His Dark Enchantress (Books We Love Regency Romance) (29 page)

But , when his lips closed around her
and he began to suckle, she knew she was wrong. Flashes of light burst behind her closed eyelids. She arched her back, pushing her breasts into his eager mouth and hand. Almost unaware of what she was doing, she slipped her hand behind his head and pulled him to her.

“Don’t stop,” she whispered. “Please don’t stop.”

He lifted his head and looked into her eyes.

“So all is to my Lady’s liking?”

Emmaline laid her head on his chest, slipped her arms around his waist and held him tightly.

“Oh, Lucius, I had no idea.”

He lifted her chin and she felt his lips on her forehead, felt them feathering down her nose to deliver a kiss on its tip. Butterfly light, he kissed her eyelids, her cheeks. A low groan escaped her throat.

“Did I do that right?” he asked in a softly mocking tone.

“Oh, yes, sweetheart, you certainly did,” she mocked back and then burst into a delighted giggle.

“Minx!”

He swept her up into his arms and spun her around. Their entwined shadows danced across boards that shimmered like liquid mercury. Emmaline wound her arms around his neck and rested her cheek against his. How patient he had been with her. How loving. How much she wanted him.

Her eyes jerked open at the thought. After all her hopes, all her dreams, here she was in his bed, naked in his arms. She glanced towards the window. Somehow, between there and the bed, her shift had been left in a pale heap on the floor. She looked up into gr
ey eyes that were smoky with desire. She smiled and stretched against him like a cat and Lucius groaned again.

He caught her chin
and she felt his hot breath on her face then his lips on the soft skin of her neck just below her ear.

How delicious it felt. How decadent.

She sighed as
those lips trailed down her neck, travelled the terrain of her breasts, slipped lower to her stomach and came to rest in her navel. His tongue swirled in that delicate depression, making every part of her shiver.

He moved his hand
on the inside of her thigh, fingers kneading gently at the soft flesh he found there. She moaned against the pillow and parted her legs in answer to the craving that swept through her. She felt Lucius’ breath on the soft curls at the juncture of her thighs, but jerked upright as his intent became clear to her.

“Y-you c-cannot!” she said in a shocked whisper.

His smile told her could.

“Y-you
would not!”

Her voice was faint as his fingers and lips told her more eloquently than words that he definitely would.

Emmaline lay back, eyes closed, pulsing with sensation as his lips teased the inside of her thighs.

Oh,
Lord, how could this be so good?

She opened her legs
wider, lifted them and in an instant his tongue dipped into her very centre.

Heat
scorched through her as he lapped at her and her belly clenched. She reached down and twined her fingers into his hair, moaning as he lifted her legs higher. Caught her breath as he suckled on the engorged bud he found there.

Bucking
against him, her skin glistened with thousands of miniscule diamond bright beads of perspiration. The tension in her loins was almost unbearable until, in one indescribable instant, everything stopped. She quivered uncontrollably, balanced on the edge of the void between the known and the unknown.

“It can’t stop! Not now!”

A rasping cry tore from her throat as the first pulse of wild sensation rippled through her body. She cried out again, not knowing that she did so, and mindlessly rode each wave of the most exquisite, bone melting bliss with neither thought or care, heeding only the fluttering spasms in her body and limbs.

She
fell back, exhausted, against the pillows.

Myriad
colours flashed behind her eyes, the sound of her pulse hummed in her ears, her skin burned. She stirred when Lucius took her hand and placed a kiss on the inside of her wrist. Felt the cat-with-the-dish-of-cream smile spread across her face.

“I never knew,” she whispered, looping a limp arm over his shoulder.

His face was close to hers on the pillow and she reached up and kissed him.

There was a smile in his eyes
as he pulled her into his arms and buried his face in her hair, drank in her scent and warmth. His fingers began to make slow, lazy circles on the nape of her neck, continued into long steady strokes down her spine.

She shivered and pressed against him, suddenly impatient
that the fabric of his shirt separated them. She broke free from his embrace.

“Sit up,” she commanded.

Lucius did as he was told. She tugged the shirt free from his breeches, her knuckles skimming the warm skin on his belly.

“Arms up.”

As soon as he complied Emmaline pulled the shirt over his head. Her eyes opened wide with delight at the sight of his bare, muscular shoulders. She clutched his shirt to her breast, gazed at his chest with its mat of dark, wiry hair that narrowed to a thin line and disappeared below the waist band of his breeches.

She continued to hold the shirt to her, but reached out with her right hand to touch him, all the while looking into his eyes. She saw them close as she lightly ran her fingers across his chest, saw his muscles contract and his nipples harden.

Fascinated that she could have this effect on him, she rolled his nipple between her fingers, saw him fighting for breath. Leaning in she ran her tongue around the puckered dark stub, circling it, dimly aware that she still felt the same sensation on her own skin. With a sense of wonderment she closed her lips around him and gently suckled.

She felt more than heard the falter in his breath, grew bold and pushed him back against the pillows so that she could feast on him.
When she stopped and looked up, his eyes were still closed, his nostrils pinched, his jaw clenched.

I
’ve done this to him, she thought.

A thrill of delight that this could be so swept through her as
she fumbled open the buttons on his breeches, worked them down his legs and over his feet, then dropped them on the floor beside the bed.

She reached out and touched his naked body, ran her hands over him, loving the swell of muscle, the undulation of each curve and contour of his frame. Every catch in his breath as her fingers explored his nakedness made her smile. This was her man, her husband and right now, in this moment, totally in her power.

