Chapter 13
Alistair’s chest expanded with a sharply drawn breath, then deflated in a rush. He pivoted on his heel and moved to the chair, pausing to remove his coat and drape it over the back before sitting. “According to our agreement, I am supposed to be the voice of reason. A model of propriety.”
Jess watched him, admiring the sleek sensuality inherent in his movements. She also admired his taut backside, eager to see it bared. “Be my guest, but I won’t be swayed. I do understand, however, that you have a strong dislike for losing wagers.”
Setting his hands on his knees, he waited. His tense expectancy was reflected in his heavy-lidded gaze. Between his legs, the outline of his thick arousal quickened her breathing. “Not in this instance. I would give up my fortune to bed you; losing our bet is a ridiculously small price to pay for the privilege.”
Her chest tightened at his fervency, her corset becoming an unbearable restraint. Needing to be free of it, she went to him and presented her back. “Help me.”
The touch of his fingers was light, too light to quench her thirst for him. As the halves of her gown parted, Jess began to feel warm and slightly intoxicated. The scent of his skin, the exotic blend that was uniquely his, filled her nostrils with every inhalation. She knew he had to be as heated as she was, and she longed to touch his bare flesh, to press her nose and lips against it.
Alistair pushed her sleeves off her shoulders, and she wriggled out of her dress, allowing the garment to pool on the floor. He caught her stays next, loosening them with a dexterity born of experience. She’d enjoyed that skill firsthand, remembered it vividly, dreamed of it.
He helped her push the corset down past her hips, and she stepped out of the boning, feeling a novel sense of freedom and lack of inhibition.
“Jess,” he breathed, a moment before his arms came around her and he nuzzled against her back. His large hands cupped her breasts, kneading the aching flesh with a firm yet tender grip.
Her head fell back and her eyes closed, a sigh escaping her. The desire to give herself over to him was nearly irresistible, but she restrained herself. If she allowed him to, he would take over, and she didn’t want that. He’d had more than his share of women who wanted him to work in bed. She did not want to resemble those women, especially after her rash words the other evening. She wanted to give pleasure, and she wanted him to take it.
Turning carefully in his embrace, Jess filled the space between his spread thighs. She caught his face in her hands and pressed her lips to his, wanting the kisses that made her feel seductive and desirable. His hands encircled her waist, pulling her closer.
“Allow me to enjoy you,” she breathed into his mouth. “You refused me last time . . .”
“After seven years, you cannot be asking me for patience.”
She pushed her splayed fingers into the thick silk of his hair. “After seven years, what are a few moments more?”
Alistair’s head fell back on a low groan, his eyes staring up at her with a bold, heated passion. It amazed her that she could incite such a response in a voluptuary as beautiful and sensual as he was. She, a peeress known for her chilly deportment, while Alistair radiated a sexual heat that made her melt and soften.
Her fingertips stroked over his dark, winged brows. Their shape lent wickedness to his countenance, while framing his stunning eyes and thick lashes. Her thumbs caressed the sculpted line of his cheekbones, holding him still as she pressed her lips to the tip of his aristocratic nose.
“Christ, Jess,” he said gruffly. “If your aim is to kill me, be mercifully quick about it. Don’t torment me.”
Pulling back, she began to work on the knot of his cravat. “I’ve yet to do anything.”
“You drive me to madness.” He tugged on her hips, drawing her close enough to capture a hard, peaked nipple in the heat of his mouth. He made a rough sound of desire, and Jess sagged into his grip.
Even through the thin lawn of her chemise, the contact was scorching. She arched and gasped, her womb clenching in greedy hunger. Catching his shoulders, she steadied herself as her knees weakened. His tongue flicked over her with ruthless skill, reminding her of the last time his mouth had been on her. When her breast grew heavy with need, her nipple swollen and red, he moved to lavish similar attention on the other side. Jess felt the hot trickle of her own arousal, the flesh between her legs growing moist in welcome.
She moaned. “I want you naked. I want to feel you inside me.”
He released her with a low growl. “Oh, you will, love. You’ll feel every inch. I have never been so hard. I am going to cram you full, and you’ll come over and over and over again.”
