Groaning, Chanderley closed his eyes. “You are killing me!”
Charlie looked down. True, you could see the swell of her breasts, yet the shirt was not any more revealing than several of her London dresses. “It’s not as if you haven’t seen parts of my bosom before.”
Another heartfelt groan. “Lud! Don’t say such things!”
This time the smile couldn’t be suppressed. With her lips curved, she walked towards him, this big, tall man, who trembled at the sight of a bit of her creamy flesh. Who would have thought it? How exciting this was!
She stopped in front of him, running her hands up his shoulders, pressing a kiss to the edge of his jaw. “I release you from your honourable obligations,” she murmured, and kissed the corner of his mouth. “For once in your life, you may do whatever you want.”
A gift not just to herself, but also to him. She wanted to forge memories he could treasure, too, a reprieve from his suffocating guilt and his sense of obligation.
He made a sound like a wounded animal. Then his hand, big and rough and wonderful, slipped inside her shirt to cup one of her breasts while his mouth swooped down to capture hers in a heated kiss. It seared through her body, making her moan. She could taste some kind of potent wine on his tongue.
“Are you foxed?” she asked breathlessly.
“Hell! I must be three sheets to the wind to be doing this,” he muttered, but with his free hand drew her tighter against himself and kissed her again.
This time his thumb thrummed over her nipple until it was hard as a pebble and—oh my gosh!—so sensitive.
Charlie whimpered. She was already shivering with pleasure, and wondered how much more she would be able to take when this was already so much.
Chanderley released her lips to gasp, “I want you forever.” Breathing heavily like a horse that had been run too hard, he leaned his forehead against hers. “I am dying inside for I can’t… I can’t… You should hate me because I hate myself. You don’t know how much! But I cannot go against my family’s wishes in this. I have already cost them far too much.”
“Shhh.” Charlie put her fingers over his mouth, stopping the agitated flood of words that came pouring out of him. Her heart bled for him, for both of them. She could have wept at the torment she heard in his voice.
Yet she was determined that this was not the time for anguish and recriminations. So she forced her tone to be light when she answered. “Well. You can’t have me forever, we have already established that. But we can have this, can’t we?” She leaned back to look him in the eye. “Just this once?”
His brown eyes two pools of darkness, he stared at her. “I should say no.”
She might have pointed out that his protests were not very convincing, given that his hand was still curved around her breast as if this was the most natural place for it to be. “If we can’t have each other,” she said, ignoring the painful pang the mere thought of never seeing him again after this afternoon elicited, “can’t we have the memories of this at least? I’ve already told you, George: I am taking responsibility for this. I am releasing you from the obligations of honour. For once in your life, you can be whoever you want to be, do whatever you want.” She stroked a hand over his cheek, again feeling that pang when he nestled his face into her palm as if treasuring her touch. “No obligations, George, and no regrets. For once, you are free to do whatever you please.”
He lowered his head, so Charlie could no longer see his expression. His hand flexed around her breast, and his thumb stroked over the sensitive skin at the side.
She gritted her teeth. It was difficult not to react to his touch when the merest brush of his fingers made her whole body tingle. Yet she felt she ought to make absolutely sure that he understood her proposition and that he wouldn’t be eaten up by even more guilt later on. “I offer you freedom, George,” she said softly, running her hand through his hair. “For this afternoon at least, here with me, you can do whatever you want.”
She jumped when his fingers suddenly closed over her nipple in a hard pinch. “Ow!”
He looked up, his expression even harsher than before, his eyes glittering dangerously. “Then I choose this.” He pinched her nipple again. “I will make you beg and scream with pleasure until you are hoarse,” he threatened darkly. He glanced down her body. “I will lick you, devour you from top to toe. I will drown you in so much pleasure you won’t know what to do with it.”
Oh my. It seemed she had unleashed a beast, and Chanderley had decided to shrug off all vestiges of propriety, decorum, and civilised behaviour.
“How exciting,” Charlie said brightly.
