Page 56 of The Lady Plays with Fire

Before she could answer, he traced the shell of her ear with the tip of his tongue. “I t-tried not to,” she insisted, aware for the first time how little the notion of a wicked tongue had to do with words.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Sharp teeth nipped at her earlobe and made her gasp. “Now, tell me, did you give in to temptation and touch yourself too?”

“T-touch myself?” His lips against her throat were doing strange things to her pulse. “Where?”

A low laugh hummed against her neck. “Wherever gives you pleasure. Here, perhaps.” His fingertips slid from her hair and down the path his mouth had taken, brushing along the edge of her bodice, then slipping just beneath to tease the tops of her breasts. One thumb swept over her nipple, bringing it to an aching peak. “Or between your legs.”

His touch alone would have been enough to set her aflame. But when combined with the smolder in his voice? Heat rushed through her—no mere blush this time, but a roaring inferno of desire.

“No,” she confessed on a needy sob. To have done such a thing would have been to admit to herself how much she wanted him.

Though now, as she lay panting in his arms, she wondered how she ever could have denied it.

“I was saving that honor for you.”

Between thumb and forefinger, he pinched the nipple he’d roused, firmly but not to the point of pain. Something like an electric charge zinged from her breast to that secret place at the joining of her thighs, leaving behind a delicious ache. “And what an honor it will be.”

It was evidently not, however, an honor he intended immediately to bestow. He went on kissing her, stealing her breath as his hot mouth searched every inch of bare skin it could reach—her lips, her throat, her chest. Nor did the hand at her breast cease its playful torment, kneading and teasing until she began to squirm.

“Have mercy,” he groaned against her hair before shifting her in his lap with a flex of his hips, as if she weighed nothing at all. “I’ll give you what you need.”

His left arm cradled her as the right swept down her body, his palm leaving a path of longing in its wake—waist, hip, thigh. Long fingers encircled her ankle, then followed the pattern of her clockwork stocking up her calf. He resumed kissing her as he toyed with her garter.

“I can feel the heat of you from here.”

Her cheeks prickled. “I think you’ve made every inch of me blush.”

“Let’s just see, shall we?” One twitch of his forearm bared her to the tops of her stockings. “Open your legs.”

The dark note of command in his voice was difficult to resist, though she tried to sound saucy as she retorted, “Yes, my lord.”

“Graham,” he corrected swiftly, sternly.

Of course, he would have a name that was little more than a growl. The sound of it reverberating through his chest made something inside her vibrate like a plucked harp string.

“Graham,” she repeated, half acquiescence, half plea, as she slid her knees apart.

“Good lass.”

To her shock, a sense of pride suffused her at those gravelly words. Sprawled in the lap of a man, with his hand up her skirts, surely she ought to have felt shame? But somehow, knowing how stinting he was with praise made her crave it all the more.

His thumb swept over the delicate skin of her upper thigh. “Lift your skirts the rest of the way.”

She fumbled to hike the light woolen dress to her waist, wishing suddenly she could shed it entirely and be bare to his gaze.

“Very pretty.” He watched himself brush a finger along the seam of her sex. “Aye, and rosy as your cheeks.”

Though tempted to look for herself, she squeezed shut her eyes, the better to lose herself to the building sensations as his fingertip danced over her folds, dipped into her entrance, then slid higher to tease her already swollen pearl. She’d never done more than toy with her private curls or press the heel of her hand against the spot that ached. But with a touch both gentle and sure, he seemed determined to learn what pleased her most.

She heard with amazement the sound of her own wetness and the greedy groan its discovery dragged from his chest. “It pleases you?” she murmured against his questing mouth.

“Only one thing could please me more.” His tongue surged inside her mouth, and below, one finger mimicked the motion, easing into her tight channel. His thumb pressed against the little bundle of nerves at the top of her sex. Together, the sensations were almost overwhelming.

When he slid his finger out, she whimpered, and he thrust forward again. He began to make maddening little circles with his thumb. A second finger joined the first, stretching her, filling her, driving her toward some unknown crisis. The throbbing ache became a tingle. Light sparkled behind her eyelids.

“Aye, that’s it,” he crooned. “Come for me.”

Instinctively, she lifted her hips to his hand as something burst inside her, radiating in circles from her core.