The Duke with the Dragon Tattoo (Victorian Rebels, #6)(50)

She’d knelt down, drying his legs from the back and reaching around his thighs to be thorough.

He glanced back at her bent head, her eyes no doubt fixed firmly on the floor.

Clever girl. She’d avoided the sight of and all contact with his sex as best she could.

But she was on her knees. All he had to do was turn around and her mouth would be right there …

Something in his jaw cracked, along with his self-possession.

Without thinking, he bent down, grasped her arms, dragged her to her feet, and pressed his lips to hers. He wouldn’t force her. He’d keep his word. But their first kiss had been enough to span the memory of two decades, and damned if he could live without tasting her again.

She made a sound, though whether shock, protest, or surrender he couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter.

He had, indeed, fancied that he’d tasted her lips on the rain, had savored the memory of her innocent kiss on the darkest nights of his life, and it had still been like trying to catch the warmth of the sun from its reflection on the cold moon.

A lovely, but pale comparison.

With a throaty growl, he locked her body against him with one arm. His other hand slipped past the collar of the shirt she wore until his fingers found the delicate nape of her neck. He spread his fingers up her scalp, threading them in the flaxen tangles of her unbound hair until her head rested in his palm.

How long had he waited? How many nights had he imagined this? Burned for it? When he’d been chained in the hull of a ship, whipped, stabbed, beaten, or starved, this was the future he’d clung to.

This was the moment he’d lived for.

He’d once been a tortured slave who had mutinied, looted, and gorged on the feasts of the wealthy exotic merchants who’d kept him like a ravenous hound.

And even that meal wasn’t as splendid as this.

She tasted of simple joy. Of innocent pleasure. Of tea and honey and hope.

Her hands rested on his bare chest and, though her arms were tense, she didn’t push him away.

He wanted to savor all of her. Every soft, delicate, hidden part. Behind her ears, the supple curve of her bare shoulder, the taut peaks of her breasts, her quivering belly.

His tongue slid past her lips, enticed by the wicked fantasy he’d conjured. He lapped and nibbled at her in a warm mimicry of what he thirsted for.

An intimate taste of her.

He yearned to feast on her desire, and then on the warm rush of her pleasure. A pleasure he wrought upon her before he finally claimed his own and lost himself inside her. His was an appetite crafted only for this woman, and he’d not be satisfied until he’d sampled every lush, pale or pink inch of her.

Driven by twenty years of pent-up need, he backed her against the nearest wall, lifting her so her weight wouldn’t rest on her ankle.

She might be slight, and delicate, but he had enough strength for them both. She never had to worry about that. He would bear the brunt of any cruelty. He’d shield her from pain. He’d fulfill her every whim.

All she’d have to do was endure him. Was that too much to ask?

Probably.

He swallowed her exhale of astonishment, fusing their mouths, their bodies. The blood danced in his veins when her arms slid around him. His frame went taut with triumph when she timidly kissed him back.

He folded over her. Into her. Curled around her as if she were the last bit of warmth in a world of ice and terror and deprivation. Even his joy became its own kind of torment. This was both everything and not enough. He needed to claim her. To crawl out of himself and to sink into her. He was like a pilgrim kneeling before a holy relic, desperate for a miracle. Praying for the touch of a deity. For the love of his goddess. Had he a soul, he’d have offered it to her.

But he didn’t.

Not anymore.

All else he possessed was hers. His money. His body. What was left of his life.

Didn’t she know that? How could he make her understand?

He would show her. Like this. He would drain every last gasp of carnal bliss from her lungs. He would worship her with his hands, with his mouth, until she begged him to stop. He’d deny himself his own fulfillment until she came to him. Until she was as desperate for him to be inside her as he was.

Reaching down, he parted her legs so he could get closer, cursing every single layer of her skirt, her undergarments, and even the air that took up the space between them. He drove his hips against the silk of her skirts, sex against sex, frustrated by the barrier, but aroused by her soft hiss of breath and the tremble he felt roll through her limbs.

The first of many, he vowed.

“Can you feel a whisper of what I can give you?” he asked, rolling against her again, knowing he abraded the sweet little nub with each flex of his hips.

“Y-yes … but I…” Her fingers became claws on his shoulders, as though she feared falling.

I’ll not let you go. He kissed the corners of her mouth, her chin, and dragged his lips over the downy skin of her throat, stopping to nibble at the pulse he found leaping there. I’ll never let you go.

“Are you wet for me?” he demanded in a harsh whisper.

It took her three tries to swallow. “I—I’m…” She lost her words when he bit at her earlobe.

“Let me make you slick and slippery,” he urged.

“Make … what?”

“Let me make you writhe. And beg. And scream. I will exhaust you with ecstasy. You will come apart in my hands, beneath my mouth.”