She braced her knees as she rose and clutched the back of the chair with all her might. The deep heartfelt groan she elicited from him as she set a rhythm—up until only the tip of his cock was inside her only to thrust down to take him in completely. He caught the pace she set and used his big hands clasped to her hips to raise and lower her faster and faster. He deciphered quickly how to thrust with his own hips to increase the speed and force of their joining.
“Yes!” she cried. “Yes! That’s it. More. More. Daedalus, harder. Harder!”
“Cordelia,” he groaned his voice a dark rasp. “God. Cordelia. I can’t…I can’t…Fuck…How…Cordelia!” He thrust up and his body locked. He pressed her down on his cock to the point their bodies fused together, shivering powerfully enough to shake the heavy chair on which they sat.
Her vision blurred to white. She dropped her head forward to rest on his sternum. He stroked her hair scattering pins all around them. With a finger under her chin her raised her lips to meet his in a kiss so gentle and sweet her chest squeezed and the burn of tears pressed against her closed eyelids. She listened to his labored breathing, felt his heartbeat against her own. Her arms around his neck, she molded her hot naked flesh against him, the hard marble of his muscles wet with a sheen of sweat. The air thickened with the scents of beeswax candles, wood burning in the fireplace and the erotic aroma of their most intimate scents mixed together.
Daedalus dotted kisses all over her face, her shoulders, her breasts. He murmured her name and other words she barely understood.
“Are you praying, Lord Whitcombe?” she asked followed by a huff of laughter.
“Yes, Miss Perriton. I am praying for God to take me now because if there is any bliss better than what I just experienced I do not think I shall know it on this earth.”
She laughed again to keep from weeping. “We can always try,” she teased.
“My God,” he said, his blue eyes ablaze. “What manner of magnificent woman are you? How has no man discovered your secrets and locked you away for fear of losing your siren’s body and goddess’s amorous mind?”
She snorted. “Take me to bed, and I’ll tell you the sort of woman I am.” What was she thinking? Something about him made her want someone, him, to understand. He lurched to his feet with her in his arms and strode to the bed in the middle of the room. When he ran into the pedestal bearing the tray of phalluses, they froze and then burst into gales of laughter. He deposited her on the bed, made quick work of removing her shoes, but did not lay on top of her as she would have liked. Instead, he sat on the side of the bed, trailing his fingertips over her sensitive skin.
“Tell me, Cordelia,” He did not command though anyone else who heard him might think so. He requested and in his request there was an assurance of understanding. Understanding she had sought all her life.
She lay back, arms stretched over her head. “I have been reading erotic books since I was fourteen. My grandfather had an excellent collection and they were easily hidden inside the covers of books of sermons and instructions for pious women, once I ripped their pages out.”
He chuckled, a sinfully delicious sound.
“Five years ago, I came to Town in search of a husband. Or at least Mama and Papa were in search of a husband for me. I was courted by a handsome young man who flattered me, danced attendance on me, and made me sincerely believe he loved me, whatever that means. He proposed, and I accepted. My parents and his mother agreed to wait to make the announcement at a grand engagement ball. Because we were to marry and I truly thought myself in love I seduced my handsome swain. Very enthusiastically. Well, at least I was enthusiastic. He was clumsy, shocked, and quick. Very quick.”
“I am not going to like the end of this particular story, am I?”
She turned her head to him and gave him a bitter smile. “He pronounced me too experienced to wed, but he thought I would make an excellent mistress. He instructed me to break the engagement and he would set me up in a nice house on Bruton Street whilst he looked for a bride worthy to be the mother of his children.”
“I’ll kill him.” He stilled and the hardness of his visage told her he meant every word.
“My brothers nearly did. Especially when he insisted I agree to his arrangement or he would break the engagement and denounce me to all society as a whore. He was disavowed of the notion with a beating that left him with a broken nose, two blackened eyes, a broken arm, and a long gash down his face to remind him. I broke the engagement saying we would not suit and returned to the country until just this year. Now you tell me, what sort of woman does that make me?”
He crawled onto the bed, lay on his side, and took her into his arms. “The sort of woman Ravenwood has proved himself completely unworthy to touch let alone marry. He is not fit to clean horse shite from your boots.”
“I suspected you would discern his name. In addition to being a beautiful man you are a clever one, the very worst sort.” She laughed, but then a horrible thought struck her. “And what of Lady Alice?”
“I will not allow my niece to be shackled to a life you narrowly escaped.”
“I agree, but how? Her father seems determined to make the match.”
“I don’t know. But for a little while, might I at least enjoy the gift you have given me and dream of the lessons to come?”
“I have a few ideas.”
“About which, my niece or my future lessons?”
“Both.” She pressed her palm against his chest and pushed him down to climb on top of him. “So lie back and pay attention.”
8
Of all the forms of torture afforded him in the last few weeks,Daedalus had decided his presence in Hyde Park at the fashionable hour had to be one of the most excruciating. Not that he minded riding out with his niece of a morning or lately of an evening. She was an accomplished rider with a wicked sense of humor.
On several occasions, such as today, Cordelia joined them, which made the activity more pleasant and more tortuous at the same time. Riding alongside her as she conversed with Alice delighted him. Being that close to her and not being able to touch her or even speak to her in the erotic tones of only a week or so ago at Club Ambrosios? Sheer agony, and she knew it, the minx. She took every opportunity to brush her leg against his, to touch his arm or to run the tip of her tongue across her bottom lip. All actions certain to turn his cock stone hard in an instant.
He sat his horse and watched as she and Alice rode toward the Serpentine where Lady Honoria and Captain Atherton sat in an open barouche with Lady Camilla. Daedalus tried to draw as little attention to his connection with Cordelia as possible. Her charity work precluded her open attachment to anyone even remotely associated with the book trade on Holywell Street. Her secret comings and goings to and from his office were ample evidence of that. The Runner, Archer Colwyn, had taken to meeting her there to report his work in searching for her missing friends. To Daedlaus’s shock, Cordelia had told Col about her secret identity.
