Her fingers work the lacings at her waist. I watch while kissing her shoulder. Her rosy nipples tent the sheer fabric of her shift. I can’t resist bending down to suck one into my mouth.
Elinor’s hands still. I have one arm curled around her back, holding her in my lap. I drop it lower and finish the job. She shifts to push the petticoats and underthings down her legs, until her body is covered in nothing but a gauzy scrim and the corset that nips in her narrow waist.
I drag her back onto my lap, hating the flicker of resistance I find there.
“Touch me.” I’ll beg if I have to.
“Alex.” She toys with my hair. “I want to make you happy.”
“Then put your hands on me.”
She slides between my legs and unfastens my trousers, freeing my cock with a jaunty spring. A hiss forces its way past my teeth when she takes me in her soft, small hand. Gingerly, she strokes it.
“Harder.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t.” I curl my hand over hers to demonstrate. Her blue eyes flare wide. Whatever Tremaine did to her, he taught her nothing. I wish I could bring him back from the dead and kill him all over again. Viciously, this time. Painfully.
Instead, his corpse is sitting in the stomachs of the moat monsters.
This train of thought is the only thing holding me back from coming all over Elinor’s sweet little hand.
She bends forward. A low groan tears out of me when she bends forward and takes me into her mouth. No hesitation. Her eagerness to please is different from the way the servants bow and scrape obsequiously. There is no love from them. Only duty.
But it’s love I see shining in Elinor’s eyes. A willingness to overcome her fears to please me. I don’t know precisely why things were different during the ball. I do know that the same hesitancy was there at the end. I know the basic outline of how Tremaine treated her, and that he is the cause.
It’s not enough that he’s dead. I have to cure her of this affliction.
Though it physically pains me, I ease her off my cock.
“Was I doing it wrong?” she asks breathlessly with her brows knitted in confusion.
“I want to show you that I can please you. I already know you please me.” I take her face between my palms so she can’t look away. “I think you need more convincing.”
She tries. I hold her gaze to mine. Conflict burns there.
“I don’t think it’s possible for me to enjoy doing this.”
“Because of what your stepfather did to you.”
Her cheeks glide against my palms. I thread my fingers through her hair, gently drawing her up as I bend forward to capture her lips.
“Use me.”
“What?” she gasps.
I release her and flop back onto the bed. “I said, use my body however you want to.”
Her snort of amusement is accompanied by a slight dip in the bed as she climbs onto it.
“You mean you want me to experiment.”
“Yes.” I roll onto my side, head propped on one hand. She’s arranged herself on her knees. I could suck her tits again from this angle. I trail one finger between them longingly. But this is for her, not me. “To my mind, the worst thing he stole from you was the freedom to explore on your own terms. I’m giving you permission right now. We won’t do anything you don’t want to, and everything you want to do, I’ll say yes to.”
Excitement shines in her eyes.
“All right, Alex. I accept.”
