Eyes like darkest blue velvet stared back at her, full of sincerity.
Passion.
Fervent adoration.
He was staring at her as though she were the most beautiful, most special woman in the whole world.
It was intoxicating.
And, it was so tempting to believe.
She caught her breath, wanting but not quite daring to believe she could…what? Capture some part of herself that life had wounded, leaving her altered. Hardened. Less the Rebecca who could have been. The Rebecca who would have been better, happier, kinder than she had ended up being.
He promised her healing. A return to her youth but with a difference. She would have the experience to appreciate and enjoy it all so much more.
“You’ll see, Rebecca.” He traced his fingertip down the centre of her chest. “You will shed all these scars that other men and life has placed on you. You will be your own sweet self again.”
She found herself drowning in his impassioned stare.
God, he was so seductive.
It was hard to focus on her own thoughts. Or to remember why it had been important to stay angry with him. To remain hardened.
Men like him know how to seduce women. They will say anything they think you want to hear.
Jon’s warning echoed in her mind.
He would know, wouldn’t he? He was one of those men. And he always had her best interests in mind. She ought to take heed and stop this madness.
She lifted her chin. “You’re telling me such incredible things. I may not be able to conceive another child at my age.”
“That’s true. I might not be capable of siring a child. I have never tried before. But we might be blessed.” Tenderness entered his gaze. “And I would welcome such an event as the dearest blessing.”
She gaped at him. This beautiful, vital and virile man wanted children from her? No man had ever before wanted children from her. Donald had been ambivalent about her pregnancy with Edwin. Jon might have considered marrying her to gain heirs but it wasn’t out of any particular desire to have her blood mingled with his.
There was something unbearably romantic about having a man telling her that he longed to create a child with her.
And there was something altogether too tempting about having this man tell her that.
Don’t lose your head. For God’s sake, remember that you do not know what he is. Not completely.
She gave herself a little internal shake. “You’re telling me things you think I want to hear.”
“I am telling you what is in my heart.”
She frowned, fighting harder to resist the undertow, the desire to hurl herself straight into the dreams he spun. “No, you know me too well. Somehow you already know me too well. It can’t be true.”
“People who are in love often want some of the same things. This is why you think I am telling you only what you want to hear.”
“You think we’re in love?”
“I know we’re in love.”
“But we don’t know each other. We haven’t spent enough time together to love each other.”
“Yes, that’s true.”
She deepened her frown. “I don’t understand.”
“We’ve spent enough time to fall in love. We have fallen in love more than once and been split apart. Both times by your misguided sense of loyalty. But it will, as you say, take time for us to learn how to truly love each other. But that doesn’t stop us from wanting to be with each other. From wanting each other.”
Stephen stroked the underside of her left breast, caressing that fullest part. Her nipple tightened into an almost painful point. He was so, so intoxicating…
“I think being ‘in-love’ is too strong a term for this between us,” she said, just to have something to focus her fast drifting thoughts upon.
“Why have you not taken a new lover in all the time since Ruel gave you the congé?”
“I told you,” she said stridently, wishing only to push back against his intensity. It was all so unfair. He was so much more quick minded than she was. He could spin such beautiful words, inspire such lovely thoughts. She was stumbling along after him, becoming more and more enchanted with the visions he created for her. More and more off-balance from his deep probing of her every nuance. “I have been busy. I have a duty to my father and my family now.”
“That’s not the reason.”
Again, his utter certainty made her mouth fall open. “How can you say that?”
“Because if you truly believed that you must stay with your father, you would never have eloped with Donald Howland.”
“But I did. I am that kind of a woman. Even as a girl I was selfish.”
His smile was a fleeting expression of gentle tolerance, of fond amusement at a foolish girl. It galled her. Yet she couldn’t look away from those enchanting eyes. Deep and blue as night…
He shook his head firmly. “You have a too finely attuned sense of duty, it wouldn’t have allowed you to leave. You knew your father would do just fine without you.”
“All right, maybe duty is just part of the reason I have kept my virtue since Jon married. Maybe I want to be safe. Emotionally safe.”
“That’s not really the reason either.”
“Ha! You think you know everything.”
“Not everything. But I do know about this.”
“Oh, well then, please do tell me the reason I have stayed celibate since Jon left me.”
“You were waiting for me to come back and to claim you.”
She laughed softly. “No, you’re wrong.”
“I am correct, you just don’t want to admit it. You can’t admit it yet.” He caressed her breast again in a slow, gentle motion.
She couldn’t help arching into his touch. He worked magic on her, surely he did. No other man had filled her with such anticipation, such desire. Never.
“We could get to know each other quite well.”
“You think this situation with Maria will continue that long?”
“No, I shall bring it to an end soon. Quite soon. But after it is done, I wish that you and I could go travelling together.” He paused in the act of stroking her. “You liked America—the former colonies?”
“Yes, I liked them very much.”
“Well, would you like to see South America?”
