She’d seen George’s naked chest only yesterday, but now… now she could touch it. And touching was far superior to looking. Though, there was no reason she could not do both at the same time.
Love need not intrude into this space with bodies and beating hearts. She’d set it aside, her fears buried under a mountain of need.
She pressed her palms flat against the planes of his chest and the crisp hair there. She rubbed around the side of the muscle and down, avoiding the small flat nipples she was simultaneously curious about and terrified of. What was she to do with them? What he’d done to hers? She’d find the courage for that one day. Now, she ran over the ridge of chest muscle and let her fingers trail into the dips that separated each muscle of his abdomen. “Gentlemen should not be so finely built,” she said absently.
“Whyever not?” His hands sank into the hair at the back of her neck, and his teeth grazed her bottom lip. She ached between her legs and squeezed them tighter together.
“You do naught but… but sit in parliament all day or at your desks.Youespecially do nothing but read all day. You’re a poet, George, not a field hand. How?” She’d seen field hands shirtless before, though she likely was not supposed to have. He looked like they had. And while her heart had pitter-pattered a bit faster that day, now it beat right out of her chest, sent ripples across every inch of her skin.
“I crave physical movement.” He nipped her earlobe.
Her eyes closed as her body thrummed with desire.
He brushed his lips down her jawline. “Movement relieves a variety of ailments.” His tongue traced the length of her neck. “Frustration.” He pulled the bodice of her dress low. “Anger.” He pressed a full, firm kiss on one breast. “Loneliness.” He swiftly moved to the other breast, pressing a hot kiss there, too.
She could barely formulate thoughts. Words would never happen. But through the haze of growing lust, she felt more than thought one truth. If he’d felt frustration, anger, and loneliness, enough to hone his body to such a taut, unforgiving thing, she would have to fix that. Not his body. She rather liked it as it was. But the loneliness, that she could fix. She could help him. Tonight at least. She’d not think beyond that.
“What if there is a, well, I know how children are created, and—”
“There won’t be.” He lifted his head, met her gaze head on. “There are ways to prevent conception. I do not have a French letter, but we’ll implement another method. Tonight.” He grinned and dropped his gaze from hers once more, lowering it down her body, his mouth leaving hot kisses wherever his gaze rested.
Who was she to argue? If he was willing to teach her such ways and means, she was willing to learn them. And she’d ask about French letters later. Now was no time for intellectual lessons. Only lessons of the body.
His teeth caught her nipple, and every thought she’d ever had in her life dissipated. She yelped and fisted her hands in his hair, tugging as he tugged gently on her. He let her pull his head from her breast and drag it up until their lips crashed together. Each time he tried to slow their kiss, she tightened her hold of his too-long locks, urging him back to their impassioned caresses.
Cold air hit her legs, and his hand found her hip. His thumb rubbed circles into her hip bone then his fingers delved toward her center. Again. He would dothatagain, thank the heavens.
But he’d stopped her from doing the same to him. Not this time. She found his fall in less than a breath. His buttons were not so easy to conquer, and as her fingers rubbed against the hard bulge straining against the cloth, he threw his head back with a moan and a curse. But his own hand never slowed or stopped as he stroked her, patiently, confidently.
She would not shatter. She wouldnot. Not, at least, until she had his fall undone and his… well,him… out. Ah ha! A button slipped from its hole. It gave her confidence. And another soon followed, and another, until she could push George’s pants low over his lean hips and—she looked down—see the long, thick, hard length of him. Dare she?
Yes, she dared. Of course, she did. She was a daring debutante, after all. One more time. Tonight. Then never again.
She took him in hand. The unforgiving steel of him was no surprise, but he was silky, too. Unexpected.
“Hell, Jane.” He kissed her collarbone and sank his finger into her. Her body tightened around him, convulsing. Her hand tightened around him, too. This time, he jerked. “You are incomparable,” he said.
She felt it—powerful, beautiful, and adored.
Another of his fingers joined the first, and his thumb circled the same spot he’d circled yesterday morning in the stables. Again, it made her writhe. “Pull up and down. Gently. Let your hand slide.”
What did he mean? Her hand still encircled him. “Like this?”
“Yes,” he groaned.
His hand moved on her faster, more fervent, and she tried to focus on what her own hand did but could not. Need and emotion and power rolled into one within her, and she unfurled into a thousand stars in the night sky. She shuddered beneath him, her hand loosening and falling to the side. Her muscles no longer worked.
He remained taut above her, and he moved his staff to join his hand at her very center. The feeling of him there, probing as his fingers had done, renewed her, sent jolts of energy through her. She knew what he planned to do now. Her mother had told her, after all. She was not uneducated in this matter. She wrapped her arms around him and pressed a kiss to his hard shoulder. Could he feel the yearning of that kiss? Could he feel every atom of her being soaked into it?
He pushed into her, and she squeezed her eyes tight. She felt full and too-stretched.
“We should not. You are uncomfortable. There is plenty of time.” He pulled away, every muscle in his body rigid.
She pulled him back. “No. I want it.”I want you.
He looked about the room. “Ah ha. The bath oils.”
“Bath oils?”
