warren Manor’s. I think it’ll be the easiest way to make everything right. I’m a little put out that you haven’t answered my question. I’ve spent this entire honeymoon trying to win your heart.”

“What was your question?”

“Do…you…adore…me?” he asked, pausing between each word to kiss her.

“I do adore you.” Heat colored her cheeks. “Of course I do, but I don’t want to have a ball.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything. You only have to be there and gaze at me lovingly, so Stafford can choke on his blasted rings and all the gossip can be put to rest. Now, please, get up. We’re riding an hour away.”

He said he would take care of everything, but he wasn’t the one everyone would be staring at. He wasn’t the one everyone thought strange and daft. “I don’t know how to ride very well.” She knew she sounded sullen, but she couldn’t help it. “Maybe you ought to go without me.”

“No, you must come because I’ve a surprise, as I told you. We’ll take the curricle.” He whipped off the sheets and picked her up, and threw her over his shoulder like a sack of grain. “Come and see what else I’ve got you, lazy miss.”

She clung to his coat, bouncing along through the passageway between their rooms and into her dressing room, which was previously quite empty for honeymoon purposes. He set her down and gestured proudly to a row of lace- and ribbon-trimmed gowns. One was of pale gray, another lavender, and the other two cream and white, embellished with pastel flowers.