Finally, there came the almost undetectable sound of lapping from the Dresden bowl. With a small smile of triumph, Iris turned—and found herself face to face with Simon.
‘I may not know much about animals, but I know that bowl is worth enough to feed and clothe a family on one of your estates. And you’ve given it for a cat to maul.’ There was a half-appraising, half-irritated look in his eyes. ‘As well as one of my blankets.’
‘Were you really expecting a practical solution from me, Mr. Harker?’ Iris blinked, wondering why his eyes seemed so very blue. Blue enough for any writer to go into rhapsodies about. ‘My ideas may be unusual, but they very often work.’
‘That they do. So what’s wrong?’ Simon leaned closer, his face a burnished gold in the weak light of the candle. ‘You have the strangest expression on your face.’
Oh, gosh. He even smells like leather and musk. ‘Nothing.’ Iris attempted to look bright, but gave up almost immediately as the atmosphere pressed heavily upon her. ‘Nothing at all, really. It’s just…’
‘Just what?’ Oh, he was so close now; tall, half-dressed, a flickering candle in his hand. Just like all of the Gothic heroes she’d dreamed about ever since she’d learned to read, but different—powerfully different. While those literary men were drawn in ink, Simon Harker was in vivid colour.
‘Well… this scene. This place. What we both look like, you and I.’ Iris shrugged, feeling acutely stripped of all pretension under Simon’s gaze. ‘I really can’t help but be reminded of any number of literary scenes. You normally make everything seem so very… real.’
She waited for a patronising expression, or a witty refutation of everything she felt. She almost felt like she deserved it. But after a long, charged moment of brooding silence, all Simon did was lean closer still. He gently set the candle down on his desk as he began to speak.
‘Yes?’ His voice sounded different. Lower. ‘And if I weren’t real—if this were simply a story—what would happen now, Miss Chiltern?’
Kissing. Lots of kissing. ‘Oh, well, it would all depend on what I’d discovered you doing.’ Iris took a step backward, wondering why she was suddenly babbling. ‘If I’d found you with the corpse of your recently betrothed, for example—that would require a spirited thump with a fire poker. If there was smuggling involved, or purloined letters, or some sort of devilish ritual with black smoke and wailing demons, then there are any number of options I could choose to remedy the—’
She stopped. Simon’s hands, his warm, infinitely capable hands, had gently encircled her wrists.
‘All interesting things for a spirited woman to do, no doubt. But I can’t help but notice, Miss Chiltern, that they are all reactions to some piece of devilry on my part.’ Simon slowly pulled her closer, his palms warm and potent on her flesh. ‘But if I were merely to stand here, in front of you, with an attitude of great expectation… what would happen now? What would you choose to do?’
Burst into flames. Melt into a puddle. Explode into stars. All of them felt entirely possible; Iris took a shaky breath, staring into the blue of Simon’s eyes. How had she ever considered dark eyes the last word in attractiveness, when blue was clearly the only colour that could ever stir a heart…
‘Well?’ There was a tension in Simon’s face; a new hoarseness in his voice that made her skin tingle.
‘I…’ Iris searched desperately for words; words made sense of the world, made it safe. But no words at all came to mind. Everything was suddenly pure sensation; her body, mute and loud at the same time, was making demands of its own.
One demand in particular was crowding out all of the others. She paused, wondering if she should explain her reasoning—but her need was stronger than her restraint. Leaning further forward, almost losing her balance, she reached upward… and gently brushed her lips to Simon’s own.
Flames.
Her wrists were suddenly free. Simon’s strong arms wrapped hungrily around her waist, his body hard against her.
Puddles.
His mouth was on hers; passionate, yearning, all silk and steel and moonlight.
Stars.
Right up until the moment Iris’s lips touched his, Simon had been sternly telling himself to stop. Stop looking at her, stop talking to her, stop letting his tongue run away with him as she stared at those magnificent eyes—stop, stop, stop.
He’d felt weak, listening to her; he couldn’t remember having felt weak in years. But Iris… who would choose to conquer her, when surrender was infinitely more pleasurable?