“It’s rather dangerous there, is it not?”
“I would keep you safe.” He caressed her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “It’s beautiful there, Rebecca, in a primitive way.” He spoke for a time about dense forests and jungles, colourful birds and flowers, majestic waterfalls and snow-capped mountains.
Longing welled inside her wholly different from the type he’d been inspiring with his hands just a moment past. It was unfair, so unfair to be tormented with this kind of temptation.
She adored travel. It was one of the things she had missed the most since she had ceased to follow the drum upon Jon having inherited his earldom and quitting the Dragoons. She missed that sense of wonder, magic, of not knowing what sights a new day would bring.
“I’d like to purchase a ship,” he continued. “I would outfit it with every luxury and then I would take you with me and travel the world if you want. We’ll see everything. And the place you decide is the best, I will build you a mansion there.”
She gaped at his fantastical little speech. “You do love to jest.”
“I am completely serious.”
“Ha!”
“I am sincere, I swear on my parents’ graves.”
“You should not make oaths like that.”
“I am wealthy. I can make your every whim or wish come true.”
“La, you had better be careful with such talk. Maybe I have some astonishing dreams of grandeur.”
“I am prepared for it.”
“And where would you ever attain the money for such an undertaking?”
“I am wealthy. I can afford it and more.”
She stifled her lau
gh. Now she knew for certain that he was either lying to her to seduce her or he was completely insane. A printer’s son could never, ever hope to amass the kind of incredible fortune he was talking about.
“You still underestimate me.”
“I am trying to believe, Stephen, truly I am. But you have to admit it is simply too fantastical that a printer’s son, a secretary, would be able to amass fantastic wealth. It is simply too much.”
“In the Dragoons, when I was still so much a boy, even for being eighteen, and you were really still such a naïve, soft-hearted girl, you felt I was too young for you. I wasn’t able to instil the sense of your being protected and safe that you craved. You found that with Jonathon Lloyd and you mistook it for love.”
“There was more between Jon and me than just his protection.”
“Of course, he was your friend. But he was not your love.”
She gave a soft gasp. “I think I am the best judge of whether or not I loved Jon.”
“There are many ways of loving someone. But the way you want to love me and the way I want to love you, there can only be one.”
“You sound so certain.”
“Rebecca, none of this really matters. I am here now and I do claim you.” He bent closer and then the warmth of his mouth on her nipple sent pleasure cascading through her. She closed her eyes.
I do claim you.
Oh God. Yes, yes, let him claim her, take her, humble her, punish her, break her… Would it really hurt anything to just let him continue, to let him seduce her?
Especially if she kept her head and the whole matter remained strictly just for tonight? Just one more night with him.
The gentle tug of his mouth on her nipple increased the pleasure coursing from her breasts into her belly. And lower.
She moaned and brought her hands up, entwined them into his hair. His thick, silken, wondrously black hair.
No, it wouldn’t hurt. One more night couldn’t possibly make anything worse.
Decision made, she stood.
His pupils dilated, making his eyes look dark, dangerous. Beautiful.
With his gaze, he swept her from head-to-foot.
She let a slow smile curve her lips and his eyes blazed with desire. She lowered her own gaze.
“Lift your arms for me, sweeting.”
She obeyed.
“Show me your lovely body.”
She turned slowly, displaying herself. When she had come full circle, she stopped, keeping her eyes downcast.
“God, you are something special.”
Her smile tugged at her lips and widened. She glanced up through her lashes, stealing a look at him.
He was staring at her as though she were the last woman on earth.
“You are incomparable.” His voice rang with passion.
Warmth blazed through her and she let herself devour his form with her eyes. He was so gorgeous, so perfectly lean and tall and utterly masculine. And he found her to be special.
Incomparable.
A surge of desire stabbed through her loins, making her nub throb painfully. She bit her lip and pressed her thighs together tightly.
He made a sound like a cross between a groan and a growl.
The sound sent renewed sparks of fire surging through her. Wetness seeped down between her legs. She could feel her flesh swelling, swelling. Growing ever more needy. She pressed her thighs together harder and writhed.
He put his hands into the curve of her waist and with one move, jerked her wet, naked body to his clothed one.
She cried out, the sound cut short by his open mouth coming over hers, hungry. She clung to his shoulders, pressing herself, her breasts, her belly against his solid form. There was nothing then but the taste of his tongue, sliding against hers, the pounding of her heart in her ears and his heart’s beat against her body.
He was bending a little and she strained up on her toes and she was aware, more than ever, of his tallness and just how petite she really was in comparison. How delicate she felt pressed against his hard muscled yet lean frame. She clung to him and clung to him as he devoured her, plundered her.
Starved for air, she grew a little light-headed and pushed against his chest.
He tore his mouth from hers. The harsh sounding of their panting, air-gulping breaths drowned out the distant sounds of laughter and ribald singing from downstairs.
“Stephen…” she said the word breathlessly against his ear.
