Unfinished (Historical Fiction) - By Harper Alibeck Page 0,19

acknowledging so much more than acquaintance, connecting portions of their souls that Lilith had feared were not, well, real.

Hands roamed across the expanse of her back, a single fully-splayed palm nearly covering the span, pulling her into the hot-breathed embrace and eager lips of this man she'd stumbled across under the worst of indecent circumstances. Kissing Jack Reed had been nothing like this, and the comparison was beyond laughable. That night in the garden had been about removing obstacles.

James was about overcoming them.

He pulled back, breathless, eyes wild with a purity of need that made her wet and swollen. “What is this?”

Her head was filled with a buzzing and a moist, slick feeling that made her caress his open skin, his wrist, his face, his neck – any part she could. “What is what?” she asked.

“This. What are we doing? I'm certainly not courting you.” He laughed ruefully, and she could feel the moment slip away.

“No!” she cried out, pulling him to her again, moving his hand to her breast, nipping at his lower lip, wrestling his tongue into a deeper connection, willing him to be entwined with her once more. He returned the kiss and groaned, shifting so that their hips met. Now she truly felt his want, and her own swelled to infinity at the knowing.

Warm flesh cupped her breast and pulled it from her shirt, his hot mouth on her now, her hands plunged into his hair as she arched her back and felt the cold air invade as his mouth retreated. Skin tightened and her body seemed to center on that one spot, fire in her pelvis and ice on her breast, all crying out for more.

One tiny hand reached for him and found his swollen bulge, her inexperience evident as she hesitated, unable to decide how to proceed. He reached down and fumbled with his buttons and then she felt him, slid her hand down his enormous shaft, her mind moving to the fascination of this. How foreign – the soft skin that slid down like a sock over a calf. The wet, warm tip that the sliding revealed. James' complete and utter emotional abandon at her touch, how she held all the control in the world in one palm.

And then he pulled her into his lap, spreading her legs so that she straddled him, and she let go.

More kisses that made her squirm, made her wriggle and want to ride him, made her damn the undergarments that bound her and made this so difficult. Convention was torture. Indecency was noble. How everything went topsy-turvy when he had fistfuls of her golden curls in his hands, his tongue possessed her mouth, and her hands kneaded the muscles on his back, as strong as a big game cat and as passionate as she'd always imagined herself.

In male form.

A distant whistle broke the cold night air and they both jumped, startled from their fog of lust. James held up his hand, a gesture of silence. Her body went cold with fear and irritation, a frustration that settled into her pores rather than her mind.

“Now that's a fancy carriage!” James knew the voice instantly. Goddammit, Bobby – do you have to ruin everything? Having nine siblings was bad enough; he had to share everything. Sharing this moment was cruel, though, and if he'd have believed in God beyond the Catholic ritual he'd have cursed Him.

Furiously quick, James moved Lilith off his lap and did up his buttons. Unfocused and drunk on lust, Lilith was dazed. He paused, his heart aching with the sweetness of this moment. That. He wanted that look on her face, every day, every morning and night, in his bed, legs wrapped around him, mouth open and hungry for more, sated yet insatiable, inelegant and primal.

But right now he had to deal with his brother.

“Bobby, back off!” he shouted, sticking his head out a small window.

“James?” Thirteen years old and shaped like a string bean, Bobby was the antithesis of James. He looked more like Da than Ma, and James had taken after the men on his mother's side, thick and huge, with a side of sarcasm.

“Yes, James. Don't be getting any ideas,” he growled, the threat clear.

“You in there with someone?” Bobby asked, the leer loud and clear in his voice.

“Go away before I beat you,” James warned. “I won't tell you again.”

“I'll go tell Ma what you're up to. You got some expensive whore in there? How'd you get the money?”

Lilith clapped one