Valiant (Gentlemen of the Order 3)

“Yes.” She took to staring then, examining the length and girth. “Fascinating, in fact. May I touch you?”

He laughed in shock. “Love, you may do whatever your heart desires. I am but a slave to your whims. A servant to your pleasure.”

The first tentative touch of her fingers on his cock drew a hissed obscenity from his lips. He fought the urge to tell her how to hold him, what to do. The anticipation of that first firm grip, that first glide back and forth, almost made him come in her hand.

“It’s a strange contradiction.” She wrapped her fingers around him, moved her hand in experimental strokes. “The sheath is so soft, yet you’re remarkably hard. The slightest movement makes you moan.”

“You hold the power, Vivienne. The power to bring me untold pleasure. The power to turn me away unsatisfied.” To sweep out of his life as quickly as she came. To leave him unloved and alone.

“Power is a formidable thing.” Her hot gaze licked his torso, though he noted a flash of tenderness that usually had no place in illicit liaisons. “But I would prefer to share the responsibility. I wish to be at your mercy, too.”

He glanced at the gown bathing her body in an incandescent sheen, and couldn’t wait to see it a crumpled mess on the floor.

“Then let us begin by stripping you out of that dress.”

With surprising gentleness, he stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers, brushed her hair from her face, ran his thumb over her bottom lip. Who knew a sweet sigh of contentment could melt a man’s heart? Who knew a man could undress a woman slowly while sporting a throbbing rod of iron?

He took his time, peeled away the layers as if she were a gift conjured by his ancestor and delivered from his heavenly plane. She breathed deeply when he removed her stays, filling her lungs, though soon she would be breathless again.

“Your skin is like porcelain.” He pressed his lips to her nape before slipping her chemise up over her bare thighs, over her hips and head.

He stepped back, surveying the beauty of her womanly form, every gentle curve taunting him. The ache in his cock was nothing to the ache in his chest. He would most likely spend the second she turned around. Yet while her breasts were equally magnificent, the longing in her eyes sang to his soul.

She reached out to him first, sliding her hand over his bare chest and up around his neck, melding her naked body to his. He locked her there, his hand flat against her spine, his erection pushing against soft flesh.

“Are you sure you want to give me your virtue, Vivienne?” The irony being it was a far more precious gift than anything one would find in a pirate’s chest.

“There is no man I trust more than you.” The minx kissed his neck, inhaled the scent of him and sighed. “And I doubt I shall ever have these overwhelming feelings again.”

He vowed she would, swore a silent promise to make love to her every night from here on in.

But it was time to stoke passion’s flames, and so he captured her plump lips in a searing kiss, explored the wonders of her mouth with his inquisitive tongue, for he had never tasted a woman as intoxicating as Vivienne Hart. Never thought the mating of mouths could make his heart swell as large as his manhood. Never expected the first slide of his fingers against her slick wetness would drag a guttural groan from his lips.

“Touch me,” she panted against his mouth. “Touch me there again, Evan.”

Hell, he wasn’t sure what aroused him more—the instant shiver that came from hearing her speak his given name, or the pant of approval as he massaged the sensitive nub. They should retreat to the comfort of the bed, but he liked the way his nymph moved against his hand, rolling her hips like the gentle undulations of the sea.

“Shall I make you come like this, Vivienne?”

Her head fell back, exposing the elegant column of her throat. “Your words, your voice, they’re as stimulating as your fingers. Oh! Don’t stop, Evan.”

Stop? He’d rather fifty lashes with a birch.

/> She reached down between their hot bodies and stroked the length of his cock. Damn. Her untutored touch was beyond divine.

“I need to be inside you, love.” This would be a quick affair, he feared. They had the whole night to work up to an encore. “Don’t be afraid. Trust me to take care of you.”

“I do, I do trust you.”

He scooped her up into his arms and carried her to bed. She tried to protest when he kissed his way down between the valley of her thighs.

“Trust me, love,” he whispered, though she surrendered with the first flick of his tongue.

As long as he lived, he would never forget the way she gripped his hair, the way she anchored his mouth to her sex and convulsed. There was nothing staged about her whimpers, nothing fake. She cried his name as if he were a knight come to her rescue, the hero of her tale.

The moment he settled between her thighs, he felt a stirring in his chest as fierce as the one gripping his cock. Indeed, when she wrapped her legs around him, opening herself for his inevitable invasion, his only thought was of her.

“If you want me to stop simply say so.” He kissed her cheek, her chin, her lips. “We can lie together, talk if that is your wish.”