Bella and the Beast (24 page)

“It's a bit premature to consign yourself to a rocking chair.” He bent his face closer, so close she could feel the warmth of his breath. “When I look at you, I see lovely blue eyes that sparkle with life. Soft skin that turns pink when you blush. And the prettiest lips I've ever kissed.” His gaze dipped to her mouth and just as her heart fluttered with forbidden longing, he straightened up and gave her a sardonic look. “But I suppose you'll accuse me of being a liar if I dare to go on.”

Her legs felt unsteady from the melting heat of desire. She ought to step away, but lacked the willpower to do so. “Yes, do stop, Your Grace. You're being quite outrageous.”

“Miles,” he corrected. “I've noticed you only address me formally when you're trying to hold me at arm's length.”

“Bosh. I'm
in
your arms right now.”

“So you are,” he said, his hands drifting idly over her waist and hips as if to familiarize himself with her feminine curves. His eyelids lowered slightly in a hooded look, he went on, “Now is when you should order me to depart your bedchamber. If I stay any longer, you'll be in danger of having your reputation tarnished.”

The prospect of his departure pained Bella. Despite all logic and reason, she couldn't bear to end their closeness. Miles had awakened her to the intense pleasure of a man's kiss. Yet she'd only enjoyed a small taste of forbidden fruit, just enough to stir a riotous curiosity inside her. There was so much more that he could teach her of passion. She might never have another chance like this—and if she turned coward now, she surely would regret it for the rest of her life.

She looped her arms around his neck and refused to think beyond the moment. “Don't go,” she murmured in his ear. “I should very much like for you to tarnish my reputation.”

He drew back to frown at her. “What?”

“The other day,” she murmured, “you told me that if ever I wanted you, I would have to do … something. You never finished saying what it was.”

“I was teasing you.” He fixed her with the Ducal Stare. “As you're teasing me right now.”

“Am I?” she asked with a coy smile. “I've given considerable thought to what you meant to say, Miles. I believe that you meant for
me
to initiate our next kiss.” To make her shameless desires clear, she went on, “And after I do so, I would like for you to come to my bed.”

*   *   *

Miles gripped her slender waist as she traced his lips with her finger. He could scarcely believe that Bella was seducing him. Only a short while ago, he'd feared he had destroyed her goodwill forever. Nothing else could have induced him to spill his guts to her. He'd been desperate to convince her that the darkness in him hadn't been caused just by her father.

Afterward, awash in a disquieting relief, he had craved her smile and the reassurance that he could still arouse her desires. But he hadn't been angling for an invitation to initiate her in bodily pleasures. He had come to think too highly of Bella to despoil her like one of his whores.

Now, however, she had yanked the rug out from under him. Although he'd fantasized about this moment—far too often over the past few days—he had never expected her to yield in actuality. Especially not after their quarrel and then the exposure of his black-hearted secret.

Yes, he was black-hearted, no matter what she said to the contrary. Black-hearted enough to take the pleasure she offered.

She arched up on tiptoes, her curvaceous body sliding against him and igniting a blaze in his groin. Her eyelids drifted shut, and the warmth of her breath bathed his lips in the moment before she touched her mouth to his.

That light, virginal kiss nearly undid him. He tightened his arms around her, running his hands up and down her womanly form. He needed to touch her to ground himself in reality, for she was a dream come true. But he held himself in check, allowing her to explore him at her leisure. She sipped at his mouth in tender little pecks before the tip of her tongue slipped out to trace the seam of his lips.

A groan emanated from deep in his chest. Craving a deeper drink of her sweetness, he splayed his fingers across the back of her head and proceeded to plunder her mouth with ravenous purpose. His tongue found hers waiting to parry with him, and her mouth tasted of dark secrets and decadent promises. He burned to brand Bella as his own, to awaken the fullness of her passion, to make her need him as desperately as he needed her.

When they were both panting with arousal, he drew back slightly to catch his breath. “Tell me this isn't some trick,” he muttered against her brow. “Where is that blasted dagger, anyway?”

