The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (London Highwaymen, #2)(49)

“Excellent. That’s exactly what I want as well, then.”

She doubted that, but wasn’t feeling particularly argumentative, so she bent down and kissed his neck, breathing in that scent of woodsmoke and leather that he somehow always carried with him. His heart was racing, his pulse fast and urgent beneath her lips, and she loosened his collar to expose more of him. “What do you like?” she whispered, judging it only fair to return the question.

“Marian. Literally anything.”

She refrained from rolling her eyes. “I was honest with you.”

“I’m being honest. I really just want to please you. That’s what I like.” He looked away, his cheeks stained red. “I like being”—he scrubbed a hand over his jaw—“I like being what my partners need.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Very well, then,” she said, because it sounded rather like he was asking her to tell him what to do. “Take off your shirt.”

She must have got it right, because he complied.

“I’ve wanted to get my hands on you,” she went on, running her fingers over the lean muscle, the hair, the scars. She skimmed a thumb back and forth over his nipple and watched in satisfaction as he tried to twist into her touch. He made a picture like this. He looked debauched. Desperate, even. “Look at you,” she murmured.

Rob swore and sat up, pulling her with him, to settle her in his lap. Then he began rucking up the hem of her skirt, sliding his hand underneath, along the inside of her thigh until his knuckles brushed between her legs. It felt so good, just that whisper of a touch, that she wanted to push against his hand, make him do more and better things with it.

“Marian, you’re so . . . is that all just from . . . Christ—”

A very stupid question, but she would forgive it. “I don’t know what else you think I’ve been about this evening.”

She felt his smile against her neck. His thumb skimmed against her and she rocked into his hand. She could feel how wet she was against his palm as they moved together. “Good,” she said. “That’s what you’re meant to be doing.” She had intended the words to be brisk and sure, because hadn’t he said that he wanted to do what pleased her? But instead she sounded breathy and fervent. It must have not gone amiss, though, because he swore again and drew her close into another kiss. Then he moved a little, and she felt him brushing against her entrance. “Yes or no?”

Must he keep asking her these things? “Yes,” she decided, because if it was unpleasant or unseemly she would tell him to go find something more useful to do. He slid a finger—two fingers?—into her, and she wasn’t sure why she was gritting her teeth, as there was no resistance or pain, of course there wasn’t, it was just—

The fingers were gone but the stroking continued, only over the outside of her body now. He wanted to make her feel good, he had said. He wanted her to feel safe, to be safe. And that was how she felt—safe, as if all it took was one well-intentioned man to shelter her from the wrongs of the world. It was nonsense, but it was intoxicating nonsense. “You’re so good,” she whispered, because he seemed to enjoy hearing that sort of thing, and she enjoyed the mortified pleasure that swept over him at hearing the praise. One of his hands found its way to her breast, and she realized she was rocking her hips into his hand.

He shifted beneath her and she felt how hard he was. He hadn’t taken his breeches off, nor unfastened them, nor even adjusted himself. Embarrassingly, that was what did it. The knowledge that Rob was probably uncomfortably hard and desperate to do something about it, but that he was enduring it for her, tipped her over the edge, and she reached her climax as if she had fought for it.

She collapsed gracelessly to the side and Rob had the gall to laugh at her. She kicked him half-heartedly in the stomach, then slid her foot lower to prod at his erection. It was as hard as an iron bar and he groaned at the contact.

“Merciless,” he said, taking hold of her ankle. She thought this was when he’d unfasten his breeches, but instead he kissed the inside of her knee. “Another?”

“Don’t ask silly questions. Find something useful to do with your mouth.”

He laughed, his breath warm against her thigh as he kissed his way slowly up her leg, shoving the fabric higher and higher.

“Do take your time. I can’t see any reason why you’d be in a hurry,” she observed, nudging his shoulder with her toe.

His only response was to hitch both her knees over his shoulders and bury his face between her legs. When he gave a little hum of satisfaction, she could feel it as much as hear it, and she had to cover her mouth with her hand to keep from crying out as he licked and stroked and kissed. She imagined him still hard and untouched.

“You’d better not finish in your breeches,” she said. “I don’t want to have to explain that to Hester when she comes to collect the laundry.”

He laughed, his shoulders shaking and his mouth momentarily stopping what it was doing, his breath hot and teasing against her skin.

“I didn’t tell you to stop.”

He glanced up at her. “Darling, we can either talk about Hester or I can resume what I was doing. Not both.”

She raised an eyebrow, then tangled her fingers in his hair and gave his head a little push in the right direction.

He groaned. “Do that again.” She pulled at his hair, not too hard, but enough so that he’d feel it, and he moaned into her oversensitive skin.