His brows meshed. “Exciting, my foot!” he growled, and his eyes narrowed to slits. “When I’m through with you, you won’t know what’s top and what’s bottom. You won’t—”
“Hmhm.” She kissed his jaw. “Are you foxed, Chanderley? I only ask—again—because you sound so strange.”
“One glass of wine, that’s all I’ve drunk.” He released her and took a step back. Crossing his arms over his chest, he gave her a wolfish smile, the kind of which she had never seen him use before. “Having second thoughts, my dear?”
Uh-oh. Even though her heart thumped loudly in her chest, Charlie mimicked his pose. “So you think I have suddenly become chicken-hearted? Truly, my lord, that’s not very generous of you.”
He raised his brows. “Prove it. Undo the lacings of your shirt.”
“That doesn’t exactly demand a lot of courage,” she muttered while fumbling with the knots at her wrists.
“Where did you get the clothes anyway?” he asked conversationally—not that she was fooled by his tone. He had well and truly shed decorum, and would probably demand something terribly outrageous from her next. She couldn’t wait.
“Really, Chanderley, don’t you know anything? There are many fine old clothes dealers in this city.” She half raised her hands and the sleeves of her shirt slipped down her arms. “See? All undone.”
“After the Frimsey conservatory, have you ever touched yourself?”
Charlie felt her cheeks heat. What kind of question was that? “No.” A thought occurred to her. “Did you?”
That wolfish smile widened.
Oh my! He had!
An arrow of potent delight shot through her, making her shiver.
He gave her a considering look. “Pull your shirt off one shoulder and show me your breast.”
Sheer excitement made Charlie almost lightheaded. She had known he would demand something outrageous. Pushed to the limit, poor man, and—poof!—all that nice, elegant exterior had gone.
And he was right: it did demand some courage to do as he had asked, but at the same time this felt so deliciously naughty that heat pooled low in her stomach.
She arranged her clothes to his satisfaction, pushing down one lapel of her shirt just so, making one breast peep through the opening. A glance showed her that her nipple was still hard from his earlier ministrations.
Just thinking about that… “Hmmm.”
“Very sweet,” he remarked, bringing her gaze back up to his.
“Don’t you think it’s too small? I’ve always thought my breasts very small, compared to those of other girls.”
He grinned, the aggravating man. “I think your breast is very pretty, Charlie. Now touch it, like I did before.”
It was another test of courage, another test of wills, another test to see whether she had really meant what she had said or whether would regret any of this later on. As if she ever would.
She cupped her breast, stroking it as he had done. Pleasure radiated from her touch, and when she experimentally pinched the tip, the pleasure became so intense, it made her moan.
“God,” Chanderley said rawly. “You look… No, no, let me.” And then he was in front of her, pushing her hand aside, bending his head and taking her nipple into his mouth, licking and suckling sharply.
Her breath hissed through her nose. She had to grab his shoulders or
surely she would have slithered down onto the floor in a puddle of pleasure.
His head came up, so he could kiss her mouth—no, devour it—while he continued to fondle her breast. Slowly, step by step, he walked her back until the back of her legs bumped against an armchair that was conveniently situated in the anteroom. He pushed her down and immediately followed her. Kneeling on the floor in front of her, he continued his sensual assault, kissing her breathless, making her stomach do somersaults.
Indeed, Charlie felt quite overwhelmed by his desire for her. It was like a flood that couldn’t be stopped. However, as it was she herself who had opened the floodgates, who had called forth this darkly seductive, sensual Chanderley, she reckoned this was not the time for trepidation.
“I can’t get enough of you,” he murmured, as he strung a row of kisses along her jaw. “So soft…” And, “You drive me insane with wanting you,” when he proceeded down her throat, licking and nibbling on her tender skin.
She shifted beneath him, moaned when he found a particularly sensitive spot.
Then she felt him tampering with the buttons of her breeches. In no time at all, the front flap fell open and cool air whispered over her most private place.
