Gabriel's Inferno (Gabriel's Inferno #1)(53)

She would be shy at first. But he would be gently insistent, whispering words of sweet seduction into her hair. He would tell her whatever she wanted to hear, and she would believe it. His hands would drop from her shoulders and inch over her lovely and innocent curves, marveling at her receptivity as she blossomed under his touch.

For no man would have touched her like that before. Eventually, she would be eager and responsive to him. Oh, so responsive. They would kiss, and it would be electric — intense — explosive. Their tongues would tangle and tango together desperately, as if they had never kissed before.

She would be wearing too many clothes. He’d want to tease her out of them and spread feather-light kisses against every inch of perfect porcelain skin. Especially her lovely throat and its metro of bluish veins. She would blush like Eve, but he would kiss away her nervousness. Soon she would be naked and open before him, thinking only of him and his rapt admiration, and not the feel of the carrel air against pale, pink flesh.

He would praise her with oaths and odes and soft murmurings of sweet pet names, and she would not feel shame. Honey, sweet girl, dear, my lovely… He would make her believe in his adoration, and her belief would not be entirely false.

Eventually the teasing and tingling would be too much, and he’d lean her back gently, cradling the back of her head in his hand. He’d keep his hand there throughout, for he would be worried he might hurt her.

He would not have her head banging against the desk like an unloved toy.

He was not a cruel lover. He would not be rough or indifferent. He would be erotic, passionate but gentle. For he knew what she was. And he would wish her to be pleased as much as he, her first time. But he desired her spread out beneath him, breathless and inviting, her eyes wide and unblinking, blazing with desire.

His other hand would flex across her lower back, the sweet expanse of arched skin, and he’d gaze into her large and liquid eyes as she gasped and moaned. He would make her moan. Only him.

She’d bite her lip, her eyes half-closed as he slid toward her, willing her with whispered words to relax as she gave herself to him. It would go easier for her that way, the first time. He would still and not rush. He would pause and not tear. He would stop, perhaps?

His beautiful, perfect brown-eyed angel…her chest rising and falling quickly, the flush of her cheeks blooming across her entire body. She would be a rose in his eyes, and she would flower beneath him. For he would be kind, and she would open. He would watch entranced, almost as if it were occurring in slow motion…sight, scent, sound, taste, touch…as she transformed from maiden to matron through loss of maidenhead, all because of him. All because of him.

Maidenhead?  There would be blood. For the price of sin was always blood. And a little death.

Gabriel’s heart stopped. It lay silent for half a beat then thudded double time as a new awareness crashed over him. Metaphysical poetry, long forgotten from his days at Magdalen College, sprang to his lips. For in that instant, he saw very clearly that he, Professor Gabriel O. Emerson, would-be seducer of the lovely and innocent Julianne, was a flea.

The words of John Donne echoed in his ears: Mark but this flea, and mark in this,

How little that which thou deniest me is; It suck’d me first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea our two bloods mingled be Thou know’st that this cannot be said

A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead; Yet this enjoys before it woo,

And pamper’d swells with one blood made of two; And this, alas! is more than we would do.

He knew why his subconscious mind chose that moment to foist Donne’s poetry upon him; the poem was an argument for seduction. Donne spoke to his prospective lover, a virgin, and argued that her loss of virginity was less consequential than the swatting of a flea. She should give herself to him quickly, without a second thought. Without hesitation. Without regret.

As soon as the words presented themselves, Gabriel knew that they were perfect for him. Perfect for what he was contemplating doing to her.

Perfect for his own self-justification.

Tasting. Taking. Sucking. Sinning. Draining. Abandoning.

She was pure. She was innocent. He wanted her.

Facilis descensus Averni.

But he would not be the one to make her bleed. He could not, would not, make another girl bleed for the rest of his life. All thoughts of seduction and mad, passionate f**king on desks and chairs, against walls and bookshelves and windows, immediately gave way. He would not take her.

He would not mark her and claim what he had no right to claim.

Gabriel Emerson was a trite and only semi-repentant sinner. Preoccupied with the fairer sex and his own physical pleasure, he knew he was governed by lust. Never did that thirst give way to something more, something approximating love. Nevertheless, despite these and other moral failings, despite his constant inability to resist temptation, Gabriel still had one last moral principle that governed his behavior. One line he would not cross.

Professor Emerson did not seduce virgins. He did not take virginity, ever, even if it was freely offered. He did not slake his thirst with innocence; he fed only on those who had already tasted and who in tasting, wanted more. And he was not about to violate his last and only moral principle for an hour or two of salacious satisfaction with a delectable graduate student in his study carrel. Even a fallen angel had his principles.

Gabriel would leave her virtue intact. He would leave her as he found her, the blushing brown-eyed angel, surrounded by bunnies, curled up like a kitten in her little chair. She would sleep unruffled, unkissed, untouched, and unmolested. His hand tightened on the doorknob, and just as he was about to unlock the door, he heard the sounds of stirring behind him.