She sank against him, her sex rubbing against his through their clothes as their mouths locked together in kiss after kiss.
Had she thought her body was stiff after so much reading in one position? Her muscles felt liquid now, her bones quick as mercury. She poured herself over Jacob, swirling into him like melting chocolate, until all she could taste or feel was their bodies mixed together.
To think that her pride had almost deprived her of the warmth of this man’s embrace! Not just in this moment, but all the times this past month when she’d worked or laughed or plotted by his side.
Most of his animals accepted her as one of their own. Even the Highland tiger gave up trying to maul her on sight. She had her own seat not just here on Jacob’s lap, but also in the dining room, and the sitting room, and the Planning Parlor.
Viv had once believed that the only way she could make a difference was by sharing her words with the public at large. But over the past month, she’d contributed to multiple Wynchester missions and planning sessions. Helping England become a better place on a case-by-case basis. No single escapade might have changed the world, but she’d reunited families and salvaged homes and returned lost or stolen goods and prevented evictions and improved working conditions. One by one.
Not that her precious words were going unspoken. Thanks to Jacob, her play on suffrage would be performed the week after Marjorie and Adrian’s fête in Vauxhall Gardens.
Perhaps no one would attend Viv’s theater debut. And perhaps the performance would launch a political uprising capable of spurring England toward greater equality. She’d find out in a fortnight.
Her words were already being performed on an even more important stage. She and Chloe and the Duke of Faircliffe had worked out several moving speeches on the topics of abolition and suffrage and autonomy. Not just prepared arguments for the duke in the House of Lords, but for his ally Olivebury in the House of Commons as well.
So much good was underway, it made her dizzy.
Tonight, Viv fully intended to debauch the stuffing out of the handsome poet whose warm hands had slipped beneath her skirts to cup the bare skin of her derrière.
Without breaking the kiss, she loosened Jacob’s cravat and tossed the fabric over her shoulder.
“That might have landed too near the fire,” he murmured against her lips. “We’re surrounded by books. Paper makes excellent kindling. We could be engulfed in flames at any moment.”
She bit his lower lip. “Do you want me to stop and tidy up?”
“Let it burn.” He captured her mouth in another kiss.
She unbuttoned his coat and pushed it from his shoulders. It slid from the chair and fell to the floor. Next thing to lose was his waistcoat. A gorgeous piece of jade-green silk. It went over her shoulder in the general direction of the cravat. Or the fire.
Now the only clothing covering his torso was the thin white cambric of his shirt. She tugged it up from his waistband, revealing his taut stomach muscles inch by inch. Then his powerful chest, and his wide shoulders.
When she reached his neck, she let the shirt hang off the top of his head, obstructing his vision.
“Vivian,” he said repressively, the stern words muffled by a layer of linen.
She grinned to herself and lowered her mouth to his chest, flicking her tongue against one of his nipples.
He stiffened, then tightened his hold on her arse, rubbing her against him as she licked and suckled.
When at last she whipped the shirt from his head and over her shoulder, he rewarded her with a kiss—and punished her by floating his fingertips over the dampness between her legs, toying and teasing without ever giving her the satisfaction of penetration.
She wiggled against his hands, trying to force him to give her what she wanted. He kissed her lazily as her pulse rocketed out of control. Her muscles trembled with frustrated desire. She untwined her hands from his neck to lower her own bodice, spilling her bosom forth into his face.
He responded by taking a breast into his mouth, and at last rewarding her with the full pleasure of his fingers. She gasped and arched her back, riding his hand until she was so close to ecstasy she could taste it.
She’d come all over his hand another day. Right now, she wanted to feel his cock inside her.
Barely able to think, much less breathe fluidly, she fumbled with the fall of his breeches until enough buttons broke free that his member popped up to greet her. She arranged herself atop him without delay, easing down ever so slowly. He teased her with his hand between her legs and his mouth on her nipple.
Once joined, she imagined she was ravishing him the way she’d wanted to when he’d first shown up at her doorstep to give her a bareback ride on his stallion. Nowthiswas the sort of ride she’d been after.
The pressure built within her until she was no longer in control of her own body. She gave everything over to him. Her breasts, her blood, her breath. Waves of pleasure shot through her as her muscles clenched around his member again and again.
The moment she finally sucked in a restorative breath, he lifted her from his hips, covering his cock with the folds of her skirt and bucking wildly.
When they were both still, she touched her forehead to his. “Did you just smear your seed inside my underdress?”
“I would’ve used my cravat, but you tossed it in a fire,” he pointed out. “Then you plucked the buttons from my breeches. I’ll have to walk up to my room with my shirt tied about my waist. It won’t be suspicious at all.”
