Seduction Wears Sapphires

by Renee Bernard

  “You make me wonder if you’ll close your eyes when I spread your thighs, or if you’ll look at me just as you are now. You make me wonder if those lashes will lower when I taste you, or if the color will appear to change when you spend yourself against my mouth and my cock.”

  She gasped in shock, a spasm of wet heat between her thighs responding instinctively to his words as her inner muscles clenched in an unspeakable need.

  “Even that little show of protest makes me want you.” He set down the glass. “I don’t have the strength to play this evening. Go, Miss Townsend. Or this time, instead of delivering you untouched back to your rooms, I’m going to finally prove myself the worst villain and ruin us both.”

  Torture him more? This time? He alluded to previous nocturnal visits, and God help me, I think of dreams and I blush. . . . Have I been sleepwalking again? Is it possible?

  “You’re hesitating, chaperone. I said go now.” He walked toward the bellpull. “Damn the consequences! I’ll ring for Mrs. Clark, and she’ll see you settled innocently enough.”

  “I am not . . .” Caroline took a steadying breath. “I can see myself to my rooms, Mr. Blackwell.”

  He hesitated and turned slowly, looking at her with an intensity and new awareness that made her skin burn and her breasts feel heavy.

  “You’re—awake.”

  “I am awake, Mr. Blackwell.”

  “How extraordinary . . .” He didn’t look away, holding her in place with the raw desire in his eyes. “Not extraordinary that you are awake, Miss Townsend, but that you’re still here—for I would think a sensible woman would have fled several minutes ago.”

  “You don’t seem to admire sensible women, Mr. Blackwell.”

  “You’re wrong. I admire them very much and demonstrate that admiration by keeping my distance. You should go now, Caroline. I don’t think one of your rousing debates is going to deter me for long.”

  She didn’t move—she wasn’t even sure she could. There was something so surreal about the exchange, and every part of her felt alive and hungry for whatever it was that sensible women ran from. “Deter you from . . .” She swallowed hard, wishing she could summon her wits enough to voice an unimaginable request. “I don’t want to go.”

  He shook his head. “You have no idea what you’re saying.”

  “Then perhaps I should make a confession of my own.” She could hear the soft whisper of his breath stop in anticipation and surprise, and she summoned what courage she could to go on. “When I look at you—I wish for the most . . . lurid and preposterous things, and I don’t care if I get hurt, Ashe.”

  “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

  “You must be right. For I think I have as much to lose, if not more, by this—but I can’t seem to remember any of it now.”

  He held up a hand. “It’s not possible, Miss Townsend. You could not have more to lose than I do. But here is where we stand. If you so much as twitch in my direction, I will not be held accountable for my actions.”

  “I want—”

  “You’ll want to flee now while you still can, or I’m going to demonstrate just how lurid and preposterous things can get. I am strong, Miss Townsend, but not strong enough to . . .”

  She said nothing, but everything in her wished he would finish speaking. Just when she knew he wouldn’t, he continued, his voice even rougher with raw emotion.

  “I am already ruined, Miss Townsend. But you have the power to make me wish that I were not. Please, show mercy.”

  “Ashe,” she whispered, “mercy is an easy thing, for I could ask the same of you.”

  “Damn it, woman!” He shook his head. “You should insist on an apology. I spoke earlier without any thought to your delicate nature and—”

  “I am not that fragile. It’s not as if I’ve threatened to swoon or run screaming.”

  “Why is that? Why haven’t you?” He took a step closer, and her heart hammered in her chest. “You accuse me of playing games with women’s affections, but it is you, Miss Townsend, who is toying with me. Have you discovered that you like the sweet taste of power? You hold the reins, as you yourself have pointed out more than once. Does it suit you to let me catch your scent only so that you can chastise me for responding?”

  My scent . . . How is it that those words make me want to beg him to teach me a thousand indiscretions? How did I come to this moment?

  “I wouldn’t do such a thing. I have no illusions of holding any power over you. I’m not running because”—she hesitated, a blush coloring her face—“I’m not afraid of you.”