“In my pocket.” She rubbed her cheek against his, and he could feel her smile. “But it would be out of my reach if you were to divest me of my gown.”

A gravelly chuckle rose in his throat. Ah, Bella. She was hardly the dried-up spinster of her imagination. She was a mature woman ripe for a night of pleasure. He craved to make her realize just how beautiful she was inside and out.

He turned her around to release the buttons down the back of her gown. First one, then another and another. Each loosening exposed a bit more warm flesh for him to taste with his tongue. As he lowered the top half of her gown, Bella rolled her shoulders to slide her arms out of the long tight sleeves. He had undressed many other women, but never one all trussed up in spinster garb. Odd how this unveiling felt far more titillating than any disrobing performed by a skilled courtesan.

Letting the bodice fall just to her waist, he untied her corset strings and then slid his hands inside her linen chemise to cup her bare breasts. She leaned back against him, tilting her head onto his shoulder, breathing his name in a ragged sigh. Her eyes were drowsy with pleasure as he weighed the perfect globes in his palms. The tips beaded at a stroke of his thumbs and she moved her hips, her bottom brushing his hardness.

He gritted his teeth to keep from taking her right there on the floor. Bella was too naïve to realize how her instinctive movements affected him. In an effort to control himself, he drew his hands from the warm delights of her bosom and turned her to face him again. He intended to do this slowly, so she could revel in every moment of her deflowering.

As she murmured a protest, he soothed her with a tender kiss. “There's no need to hurry. You'll like it better if I linger.”

“All right, but I want to learn everything …
quickly
.”

A chuckle surprised him. When was the last time he'd laughed during sex? Never. Bella had a way of making him view things in a new and unexpected manner.

He dropped to one knee before her. Working her dress downward over the curve of her hips, he spied the charred spot at her hem where she had smothered the burning letters. Miles knew he ought to be sorry, for he had hurt Bella. But his angry action also had propelled them to this point—though he didn't quite understand how they could be at each other's throats one moment, and kissing madly the next.

He had considered himself well versed in the art of lovemaking. But he was fast learning that seducing Bella was outside the realm of his experience. Being accustomed to light-skirts trained to please a man, he had never bedded a respectable woman. A woman who shared his passion for ancient civilizations, who bedeviled him at every turn, who thought nothing of challenging his long-held beliefs.

A woman who drove him wild with desire.

As the gown slithered to the floor, he lent Bella a hand to help her step out of it and her petticoat. She tugged off the loosened corset and dropped it onto the heap of her gown. “Englishwomen should rebel against such a contraption,” she said with a wry grimace. “I daresay a man invented that whalebone cage.”

Still on one knee, Miles could only stare up at her in mesmerized attention. The chemise skimmed her feminine form, and he feasted his eyes on the jut of her breasts and the dark shadow at the apex of her thighs. He struggled to keep his mind on her words. “You … didn't wear corsets in Persia?”

“No, I dressed in the traditional costume of the women, a belted robe and jacket.” She sighed. “Now, there is something that I
do
miss.”

With that allusion to their dinner conversation, she gracefully lifted her arms to pluck the pins from her prudish bun. Then she shook her head and the luxurious brown locks cascaded around her shoulders and rippled down to her hips. The natural sensuality of her movements held him transfixed. So did the curls that fell around her breasts, where the strands played peek-a-boo with her nipples.

Her gaze flitted to him and a charming blush pinked her cheeks. She smiled, a warm yet uncertain look. “I'll just … put these pins away. In the dressing room.”

Even as she turned to go, Miles leaped to his feet. “Permit me.” He emptied the pins from her hand into his. Then he put his arm around her slender waist, walked her to the four-poster, and dropped the pins onto the bedside table.

Maybe it was irrational, but he didn't want to let Bella out of his sight. Despite her boldness, she had to be feeling somewhat skittish. She might yet change her mind and retract the decision to give herself to a ne'er-do-well with a dark sin staining his soul.

He mustn't allow her time to think.

Drawing her flush against him, he kissed her deeply, thoroughly, caressing her bosom until she was melting in his arms again. He loved the way she responded to him with zeal and fire. He loved her lips, rosy and soft. He loved her full breasts and her slim legs and her rounded bottom.

