My Reckless Surrender

by Anna Campbell

  Hunger flared in his eyes, and he stood. Within seconds, his breeches followed the shirt to the floor.

  He was wrong about being at a disadvantage. She cleared her throat and forced out the words. “Lie back.”

  With surprising alacrity, he obeyed. Her attention glanced across the birthmark that proved his parentage, then fastened on his penis, rising hard and ready. Moisture welled between her thighs. Curiosity tightened her throat and made her heart pound.

  She couldn’t remember wanting anything as much as she wanted to taste him. Somewhere in her checkered relationship with Ashcroft, inhibitions had vanished.

  Her gaze never shifting from that pulsing length, she knelt on the bed.

  Although Diana was yet to voice her intentions, Ashcroft had no trouble reading what she meant to do.

  This was far from the first time a mistress had promised to take him into her mouth. He’d discovered that particular path to bliss in his teens. He’d lost count of the women who’d serviced him since.

  So why did this feel so ravishingly different?

  It was a mystery he didn’t particularly want to solve.

  Thought exploded to ash as her hand closed around his erect cock. Hot blackness overwhelmed him, and he shut his eyes.

  “Oh, yes,” he breathed, as she rubbed her fist up and down his length.

  He’d been hard all night. Hell, he’d been hard for her for a century. Amazingly, at her touch, he got harder, larger. He ground his teeth and battled for sanity.

  The first time she’d touched him like this, she’d been hesitant, uncertain, fumbling. He’d needed to show her what to do. His lessons had clearly taken root. Stroke by tantalizing stroke, she built his blazing need to an inferno.

  Feverishly, he caressed her thigh through her skirt. He cracked his eyes open as the silk slid under his hand. She knelt at his side in an uncharacteristically submissive pose. Except if anyone submitted, it was he.

  She increased the pressure, and he released a deep groan.

  A pleased smile curved her lush mouth. Her eyelids lowered so her lashes were dark gold fans on her flushed cheeks. It was the most arousing expression he’d ever seen on a woman’s face. The utter concentration. The undisguised enjoyment.

  Arousal flared as she licked her lips. The gleaming moisture on her mouth made him think of other ways she could employ that busy, pink tongue.

  Would she take him in her mouth? Or would her nerve fail?

  Sizzling suspense conspired with pounding need to make him light-headed. His hand tightened on her thigh, crumpling her skirt, as his heart kicked into a headlong gallop.

  Under cool silk, he felt warm, supple flesh. He wanted his hands on her skin without the barrier of clothing. He wanted to share the pleasure she inflicted with this slow seduction. And perhaps a modicum of the torment.

  “Take off your dress. I’ll touch you while you touch me.” His voice was harsh with restraint.

  Instead of giving him his way, she lifted her hands off him. She looked directly at him, shaking her heavy fall of hair back. That evocative smile still flirted with her lips.

  She knew exactly what she did, the darling jade.

  His cock throbbed with frustration, his heart slammed to a stop. It was a warm night, but compared to the scorching heat of his skin, the air felt like ice.

  Amusement sparked in her face. She didn’t replace her hand where he wanted it, blast her. “You promised to lie still.”

  As he looked into her lovely face, for the first time he wondered if he’d met a woman he wanted to keep for longer than a few weeks. Even more shocking, he wondered whether, in such company, monogamy might have its benefits.

  Dear Lord, save him from such madness. He needed to get a grip before he started spouting romantic absurdities. Diana was only in Town for the summer, before she retreated to that confounded mysterious village in Surrey. And a dull life as a respectable widow if he believed the tale she’d spun him.

  Perhaps he could convince her to stay. Or visit the capital regularly.

  Like every week.

  Every day.

  Every minute.

  “I feel like a specimen at the damned Royal Society,” he said, not entirely joking.

  She watched his face as if he were the air she breathed. “You’d be the most popular exhibit. Especially displayed as you are. Or perhaps in the British Museum. You have a fondness for the place. After today, I must confess I too have a liking for it, especially the Egyptian rooms.”