When she kissed him, all such considerations vanished. All thought vanished, replaced by a passion so profound he was surprised it didn’t knock him off his feet. If the books Iris read revealed a tenth of this, a hundredth of the raw excitement thrilling through his bones, it was wonder the paper didn’t scorch itself to ash.
He’d teased her into kissing him. Practically goaded her, really—but only because he hadn’t been expecting the sheer force of his own response. Now, caught in the swooning kiss of Iris Chiltern, all he could do was silently beg for more.
Glorious. The way her mouth lingered brokenly against his own, hot, sweet, velvet soft; her throat tense with half-caught breath as her body melted against his. She didn’t treat kissing like a game, or a type of bargaining; Simon knew without conscious thought that this kiss had the whole of her heart in it. Surprising, perhaps—but more surprising still was the ache in Simon’s own heart, the urge to respond with everything he had.
He was glad, now, that he hadn’t kissed her in the garden; Iris needed candle-flames and starlight, not a soggy patch of earth on an otherwise unmemorable day. She needed silks, and gold, and acres of flowers—and even if he had never considered himself a connoisseur of luxuries when his own comfort was concerned, Simon found himself more than willing to begin a course of study.
Moving deeper into the kiss, her body a bright pillar of fire in his arms, he found himself murmuring soft, teasing words as his mouth travelled over her neck.
‘These are the kisses of a man in trade, Miss Chiltern. Not cruel, not punishing… or am I punishing you?’ He paused, breathing on the flush of red his kiss had left on her neck. ‘Do tell me if I should stop. Or scowl. Or be a little more cruel.’
‘Don’t stop.’ Iris’s commanding tone made him want to smile. ‘And… and I have no specific criticisms as to your style.’
‘How glad I am to hear it.’ Simon bent his head to her neck, grazing his teeth against her skin. ‘You outrank me, after all. I aim only to serve.’
As each soft, sweet moment collapsed into the next, the animal in him became harder to control. He could normally lengthen his kisses, limit himself to what was acceptable—but Iris’s yearning eyes, her hands gripping his back, demanded so much more than mere acceptability.
Before he knew it he was sat once more in his high-backed chair, pulling her into his arms in a soft, frothy rush of petticoats and warm, willing flesh. Now her body was at his mercy, deliciously inviting as her lips pressed ardently to his hair. If she wanted cruel kisses, punishing kisses, more fool her—the only kisses he would give her were the worshipful ones she deserved, along her collarbones, down to the neckline of her petticoat.
He pulled away her shawl with an impatient tug, letting it fall to the floor as more of her flushed, silken skin was revealed to him, his fingers already impatiently untying the ribbon at her neckline. Soon, but not soon enough, the ribbon fluttered to the ground to join the shawl… and there she was, revealed to him, the intimate peaks and valleys of her body concealed by naught but the thinnest of shifts.
Simon couldn’t wait. He wanted to rip the linen, tear at it—but that was cruelty, and he was determined to deny her that. Instead he brought his mouth to her breasts without even considering the shift, the linen whisper-thin under his tongue as he kissed his way over her soft, smooth peaks. Iris’s shocked cry of pleasure only fuelled him; he ran his tongue over her hardening nipples, dark and sweet as wine, his hands cl
utching fistfuls of her shift as he slowly manoeuvred her thighs to sit astride him. The boldness of her position, the heat and weight of her, combined to create a pleasure so intense that it came close to rapture.
He was so caught up in her, her raw, trembling beauty, that his own hardness came as an almost unwelcome surprise. Simon shifted, trying to conceal his arousal, but stopped as Iris tensed. He was trapped beneath her, her thighs tight against his own, her centre merely a few layers of fabric from his cock… oh, this was agony. The most delightful kind of agony.
‘Don’t stop.’ The slight petulance in Iris’s voice was unspeakably arousing; her body shivered lightly in his hands, her nipples stiff and swollen against his lips. ‘I told you, most clearly, not to stop.’
‘Oh, yes? And what are you going to do—punish me?’ Simon gripped her shift tighter, letting his hips strain upward for a brief, throbbing moment. ‘Or perhaps stopping is punishment enough. Do you find me cruel, stopping?’
