He took her foot, lifted it out of the small tub and rubbed it clean. Then his hands slid up her leg, moving in slow, deliberate strokes, closer to where she ached for him. But just as she began to shake with anticipation, his hands slid back down again and he repeated the torture with her other leg.
This time, she knew, he would touch her, and she shook with need as his hands skated over her flesh, coming nearer and nearer to her core. She closed her eyes tightly, feeling as though she might explode with even the merest touch, but just when she rose to meet him, his hands skipped away again.
She opened her eyes and glared at him.
“Something wrong?” he asked, mischief in his twinkling eyes.
She bit her lip. “No.”
“I want to wash your hair,” he said, coming around behind her again. Maddie noticed that he’d left one pail of water beside the hearth, and she was glad for his clear thinking. She was so distracted tonight. She would have poured all the water in and left nothing with which to rinse off.
Jack began to pull the pins from her hair, and Maddie reached back to stop him. “You don’t need to do that. I can wash it.”
“Oh, but I want to,” he growled in her ear. “I love your hair.”
“You do?” No one had ever told her that before. No one had ever made her feel as beautiful and desirable as Jack did.
A moment later her hair was heavy with suds, and the smell of mint surrounded her. Jack’s fingers were indeed enchanted as he massaged her scalp, coaxing away the last of her tension and worry.
She was half asleep when his hands finally ceased their ministrations, and she didn’t even feel embarrassed at her nudity when he pulled her to her feet in the tub. She was the shameless Lady Blackthorne after all.
“Ready?”
She nodded, not certain what he had in mind, but knowing whatever it was, she wanted it. Warm water trickled over her head and slid down her body. She leaned her head back so the suds from her hair wouldn’t fall in her eyes, and she heard Jack’s quick intake of breath.
She smiled. Good. At least she wasn’t the only one affected.
The water cascaded over her, soft as her lover’s touch, and when the soap had been washed away, Jack wrapped her in warm linen and led her close to the fire.
She wrapped her arms around him, reaching on tiptoes to kiss him. “That was wonderful.”
“Oh, wonderful hasn’t even begun.” He reached between them, stripping her of the linen and feasting on the sight of her. Maddie opened her arms to him, and he came to her, kissing her until she could no longer think of anything but him.
His hands roved over her, and she was equally liberal in her caresses of him. She ran her fingers over his chest, memorizing its angles and planes, loving the way he tensed at some of her touches and how his skin seemed to heat when she touched him in other ways.
She couldn’t get enough of him, and now that his bruises were fading, she felt free to explore him. He allowed it, and when her hands dipped to the waistband of his trousers, his dark gaze met hers.
She unfastened his trousers, pushed them over his hips, and when he stepped out of them, she took his hard manhood in her hand. It pulsed in her grip, its velvety smoothness such a contrast to its unforgiving hardness.
She caressed the length of it lightly, trying to gauge by Jack’s reaction how much she pleased him. “You’re driving me mad,” he said when she squeezed him gently at the base of the shaft. “I need to be inside you.”
His hands slipped between her legs, and though she was slick with need for him, she couldn’t stop a small cry of pain at his touch.
“Damn it.” He pulled back and took her by the shoulders.
“I’m sorry,” Maddie began. “I didn’t mean—”
“Shh. It’s my fault. Of course you’re sore. I should have realized. We’ll stop.”
“But, Jack, I don’t want to stop.”
One brow rose in a cocky gesture she was beginning to know well.
“What do you have in mind, sweetheart?”
Maddie shook her head. “I don’t know. I—I just want you.”
He walked to a chair in the corner, grasped it and pulled it toward her. She watched his lithe body move in the firelight and wanted him even more.