  “I’m neither dead nor dusty, my love.”

  My love?

  Clearly she sent him into such a fever, his normal, well-considered reactions were lacking. He’d return to something approximating sanity once he’d had her.

  A hundred times.

  Maybe.

  She ran her finger down his bare thigh, steering clear of where he wanted her. She raised her finger and inspected it. “You’re right. No dust. The housemaids are doing their duty.”

  He laughed. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone teased him. Nobody considered themselves on such relaxed terms with him. No friend. No lover. The realization struck him as a sad reflection on his existence.

  “Come here,” he said without moving, although he withdrew his hand, most reluctantly, from her leg.

  She looked wary. “Why?”

  “Because I want to kiss you. Then I promise to endure your torture.” He sent her a meaningful glance. “Although don’t expect to escape retribution.”

  Her color intensified. Her skin had the bloom of a ripe peach. In the soft candlelight, she could be a girl with her first lover. He wondered if her husband had had any idea of the treasure he’d won in the young Diana. He could picture her ten years or so ago. Ardent. Generous. Virginal. The idea struck Ashcroft as poignant in a way he couldn’t explain.

  Although jealousy stirred.

  And he was jealous of no lover.

  “I think that can be arranged,” she murmured, trailing her finger down the center of his chest as if checking for more dust.

  Did she mean it? He’d longed to put his mouth on her sex since he’d first seen her. Another blast of excitement crackled through him.

  When she pressed her lips to his, she tasted fresh and almost innocent. For a brief, enchanted interval, she kissed him chastely. Just moving in a subtle exploration that nonetheless made his pulses thunder like an avalanche. His fingers twisted in the sheets.

  Her hand crept up his shoulder to stroke his face. Poor bedazzled fool he was, the touch felt like tenderness. And that scored his heart deeper than passion.

  The chaste kiss couldn’t endure, not when desire raged like a forest fire. Her tongue flicked out to test the seam of his lips. He opened his mouth. The kiss changed from a sweet prelude to develop heated momentum. By the time she drew away, they both panted.

  He ached to touch her but reined in the impulse. Her face hovered so close, it was a blur, but he felt the brush of her breath and her hand caressed his cheek with what he still read as tenderness.

  Idiot, Ashcroft.

  He fisted a silky hank of her hair and rubbed it against his cheek. He waited for her to speak, but she remained silent apart from her uneven breathing.

  She pulled away until her features came into focus. The tenderness in her touch shone in her face. He wasn’t blockhead enough to mistake that.

  He tried to stem the tide of warmth that flooded his heart.

  Her brows drew together, creating a faint line on her forehead. Swimming in the darkness of her eyes, he saw trouble. He forced his sluggish brain to work. Was something wrong?

  “What is it, Diana?” he asked roughly, cursing the delay but unwilling to let her continue if she genuinely didn’t want to do this.

  As clearly as if she drew the curtains in a house at evening, he watched her conceal her expression. Suspicion tightened his gut, but he was too close to the edge to heed it.

  She smiled, but the beautiful honesty was absent. “I’m ne
rvous. I’ve never done this before.”

  He told himself that made sense. His assurances rang hollow. He tightened his hold on her hair. “Trust me.”

  “Ashcroft…” she said shakily. Her slender throat moved as she swallowed. The erratic pulse fluttered at the base of her neck.

  “What is it?”

  For one electric second, he thought she meant to say something momentous. Confess some sin. Reveal some secret. Open her heart.

  The second vanished.

  The glance she cast him was pure seduction. The tremulous moment of uncertainty might never have existed. He tried to tell himself he’d imagined it. He knew better.

  As she placed a hot openmouthed kiss on his chest, he couldn’t summon will to pursue his curiosity. Her soft lips moving on his skin, the dampness of her breath, the lick of her tongue threatened to banish any thought but desire.

  If only he wasn’t sure she worked to achieve that end.

  She gently bit his nipple. Sensation crashed through him like a carriage running him down at full tilt. Her tongue soothed the sting. He released her hair to let her pay the same attention to his other nipple. He didn’t need to voice the invitation aloud.