Tackling the ivory buttons of his waistcoat, Alistair quickly divested himself of the garment. When he pushed to his feet in a powerfully graceful movement, she stepped back on shaky legs, her entire body feeling alien to her. She was a mass of sensation and wanting, her emotions so riotous she might’ve run in fear if her limbs hadn’t been weighted by longing.
Seven years. It felt as if her attraction to him had been simmering the whole of that time, waiting for his touch to free it. Now it spilled over her in heated waves, flushing her skin and making the ephemeral weight of her chemise and pantalettes a burden. But she dared not remove them. As it was, she was too vulnerable. Too bare. None of the shields she was used to erecting—her rigid deportment, biting rejoinders, and faultless manners—were available to her now. She didn’t know who she was beneath all that protection, which left her feeling so open and unprotected.
Blissfully unaware of Jess’s turmoil, Alistair finished unwinding his cravat and tossed it aside. The next moment his shirtsleeves were yanked over his head. He was reaching for the placket of his breeches when she stayed him.
“Stop,” she said, swallowing hard at the sight of him. As elegant as he was while dressed, he was pure unadulterated male beneath his clothes. The evenness of his sun-kissed skin color betrayed how often he went about without a shirt, while the thickness of his biceps and the taut roping of abdominal muscles told her how often he worked alongside the men he employed.
Her hand lifted to touch him, her feet moving her forward without volition. She pressed her palm to his warm skin, and a shiver moved through her. She felt his heart racing. There was so much power and strength in him. His anticipation was tangible and visible; his muscles were hard and delicious. She was searingly aroused by his virility, quivering with eagerness at the thought of that pure masculine energy focused on pleasuring her body.
Alistair caught her wrist. “I am aching with lust for you.”
“You are not alone,” she whispered, tugging free of his easy grip to touch his shoulders. Both of her hands stroked over the broad curves, then slid down his biceps, her fingers squeezing and finding no give to her applied pressure. He was like warm marble. She wanted to touch him all over, take her time, nuzzle her nose against him and breathe him deep into her lungs. She wanted him. In that moment, she wanted him more than anything else in the world. She felt as if her repressed hunger had overtaken her completely. Her need and longing for him was all that was left of her after he’d stripped the entirety of her defenses away.
His fists clenched at his sides as her hands drifted over the rock-hardness of his rippled abdomen. “Are you wet for me? Do you feel empty without my cock in you?”
Jess nodded, feeling her sex clench tight with greed.
“Let me fill you,” he purred, temptation incarnate. “Let me push inside you and make you come—”
“Not yet.” Wrapping her arms around him, she drew closer still, delaying her surrender because she desired his first. With the flat of her tongue, she licked across the hard disk of his nipple.
He hissed and gripped her hips with bruising strength. “In a moment, I will pin you to the bulkhead and take the choice from you.”
“Where is the laudable restraint you displayed the other night?”
“You were intoxicated; I knew before we began that I wouldn’t be having you. Now . . . There is no turning back. I know I am only moments away from having you as I’ve needed you for far too long.”
“Alistair.”
“Damnation, I am trying to be civilized.” He pressed his lips to her forehead in a quick, hard kiss. “I am trying to keep from pushing you to the deck and rutting atop you like a maddened beast. But I am only a man—a vastly flawed one—and I know damn well how good it will be between us. I’ll never want to stop; therefore I cannot wait to begin.”
Jess stilled, her breath panting across his skin, her chest constricted by the weight of his expectation. Disappointing him would crush her. She couldn’t allow it. He expected great pleasure, and she was determined that he should have it. She reached for the fastenings of his breeches, slipping the buttons from their holes.
Alistair reached for her coiffure, withdrawing the pins that secured her tresses. “I want to feel your hair brush all over my body. I want to fist it in my hands and hold you still while I ride you deep and long.”
Her hands shook as she reached into his smalls and wrapped her hands around him. He groaned and jerked in her grip.
“You are so hot,” she said, scorched by the heat of him. She shoved his clothing out of the way, releasing him. He made a low, animal sound as he fell heavily into her palms.
