She stared into his dark eyes. Something fluttered in her chest. She wanted him to touch her again. Her breasts felt tight and hot. She wondered how they’d feel if he put his lips on them, to have him reveal the mysteries making these people behave so outrageously.
In the few moments her attention had been held by Lord Winslade, the gathering had lost any pretension of decorum. A couple openly fornicated on the table. The woman lay on her back amid the debris of the meal, the man working away above her, his bare buttocks pumping. With each downward push, the crowd cheered. Suddenly, the man stiffened and pulled back on his knees.
Susan watched in dry mouthed amazement as a rope of white fluid fountained out from the rigid pole of flesh thrusting out in front of him. It pumped and spurted. A well-endowed woman ripped down her bodice to allow the liquid to splash onto her bared breasts. With a roar of approval, the crowd watched as two men grabbed her and licked her clean.
The heat in Susan’s cheeks spread, turning into strange, pulsing warmth suffusing downward through her body. She shifted restlessly on her chair. Winslade leaned in closer. His warm, masculine scent raised the temperature another degree or two. “You’re enjoying this,” he said. She shivered as his breath teased her ear.
“I shouldn’t,” she replied. “I know it’s wrong, sinful…”
“Only if someone is being forced against her will,” he said. “Here there is only willing participation in pleasure.”
“But society says…”
He spoke with cool assertiveness. “I am not concerned with the strictures of petty-minded prudes.”
He wouldn’t need to be, Susan thought. Everything about him spoke of a man who followed his own path, heedless of the opinions of anyone else.
Another man took the place of the first on the table. The crowd cheered again. Winslade got to his feet and held out his hand. “Come. This spectacle begins to bore me. You and I can find much more—inventive ways to entertain ourselves.”
She could no more deny the invitation of his outstretched hand than she could have spread a pair of wings and flown.
He led her out and up a flight of stairs. Behind them the raucous noise of the revelries faded. By the time he pushed open the door of an elegantly furnished sitting room, only the odd pressure in her groin remained to remind Susan of the scenes being acted out below.
Winslade gestured for her to take a seat on the leather-covered sofa. He turned to a table. Susan heard the tinkle of glass against glass. Then he sat down next to her and handed her a crystal goblet half-f of a liquid glowing amber in the flickering light of the candles.
“I know young women do not customarily drink brandy, but I think after what you have seen tonight, we can dispense with custom.”
He lifted his glass in salute and raised it to his mouth.
Susan followed suit, taking a long swallow. The brandy burned its way down her throat with its own kind of fire, filling her with a delicious languor.
A discreet scratch from outside brought Winslade to his feet. A footman opened the door and listened attentively as Winslade spoke. Winslade resumed his seat, sipping the brandy, saying nothing, just subjecting her to a slow, intense scrutiny.
She took another drink, hoping the alcohol would slow her racing heartbeat and ease the tension tightening her nerves to quivering point.
The door swung open again. A procession of servants arrived carrying trays laden with food. They arranged them on a table backed against the wall, then walked out.
“You didn’t finish your meal,” Winslade said. “I don’t want you to go hungry.” He strode to the table then returned, holding a plate. “Open your mouth,” he ordered.
“You don’t have to feed me, Lord Winslade,” she whispered.
“It’s my pleasure,” he replied. “My name is Anthony.”
He dug a spoon into a creamy concoction and held it to her lips, waiting silently. Her upbringing, her conscience, even her sense of self-preservation told her she should stand and walk out. He wouldn’t stop her. He’d promised she’d be safe.
But he’d made another promise. Not with words but with the way his body leaned toward her, the way his pupils widened, the way he compelled her with the force of his presence.
If she obeyed, she would still be safe, although safety no longer meant what she thought. He wouldn’t hurt her, he wouldn’t lead her anywhere she wasn’t willing to go. If she went with him, she knew with certainty she would be changed in ways she couldn’t yet imagine.
She parted her lips to allow him to slide the spoon into her mouth. Before she had time to close it, he dipped his head and kissed her, his tongue exploring, tasting and sharing the sugary sweetness.
