He’d reached the bed now and he climbed in, sitting up against the headboard and pulling her back to lie on his chest.
She laid her head on his shoulder, listening.
“I’d met some fellows at Oxford who had new theories on gardening. Grand schemes that broke from the medieval idea of straight little lines and ordered plantings. They were thinking in terms of vistas. Of beautiful sights that would last for generations. Of natural lines and shapes—made better. I began corresponding with them while I was in London, exchanging ideas and plans. Then I was hired to help on an estate outside Oxford itself.”
He wrapped his arms around her, and she leaned forward to kiss his hand, silently urging him on.
“It was a great opportunity,” he said, but his voice was sorrowful. “It was practical work when before all I’d done was dabble in theory. That garden took a season to build and after that I was recommended to another estate. And then my grandfather found out what I was about.”
She frowned. “Why would that matter?”
“Because,” he whispered, leaning his cheek against her temple, “remember what I already said? Aristocrats don’t labor. When my grandfather found out, he cut me off. He considered my desire to learn the art of garden planning on a grand scale to be an early sign of the same disease that had driven my father mad. He thought our entire line tainted.”
wallowed, watching as those wild locks came perilously close to her maiden hair. She felt his fingertips trailing behind her knee and then he bent and pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the same place.
Her hand moved from his shoulder to his head, threading through his hair, clutching as he moved up her thigh, licking, sucking, the stocking entirely abandoned, until she felt the whisper of his breath against her damp flesh.
She nearly toppled, her knees going weak. He grasped her hips and turned with her until she could rest against the bed, and then he took her leg and flung it over his shoulder and kissed her.
There. Open-mouthed, licking across delicate flesh.
She gasped and could not breathe out again. He’d seized her lungs, made her forget everything but that place between her legs as he lapped at her, thoroughly debauching her.
Helplessly she grasped at his head, holding on for dear life as he found her nub and fitted his lips around it, licking delicately, relentlessly until she suddenly felt the gentle scrape of his teeth and that was it.
She shoved her fist into her mouth and only just in time as she arched into him, her leg tightening on his broad shoulders convulsively. She shook, wailing behind her fist, black spots in her vision as warmth flooded her. And all the while he licked and licked and licked until she had to weakly push against his shoulders to make him stop.
He raised his head and wiped his chin and mouth with his hand before prowling up her body, stopping to lave her navel. He pulled her all the way on top of the bed and then pushed her thighs farther apart. He settled between them, his belly at her center and his head just on a level with her breasts.
“So pretty,” he crooned, and for an amused moment she wondered if he was talking directly to her breasts.
Then he dipped his head and licked around one nipple.
She whimpered and he opened his mouth over her nipple, suckling gently but urgently. With his fingers he tapped the other nipple, making it peak. She ached with want, almost painful so soon after her orgasm. Surely he was hard by now? Surely he was ready to join with her?
But he seemed in no hurry, lifting his head only to move to the nipple he’d fingered. When he pinched the one he’d left she nearly screamed at the feel against her wet flesh.
“Please,” she moaned, grasping his head, trying to pull him up. “Please, please, please.”
He looked up at her, lazily licking her breast. “Who am I now?”
She shook her head, restless, on edge, and so very, very wet for him. “It doesn’t matter.”
He smirked then and rose over her.
She looked down, watching as he grasped his penis, fully engorged now, an angry red pillar rising from his pubic hair. He brought it between her legs, rubbing it up and down, wetting the head with her moisture.
She lifted her legs, wrapping them over his hips loosely. “Now, now, now.”
He glanced up at her and his smile had left his face. He bit down on his bottom lip as he notched himself, the skin white beneath his teeth. He flexed his hips and nudged inside.
Big. He was a big man.
She gasped, holding her legs wider, higher, trying to give him more room.
His eyes were closed, his upper lip hitched in a snarl, almost as if he were in pain.
Or great pleasure.