  “Of course you are, and you should be.”

  Her stomach fluttered with a dozen molten butterflies that began to alight in the cradle of her hips, a molten wet heat blossoming at the potent threat of his words. “And why is that?”

  “Because you know I’m no gentleman.” He took another step toward her. “Don’t press me, Miss Townsend. An oath will only carry a man so far.”

  “Are you really so monstrous that you have to keep yourself hidden away from civilized folk? What sins have you committed, Mr. Blackwell, to earn exile?”

  “What do you want from me, Miss Townsend?”

  “I want you to tell me why you work so hard to be so . . .” Caroline hesitated, unsure of how to describe his self-imposed exile. “Why do you punish yourself, Ashe? Why do you despoil your own character?”

  “Every misfortune is earned,” he whispered.

  Caroline shook her head and had to catch her breath before responding, as the sight of him so vulnerable and honest made her heart ache to touch him. “That is a philosophy that I cannot ascribe to, Ashe. You’re intimating that you have the power to summon suffering, and while men may think of themselves as masters of the universe . . .” She prayed his humor would warm at the jest.

  Ashe’s smile was a wicked and wonderful thing to behold. “How is it that we’re now discussing philosophy in my bedroom, Miss Townsend? You would make seduction a debate when I am seconds away from demonstrating just how ungentlemanly I can be. I’ll only offer you one final chance to run, Caroline.”

  She held her breath before she shook her head. “No.”

  “For all your talk, you cannot be this much of a reformer, even with a fortune at your fingertips. You make a brave enough show of not wanting a husband, but I don’t think you want to throw your chances for a good match away, Caroline. Not for me.”

  “Not for . . . you.” Caroline tried to think of the words that could frame the storm of desire and desperation that raged inside of her. “You were right, earlier tonight, when you said that none of us were masters of our own fates. We’re so different, you and I, but we have that much in common, Ashe. I have a fate and future of my own waiting in Boston when I return. And there is no match to ruin.”

  “You don’t know that, Caroline.”

  You’ve known love and have no use for it, Ashe. But what I wouldn’t give for a small taste of it . . . Aloud, she answered him as calmly as she could. “I want to stay because I want to be daring. For once, I would like to be brave.”

  The space between them evaporated and he gently framed her face with the warm, strong blades of his fingers, his eyes gazing deeply into hers. “Tell me what lurid and preposterous things you imagine, Miss Townsend.”

  “I cannot.”

  “Can’t you?”

  She wasn’t sure she could speak at all but finally managed. “Kiss me.”

  “Not if that’s all you want, Caroline.” He spoke through clenched teeth, his voice a low, threatening rumble that made her knees feel weak and numb. “I swear, woman, you—”

  “You swear a great deal, Mr. Blackwell,” she cut him off. “If I’ve tormented you, if I’ve caused you pain . . . I won’t be the one to betray you, Ashe. But if you don’t kiss me again, I think my heart is going to stop.”

  For a single moment, she feared he wouldn’t—but then she was in his arms and his mouth covered hers in a warm press, and it was a
revelation.

  She had never been kissed before Ashe had done so after her first disastrous riding lesson, and she had always imagined that it would be a strange thing to have another person pressing his mouth to hers. It had always looked like a pedestrian and ridiculous thing, but she had only seen the most polite and cool exchanges amidst her cousins and their relatives. But this—this wasn’t mundane or polite.

  This was the first tendrils of an electrical maelstrom as the silk of his lips touched hers. This was a connection that unraveled her ability to reason as he suckled her lower lip and introduced her to a storm of hunger, tasting and savoring the fire and texture of Ashe’s passion. He pulled back to coax her into opening her lips in protest only to invade the intimate chamber of her mouth with his tongue and demonstrate that even now she had yet to be “truly and thoroughly” kissed.