Not
love
in the sense of poetry and forever. That road had no place in the life he had chosen for himself long ago.

No, what he felt was merely infatuation, a fascination with the novelty of Bella Jones. She had offered him the gift of her virtue, and in return he hungered to make her happy. To erase the memory of seeing her teary-eyed over the half-burned letters and her distraught voice crying out,
What are you doing?

That had been the moment when he'd recognized that the malice inside himself had the power to hurt her deeply. The moment when he'd known he would do anything necessary to restore the closeness that had sprung up between them so swiftly and unexpectedly. The moment when he'd decided to confess all.

He had never expected to be rewarded like this.

Miles lowered her to the bed. Rather than lie down, she perched on the edge, drew the wealth of her hair over one shoulder, and combed her fingers through the long strands. He remained standing a moment to strip off his shirt. After drawing it over his head, he noticed by her deft movements that she was braiding her hair.

He flung away the shirt, sat down beside her, and caught hold of her wrists. “Don't.”

Those candid blue eyes widened on him. “I always plait my hair at night. Otherwise it becomes tangled.”

“I like it free. It's too beautiful to hide.”

She arched an eyebrow, and the corners of her mouth curved up, as well. “On the day I arrived here, you scorned it as a middling brown.”

Miles caught a lock of her hair, letting the soft strands sift through his fingers. Gold glinted like filaments of fire hidden among the darker tresses. “I hadn't seen it in the candlelight. Nor had I seen it loose, spilling around your shoulders, framing your bosom.”

He slipped his fingers beneath the curtain of hair to stroke her breasts over the chemise. Bella's eyes went hazy. Abandoning the braid, she angled herself toward him, put her arms around his neck, and tucked her head into the lee of his shoulder. The soft, swift exhalations of her breath against his skin fed his passions.

He pressed her back against the bed, and she made an erotic portrait reclining against the pillows, the nimbus of dark hair spilling all around her, the hem of her chemise riding halfway up her stocking-clad thighs. He could just glimpse the tantalizing thatch that guarded her womanhood, and the sight sent molten lava coursing through his veins. How he burned to drive into her heated depths and take his pleasure without further ado.

But this night was about her, not him.

Delaying his gratification was a new and torturous circumstance. He'd never needed to do so with his other women. In an effort to distract himself, he turned his gaze downward. She still wore her shoes, and those sparkly garnet slippers seemed more suited to a lady in a ballroom than a scholar who worked with dusty artifacts.

He eased off one of the slippers. “Where did you get these shoes?”

“What? Oh, they're…” Her eyes rounded on him, and then she glanced away, her lashes lowered halfway. “I … I don't really remember. Does it matter?”

The shoes likely had come from a secondhand store, or perhaps a jumble sale at a church. She must be too proud to admit it, and that fact struck him deeply. Bella would never want for anything ever again, he vowed silently. He would make certain of it.

Even when she left his house for good.

“
You
matter,” he said in a gravelly tone. “I'm curious to know everything about you.” He removed her other shoe and dropped it to the floor. “First and foremost, I want to know the taste and feel of your bare skin.”

A sigh of assent rippled from her as he slid his hands back up to her thighs to undo the garters holding her white silk stockings. She reached down to aid him with the fastenings, her fingers clumsy as she tried to hurry. “Oh, Miles. I want you, too. So very much.”

His chest tightened into a knot, though he didn't quite know why. Women often gushed such nonsense during sex. Perhaps the difference was Bella herself, her lack of artifice.

Bracing one hand on the mattress, he stretched up to brush his lips over hers, savoring a hint of the wine they'd drunk at dinner. “Soon I'll satisfy you,” he whispered. “I promise.”

He rolled down one stocking and then the other, leaving them where they fell. Turning his attention to her lower leg, he nuzzled the circlet of dainty tattoos around one ankle. How exciting she was, the perfect blend of sweet and exotic. In the quiet darkness lit by only the dim candlelight, they might have been the only two people in the world.