Heiress in Red Silk (Duke's Heiress #2) - Madeline Hunter Page 0,105

signed about leaving Rosamund’s share in her hands.

“We had a row,” he said. “It was small, but it became a poison affecting everything. I had already proposed that I needed a place to pursue my interests, and we agreed to separate those two parts of our lives.”

“So whenever the two of you discuss the enterprise, you will do it here?”

“That is the thinking.”

“And you believe that if you argue, you can leave the argument here?”

“Of course. Why not?”

“It is unlike any marriage I know, but you are unlike any man I know, so perhaps you have found a perfect solution. Now, I have to go to the City. I’ll leave you and Brigsby to settle in.”

The notion of being settled in by Brigsby had Kevin striding to the door in Chase’s wake. “I’ll ride part way with you.”

* * *

Rosamund wound her hands around the silken tie that bound her wrists to the bedpost above her head. Her vulnerability excited her more than she expected. Kevin had aroused her perfectly, masterfully. Now he sat back on her legs and watched her, making her wait while she trembled with desire.

Lessons like this had progressed in fits and starts. A week might pass before a new one. A pattern had emerged. He would tell her, in that quiet, clear voice of his, what he was going to do. One time she had recoiled at his words. He had discarded the idea and never presented it again.

This reminded her of their first time together, when he held her hands together above her head. Nothing else was similar, however. She was not lying but sitting, for one thing.

He spread her legs and kissed up the length of one. The higher those kisses went, the shorter her breaths came. His mouth turned toward the dampness down there. His fingers stroked and his tongue flicked. She closed her eyes and rode the intensity of pleasure that he created.

She was almost there, almost breaking apart, when he moved again, leaving her need bereft of completion. He knelt close to her, rising above. He untied her hands.

He had not described this part, but she knew what to do. She caressed him, her hands rising up his torso, then down to his hips and thighs. She took his cock in her hands and pleasured him the way he liked.

His position and hers allowed her to caress him fully. It also allowed something else. She had heard the women talk about it and thought it among the worst of their duties. Now the notion did not shock her. On impulse, she leaned in and flicked her tongue up his cock’s shaft. She sensed a new tension in him and looked up.

“Do you want this?” She flicked her tongue again.

“Yes.”

His ragged voice, his tight jaw, the way he watched her—all of it said he wanted this more than that “yes” admitted.

She grazed him with lips and fingertips, teasing him the way he often did her. Torturing him and making his hunger increase. “I wonder if I can make you beg,” she said, before circling her tongue around the tip.

“Never.”

“No? I have all night to find out.”

He braced against the headboard with one arm. “Do your worst.”

* * *

Kevin woke to find Rosamund looking right at him. She rested on her side, her head propped on her upright hand, while she regarded him.

He must have fallen asleep after collapsing. She had exhausted him. She lacked experience, but her curiosity alone aroused him. And charmed him. Feeling her explore and experiment had left his blood screaming.

Now she wore a self-satisfied smile. “I expect decent women are not supposed to do that,” she said. “Is that why you never asked it of me?”

It was a hell of a question. “I thought later, perhaps.”

“I told you the women talked. I know that men like it.”

“Yes. Well . . .”

“You liked it enough to beg.”

“I don’t think one ‘please’ is begging.”

“It wasn’t only one ‘please’ but a good number, along with some ‘yes, like that’ and ‘deeper’ and—”

He grabbed her and tucked her close so she would not feel obligated to repeat every desperate muttering he had made.

He began to drift away again.

“Tell me about Lady Greenough.”

Suddenly, he was alert, staring at the underside of the bed’s drape that billowed above them. “What about her?”

“I was told that you had a liaison with her last year. I thought you didn’t have lovers.”

His response shouldn’t matter, but an acute sense of caution made him hesitate. “For the