Her eyes searched his, verifying his meaning, then a slow, sultry smile—one he’d only seen in recent days—curved her lips.
“However I wish…” she murmured, and stretched up and kissed him.
CHAPTER 14
INWARDLY SMILING, CHARLES GRIPPED HER WAIST; FOR LONG moments, as her tongue dueled with his, he simply savored the feel of her between his hands, supple, imbued with feminine strength, subtly rather than overtly curvaceous.
Why that last should so attract him he’d never understood; perhaps it was because her body with its svelte charms echoed her elusive and therefore more tantalizing feminine responses.
If she liked challenges, he liked them even more. Especially when they were feminine. Especially when the female was her.
Letting her have her way wasn’t easy; his instinct in this arena was always to control, for his partner’s pleasure as much as his own. But pleasure was not the only currency he—they—were dealing in; if he wanted that other coin in the mix, he had to give ground, yield as she wished, and accept the risk that whatever was revealed wasn’t too frightening. Either for her, or him.
She pressed close again, and he shuddered, then she drew back enough to start on his clothes. Coat, waistcoat, cravat all went while he schooled himself to do no more than return her kisses, to leave his hands riding at her waist. He wasn’t sure where her imagination might lead her; he was eager to learn.
Inevitably he responded, not just to her nearness or the touch of her hands, but even more to her intent. From the instant she’d turned into his arms, that had never been in doubt. She wanted to take him inside her, wanted him inside her; that knowledge alone was enough to make him ache.
He tried not to dwell on it, instead reminded himself that courtesy of her relative inexperience combined with her confidence, the moments before they reached any rapturous state were bound to be not just fraught, but full of potential potholes large enough for him to bury himself in. He was feeling his way with her just as much as he was with her relative, but succeeding with her was far more important.
She’d opened his shirt; now she broke from the kiss, spread the halves wide, and visually devoured. “Stand still.” She leaned close and set her mouth to his skin.
He closed his eyes, felt his fingers tighten about her, helpless to desist, and reminded himself how vitally important winning her had become. Her mouth felt like flames licking over his already heated skin. Her greedy fingers danced, tangling in the dark hair dusting the muscle bands, finding the flat disc of one nipple and teasing, lightly tweaking.
Her lips and tongue distracted him while her fingers slid down to his waistband. And stilled.
She trailed kisses up the midline of his chest, through the hollow at the base of his throat, then up to his chin. He opened his eyes as she drew back, studying his face. He raised a brow.
“I’m thinking.”
That struck him as even more dangerous than usual. “Would you like me to make a suggestion?”
She shook her head, her gaze perfectly steady. “I’m trying to decide which, not what.”
It was going to be torture whichever option she chose.
One brow arched; she looked at him consideringly. “I think…” She stepped back, out of his hold. “Stay there—don’t move.”
He watched as she took another step away, then, hands bunching the fabric at her sides, she drew up her nightgown.
He’d been right, much good did it do him; the battle to remain where he was, to not reach for her as she—smoothly, gracefully, and entirely unhurriedly—drew her nightgown up and off over her head, then tossed it to fall across her dressing stool was fraught, as difficult as any he’d faced. Totally naked, she considered his chest, then her gaze drifted down.
“Your boots—take them off.”
Leaning back against the edge of her bed, he complied, flicking open his breeches’ buckles and stripping off his hose as well, setting all to one side.
As he straightened, he fixed his gaze on her feet, then slowly traced upward, over the curves of her calves, the long, sculpted lines of her thighs, lighting on the thatch of pale blond curls at their apex before idly drifting up over her belly, her waist, her breasts, ultimately to meet her eyes.
Her skin was already faintly tinged; in the moonlight he
couldn’t tell if his perusal had made it rosier still.
She held his gaze for a moment, then smiled, a cat sighting cream.
“Good,” she said, and closed the distance between them.
He’d forgotten his legs were against her bed; she stepped into him, not trapping him but limiting his ability to move—to create any distance between them—without moving her. Her breasts brushed his chest, wickedly evocative, then she lifted her head and set her lips to his—and set her hands and her body willfully to his. To work on his.
That was the option she’d chosen.