‘Yes.’ Iris’s curls shook as she nodded. ‘Extremely cruel.’
‘But I thought you wanted cruelty.’ Simon placed a slow, deliberate kiss on the hard peak of her nipple, letting his mouth linger as Iris gasped. ‘Wouldn’t you prefer for me to be cruel?’
‘I don’t prefer you to be anything.’ Iris looked down at him, her eyes full of frustration. ‘The only thing I prefer, which I have told you many times, is that you do not stop!’
‘Then I won’t stop. I won’t stop until you command me to.’ Simon kissed her softly between her breasts, feeling her heart jump beneath his lips. ‘I will keep kissing you as a trading man kisses—sure of the value of what he holds.’
Iris’s soft, half-embarrassed smile, her laughter, had Simon stifling a smile of his own.
With a gentleness that only hinted at the desire flowing through him, his cock rigid and waiting, he took her in his arms. Slowly, half-lost in a sea of muslin and lace, his placed her in his chair. Iris looked at him wonderingly, her half-clothed body suddenly even more illicit against the sturdy leather of the chair-back, the dark shadow of her mound delightfully visible through her shift.
Wordless, powerless, Simon sank to his knees. With hands on the verge of shaking he pushed Iris’s shift upwards, exposing slim, fragile ankles and shapely calves. Wrapping his fingers around one ankle, Simon began gently lifting it upwards—and stopped as Iris spoke.
‘What are you doing?’ She looked down at him, her ankle tense in his hand. ‘This seems unorthodox.’
‘Just kissing. The same kisses as before, in new places.’ Simon gently placed her foot on his shoulder, allowing her to become accustomed to the new position. ‘Would you like me to stop?’
Iris’s irritated sigh couldn’t help but make him chuckle. ‘I really don’t know how many other ways to say it, Mr. Harker. Do not stop. I…’ A small note of vulnerability crept into her voice. ‘I like to imagine myself as a courageous person.’
‘You do not, under any circumstances, need to be courageous for this.’ Simon kissed her calf, feeling a shiver run through her skin. ‘This, I can promise you.’
Reaching one hand upward, caressing her thigh, he pulled her hips forward, kissing with soft, light constancy along the white expanse of her upper thigh. She was tense; he could feel her foot flexing experimentally against his shoulder, finding a comfortable place… but soon a hand slid into his hair, shyly stroking his scalp as he kissed ever higher.
Play with me. Simon held back a gasp as his cock strained painfully against his breeches, reacting to Iris’s exploratory hand far more quickly than the rest of him. Kissing with slightly more fervency, moving ever-higher, he finally rested his lips against her dark, silken-curled mound—and paused as Iris’s hands gripped his hair.
Don’t stop. She had said the words, but he wasn’t going to move forward until he had some further sign. He waited, his lips stilled at her entrance, hoping against hope that Iris was as curious as he was.
Finally, gloriously, he felt her push his head gently but firmly forward. With a prayer of relief to whichever pagan god organised encounters of this nature, Simon parted her lips with his tongue as he began to kiss the most intimate part of her.
All he could feel, all he could sense, was sweetness; sweetness, ripeness, the intimacy of pure desire. What a gift it was to explore her, to feel the deer-like swiftness and sensitivity of her responses to his mouth—the way her breathing hitched, soft whimpers leaving her throat as her thighs spread imperceptibly wider. Slowly, with a patience he hadn’t even realised he possessed, Simon kissed her flushed folds with a passionate reverence that took hold of him like a fist around his heart. Kissed, and kept kissing, until Iris’s quiet gasps became full-throated, low murmurs of surprise and pleasure.
He didn’t know what he had expected. A shyness, a timidity from a woman unused to such attentions—but the boldness he felt in Iris’s fingers as she guided his head, her toes curling against his shoulders as she gasped out the pleasure he was giving her, spoke of an intensity that could only come from wholehearted immersion in passion of all kinds. A discovery and a priceless treasure, all at the same time; one he was eager to receive, to revel in, for as long as he possibly could. Her bliss, her climax, was the only thing that mattered.