  She lifted her head, briefly met his gaze, and straddled him. Myriad impressions fed his dazed senses. The warm drift of her hair, a silky tickle across his bare chest. The rustle of her skirts. The slide of silk against his flanks. The waft of scent, hot with arousal. His cock jerked even as his nostrils flared.

  His hands clenched in the sheets as he fought the urge to roll her under him and thrust hard. Every second they’d been apart, he’d wanted her. This delay was excruciating.

  She trailed her mouth down his stomach. He drew breath so hard, his belly turned to rock. Much more delay, and promises be damned. He’d have her.

  A strangled groan escaped. “For God’s sake, don’t make me wait,” he forced past a jaw aching with tension.

  “Patience,” she said, and his heart lurched at the laughter in her voice.

  He ground his teeth with frustration. “You ask the impossible.”

  Still, she incited him with pleasurable licks and bites across his belly. She slipped down, coiling over his body. Still, she took her time, tasting him, experimenting, testing what set him shivering with need.

  He shook like a man with malaria. Sweat sprang onto his skin. His heart raced fit to burst. His lungs ached as he dragged in every breath.

  This inexperienced woman drove him to the limit. He hadn’t been as wild since he was a randy adolescent slavering after the dairymaids at Vesey Hall.

  After what felt like a millennium, she curled her fingers once more around his straining cock. He trembled under her touch, not far from losing himself. Only the last vestiges of rapidly fading masculine pride stopped him spilling into her hand.

  “Christ,” he whispered, not sure if it was curse or prayer.

  For a long time nothing happened. She held him but didn’t shift her hand.

  He stopped breathing. His heart stopped beating.

  Do it. Do it. For God’s sake, do it.

  Hell, how much more could he bear?

  The quiet shadowy room with its distant sounds of traffic receded. All he knew was the clasp of her hand and the throbbing need in his cock.

  Dear God, why didn’t she…

  Wet heat closed around the head, and bright red light exploded behind his eyes. He made a sound deep in his throat, afraid to move unless she stopped. Every muscle in his body tensed.

  At first, her mouth was hardly less frustrating than her hand. She exerted no suction. Just let him rest in warmth and moisture.

  He was taut as a violin string. Waiting for the bow to strike so the music could flow.

  She shifted. Her hair slid across his thighs in a whisper of seduction. He bit back a plea to keep going, not to stop, to give him what he wanted.

  Her hand tightened and her mouth flexed. Lightning struck.

  Her tongue flickered.

  He wouldn’t survive. She’d kill him before she finished. She took him deeper. His hips jerked before he recalled he’d promised not to move.

  Her hand closed hard around his shaft and moved up and down. He was in heaven. Angels sang their lungs out. He swore he heard rippling harp glissandos.

  His fists clenched as he fought the urge to compel her to more concentrated action. He could show her what to do. Yet something about her determination indicated she wanted to find her own way.

  He just hoped he retained enough sanity to celebrate her arrival when she finally got there.

  He made another inarticulate sound, and she seemed to take this as a signal. Her mouth started to move, while her hand performed a complex dance of pleasure.

  She still didn’t have the rhythm.

  Heaven help him when she found the right combination. Her amateurish efforts pushed him close to exploding. The hot pull of her lips made it almost impossible to hold back.

  Abruptly, she broke through to another realm. Her hand, her mouth, the sounds she made crescendoed into a tumultuous rhapsody. He teetered on the brink of an endless fiery blaze.

  He should stop her. He couldn’t come in her mouth. Not her first time.

  Control, Ashcroft, control.

  His shaking hands slid down to her shoulders, felt hot skin under that damnable red silk. He meant to drag her up his chest and kiss her. He meant to settle her over him and plunge into her welcoming depths.

  His hands curled, ready to lift her up, to make her stop, to end before it was too late.

