Wicked Intentions (Maiden Lane #1)(82)

He cleared his throat. “I hadn’t really thought about it.”

“Of course you have,” she mocked gently. “You’re a gentleman of intellect, a very cynical one. I think you spend inordinate amounts of time thinking about the world and how very alone you are in it.”

He swallowed, his Adam’s apple moving beneath her fingers. “Aren’t I?”

“Perhaps.” She flicked a look at him, then concentrated on slipping off his neckcloth. “Is that why you tie them?”

“Who?”

“Tsk. I never thought you a coward, Lazarus.”

He sighed and closed his eyes. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

She began on the buttons of his waistcoat. “You don’t know why you tie them, or you don’t want to admit it?”

“How very stern you are, madam.” His voice held a hint of warning.

“Yes.” She nodded, her eyes on her work. “But I think I would never get any answer from you otherwise. Does their nearness give you pain? Does the thought of how apart you are from them—from everyone—cause you the anguish you feel when others touch you?”

“Your perception terrifies me.” He helped her remove his waistcoat. “I don’t know why I feel pain.”

“Is the pain physical or mental?”

“Both.”

She nodded as she began to unbutton his shirt. She could feel the heat of his skin, and his dark chest hair was shadowy beneath the fine linen. She felt her insides clench. “Then perhaps you tie them so they will not cause you pain.”

“Perhaps.”

“Or”—she lifted her eyes to meet his—“perhaps you tie them so that you have no need to acknowledge their humanity.”

He arched an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t that make me the devil?”

“Would it?” she asked softly.

His eyes slid away from hers.

“Are you afraid of their gaze? Is that what the blindfold is for? So you can’t see their eyes?”

“Perhaps I don’t wish them to see my eyes.”

“Why?”

“Perhaps I don’t want them to see the black at the center of my soul.”

She stared into his amazing blue eyes a moment, and he let her as if he was telling her something silently.

Then she looked away.

“You don’t tie me.” She felt her pulse speed. She wanted to take off his shirt, but then again, she had no wish to cause him pain. She smoothed her hands over the linen, feeling his warm muscles beneath. He had a lovely chest, broad and fine, the mounds of his shoulders flowing smoothly into the bunched muscles of his arms.

“No, I don’t.”

“Is it because I’m more important than those others or less?”

“More. Most definitely.”

She nodded, watching her hands on him. The thought that she was important to him made tears prick in her eyes.

“Am I more important to you?” he asked softly.

Of course he was. But she brushed aside the question. She was interested in his vulnerabilities, not her own. “Does this pain you? If I touch you through the cloth?”

“No.”

She leaned forward and softly kissed his shoulder. “I’m glad.”

“I answer your questions, but you don’t answer mine.”

She shook her head. “I can’t. Not yet. Don’t push.”

“What—” His question was cut off as she leaned forward and delicately licked one nipple through his shirt.

He inhaled. “I’ll need to know someday.”

“Perhaps.” She traced around his nipple with her tongue. The wet fabric was nearly transparent, and she could see the brown nipple beneath his shirt.

“Ahh.”

She smiled against his shirt.

“Temperance.”

“Don’t push.” She held the shirt flat against his chest to more clearly see him. His puckered nipple made a tiny peak.

“As you push me?”

“Am I pushing you?”

“Most assuredly.”

She tugged on a strand of his hair in reprimand.

He grunted. “Do you ask yourself why you have a need to push me?”

“No.” She traced downward to lay her hands flat against his belly. It felt firm and hot.

“Maybe you should.”

“Hmm.” She was distracted for a moment by the waistband of his breeches and the fall beneath.

“Temperance…”

“No.” She slid off his lap and to her knees between his legs. She flicked open the buttons of his breeches. “Do you feel pain now?”

“Hmm?” he murmured. He seemed enthralled by the sight of her fingers working at the opening to his breeches. Beneath, his erection strained at the cloth. Her mouth was dry, anticipating the sight.

But she wasn’t going to let him go that easily. “Lazarus? Am I hurting you?”

“If you are, it is exquisite.”

“Good,” she said as she laid his breeches open. His cock was tenting the front of his smallclothes. “Lazarus…”

“Yes?” he answered. “Ah…”

She wrapped her hands about his penis inside his smallclothes. She glanced up at him under her eyelashes. “Would you like to tie me sometime?”