Who could care about time, when it was spent pleasuring her with every ounce of skill his tongue possessed? He could spend hours, weeks, buried in her lap, licking her hot, sweet centre as she shivered and moaned above him. He could live forever with her hands in his hair, tugging the roots to the point of pain as she showed him how to please her again and again with neither reticence nor restraint, her thighs beginning to quiver around his head as her peak began to make itself felt. Once, twice, innumerable times he returned to her tight bud of pleasure, guided by her needy hands, his lips gratefully closing over her point of pure sensation as her moans became soft, yearning cries.
Her release was coming. He could feel it in her frenzied breaths; the way she bucked against his tongue, raw and needy, any trace of shame long-vanished. All he could do was let her cling onto him, obeying every wordless command her body gave him, his tongue flickering against her bud with the fast-paced rhythm of his own heart. Just a little longer… a few more long, deep strokes of his tongue, holding her hips like she was the only thing in the world he wanted to possess…
Yes. There it was; the high, arched cry of abandon that shot through the very core of him, moving him more profoundly than any other woman’s cry ever had. There was the exquisite ripple of tension cascading through her body, her thighs pressing tight against his ears as she gripped the arms of the chair. There, there, was her sweetness flooding his mouth.
For a long, languorous minute he simply lay in her lap, savouring the taste of her. With her usual magic, Iris had made everything around her both grander and finer; the study, the chair, his own body and hands and heart. If he could just keep her here, like the rose petal that sat on the corner of his desk, sweetening everything he looked at with its sheer presence… what would he be able to achieve? What could they achieve, together?
‘Stay here. Stay with me, here, and drink wine and kiss me and tell me what these books are about.’ Half-drunk with pleasure, he let the words come from somewhere deeper than his conscious mind. ‘I’ve always wanted to know.’
‘I… I think you understand why I cannot.’ Iris delicately drew her petticoats about her, concealing herself; Simon felt a rush of disappointment as she gently moved his head. ‘And why, of course, this can neither be discussed nor repeated.’
She slowly rose. Simon remained on his knees, suddenly afraid of something he could barely articulate.
‘I don’t understand.’ He cleared his throat, his voice hoarse. ‘Perhaps I don’t want to.’
‘You already explained in the garden. I forgive the tone, but I will never forget the words. Kisses are investments—and kissing me is a bad investment.’ Iris shyly tucked a curl behind her ear. ‘No matter where I am kissed.’
Simon opened his mouth, ready to deny it—ready to deny everything—before realising the brute reality behind the words he had spoken. A reality that was almost impossible to fight… a reality that solidified even further the longer he stayed silent, watching the spark of hope in Iris’s eyes slowly turn to ash.
He couldn’t tell her how different the world seemed after kissing her. How useless, how foolish, any words before their kiss had been.
‘Goodnight, Mr. Harker. I will attend to the cat tomorrow morning.’ With a grave, impeccable curtsey, Iris turned and left the room.
Iris walked back to her bedroom as one in a dream, barely feeling her feet touch the ground. Pulling the blankets back around her, staring at the nightshirt with a new, powerful awareness of the man who normally wore it, she sank into a sleep so profound that dreaming seemed as far away as waking.
When the bright, bustling sounds of morning finally dragged her back to consciousness, she lay in a quiet stupor for some minutes before summoning up the energy to rise and dress. Sitting at the dressing table, apathetically brushing her hair, she silently begged her reflection to conceal the change of state her body had undergone.
She was dancing with it—glowing with it. She knew it. The raw, savage, frightening pleasure that he’d given her was still present in her body, much as she knew she should forget it as soon as possible. How could she look at Simon Harker, talk to him, without her feet lifting off the floor as she took wing…
Why had she let herself dance so very close to ruin, knowing all that could be lost? Was she simply stupid? Or was there a part of her, a part she rarely allowed herself to hear, that
A sudden sound from downstairs caught her attention. The front door had opened; she heard the low, obsequious tones of the butler who had welcomed her the night she had arrived, followed by a voice she easily knew as well as her own.
‘Well? Where on earth is my sister?’
Private Passions Page 30