  Every nerve ending seemed to stretch out like eager reeds toward the sun, and Caroline knew that the time for command and discipline was lost. She reached up, her hands sliding up over his shoulders, and absorbed the heat of his body through the barrier of linen. She felt like a vine clinging to a solid rock wall, her grip tightening as her knees began to buckle at the waves of unfamiliar need that radiated through her frame. There was no thought—no logic—just a sea of sensation and heat and an introduction to a primal world of instinct and desire.

  His mouth left hers, only to trail down her bare throat, and Caroline moaned. This is like pushing away from a cliff wall, and instead of falling, discovering that you can fly.

  He released her briefly, only to turn her so that she was facing away from him, and then his kisses returned to the sensitive curve of her throat, the warm indent behind her ears, and to uncover the point where her neck and shoulder met to send molten fire down her spine. She moaned again as his breath fanned over her skin when he lifted her hair to move it aside and give him access to the back of her neck. She squirmed at the powerful arcs of fire that traveled down her spine to pool between her hips until she was sure that nothing of her body was now bone—for she felt transformed into a creature of liquid and molten flesh.

  One of his arms held her in place from behind while his free hand began to unlace her ball gown, the teasing brush of his fingers against her back making her writhe with wicked anticipation. Caroline tipped her head back against him and closed her eyes in surrender.

  This. This is what I wanted when he looked at me in the carriage. All of this.

  He pushed the dress slowly off her shoulders and began to taste and tease every new inch of bare skin along her shoulder blades that was exposed for his attentions. His mouth was magic against her skin, and every caress of his lips only made her want more. The expensive garment pooled at her feet and she kicked it away, mindless of anything but Ashe.

  Her corset lacings proved to be no hindrance at all for his deft fingers, and Caroline sighed as the confines of the undergarment fell away to join her gown on the floor, allowing her to inhale deeply and savor the sweet ache of her ribs expanding again. With each layer lost, she felt more free and strangely more brave.

  His hands slid down her shoulders and then across the curves of her back to encircle her, his fingers splayed as they traveled up her rib cage and soothed the bruised flesh only to cup her ripe breasts and lift them in his palms. Her nipples hardened at the shocking contact, the thin material of her chemise making the touch even more wicked. She arched back against him, offering herself up to his hands, and was rewarded as his fingers circled the sensitive coral peaks, drawing them out and teasing each tip until Caroline was bucking against his hands, writhing at the lightning he invoked.

  Ashe’s breath quickened in her ears and one of his hands dropped to grip her hip, holding her in place against him as he moved against her to increase the friction of cloth and flesh. She almost cried out when she realized that the rock-hard shape pressing against her bottom was his unmistakable arousal. Even through the clothing that remained to her, she could feel the daunting size and shape of his erection, its searing heat making her shudder.

  Suddenly, he twisted her around to lift her from the floor in a flurry of petticoats and Caroline’s eyes fluttered open in shock to be cradled against his chest. She looked up and was instantly lost in the blue storm in his gaze. I should be afraid, shouldn’t I? But how can any woman experience fear when you look at them like that, Ashe?

  He carried her to the bed and set her down in its center with a playful throw. Her teeth teased her lower lip in nervous anticipation. “Ashe . . .”

  He shook his head, a new energy encompassing them both as he stood next to the bed and began to unbutton his white linen shirt. “No talking, Caroline. Not this time.”

  Not this time. The implication that there would be other times made her aware of the damp, slick need that seeped from her body, a new wave of hunger almost making her whimper. She couldn’t believe that it wasn’t a dream; that she was in his bed in her underclothes, shamelessly watching him disrobe and impatiently waiting for him to ruin her.

  He shrugged off his shirt, and before she could marvel at the planes and chiseled shape of his chest, he’d unfastened his pants and shed everything to bare himself for her inspection. Caroline gasped at the delicious display, mentally comparing him to the only male figures she’d seen—although unlike the classic statues she’d seen with their modest fig leaves, he was a living, flesh-colored example of male beauty with nothing to disguise his now rampant erection.

  She knew she was staring, but the sight of him was far more than any ignorant fantasy had prepared her for. Here was male power at its peak, and her confidence wavered.