  Her grip firmed. She drew hard. All good intentions shattered.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Hot, salty liquid spurted into Diana’s mouth. Automatically, she swallowed. Her hand tightened on Ashcroft’s jerking shaft. His long groan of release echoed in her ears.

  Her heart swelled with joy, and dazzling triumph streaked through her. What she did held a truth. A truth lacking in everything else between them, no matter how he touched her emotions and made her quake with ecstasy. She’d found something for him alone. Something outside her shabby bargain with Lord Burnley, something outside her own undeserved pleasure.

  Although she’d discovered searing pleasure in arousing him until he couldn’t hold back.

  His hand drifted down to tangle in the hair at her crown. He was shaking. The rhythmic clenching and unclenching of his fingers against her scalp became an ineluctable part of the wild sensations careering through her.

  She drank him dry. Only then did she raise her head and stare along his flat belly and hard chest. His eyes were closed, his thick lashes quivering on his cheeks as he gasped. He looked like a man who had measured the outer reaches of sin and hadn’t yet returned to the bounds of reality.

  She’d expected to be revolted, but when she’d taken Ashcroft in her mouth, she’d felt more a woman than ever before. She’d sensed both the power of his masculinity and the vulnerability of his humanity.

  Slowly she rose, wiping her mouth. When she licked her lips, a new taste lingered. Ashcroft…

  She knelt at his side as she had when she’d begun. In an exhausted caress, his hand slid from her hair to lie open at his side. He looked like he couldn’t move to save himself from a tidal wave.

  “Take off that damned dress.” A sliver of green shone between his lashes, and his breathing gradually steadied.

  “Clothing gives me the advantage.” She found decadent gratification in having this man, omnipotent outside this room, naked and at her mercy.

  A reminiscent smile curved his lips. Her heart, which had only just resumed its normal rate, battered her ribs, then set off on another race.

  “You don’t need special advantages,” he said softly. “I’m all yours.”

  At last he looked directly at her. His eyes were bright jade. They were always that color when he was happy. It was an unwelcome shock to realize how well she’d come to know him. Another twist in the skein of inescapable intimacy.

  “If I’d gu
essed that was how to vanquish you, I’d have done it much earlier,” she said lightly, even as her blood pounded fast and hard with excitement.

  Sudden concern shadowed his gaze, and he rested one hand on her thigh. It was where he’d touched her before, curling his fist in her skirts, but this contact was soothing, comforting…affectionate. After the passion, this gesture emerged from a different world. A world beyond the deception and desire that trapped her.

  “Are you all right?” He met her eyes with an expression as deep as the ocean.

  She tried to stop her wayward heart melting. It was too late. Her defenses crumbled more quickly than a wafer dipped in hot tea.

  “Yes, I’m all right,” she said in a choked voice.

  Her assurance didn’t seem to convince. Given the way she sounded, she couldn’t blame him for doubting.

  How could she say her regrets focused on why she came to his bed, not on anything she did while here?

  “I swear I didn’t mean to…”

  Flood her mouth with his seed? She was surprised he found it difficult to articulate what he’d done. How she wished she didn’t find his demurral so charming. “I liked it.”

  What an understatement. If she told him exactly what she’d felt, she’d leave herself too vulnerable.

  His hand tightened on her leg. “You’re magnificent.”

  What did one say in response to that? “Thank you,” she muttered.

  He laughed. “You’re most welcome. You’d be more welcome if you were naked.”

  “You won’t be much use to me even if I’m naked,” she said with faint challenge.

  The smile teasing his lips broadened, and the green eyes took on a devilish glint. “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

  Her attention dropped to his organ. To her astonishment, it twitched as if responding to physical contact. Anticipation seared her. In spite of that titanic release, he’d have no difficulty performing.

  She slid off the bed to stand on the richly colored rug. He piled pillows under his head and propped himself up to watch her.

  She loved this dress. As the irreproachable Marchioness of Burnley, she’d never wear such a seductive garment again. In this dress, she’d seduced a notorious rake into incoherent pleasure. In this dress, she’d come closer to freedom than ever before. In spite of how lies and self-interest strangled her.