She heard the faint clatter of the spoon falling but any thought disappeared as he wrapped his arms around her. He pulled her in close, changed the angle of her head and devoured her.
Chapter Four
Susan had thought she understood the concept of a kiss, but nothing had prepared her for this total subsummation, this overwhelming of her senses.
When he at last lifted his head, her dazed mind held only one thought. “More.”
“More food?” His voice was a dark hum shivering across her sensitized skin. “Or more of this?” He closed his teeth on her earlobe.
She whimpered. “I…I…just more.”
He chuckled and slipped one hand out from behind her, then reached out to run his finger through the dish once more. “We seem to have lost the spoon,” he murmured, “so we’ll have to make do with this.” He stroked along her lip, then swooped down to leave a trail across the tops of her breasts. The same gesture had begun the orgy downstairs, but here, in the privacy of the room, it seemed not vulgar but unbearably erotic.
His mouth followed the trail, taking tiny licks and nibbles. Susan’s head dropped back and she sank further into his sensuous spell.
The low neckline of the scandalous red dress offered him no obstruction. With an expert flick of his finger, he pulled her nipple free. “I want to taste you,” he said, his tongue curling around the sensitive tip, shaping it into a hard bud. “Sweeter than sugar could ever be.”
He sucked there for a moment. Beads of fire shot from where his mouth moved to burst into conflagrations racing along her nerves.
He lifted his head. “You are a banquet for my delectation. But I would enjoy the feast far more if the covers were removed.”
Before Susan was fully aware of what he intended, he had undone the row of buttons closing the embarrassingly short distance between the scooped out neckline and the waist of her dress. In another second, he had it gaping. He pushed the bodice down to puddle about her hips. “Stand up. We will rid ourselves of this encumbrance.”
Still obedient to his every word, she stood, allowing him to press the red silk into a pile at her feet. The maid had provided no camisole. He hooked his thumbs into the waistband of the soft drawers Susan had donned, and untying the bow at the sides at the same time, he shoved them down to join the bundle at her feet.
She stood there before him, he in his dark, elegant evening clothes—she, naked, a pink flush running over her skin, fighting the desire to clasp her hands across her breasts or the triangle of hair at the juncture of her legs. She fought the urge because she wanted him to see her. A wanton part of her wanted him to enjoy her nakedness.
He pushed her back onto the sofa then scooped up another dollop of cream. With his elbows, he nudged her thighs apart and smeared a long line down her center. “As sweet as you are, I find the thought of feeding myself from your soft skin strongly appealing.”
His head dipped. His lips closed over a knot of nerves she hadn’t known she possessed. He sucked, murmuring his approval as she tensed and shivered. With each movement of his jaws, each humming vibration of his low voice, a spiral coiled tighter and tighter inside her. A strange pressure contradictorily filling her even as some deep nameless hollow opened.
He sucked harder. The edges of her vision blurred and darkened. Her breath rushed out in short, choppy gasps. Although she was naked, she burned. Everywhere he touched a new fire ignited, but the flames burned hottest and highest where his mouth caressed her.
The darkness spread and deepened, pulsating in time with the rapid thrust and retreat of his tongue. Her heart raced and thundered as if she were running for her life. The fever he created drove her relentlessly on until she exploded in a shower of heat and light.
When she opened her eyes again, he was sitting up, his dark eyes glazed, his lips glistening, his hair disheveled. She’d done that, she realized with a sense of shock. She’d shaken the composure of this worldly dark lord.
“You are remarkably responsive,” he said.
She dragged in a shaky breath. “Is that good?”
“Oh yes, my dear.” He ran a finger across the upper curves of her breasts. “Women like you are precious. You were made to experience the delights of the flesh.”
He was mistaken, Susan thought. With no hope of Charles’ support, she was destined for poverty and drudgery. Tomorrow morning she would present herself to an employment agency, hoping they would believe she could provide character references from home, and her good diction and polite manner would secure her a position, even if only as a scullery maid.
There would be no more delight in her life, no luxury at all—born a gentlewoman but forced to become a servant. Since nothing would induce her to follow a life of prostitution, only tonight could she experience what happened between a man and a woman. The only chance she would have.