Yet before she even had time to feel embarrassment, his fingers had slipped between her legs. One large finger settled at the top of her slit, moving insistently against her. Quite suddenly the pleasure became so intense all rational thought fled her mind. All she could do was writhe and moan and gasp his name and lift her hips in a desperate attempt to get closer… closer.
“Good girl.” He kissed her temple, then leaned his forehead against hers. “Come for me,” he whispered seductively, his voice sweet as dark honey. “Now!” His hand slipped to her breast. He pinched her nipple once more, and sharp delight shot through her, making her arch off the chair, his name on her lips, as pleasure upon pleasure crashed over her.
When it was over and she lay sprawled limply on the chair, she asked weakly, “What was that?”
Chuckling, he pressed a kiss on the top of her head. “That, my dear, was only the beginning.”
With easy grace he stood, and swung her up into his arms. “Time for bed.” He walked with her into what looked like a sitting room cum study, and from there through a large double door into his bedroom. There he laid her down on the bed, and cupped her face in his hand, his other hand stroking over her cropped hair. His eyes searched hers, then his gaze suddenly darkened dramatically, and he leaned forward and kissed her with something close to desperation. “My Charlie,” he murmured.
But she wasn’t his.
Not really.
A pang of sadness threatened to dispel all that wonderful pleasure he had given her, and she couldn’t, couldn’t let this happen.
Determinedly, Charlie started to work on his neckcloth. “I want to see you,” she told him. “Now,” she added, echoing his earlier demand.
As she had done, he willingly complied, by climbing onto the bed and straddling her. In a trice he had loosened his neckcloth and then he pulled his shirt over his head, revealing a rather marvellous chest.
Charlie’s breath caught. “Oh Chanderley! You look so… so…” Helplessly, her gaze roamed from his chest, sprinkled lightly with curly blond hair, to his belly, tight with muscle. An intriguing swirl of hair circled his navel, then disappeared under the waistband of his breeches.
He gave an unsteady laugh. “Your regard is very gratifying, my dear.”
When he leaned forward to kiss her, she could feel his hardening staff press against her belly. It was enough to make her own excitement mount again.
“Hmm,” she murmured against his ear. “This is all very nice, but haven’t you promised me something about devouring and tormenting me?”
“Aggravating minx,” he murmured back, and nipped at her lower lip in retribution. “I will show you torment.”
Charlie chuckled. “Threats, idle threats,” she teased him, enchanted by this unexpected hint of playfulness in him.
With a growl he proceeded to divest both of them of the rest of their clothes, even while Charlie continued to giggle and chuckle.
However, her hilarity quickly subsided when his mouth caught her breast and his fingers started to play with her nether curls. “Hmmm.” Closing her eyes, she pressed her head back into the pillows. “Is that the part where you lick me from top to toe?” She stroked her hand over his back, loving the feel of bunching muscles under the smooth skin. “Do people really do such things?”
This time it was his turn to chuckle. “Charlie, you say the damndest things. Even in bed.”
“Hmm.” She buried her hand in his hair, as his mouth found her other breast. “I assume it must be very disconcerting.”
“Horribly,” he assured her. “I had better shut you up, hadn’t I?”
She opened her eyes and lifted her head to peek down at him. “How do you propose to do that?”
Instead of an answer, he merely gave her another of those wolfish smiles that, she realised, she could quickly come to love just as much as his meshed eyebrows.
“Hmph.” She let her head fall back. “I don’t think you can. I think you are only bragging, sir.”
His hands spanned her waist, and he buzzed a row of kisses on her stomach.
“That’s very nice,” Charlie said, smiling. “You may continue with this.”
His tongue dipped into her navel.
With a gasp she shot up.
Kneeling between her legs, he regarded her with amusement. “Ticklish, my dear?” He raised a brow. “What about the back of your knees? Are you ticklish there as well?”