  I am to manage—that?

  Ashe climbed up onto the mattress next to her, kneeling to begin relieving her of her petticoats, each stroke of his hands across her skin soothing her nerves and reigniting the fire inside of her. Caroline kept her eyes on his, drinking in the approval she saw there as he spread her out like a feast for the eyes.

  She lifted her arms as he dragged her chemise up over her head, tossing it away, and then pushed her back onto the feather mattress. Completely naked, she stretched out for him to survey at will.

  Caroline was a woman transformed and she relished it. Everywhere his eyes swept over her, her flesh marbled and then flooded with tingling awareness. She was starving for the heat of his hands on her body.

  Now was the moment when she should shy away and protest her innocence, but she’d already crossed the Rubicon. She wanted more than kisses from this man. At last, his hands moved over her body, his fingers splayed to tease and torment. The palm of his hand swept over the gentle swell of her belly, then across her hips to hover over the triangle of curls, skimming across the juncture above her thighs as if to divine her very essence—an erotic wizard casting a spell over her body.

  She wanted all of him and all that went with him. She wanted ruin and rapture.

  His body covered hers and she instinctively lifted one of her legs to increase the tantalizing feel of his skin working against hers. Her breasts felt swollen and heavy, the coarse silken hair of his chest teasing her nipples until they were like pebbles to the touch. His arousal pressed into the soft swell of her belly and fed a sharp ache that was growing between her legs.

  He kissed her again, this time as if he would consume her very soul. Caroline held nothing back, clinging to him and riding the crest of each impulse that guided her desire.

  Caroline’s hands roamed over him in gentle conquest and exploration—daring to touch him as she wished; unwilling to be passive in this adventure. His cock had a wild attraction all its own, and she blushed at the raw power of it, dipping her hands down to seize it, pulsing and hot in her hands. It was heavy and fever-warm but silky smooth like suede against her palm, jerking and pulling at her lightest caress as if it had a separate will. The head of it was shaped like a plum, mounted atop a thick, rigid mast of flesh that pushed up as if demanding more.

  His breath hissed through his teeth and he captured
her hand with one of his, covering her fingers as they tried to encircle him. “You’ll kill me with pleasure, Quaker,” he whispered. “Here . . . like this.”

  He guided her hand, demonstrating the stroke and pressure that he needed, and Caroline’s heart skipped a beat at the delicious knowledge that she could affect him so easily. His breathing changed with the speed of her fingers and she smiled at the victory.

  His head dropped to capture her breast with his lips and Caroline nearly fainted in surprise. His tongue circled the swollen taut flesh, grazing her with his teeth and teaching her an entirely new lesson about the ways his mouth might yet send her over the edge.

  She twisted beneath him, bucking in innocent ecstasy and unknowingly adding to Ashe’s urgent need to complete this conquest. “Enough.” His voice was rough with passion. His hands centered her beneath him, parting her thighs with his. Caroline closed her eyes as one of his hands slid between her legs and delved into the damp well, stroking the soft flesh there. It was heaven to feel him there, but then his thumb moved across the tight little pearl of her clit and Caroline cried out as a new kind of bliss overtook her. With feathery strokes of his fingers flickering across her sensitive flesh, he created a paralyzing tension within her, mounting it like a coil preparing to unleash untold force. Caroline instinctively welcomed it and tried to remember to breathe.

  It was a relentless pressure that finally released the force inside of her, a wave of ecstasy making her cry out. She rocked her hips up into his hand as shudder after shudder of pleasure began to whip through her frame, until she was sure she was lost to it.

  Ashe pulled his hand away, but before she could register the change, he’d positioned his thick cock against her entrance, pressing into her as she continued to come. Caroline threw her head back as she felt herself fall apart, the last vestige of control slipping away as her world became the sensation of her core stretching and tightening around the thick, hot velvet sheath of him. He drove into her, each stroke a revelation as her body shook, her inner muscles clutching at him with shameless greed, wordlessly begging him for more.