He groaned then pulled her down, bending her backwards, tipping her off her feet and put his mouth on hers again, a harsh, urgent kiss.
The hardness of his erection pressed against her. She straightened, pulled back a little and began to fumble with the buttons on his fall. But her eagerness made her fingers clumsy and his growing size strained against the cloth, making it difficult to manipulate the buttons. She paused in her struggles with his fall to caress his length through the velveteen. Oh, God, she wanted to touch that bare, throbbing heat so badly! She wanted it now! She released her breath in a low, lengthy exhalation that was a cross between a wail and a moan.
He swept her hands away and wrenched the fastenings undone himself.
In the next moment, his cock sprang free into her waiting hands. She stroked him, closing her eyes at the deliciousness feel of silk over steel, the heat of him.
He took her hands, prying them off with hasty, impatient motions.
She gasped with loss.
He grasped her buttocks and pulled her tight against himself until his erection throbbed against her stomach. A gush of wet warmth spilled over her bare flesh. He groaned and thrust his hips. The slick slide of his rod against her sent fire sparking directly to her nub. She grasped his shoulders. “Stephen, oh Stephen.”
He pressed her harder. “I love your arse, Rebecca. You surely have the most gorgeous, perfect little arse in the whole world.”
He said this with such reverence in his tone, it made her laugh.
She wiggled against him, sliding herself on his throbbing heat.
“Christ,” he said and the groan in his voice sent a surge of satisfaction through her. Anticipation.
A sense of being young, free, of having regained something lost.
She tossed her head back and laughed.
He bent over her, his breath tickling her throat. His lips traced the line from her collarbone to her ear. He took her earlobe into his mouth and sucked gently.
Wicked fire lit her from head to foot but centred in her sex. She shuddered. “Stephen, Stephen.” She arched into him, trying to increase the friction. “Oh God, Stephen.”
“Here, here,” he said, disengaging from her and taking her hands and looking down.
She stepped out of the tub and then allowed him to lead her to the table.
He turned her. “Put your hands flat on the table.”
She obeyed him.
He grasped her hips. His crown touched her entrance.
She moaned and pressed backwards. She was so wet that on one quick thrust, he slid all the way inside, filling her, stretching her.
With closed eyes, she tossed her head back and moaned.
He reached around and touched the little nub at the crest of her sex and caressed it with a steady, firm circular motion even as he moved within her.
“Oh, oh, oh I shall c-come.” She gasped. “I shall come immediately.”
“Come then, I want you to.” He redoubled his efforts.
She closed her eyes, drew her breath in and let herself be swept into the cascade of shuddering, clenching pleasure.
Oh, it was all so sweet and swift!
It left her panting.
He withdrew.
She whimpered. A soft protest, a sound of loss.
He stepped away from her and began shedding his clothes. When he stood in his breeches and boots, he sat in the nearby chair and motioned for her. “Come, girl, help me with my boots.”
She gave a gasping laugh. No one had called her ‘girl’ in a very long time
, except maybe for Father but that was entirely different and even thinking of it had no place here! She laughed again. Tension that she hadn’t even been aware of, tension that she now knew had been with her a good, long while, lifted from her chest and belly.
She felt freer and lighter than air.
Her feet seemed to glide on the floor as she approached him with downcast eyes and knelt and then helped him remove his footwear. When his feet were bared, she put her hands on her cheeks then bent forward and kissed the top of each of his feet.
He touched her shoulders, silently urged her to rise back to her knees.
She obeyed but kept her eyes lowered.
He widened his legs and pulled her closer until her breasts were touching his spread inner thighs, sliding along the soft rasp of velveteen as he pulled her even closer.
Sparks of sensation made her grit her teeth.
He caressed her head. “You have such lovely hair. All golden and red threads, as soft as a September sunset.”
She couldn’t help a smile.
He removed what remained of her hairpins. Her curls fell to her shoulders in tangled disarray. He threaded his hands into her hair, sliding them along her scalp until he had the whole mass of her loose curls lifted off her neck. He tightened his hold, pulling gently. The dull pressure was pleasurable. It relaxed her further, made her rag-doll limp, leaning against his legs.
“Unfasten my fall.”
She felt almost drunk. Dizzy with anticipation. Like one in a trance, she moved to obey him. He had only refastened the outer buttons and it was quick work free his erection once more.
“May I touch you?”
“Yes, touch me.”
She stroked her hand up and down his thick length.
His cock jerked violently within her grasp. It was hard to keep her hold firm. He was leaking and leaking, the hot sticky fluid wetting her hand.
He drew his breath in sharply and his hands tightened on her hair, pulling her head back. A little painfully.
Her nipples grew more rigid than ever and wetness gushed between her legs.
“That’s enough of that,” he said, with amusement in his voice.
She moaned. He was always denying her.
He released her hair and urged her to move aside and allow him to stand.
Perilous Risk Page 22