Jess sucked in a sharp breath, staring down at the magnificent penis thrusting so hungrily toward her. Perhaps she should have expected his body to be uniformly awe inspiring, but in this matter she was at a disadvantage. She had accustomed herself to one man and had never expected to become intimately familiar with any other.
Her fingers explored carefully, following her gaze. She traced the sinuous curving of the thick veins that coursed the rigid length. He was fully, ragingly aroused. His bollocks were drawn up tight, but they were no less impressive for their readiness. He was large there, too, giving proof of the virility promised by his confidence and arrogance. She wondered if her body could accommodate him. He was so thick and long, wide from the tip to the root.
“Say something,” he said gruffly. “Tell me you want it.”
“I shall show you instead.” Licking her lips, she dropped to her knees.
“Jessica.”
The serrated edge to his voice thrilled her, made her disregard the discomfort of the hardwood beneath her. Alistair stood still, his hands tangling in her hair. His chest heaved with labored breaths, and a slight sheen of perspiration glistened across his abdomen.
At least in this, she was assured of giving him pleasure. Her lips parted. Mouth watering, she engulfed the thick crest.
“Bloody hell,” he groaned, shuddering violently.
A slow, heated spurt of pre-ejaculate flowed over her tongue. She moaned at the taste of him, her cheeks hollowing on a drawing pull, seeking more of the rich flavor.
“Yes . . . Jess. Yes.” Alistair held her face in his hands, his thumbs stroking over her cheeks. “I have dreamed of this. Wanted you like this so fiercely I was certain I’d lose my mind.”
His hips moved, stroking his cock in and out of her working mouth. His beautiful features were harsh with lust, the skin stretched taut over his sculpted cheekbones, his sensual mouth twisted in a grimace of pained pleasure. The ferocity of his need might have frightened her if not for the fierce tenderness in his eyes and touch.
Sweat bloomed across her flushed skin, her mind reliving his ministrations to her the other night, remembering the feel of his tongue and fingers on her. In her. Remembering the unbearable ecstasy. She wanted to give him that ecstasy in kind, wanted to leave a similarly indelible memory with him.
Gripping his lean hip in one hand, Jess cupped his scrotum with the other. His curse was bitten out, his body jerking as she tested the heavy weight, her fingertips massaging the tightened sac with luring caresses. Her tongue was equally adventurous, swirling around the plush head of his cock, flickering along the tender underside.
“Dear God,” he gasped, the muscles of his stomach clenching and quivering. “Suck me, Jess . . . take me deeper . . . yes, like that . . .”
She gripped the thick base of his penis, fisting him just to feel him quake and hear him curse. He was riveting, so darkly erotic in his unrestrained abandonment. Her thighs clenched tightly together, her body’s attempt to ease the unbearable aching and swelling of her needy flesh. She was searingly aware of the slickness of her sex, the way she trembled in longing. But she wanted this more, wanted no distractions from witnessing his release, wanted to absorb every nuance of his expression when he succumbed to the climax she knew he was swiftly approaching. She felt like a different woman, a fiercely feminine creature who knew no boundaries or restraint, no rules or law, a force of nature wild and untamed.
Alistair’s callused thumbs rubbed along the edges of her straining lips. Her jaw stretched wide to accommodate him, the slight discomfort anchoring her to the moment. The act had never been this way with Benedict. Her husband had always been sweet and solicitous, their sexual relationship marked by tenderness and care. Alistair was raw and unguarded in his pleasure, creating a rich intimacy. She’d never felt as close to another person, never felt such a brilliant and binding sense of connection.
“I’m close,” he said hoarsely. “Ah, Christ . . . your mouth is divine . . .”
Alistair held her head still and took what he needed, the thrust of his hips accelerating until she could only grip his thighs and tighten her suction, her tongue stroking his cock-head with fevered desperation. The sounds he made, the mindless groans and gruffly voiced praise, brought her to the brink of orgasm.
“Yes!” he growled, swelling farther a moment before the first hard burst of semen poured over her tongue.
He climaxed with the same unmitigated intensity with which he did everything. The cords of his neck stood out in harsh relief as he threw his head back and flooded her mouth with a guttural cry. She worked him with her hands, milking his release, wanting the entirety of his lust and hunger, claiming it as her due with savage exultation.
