So deeply she had been in thought, she failed to notice the carriage had turned onto a well-kept mews lane behind some impressive Mayfair town homes. Once the coachman pulled the horses to a stop, a footman she had seen before opened the door and let down the steps. She took the hand he offered and stepped onto a cobblestone path that led through a small formal garden to the back of an imposing townhouse. She glanced about and found the location familiar, but not enough to decide where precisely she was.
“I don’t suppose you are permitted to tell me where I am.”
The footman nodded, though a slight smile tilted his lips up. “No, miss. I was told to ensure you safely entered the house and to bring the carriage back when sent for to put you down wherever you wish to go.”
“I see.” She took a few steps toward the elegant door at the back of the house. She peered over her shoulder at the footman who watched her without moving. “Might I ask, for whom you work and whose lovely carriage that is?”
“Mister Carrington-Bowles, miss, and Mister Charpentier. The path is wet from the rain. Please do be careful.”
“Thank you.” She pulled the thin silk evening cape around her and hurried into the house where she was met by another footman, far more outlandishly dressed than Carrington-Bowles’s austerely garbed man. This young man looked like a harem guard in some Middle Eastern seraglio. She suddenly had an inkling of where she was.
“This way, Miss Perriton.” The young man picked up a lantern and started down a corridor. They reached a rather imposing medieval-looking door and then went down a flight of stone steps to a wider, well-let corridor with a single heavy door set into the wall on the left and farther down another equally imposing door on the right. The footman led her to the door on the right, knocked twice, and raised the door latch for her. He bowed and made his way back up the corridor and out of sight. The door opened without a whisper of sound and just inside stood Daedalus, his golden hair glittering in the light of what appeared to be dozens upon dozens of candles.
He took her hand and pulled her into the room so he might close and lock the door behind her. She ran her hand down the front of the blue silk banyan he wore. Her heart raced at the shudder that ran through his body at her touch.
“No spectacles?” She touched the bridge of his nose.
“There.” He nodded toward a bedside table across the room. “Though I hope we shall be close enough all evening I shan’t need them.”
“I daresay I can arrange that.” Was this serene, confident seductress really her? Something about him made being this woman easy. Right.
“May I?” Daedalus took the ties of her cape in his long, strong fingers.
“Yes.” The word came out a hoarse whisper. He untied the cape and stepped behind her to remove the garment and hang it on a hook by the door. “Is there anything else you’d like to remove?” She turned her head to peer up at him. His eyes, a fiery shade of blue, widened, and he licked his lips.
“Everything?” He pressed a tenser kiss to the nape of her neck and ran his tongue up the ridges of her spine from the top of her dress to the place where her coiffure of braids and curls started. Cordelia shivered.
“Please do,” she replied. She tried to concentrate on taking in the room. His slow careful hands made breathing difficult. He unlaced, unhooked, and unpinned in fits and starts, as if he were trying to decipher the mystery of how her evening gown and then her undergarments worked. Each time his fingertips brushed her naked skin she tried to suppress the involuntary tremors of her body and the damp heat that pooled at the apex of her thighs. He smelled of sandalwood and soap. His breath blew hot and shakily across her flesh, raising gooseflesh in impossible places.
The room was round and the walls were paneled in floor to ceiling gilt-framed mirrors. She tilted her back and saw that the ceiling was mirrored as well. In the center of the room was a huge mahogany four-poster bed. The counterpane was embossed red velvet and a dozen or more silk-covered pillows in various shapes and various shades of gold had been artfully arranged against the headboard.
Around the room, placed strategically before the walls of mirrors, a selection of chaise longues and high-backed chairs wide enough to seat two, upholstered in plush red and gold velvet, brought several wicked ideas to her mind. And the candles. There were candelabras on every flat surface so that the room was as light as a glass house on a summer’s day. The glittering reflection, however put her in mind of starlight on the sea at night.
“My God, you are exquisite, Cordelia.” He said the words with such hushed awe, such raw feeling, she had to steady her breath and slow her heart before she raised her eyes to see his face in the mirror before which they stood.
Daedalus, in all his glorious golden masculine beauty, was behind her, her gown, petticoats, and stays pooled at their feet. She wore only her thin shift and stockings, tied with red silk garters above her knees, and her red evening slippers. She turned and raised her arms over her head. He did not hesitate, but took the hem of her shift in both hands and raised the garment gently up her body and over her head. With one hand he dropped the shift to the floor whilst with the other he reached for one of her garters.
“Leave the stockings,” she murmured. “And the shoes, for now.”
“Yes, miss.” His mock meekness made her snort.
“You truly are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.” He raised his hand to hover over her breast. She met his gaze and nodded.
He stroked his fingertips down her breast to pluck lightly at her taut nipple before he caressed the underside and sighed. “Your skin is so soft, Cordelia. I could spend hours simply touching you.”
“We shall try that in a future lesson.” Her voice barely shook though inside she quaked at the sharp bolts of sensation his caresses sent through her body from her breast to her quim and all the way down to her toes. “How many beautiful naked women have you seen? I should like to measure the sincerity of your compliments.”
He leaned forward to whisper in her ear and the silk of his banyan dragged across her sensitive nipple which made her gasp. He laughed, a rich dark baritone sound. “Dozens. It has not been for lack of opportunity that I have saved myself for a truly talented teacher.”
“Youhavebeen reading my books. Your compliments are excellent.” She clutched his banyan’s lapel with one hand and the belt with the other.
“My compliments are sincere, though their use is due to your instruction. I hope to earn a First in the art of giving you pleasure.”
“I have never awarded a First before, Lord Whitcombe,” she said as she untied the belt of his banyan. “My standards for such are quite high.” As the robe parted she flattened her palm against his bare belly—his skin was hot and soft, but the body underneath was hard and fairly hummed with strength.
“Then I have my work cut out for me, but I am a most eager student, I assure you.”
“I see how eager you are.” She indicated a tall marble pedestal next to the oversized chair where they stood. In an elegant round glass fishbowl, a dozen or more packets waited. Next to the fishbowl a French letter soaked in a smaller bowl of water. A shorter pedestal held a tray with a selection of jade, ivory, and horn forms of a man’s cock. She recognized them at once as she had one secreted away in a hidden drawer in her wardrobe.
