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“What would you do with me?”
That devilish smile sent a shiver through Cora’s spine. Her body readying itself for the pleasure it knew would come. Manuela didn’t waste time in describing her plans for her.
“I’d use my hands to get you in just the right position, cant your hips so you’re at the perfect angle to be devoured,” she explained, her fingers simulating how she’d presumably spread Cora’s folds. “Then I’d use my tongue on you. Just little flicks at first.” She gestured, that pink tongue flickering enticingly and again, that sweet tug made Cora squirm on her lover’s lap. “Then I’d give you deep, long strokes. Mm.” She made a sinful sound, her eyes closed as she licked her lips, while Cora shook. “I’d bury my tongue so far inside you, I’d feel you tighten against me. My fingers would be next and they’d slide inside, on all that dewy passion you always have for me.”
She winked, and Cora felt liquid rush out of her. “Then...” she said as she tapped her chin and raised her gaze to the ceiling, apparently considering what to do next. “Then I’d eat at you until you flooded my mouth and screamed my name...more or less. The order could vary.”
Cora was panting by the time Manuela was finished talking, trembling with need and ready to crawl up and demand that she do every one of the filthy things she’d promised. But she didn’t have to. Her lover, without the need to be asked, diligently delivered on every one of them, down to Cora very loudly shouting Manuela’s name during a mind-shattering orgasm.
“How can anyone be so beautiful?” Cora asked a while later, looking at Manuela as she lay on her stomach, her curls cascading down her back.
“You tell me, Your Grace.” She bit her bottom lip and looked wantonly over her shoulder, that cheeky grin undoing Cora’s control. She knelt on the bed and ran her hands over that round backside, then unable to resist, leaning in to take a bite.
“Mm, I like that,” Manuela purred, tipping her rump in the air. Cora laughed, then licked the spot where she’d bitten, before sucking a love bite on the other cheek.
Manuela sighed, resting her head on her arms as Cora fondled and touched her back and rump. “You certainly know how to make a weary traveler feel welcome.” Her voice was a little slurred, probably the days of travel and their frantic lovemaking catching up to her.
“I’m going to order up some food, so I can keep you in bed as long as possible,” Cora told her.
“That is not the threat you think it is, Duchess.” Manuela lifted her head for a kiss, an achingly sweet smile on her lips.
Cora continued to touch her, rubbing circles on her back, leaning down to place openmouthed kisses on her warm, sweaty skin and tried very hard not to offer things she would later regret. She had planned her life so meticulously, been so careful, only to be undone by the woman who was supposed to help her claim her biggest feat yet.
“I can’t believe you came back to me.”
“I missed you,” Manuela told her again, clear and strong. Unafraid. Cora would be brave too.
“I missed you too, so much,” she whispered into the silence of a bedroom that no longer felt hers. That had been unbearably empty and cold without Manuela’s smiles and cries of pleasure. Manuela sat up to face Cora, her expression a mixture of affection and dread.
“I don’t think I can betray my parents,” Manuela admitted, her eyes filling with tears. And Cora could not risk any disruptions with the railway, which would almost certainly happen if she decided to help Manuela get out of her engagement. Not that she’d said she wanted that. “I want you so much,” she said and gulped visibly, “but I don’t know if I can do it. I’m afraid.”
“I’m afraid too.” Cora had never uttered those words before, had barely ever admitted them to herself. And here she was, thirty-five years old, electrified by the prospect of a future she’d buried long ago.
A future that would cost a hell of a lot to secure but might just be worth it.
Twenty-One
“Cora, you didn’t saythis was an actual palace!” Manuela exclaimed as their carriage slowed down at the end of a long row of conveyances waiting to deliver their passengers to the residence of the British ambassador for a reception to honor the various businessmen—and businesswoman—from the United Kingdom living in France.
“I told you it was called the Charost Palais,” she laughed, leaning in to kiss Manuela on the cheek. She was resplendent today in a yellow dress. She looked well pleased, well fed and well...bedded, and Cora was exceedingly proud to know she was partly responsible for it.
It was the evening they’d planned to announce the completion of the railway.
Mere weeks ago, if someone had told Cora that she would be setting out to announce her greatest victory accompanied not only by her new lover but by her new lover’s rather prickly best friend, she would have insisted they were mad. And yet...
The last week had been a watershed for Cora. Manuela’s return to her had done away with any notion she harbored about continuing on as she had been, though there were too many unknowns to rush into anything.
Manuela had her parents to think about, and Cora had Alfie and her railway, not to mention Manuela’s imminent marriage in Venezuela. They’d been through at least a dozen iterations of how to do it and inevitably arrived at the conclusion that whatever it was would involve at leastsomescandal. Neither of them had made any promises. Cora’s life and her dealings didn’t exactly allow for domesticity. But perhaps if she could help Manuela get settled here in Paris... If she could help her with her idea to organize a guild for commercial artists... If Manuela had the means to stay...
Faced with the daunting string ofifs, Manuela proposed that Cora focus on getting the sale of Baluarte settled, and once that was out of the way and their deal done, they could make future plans. Cora swore to never again put herself in a situation where her feelings for a lover could risk her reputation. But how could she not? Who could resist closing their hand over a star if it landed in the palm of their hand?
“Was it really a palace before, or is this just the Brits being pretentious?” Manuela asked, clearly trying to get a rise out of Alfie, who laughed heartily at the jab. Her stepson, like every other living thing whose opinion Cora valued, had fallen as madly for Manuela as she had in the last week.
“It truly was a palace. It was built for Napoleon’s sister,” Cora explained as their carriage made infinitesimal advances to the front of the line. “The rumor is that she hosted orgies where she came out to welcome her guests in the nude atop an uncovered palanquin carried by four men dressed only in loincloths.”
“No one can blame the Bonapartes for their subtlety,” Manuela said with a giggle, and Cora leaned over and kissed her, right under Alfie’s nose. And wouldn’t it all be so easy if it was a matter of her loved ones falling for Manuela? Of them loving each other, of her small circle of friends welcoming them home?
Two days earlier in a moment of madness, she’d actually considered doing away with the purchase of Baluarte, of trying to find some other piece of land. But that would absolutely destroy her name. Everyone would know why she’d done it, and the rumors would start—and immediately. Then the regrets would closely follow.
