“Of course he isn’t, my dear.” Warminster captured her arm. “I’m sure he’s simply been detained by conversation elsewhere.”
Lady Jocelyn glanced about, a hopeful expression lighting her features. Why would she be so keen to become better acquainted with Lord Selwood when she had Warminster dangling on her arm?
Phoebe stood between the pair for sometime while they remained silent. Quite discomforted by the lack of conversation, she excused herself. Yet she couldn’t shake the idea that Lady Jocelyn had designs on Selwood too. She already had Warminster eating from the palm of her dainty hand. If she set her sights on Lord Selwood, they could be at each other’s throats.
The two men—now both twenty-two—had been great friends since childhood.
A woman shouldn’t come between them.
When Phoebe eventually retired, she was a bundle of nervous energy. She changed for bed, dismissed the maid then turned to extinguish the candles. But her hands shook as she snuffed each flame until she stood in the weak illumination from the fire.
She stared at the glowing embers a long time before picking up her pitcher of water to douse them. If she saw who came to her bed tonight, she feared she’d never go through with the endeavor. Selwood appeared to be correct: she’d be uncomfortable seeing her lover’s face. Darkness definitely appealed.
Once the room harbored nothing but shadows Phoebe stumbled to the bed, slipped from her nightgown, and settled against the carved headboard to wait. After a few minutes, her door creaked open. A spill of light brightened the chamber briefly, and she caught sight of a tall form entering her room. The floorboards groaned as the man came closer, fabric slithered in the dark, and then the foot of the bed dipped.
“Enchantée, ma belle.”
A Frenchman? Phoebe wracked her brain for his identity. There had been none on Warminster’s list that she could remember. Phoebe inched up the bed.
“Do not be afraid, S’il vous plait. Your Lord Selwood ‘as sent me for your pleasure.”
Although surprised Selwood had sent a Frenchman to her bed, the stranger’s cultured accent reassured her. Phoebe relaxed and moved her legs from the sitting position she was in towards her midnight guest.
After a brief slither of sound, he captured one foot. “You ‘ave such délicat toes. Perfection.”
The stranger pressed a kiss to the tip of her big toe. Then another, and another. When he surrounded her toe with the warmth of his mouth and sucked, Phoebe gasped. No one had ever touched her feet before with such reverence. To her surprise, she liked her mysterious Frenchman so far. When he released her toe, he did not stop kissing. He bathed her whole foot in soft kisses. Some—like the ones pressed into the arch with more pressure—made her squirm. When he released her right foot altogether it was so he could turn his attention to her left.
The Frenchman’s hot breath rasped over her senses and when he was done he raised her leg. Phoebe gasped as he perched her calf on his hot, bare shoulder. Shocked that her lover might be completely naked already, Phoebe wriggled higher up the bed.
“‘Ave you ‘ad a change of ‘eart, ma belle?” Her Frenchman stilled, but his churning breath rang loud in the room.
“No,” she whispered. “Not at all. I like this very much.”
“Dieu merci!”
The fervent exclamation drove a laugh from her lips. She didn’t want this french stranger to go, she’d just been surprised to find him as naked as she. At least her first foray into scandalous pleasure would be quick.
The skin under her leg shifted as he continued to kiss a path up her inner thigh. “If only I could see you, ma belle.”
Given the way the Frenchman had her arranged, Phoebe was grateful for the blanketing darkness. She couldn’t have borne this pose in the light.
Her Frenchman shifted again, dragging her other leg onto his other shoulder so her feet rested on his back, her knees open wide. A breath of air brushed her curls. Phoebe tensed, anticipation lifting her hips restlessly. The Frenchman dragged in a deep, loud breath, and then his lips touched her inner thigh, high up where her leg joined her body. That kiss wasn’t where she’d expected it to be. She’d expected he’d go straight to her nub first, but he took his time, pressing light kisses around her lower lips, teasing but not fulfilling her wish for more.
Phoebe crossed her ankles behind his head and nudged him forward.
Her reward—resistance and a deep laugh. “We ‘ave all night, ma belle. I want to feast on you the way you deserve. Slowly—” he pressed a kiss low down, next to the entrance to her body—“and with reverence. You deserve nothing less.”
Phoebe shuddered, her body rippling with pleasure at the slow loving her Frenchman lavished on her. She was in the hands of a master of seduction. His words set her body aflame. As the urge to beg for him to finish filled her mouth, she pressed her head harder against the pillow, determined to control her impatience.
As if sensing her capitulation, the Frenchman slid a warm hand under her bottom and tilted her hips. His waiting, hot mouth dragged a long moan from her lungs at the brief touch against her skin and she buried her hands in the sheets to rein in her need for more.
Warmth flooded her senses, and then the unmistakable brush of a wet tongue. The Frenchman parted her lips with his talented mouth, sliding upwards to briefly touch her nub before retreating. Phoebe would die. He did it again, repeating that soft touch so often that she growled aloud at the incompleteness she felt. Another chuckle, and then he applied fir
mer pressure.
To her relief, he moved higher to her nub. At the sensation of suction, Phoebe curled up from the mattress to hold her lover’s head firmly in place. The soft, silky hair threaded through her fingers was long enough to grip. Phoebe tightened her hold as he ate at her greedily, laving with his tongue, sucking hard on the nub then biting gently on her lower lips.
The furious assault on her senses pushed her dangerously close to the edge. She clutched his hair tight, pulling his face harder against her need. The edge loomed. She was going to come right now. Any moment. She burst to—