His right hand closed around her leg, and while he lifted it, his eyes remained trained on hers. “Well?” he asked, and gave the side of her knee a peck. “Not ticklish there?”
“Hm.” His warm fingers on his leg made her mouth go dry, but she forced her voice to remain light. How it delighted her that Chanderley, very proper Chanderley, had turned out to be a bit of a mischievous devil in bed! Who would have thought? “No, I don’t think so. I am most sorry.” She infused her tone with a suitable amount of regret.
“Don’t be. What about this?” And he licked the back of her knee.
Charlie gasped as a bolt of intense pleasure drove all the air out of her body.
“Ahh! Success,” he pronounced, and repeated his actions.
Moaning, Charlie writhed and tried to free her leg from his grasp. “No, George, no, that’s too—”
“Intense?” he purred. Lud, he was a devil! “But I haven’t even started yet, my dear.” His hand glided down her thigh, slowly. The next moment, he swooped down, both hands pushing her thighs up and outwards, so that most private part of her was exposed to his gaze.
Embarrassed heat washed up from her chest over her face. “Chanderley, that’s really not— Ooooh, ohhh my!” when he kissed her there.
Charlie thought she would surely die from that much pleasure. And the worst thing was: he wouldn’t stop. He went on kissing and licking, even biting the swell of her mound, while she moaned and begged and arched off the bed, incoherent with all the pleasure he inflicted upon her.
And just when it was about to crest and pull her under, he did stop.
Charlie sobbed in frustration.
He flipped her around and stretched over her back. “You did say I was to lick you from top to toe,” he murmured into her ear, each word a hot, delicious puff against her sensitive skin. “I am only following your commands.” He licked the shell of her ear, then kissed her neck and the long, long curve of her spine. Reaching underneath her, he teased her breasts until helpless shudders shook her body.
“I love how responsive you are,” he said, his voice strained. “I love how each of your moans and gasps belongs to me.” He took a pillow and thrust it under her belly, lifting her bottom in a way that was most certainly very rude. Only he didn’t think so.
She pressed her hot face into the remaining pillow and let his words wash ove
r her.
“I love the knowledge that everywhere I touch you haven’t been touched before.”
She gasped as his hands closed over her bottom. They felt enormous when he started to knead her flesh.
He groaned. “I love that you let me do this. I love the knowledge that you will burn for me when I do this.” He spread her thighs, and once again buried his face in her sex.
This time Charlie did scream. After the interruption before, the pleasure had become even more intense, more consuming. Oh God, it was too much!
She tried to wriggle away, close her legs, anything, to evade that terrible, terrible pleasure that he brought forth. But he held her fast, not letting her go, forcing her to accept all he had to give.
She cried out again when her world exploded into a million little pieces, and pleasure upon pleasure pumped through her body.
Afterwards she lay boneless on the bed, floating on pure bliss. In a dim and distant corner of her mind, she could feel Chanderley behind her. He stroked over her back with a hand that was no longer quite steady.
“You never fail to amaze me,” she heard him say.
He turned her around, and she gave him a lazy smile. “That was most nice,” she managed, but the remainder of her pleasure quickly evaporated as she caught sight of his stiff, engorged member. Her eyes widened. “Dear God, Chanderley, what has happened to you?” Surely it wasn’t supposed to be quite so big and so dark?
He followed her eyes and barked a laugh. “You, my dear, are a treasure.” He shook his head at her. “Lie back.”
“But it looks so painful!” A large hand on her chest pushed her back. “Surely you cannot mean to tell me that it is supposed to look like this! It’s—oh!”
One of his fingers probed between her legs, slipping inside her.
“You are so ready for me,” he groaned.
Charlie frowned. “Are you sure this is wise, Chanderley?” He added a second finger, stretching her. She wriggled a little because the invasion felt rather uncomfortable. “Chanderley?” she repeated, not to be deterred. “With the state that—” She pointed in the general direction of his member. “—part of yours is in, I don’t think we should be doing this.”
Springtime Pleasures Page 21
