Don't Tempt Me (Fallen Women 2)

Now, now, she wanted to scream.

She was ready as she’d never imagined she could be ready. She reached down and laid her hand over his breeches front, where his membrum virile pushed against the cloth. She found the buttons and undid them, quickly, impatiently. Then she found his manly place, and she closed her hand over his instrument of delight. It was nothing like Karim’s.

“Zoe.”

She stroked up and down its length.

It was very large and hot and hard.

It couldn’t possibly fit inside her.

She didn’t care. They’d make it fit somehow.

She’d learned a hundred positions, and she simply turned a little and bent her knee and got her bent leg up against his hip, her foot on the carriage seat.

His hand came away from her pleasuring place and slid over her hand and pushed it away from his rod of joy. She rocked against him, as close as she could get, skin to skin.

There were a thousand roads to pleasure. This was only one.

“You,” he said thickly.

She lifted heavy-lidded eyes to meet the smoldering green of his gaze.

She leaned toward him and ran her tongue over his lips.

She licked his chin.

He made a sound, a laugh and a groan combined.

“We have to stop,” he said.

She kept on rocking, pressing her soft treasure against his hard one. She was lost in pleasure, in the dark world of the passions. She was lost in the scent of him and the low sound of his voice, so rough. The carriage rocked under them and the satin gown rustled against his breeches.

It was wicked and beautiful, and she hung in the hot darkness of desire, rocking against him, skin to skin, pleasuring herself.

“Zoe.”

She brought her hands up and pushed down the top of her dress and grasped her breasts. Eyes closed, she rocked.

He made sounds. Words, growls—she didn’t know. She was deranged with passion and pleasure and heat, beautiful animal love.

He grasped her waist. “You have to—”

And then he growled deep in his throat. His hand came between them, to her pleasure place, hot and damp. And then she felt it, the great hot thing that couldn’t fit and she didn’t care.

He pushed, and her eyes flew open.

“Oh,” she said. “Oh.”

He pushed again, and her head sank onto his neck. She bit her lip. It hurt.

He pushed again, and she swallowed a cry of frustration. It was very uncomfortable.

Then she felt his hand again, so caressing, in her soft place, and inside her something gave way and she could feel him inside, filling her, and she whispered, wonderingly, “Oh, this is—oh, this is very good.”

He made the sound again, half laughter, half groan.

Then he moved, and she moved with him, rocking as she’d done before, but this time he was inside her. And this time the pleasure strengthened and seemed to rise inside her like a rocket. Higher and higher it went. And then it struck the top of the heavens and burst, and its remnants cascaded down, through her and around her, sparks of happiness trickling down in the darkness.

Mad, mad, mad.

He held her tightly while he came back to himself and she came back to herself.

He held her tightly while reason returned and said, Mad, mad, mad.

“Oh, Zoe,” he said, when he could find his voice.

“Oh,” she said softly. “That was splendid. Now I understand why the women carried on so. It’s most agreeable—except for the painful part in the middle. But that was because of my virgin barrier. Before that part and afterward, it was very good.”

He drew back a little to look at her.

She gazed at him dreamily and rocked a little, back and forth.

It was the shameless rocking. He might have come to his senses if not for that.

Or probably not.

There she was, smiling her wanton smile, her breasts hanging out of her dress.

“You have no inhibitions, have you?” he said.

“My English came back so quickly and easily,” she said. “Inhibitions seem to need a great deal more time than three weeks. I didn’t have much time for them—I was so busy practicing curtseying out of a room backward without tripping over my train or the hem of my gown or dropping my fan.” She stroked his cheek.

He turned his head and kissed her hand. The scent of their lovemaking was there, and his mind started to thicken again.

Think of her father, he told himself.

And that was like a pail of ice water dumped on his privates.

Lexham, the one man in the world for whom he’d lay down his life.

…whose youngest and dearest daughter Marchmont had just dishonored.

He took her hand and kissed the back of it. As he did so, his gaze strayed to the window. “Curse it,” he said.

“What?” she said. “What?”

“We’ll be there in a moment,” he said. “We need to put our clothes in order very quickly. We need to pray that the sun’s glare on the coach window prevented anyone’s seeing what we were doing.”

This was another coach meant for formal occasions. A heavy vehicle, older and larger than the one that had brought them here, it was built like a man-of-war, and richly fitted out. It would not jounce about a great deal when people were not sitting quietly in their respective seats. Onlookers wouldn’t be able to make out what transpired inside the carriage. The windows were small, the interior dark. Still, the two footmen standing on the footboard at the back might have heard the sounds and known what they signified.

Never mind.

It didn’t matter whether anyone had seen or heard or guessed what the Duke of Marchmont had done. He’d done it, and he knew what he had to do next.

He shifted her back onto her seat and helped her clean herself and put her clothes in order. Then he attended to himself. In the process, he found some spots of blood on the inside of his breeches’ flap and some on her petticoats.

It was only a very little, and that discovery eased one weight from his mind. He hadn’t hurt her so badly as he’d imagined.

/> He shouldn’t have hurt her at all.

He should have been content with keeping his cock out of a place where it didn’t belong.

But no. He couldn’t be content with touching her and pleasuring her with his hands and letting her pleasure him with her hand, her wicked, wicked hand.

Never mind. It was done, and at least there was no obvious evidence on the outside.

The matter could be dealt with quietly.

Quietly, that is, if she would cooperate.

He knew Zoe too well to count on that.

He had better be careful how he approached this. He took a moment to determine the best way to put it to her. Then, “Zoe,” he said.

She was giving a few final adjustments to the lace at her neckline. “You’d better fix my headdress,” she said. “I can’t see whether it’s straight or not.”

He adjusted her tiara. He brushed from her hair and his coat bits of feathers that had got loose during the orgy.

“Zoe,” he said.

She looked up at him and smiled the beatific smile.

“Zoe, would you mind very much becoming the Duchess of Marchmont?”

The smile faltered a little. She gazed at him for a long, long time.

He made himself wait.

“It’s because of this,” she said, her hand sliding to her belly. “Because I’m not a virgin anymore.”

“I know I should have controlled myself,” he said. “I know you wanted to meet other men—but even if we hadn’t done what we did…Zoe, I’m sure I wouldn’t like it at all if you did that with someone else.”

Those were not the smoothest remarks he’d ever uttered, but he felt anything but cool and composed at the moment. He was too painfully aware of having destroyed her chances of choosing a husband for herself. He was too painfully aware of having betrayed her father’s trust. At the same time, he didn’t regret what had happened, and it was quite true that he didn’t want her to choose another husband.

“Possessive,” she said.

“Yes,” he said.

Her expression brightened again. “Only a crazy woman wouldn’t wish to be the Duchess of Marchmont,” she said.

It wasn’t quite the answer he’d expected—but what should he expect? “Does that mean yes?”