“Teach me,” she whispered. “Teach me all you know.”
He laughed. “That would take a very long time.” He cupped her breasts, weighing them. “But there’s no reason not to start.”
He leaned back and plucked a sliver of chicken from one of the plates, holding it above her mouth. “Open.”
She parted her lips willingly. He lowered the morsel, without letting go. “Now close your lips,” he directed. “Let the form and taste fill your mouth. Explore it with your tongue.”
She followed his every order. The simple act of eating became erotic.
“Now swallow.”
Again she obeyed. His face softened with approval. “Good girl.”
He took her hand and carried it to the front of his satin breeches. “I think you are ready to learn to apply the lesson to something—more satisfying.”
Her eyes widened as she realized what he intended her to do. Her surprise lasted only a moment. Excitement flooded in to take its place. Why shouldn’t she do it? Had he not just driven her to ecstasy by taking her with his mouth? She wanted to see if she could give him the same pleasure. A sensualist like Anthony, Lord Winslade, would not do anything from which he failed to derive enjoyment.
“You want me to touch your…” The paucity of her experience failed her. She had no words for the action she contemplated.
“My cock,” he supplied. With a quick manipulation of his wrist, his pants opened and the thing he spoke of fell into her hand, hard but soft at the same time, warm and throbbing with a life beat of its own. He closed her fingers around it. He leaned back, spreading his legs wide apart.
Then he slid his hands beneath her, cupping her bottom, encouraging her to move off the edge of the sofa. “Kneel.”
For a moment she failed to understand, but she obeyed the pressure he exerted and dropped to her knees on the floor. She turned to face him, his thighs still clad in his evening clothes clasped on either side of her, his cock still held loosely in her hand. She looked down at the thick, rigid shaft, the round head divided by a crease with a small slit in the center. From the slit, a bead of moisture welled up, reflecting the flickering light of the candles.
“Open,” he said, as he had when he had offered her the food. He cupped the back of her head and drew her forward. “Now close your lips.”
Again his words were an exact echo of his previous instruction. Again she obeyed. But this was not some tiny sample of an everyday meal. This was an experience unlike any she had ever imagined. The soft skin lured her tongue and she wrapped it around the head. Her lips closed on the rigid shaft. Without conscious volition, her tongue slid across the slit at the top, scooping up the droplet of his juices. The sweet, salty taste intrigued her. She closed her fist tighter, holding him steady so she could lap up more. Above her he stiffened and groaned. The sound made the place between her legs clench.
She looked up at him, although she didn’t release the pressure of her mouth. His cheeks were flushed, his teeth clamped onto his bottom lip, his eyelids almost completely lowered. She had discovered a power she hadn’t known she possessed. By letting Anthony control her, by doing everything he instructed, she found freedom. For this one night, she rejected the restraints of her upbringing, longing to be free to learn things she would never experience again.
Anthony’s fingers curled into her hair, thumbs pushing against her jaw. He pulled her head back, releasing himself with a wet pop. She frowned. Why had he stopped her? Had she failed, in her ignorance, to please him?
Before she could ask, he pulled her upward and turned her, nestling her onto his lap and bending his head to take her mouth in a long searing kiss. When he pulled back, he whispered, “You tempt me, more than you should. If you wish to remain a virgin, we need to stop now.”
The first part of his statement barely registered with her. Only the last words mattered. “Why must we stop? Did I do something wrong?”
He ran his thumb across her lips. “You were perfect. There is a time when I would love to finish in your delectable mouth, but not now. I want to take you in the most elemental way. To show you how it can be between a man and a woman.” He looked deep into her eyes. “But you must decide. Once we proceed, you can never go back to how you were before.”
The simple truth confronted her. “I am already changed. Whatever happens next can only enhance my experience. I will regret nothing.”
“You honor me with your generosity,” he said and picked her up. Holding her close in his arms, he carried her to a door she hadn’t noticed before. He opened it with one hand, still holding her securely with the other, then walked through into a room dominated by an enormous, canopied bed.