His rigid tension had just barely begun to ease when he caught her beneath the arms and hauled her to her feet.
“Jessica.” He caught her up and carried her to the bed.
In the aftermath of an orgasm so powerful it weakened his knees, Alistair held Jessica tightly to his chest, consumed by the need to reduce her to the same base state she’d stripped him to. His skin felt too small and stretched too thin. Sweat soaked the roots of his hair and slid down his nape. His mouth was dry from hoarse mutterings.
He’d never imagined anything could feel so good. She’d sucked his aching cock as if starved for the taste of him, moaning and clutching him as if she would die if he denied her. As if he could. He doubted even the sinking of the ship could have pulled him away.
Jess’s hands dug into his hair, her lush body writhing against his torso. Alistair seated her on the edge of the mattress and pulled her chemise up and over her head. He tossed it aside, his attention focused on the full breasts that heaved with her every ragged breath. He cupped their lush weight in his hands, his thumbs stroking over the hard, peaked nipples. She leaned back, her weight propped on her canted arms. Her lovely face was flushed, her gray eyes so dark they were nearly black. Her rich golden hair fell around her shoulders in total disarray. She looked glassy eyed and ravished, certainly the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
“Thank you,” he murmured, pressing her backward to take a nipple into his mouth. Her selflessness meant more to him than he could express with words. He’d needed so much from her for so long, and she had given generously and with heartening enthusiasm.
His tongue stroked over the taut point of her breast, his lips pulling with deliberately soft suction. Teasing. Making her want more.
“Alistair . . .” Her breathy tone was ripe with surrender. There was no resistance left in her, no caution or wariness. He was uncertain of what had transpired to make her so free in his arms, but he would have time enough to discern the cause later. For now, all he wanted was to make her come apart in his arms, to hear her say his name as she climaxed.
Reaching between her legs, his questing fingers slid into the slit of her pantalettes and found her sex gratifyingly slick. He parted her, sliding through the silken skeins of her desire, then pushed two fingers into her. She was ready for him. More than ready. Wet and hot, ripe for the taking. He thrust gently in and out, his teeth gritting as he felt her clenching hungrily around him. He tugged on her breast with a hard suck, then released her.
Jess’s arms gave out, and she sprawled across his dark brown counterpane, looking like a debauched angel. Straightening, he gripped her knees with both hands and spread her wide.
“So pretty,” he praised, coveting the exposed glistening pink flesh between her thighs. He briefly debated removing the rest of their garments, then discarded the notion. They’d undress next time, after she was soaked with his seed and limp with satiation.
He gripped his cock with one hand, angling downward to glide the sensitive head through her petal-soft lips. The feeling was exquisite, engorging his penis as if he hadn’t had a galvanizing orgasm only moments before.
“You’re still hard,” she breathed, pushing up onto her elbows.
“For you, always. I intend to ride you all day,” he promised darkly. “All night.”
“I await the proof of such stamina.”
“A challenge, my lady?” He bared his teeth in a semblance of a smile. “You are aware of how I respond to those.”
Notching the thick crest into her tiny slit, he pushed through the token resistance of tightness caused by her year of abstinence. She gasped as the crown breached the stretched opening. He bit back an animal sound of pleasure and fought the urge to fall upon her with a hard, deep thrust that pierced her to the womb. That would be too quickly done, robbing her of the full awareness of his possession. He wanted her to feel the stretch of every wide inch, wanted her to writhe as he sank deeper, wanted her to remember the sensation of that last leisurely stroke that seated him to the bollocks.
So he kept her spread and worked his way into her, his eyes riveted to the point where they were joined. His lungs burned as he gulped in air, every nerve in his body attuned to the feel of her satiny tissues quivering and clasping around him. A surfeit of sensation burned through him. Sweat coursed down his back and chest, a physical manifestation of the rigid control he exerted.
“So tight,” he gritted out, his jaw clenched with strain. “Like a fist . . . so hot and tight . . .”
She moved restlessly beneath him, biting her lower lip as he slid in and out, pushing deeper and deeper with every leisurely thrust. “Please. Hurry.”
