begin with.
She was struggling, just slightly, making a distressed sound, and he silently cursed. She was going to have to be handled very carefully or she might bolt, and he'd be honor bound to let her go. Assuming he still possessed a degree of honor.
Except that he knew she wanted this, or would if well-bred, virginal young women had any honesty. If he could just manage to convince her to let go of it all, this could be quite revelatory for both of them.
He lifted his mouth from hers, just barely, and looked down into her shocked, wide-open eyes, now without the annoying barrier of glass. She didn't even seem to notice he'd taken them. "It's easier if you close your eyes," he said in a practical voice. To his astonishment she did, and he kissed her again.
She was no longer struggling, a mixed blessing; her squirming had provided a lovely friction for his erect penis. Then again, it wouldn't help matters if he climaxed in his breeches. Her lips had been tight, frightened, but now they had softened, and he brushed his own lips against hers, once, twice, wanting to hum with anticipatory delight.
If she accepted his kiss he'd have her, he told himself. Accepted a real kiss, his tongue in her mouth, taking her, not this innocent stuff reserved for young ladies behind the punch bowl, innocent creatures who didn't know what they wanted.
He lifted his head again. "Open your mouth for me.”
Her eyes flew open again. "Why?"
It was the first word she'd spoken in quite a while, but her voice was husky and raw as if she'd been screaming.
"Because I want to kiss you that way."
"I don't know what you're talking about. You need to let me—"
He covered her mouth again before she could say the fateful words, and he pushed his tongue into her mouth so he could taste her fully. She froze again, but he knew how to kiss, how to use his tongue and teeth to get the response he wanted. Her body softened first, then her jaw, then her mouth, accepting
He took his time then. He wanted her tongue in his mouth, he wanted her to draw his in and suck on it. He demonstrated, hoping she might get the idea, letting his tongue slide against hers, teasing, dancing, sucking, but she still didn't do anything more than let him.
And he wanted more. He'd told himself that acceptance was enough, but he'd been wrong. He wanted, needed participation.
"Kiss me back," he whispered, his own voice hoarse.
She started to shake her head, but he caught her chin in one strong hand, holding her still. "Kiss me back," he repeated in a rough voice.
Her eyes were huge. In the darkness her rich red hair looked black, and she looked up at him beseechingly. Don't ask me to let you go, he thought.
A slow smile curved his mouth as relief flooded him. "I'll show you," he said, claiming her mouth again, trying to control the sheer ferocity of his desire for her. He kissed her slowly, much more slowly than he wanted to, but after a moment he got into the feel of it, the slow, languorous sweep of his tongue in her mouth, the soft little bites, the lift and repositioning of his mouth over hers.
The final, tentative touch of her tongue against his.
He wanted to throw back his head and laugh with triumph, but he didn't want to stop kissing her.
He could feel the changes in her body, as it softened, flowed against his, and he wanted to push her against a wall, shove her robe up and take her right there.
He couldn't. He wasn't prone to kindly gestures, but her first time should be in a bed. Hell, her first time should be in her new husband's bed, but he wasn't going to give her that.
He also wasn't going to give her a baby. He would pull out, and her cousin would be able to provide the remedies most of their set used to prevent unwanted conception just in case. She would emerge from his little cave minus her innocence but not much more the worse for wear. She'd still be (he same prissy old maid, and she'd conveniently forget her night of love in the bed of London's most notorious rake.
If he ended up letting her stay that long. Virgins were tedious—they cried and then professed themselves to be in love with their heartless seducers, because God forbid they should find any