Emboldened by this realization, she ran her hand up his straining erection and smiled with satisfaction as he groaned out loud. Her smile widened when, as she closed her hand around him and squeezed gently, he groaned again.

His sigh of pleasure changed to a surprised
gasp as she circled her thumb over the tiny bead of moisture appearing at the tip of his shaft. She lowered her head and ran her tongue along its length, licking and kissing before taking him gently in her mouth and suckling him as he had her. He moaned softly and his body stiffened. He stopped her and pulled her up in a tight embrace.

He
nuzzled at her cheeks, his breath moist on her neck as his lips began their downward journey again. Emmaline gasped at the lightning speed with which she responded. She twined her fingers in his hair, shifted her hips so that he could grasp her buttocks. Her legs lifted and she cried out as she felt the hardness of him against her soft folds.

She reached down and guided
him into her. She had no pride, no shame, knew only that there was an emptiness in her that only he could fill.

He gave one thrust,
then stopped as he again felt that delicate barrier in his way. His forehead rested on hers as he propped himself on one elbow, breathing laboured, face glistening with sweat. He took a deep breath and his heart thumped. She was his, truly his.

“Sweetheart, this will hurt,” he whispered.

Her answer was to thrust upward to meet him. The pain made her gasp in shock, a gasp that changed to a soft mew of delight as he
slowly sank deeper and deeper into her. She tightened her legs around him, held him as close as she could, began to move with him as the now familiar tightening in her belly began to strengthen.

She rocked with him,
her legs cradling him, opening more and more for him like a flower opens to the sun. He moved faster and she kept pace with him, felt him harden even more, felt her own pleasure spike and splinter as he emptied himself into her, one heated rush after another until, both spent, they lay limp in each other’s arms.

When their breathing steadied, Emmaline turned on her side and s
miled at him. She reached up, pushed back the wayward lock of hair that fell across his forehead and stroked his face.

Lucius captured her hand and placed a kiss in it.

There was no need for words.

He pulled
her into the crook of his arm. She snuggled her head into the now familiar hollow beneath his shoulder and closed her eyes.

In moments they were both asleep.

CHAPTER 2
4

When she awoke, she was alone.

Emmaline rested the back of her hand in the depression on the pillow where his head had been, breathed in the scent of him, of them.

She was not sure how many times she had awakened during the night, turning to him in eager anticipation, loving his hands on her naked body, loving the feeling of him deep inside her.

Finally sitting up in bed, she peeped out of the closed curtains on the four poster bed only to see two footmen carrying a bath tub into the bed chamber. She closed the curtain again and pulled the sheets up to her chin, all the while listening to Lucius’ firm instructions and the ordinary sounds in the room.

Ashes were raked out of the fireplace. Logs were dropped on the hearth. She heard the crackle of kindling as the fire was made up. Water splashed as the tub was filled. Cups rattled slightly on a tray as it was placed where Lucius requested.

Emmaline waited, suddenly shy. She wasn’t exactly a new bride, but what might be expected of her after the night they had spent together? Hearing nothing she reached up to open the curtain again but, before
her fingers caught the fabric, Lucius drew it back and sat on the edge of the bed.

“Good morning. Did you sleep well?” His hair was damp as if he’d just washed it and an easy smile sat on his face.

“Some of the time.”

She smiled at him
. Lucius loved the lazy look of left over love in her eyes.

“And when you weren’t sleeping?”

“Aah.” The lazy look changed to dancing happiness. “Those were times when dreams were made.”

“Well, there’s no time for dreaming now. Come.”

Lucius drew back the covers and she swung her legs out of the bed and stood up, astonished to see the tub in front of the fireplace.

“This is a little decadent, is it not?”

“Maybe, but a soak in warm water will help ease muscles that I am sure must be aching somewhat this morning.”

She could not deny it and held on to his hand as she stepped into the lavender scented water. As she lowered herself into it she realized just how right Lucius was
. Once she was soaking luxuriantly in the tub be brought her a cup of hot chocolate.

“Oh, my.” She grinned up at him. “Did all your ladies receive this treatment?”

Lucius shook his head. “My ladies, as you refer to them, never stayed the night. Either I left them, or insisted they leave me.”

Emmaline handed him the empty cup and let her head drop back on the curve of the tub and before she knew it, Lucius was behind her, brushing her hair in long steady strokes.

“Mmm. That is so good,” she murmured. The strokes continued. There was no sound other than the pop of the logs on the hearth, the sensation of the brush on her hair and Lucius’ steady breathing.

He had not said he loved her, but surely he would not be tending to her so sweetly if it were otherwise
? A small nagging doubt wormed itself into her mind. What if he still had feelings for his first love? She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She had to know.

“Tell me about her, Lucius,” she said softly. “Tell me about the girl who broke your heart.”

The brushing stopped. Behind her Lucius sighed as he began brushing again.

“Her name was Lucinda Hawkes-Carradine.
Her hair was as fair as yours is black. She had pretty brown eyes and a quick wit and I had never met anyone like her before. Her family were only too pleased to approve my suit and within six months of my coming down from Oxford we were engaged.”

Emmaline
heard the soft thud of the brush landing on the table, but Lucius still held her hair as if he were afraid to let her go.

“Caroline was afraid I had moved to
o fast and urged caution, but I wouldn’t listen. This was the love of my life, or so I thought. We were invited to an Oxford fellow’s Christmas house party. Beamish and Skeffington were there, a couple more from our circle, and Peregrine Styles. We had rubbed shoulders somewhat during our college years, but I found his envy wearing and avoided him when I could.”