Hunching over her, Alistair sank his teeth into her shoulder. Hard enough to leave a mark, but not enough to break the skin. She moaned and arched into his mouth. It was a primitive act, one goaded by the feel of her greedy cunt pulling and sucking at the head of his cock, luring him to sink home. Bare. Nothing between his most sensitive flesh and hers. In all his life, he’d never taken a woman without the protective sheath of a French letter. Only with her would he do so. Jessica—a woman he’d known was meant to be his from the moment he first saw her.
His hands moved from her thighs to the bed, supporting his weight as he pumped his hips in a timed, unhurried rhythm. She took advantage of her sudden freedom, wrapping her legs around him and tugging him deeper. Her breath left her in a gasped cry of his name as he slid in to the root, buried completely.
Alistair held still, struggling for control. He fought to make allowances for her straining body to grow accustomed to him throbbing hard and thick inside her. She stared up at him, her eyes wide and luminous, windows to her soul. There was no evidence of the chilly hauteur she was renowned for. She was burning hot beneath him, around him; all artifice and distance melting away. The look on her face was one he’d never seen on anyone, yet it mirrored how he felt—profoundly affected, split wide open, with nowhere to hide.
When she pushed upward and kissed his clenched jaw, something shifted inside him, shaking him to the core. His blood was raging for her, spurred by seven years of waiting to be right where he was, but she stayed his violent need with a single soft, sweet kiss. He was devastated by her tenderness in the face of his ferocious desire. Pressing his damp cheek to hers, he nuzzled against her, breathing in the smell of sex and lust and beloved woman. She fit him perfectly, if tightly, as he’d known she would. His beautiful, irreproachable Jess. A woman capable of reining in an entire roomful of exuberant people with a single quelling glance. Yet her body had been designed to hold him, a man built for pleasuring women in the most exuberant way possible.
Without conceit, he knew how generously he was endowed. His size had been a tool he’d used to his advantage once he had become aware of how pleasing it was to women.
But he had not been meant for those women. He had been fashioned for Jessica, just as she had been crafted for him. If it killed him, he would make her see it.
He traced the shell of her ear with his tongue, feeling her slick sex clasp him in response. “Perfection,” he whispered, following her down as she sank back into the bed. “Two halves of a whole.”
Jess gripped his upper arms and licked her lower lip, her hips moving in tight little circles, loosening the way for him. “Please,” she pled again in that throaty murmur that undid him.
Bracing himself with palms flat to the bed, he withdrew slowly, relishing the feel of her clinging to his cock. He returned with effort, pushing through the tight resistance. Her head thrashed and her eyes closed, which he could not allow. He needed her to stay with him, to see him through the storm he knew was coming. The pressure of his impending orgasm was fisted around his bollocks and pulsing through his cock, warning him that he would soon be wasted by the woman beneath him. Even knowing how she could destroy him, he couldn’t pull away. She’d snared him completely that long-ago night, bewitched him beyond redemption. There was no other choice for him. Somehow, he had to make himself the only choice for her.
Pushing his arms beneath her shoulders, he cupped her head in his hands, pinning her completely. His mouth came down over hers, his head tilting to deepen the contact. She caught his waist, arching into him. Their perspiration sealed their torsos together, adding another raw layer to their heated coupling. He moved. She moved. They found a rhythm. She clawed at his back; he kissed her as if he’d die if their lips were parted. His tongue plunged and retreated along with his cock, both seeking to drive her wild. He needed her wild, as crazed and desperate as he felt.
Alistair rolled his hips, probing with the iron-hard length of his penis, absorbing every nuance of her fevered response. He found a spot that made her shiver beneath him and exploited it, stroking over it again and again. He growled when she climaxed, the delicate muscles inside her rippling and gripping his plunging cock. He hung on to his control by the thinnest of threads, needing to see her through first before he took any more than she’d already given him.
He slowed, gliding in and out, lifting his head to watch the pleasure take her. The way was easier now, her body accepting his possession with rich creamy moisture. Her eyes were dazed, her lips swollen. She breathed his name . . . Alistair. He thickened.
“You didn’t—You still . . .”
“All day,” he reminded, lunging heavily, accelerating his tempo. “All night.”
Her fingertips flexed into his back. Her legs tightened around his hips. “Yes. Please.”