you want me, Jess? Even a fraction of the way I want you?”
“I do,” she whispered. “God help me, I do.” There were very good reasons why she had to keep away from him, but she couldn’t think of a single one—not when his body radiated warmth and his gaze was even hotter, and without his coat, his thighs and arse were revealed in his tight buckskin breeches. Lord was he beautiful.
His arms enfolded her, bringing her body snug to his. His hands cupped her hips.
He growled and she made a kind of mewl as the thinness of her gown provided no barrier to sensation. Already, he was aroused, his cock thick and rigid against her belly. She rubbed against it, drawing from him a long, moaned “Fuck.”
She brought her arms up and threaded her hands into his hair. She curled her fingers, tightening her grip on him. Not too much. Just enough to sting.
“God, yes,” he rumbled, his eyes closing.
“Kiss me.”
She lifted up to meet him as his lips crashed down onto hers. The kiss was fevered and urgent, openmouthed with need. His tongue lapped at hers, and each stroke reverberated through her, centering in her breasts and quim. He kissed her as if he’d been formed for this singular purpose, and he finally had a chance to do exactly the thing for which he’d been made. Her shawl slipped down to the ground.
He brought one of his broad hands up to cup her breast. But even the whisper-thin cambric was too much of a barrier, and he tugged at the ribbon of the neckline until it gaped open. She bit back a cry as his bare hand, hot as a brand, stroked her. When her nipple tightened into a point, he pinched it lightly. Enough to make her gasp.
“I want to talk to you,” he growled. “Or perhaps you prefer me silent.”
“Talk,” she said at once.
“Been thinking about this.” He rumbled each word, his voice deep and low. “Since we arrived at Carriford. Your skin against mine. My cock hard as iron as I pleasured you. I want to pleasure you. May I? Will you let me?”
“I will.” And she knew with certainty what he wanted—he’d said so in the conservatory—and she wanted it, too.
It felt perfect to hold dominion over him, this man who was so powerful. To receive the gift of his submission and honor it with her own power.
All along, every interaction, every word and glance, where she had met him parry for parry, led to this moment between them. And it was glorious.
Somehow, he’d known. Seen within her that need to be in command, something that no one—not even she herself—had understood. She had done her best in her life to be in control, but she had been born too poor, and a female. The world gave her no power, and she had not realized until now, until him, how much she hungered for it.
“Taste me.”
He groaned. “Yes, Jess. I will lick your pussy.”
She nearly came right then. But she managed to keep her release at bay for a moment. “My bedchamber . . .”
“Too far.” He clasped her waist and lifted her up, setting her at the table’s end. “Too far for a starving man.”
His hands trembled as he raised the hem of her nightgown.
She clasped the edge of the table as he eased back. He was a beautiful man, and the candlelight turned him into a vision of Eros himself. She could see the long, heavy length of his shaft pressed tightly against the front of his breeches, and she sucked in a breath when he stroked his hand over it.
“Am I wrong, Jess? Am I wrong to touch myself when I think of you? To pump my hand on my cock and imagine it’s your mouth or your quim, taking me in, surrounding me?”
“You are wrong,” she said imperiously. It felt perfect to speak to him in this way, as though she’d been waiting for eons to find a man strong enough for her to command. “On your knees and perform your penance.”
Noel slowly sank to his knees between her legs, his gaze blazing and ripe with intent. He slid his broad hands up her bare legs, pushing up the hem of her nightgown. She could barely catch her breath as sensation built higher and higher still in time with his hands. Her rasping gulps for air combined with his own rough inhalations.
She didn’t sleep wearing drawers, and soon he’d hiked