Page 60 of The Earl’s Forbidden Temptation

“Red,” he warned, his voice strained.

She looked up at him through her lashes, a wicked smile curving her lips. “You told me to take what I want.”

She sank to her knees before him, her hands finding the fastenings of his breeches. He sucked in a sharp breath as she freed him, his thick length springing free, and she marveled at the sight of him—the proud curve, the velvet-soft skin over rigid heat, the pearl of moisture at the tip. Darcy had painted this proud length and taken it into her body, yet she had never touched it with her hands.

Tentatively, she leaned forward and ran her tongue along the underside of his shaft. Sebastian shuddered, a guttural sound tearing from his throat. Emboldened, Darcy took him into her mouth, swirling her tongue around the tip, savoring the taste of him—musky, utterly male. His hands found her hair, gripping without pulling, and he breathed Red as though it were a prayer. She laved him with her tongue, then drew his cock into her mouth again, sucking him as greedily as though he were some forbidden sweet. Each moan and involuntary tightening filled Darcy with awe that she could give him so much pleasure. His evident enjoyment sharpened her own need until a deep ache gathered between her thighs and her sex grew mortifyingly wet.

Sebastian trembled beneath the worship of her mouth, every broken sound urging her onward.

“Enough,” he rasped, pulling her gently away. “If you continue, I will not last.”

He drew her to her feet and began to undress her with a patience that made Darcy’s pulse quicken. There was nothing hurried in the way he removed each layer. He eased her gown from her shoulders, then bent to press a soft kiss to the newly bared skin, lingering there until warmth spread beneath her flesh. When he straightened, his gaze met hers before his hands returned to her clothing.

Piece by piece, he revealed her. Between each discarded garment came another kiss, sometimes to her mouth, sometimes to her cheek or the sensitive curve of her throat, each one gentle enough to make the anticipation almost unbearable. Darcy found herself scarcely breathing as she waited for his hands to return, every newly exposed inch of skin seeming more sensitive beneath his attention.

Her stays followed, and then her chemise, until the final barrier slipped away and she stood before him as bare as he was. For one suspended moment, Darcy could only look at him, her heart beating wildly, exquisitely conscious of the intimacy of standing before him with nothing left to conceal her.

Sebastian’s eyes moved over her with something that felt almost like reverence, lingering upon the curve of her breasts, the dip of her waist, the dark triangle of curls between her thighs.

“You are exquisite,” he breathed, and lifted her onto the bed.

“I daresay you offer that compliment to every lady,” she drawled, though pleasure unfurled warmly within her beneath the ravenous appreciation of his stare.

Sebastian went still.

The change was so unexpected that Darcy’s teasing smile faded. Surprise flashed across his features, followed by something more introspective, as though her careless remark had revealed a truth about himself he had never before considered.

“I have never lavished praise upon another lover,” he said quietly. A faint crease appeared between his brows. “How…unlike me.”

Darcy stared at him. She had meant only to tease. Yet there was no practiced charm in his expression now, no rakish amusement meant to flatter her into surrender. He seemed genuinely disconcerted by the realization.

He had never told another woman she was exquisite. The knowledge slipped beneath Darcy’s defenses with startling ease. She knew how experienced he was, knew there had been other women in his bed and pleasures shared long before she had stumbled into this secret world of his. She had accepted that truth. Yet somehow, impossibly, she had been given something none of them had.

Something small, perhaps, but his. A tenderness swelled inside her chest, so sudden and profound that for a moment she could only look at him. She felt absurdly pleased, almost shy beneath the force of it, and beneath that pleasure lay something more dangerous, a yearning to believe that whatever was unfolding between them was becoming as singular to him as it already felt to her.

Darcy reached for him, letting her fingertips trace lightly along his jaw.

“You are my first in every regard,” she murmured. “I find I am rather glad to be your first in this.”

His gaze held hers, and the intensity there made Darcy’s breath catch. She slipped her arms around his neck and drew him down with her until her back met the cool silk of the bed. The contrast made her shiver, coolness beneath her naked skin and Sebastian’s heat settling above her. She brushed her lips against the corner of his mouth, a tender caress that seemed almost unbearably intimate after all the bolder liberties they had shared.

For a heartbeat, neither moved. Their bodies rested together, bare skin against bare skin, and Darcy felt every quiet breath he took, every subtle shift of muscle beneath her hands. Then Sebastian turned his face and caught her mouth with his.

He kissed her slowly, with such unexpected gentleness that her throat ached. Darcy softened beneath him, her fingers sliding into his hair as his lips left hers and wandered along her jaw to the sensitive flesh beneath her ear. He lingered at her throat, kissing and tasting his way downward until anticipation became a warm, restless ache beneath her skin.

His mouth reached her breast. He kissed the soft curve first, almost reverently, while his hand traced her waist and settled against her hip. Then his lips closed around the aching peak.

Darcy drew in a broken breath, her back arching as pleasure rippled through her. She gasped as his tongue circled the tight bud, teasing it into an even harder point before he drew it deep into the heat of his mouth, sucking gently at first, then with a hunger that made her gasp his name.

Sebastian released her only to lavish the same attention on the other, his teeth grazing the sensitive flesh in a way that sent sparks of pleasure straight to her pussy. His mouth trailed downward, a wet, burning path over the trembling expanse of her belly. She felt every kiss like a brand, every flick of his tongue against her quivering skin drawing her tighter, winding her higher. He paused at the sensitive hollow of her hip, nipping gently, before his lips found the soft, heated flesh of her inner thigh. He kissed her there once, then twice, his breath hot against her most intimate place, and she trembled with her fingers fisted in his hair.

Then he knelt between her thighs, spread her open with his hands, and lowered his mouth to her pussy. Darcy cried out as his tongue found her, stroking her slick folds with unhurried passion. He worshipped her with his mouth, circling her pearl until she was writhing, gasping, her fingers twisted in the sheets. When he plunged his tongue inside her, she shattered, her release crashing through her with an intensity that tore a cry from her.

He turned her gently onto her belly, his hands settling upon her hips and coaxing them upward until she knelt before him, her cheek pressed into the cool silk of the pillow. Darcy’s breath quickened as he arranged her with an unhurried care that made the intimacy of the position all the more acute. Her spine curved beneath his hands, her bottom raised, leaving the most private parts of her body utterly exposed to his gaze.

There was no hiding from him like this. No modest angle she might turn to, no pretense that he could not see every intimate detail she had never willingly revealed to another soul.

The realization ought to have mortified her.