Luck Is No Lady (23 page)

He stood stiffly patient, allowing her the delight of discovery, though she sensed the rising tension in his body.

She took her time in a slow exploration of his chest and shoulders before she realized the shirt would have to be lifted over his head to be fully removed. Drawing her bottom lip between her teeth, she tugged the light fabric from the waistband of his breeches. Reaching beneath the hem, she slid her hands up along his sides, feeling the wonderful tension of lean muscle over his rippled abdomen and rib cage. He obediently lifted his arms so she could shove the shirt up over his head. She was forced to step toward him and rise up on her toes to free him completely from the garment.

As his upper torso was fully bared to her view, a tingling rush of delight ran through her blood at the sight. The shirt fell forgotten from her hands as she reached to press her palms to his skin again. Her hands skated over the contours of his chest, shoulders, and arms. She took a tender moment to explore the healing scar on his upper arm before her fingers drifted gently across his low belly. She watched in delight as his muscles clenched beneath her touch.

He was all heat and hardness.

And control.

She didn't realize just how much he held himself in check while she delighted in her sensual exploration of his body until she glanced back up into his face and saw the tight clench of his teeth and caught his heavy-lidded gaze.

“You have no idea what that does to me,” he muttered gruffly.

Emma licked her dry lips. “Why don't you tell me?”

“I would rather show you.”

She instinctively dropped her gaze to the prominent ridge of his erection visible beneath his fitted breeches. She had sensed his arousal as she explored his bared body, but had not allowed herself to look directly at the evidence of it until that moment. The breath she drew was ragged and deep at the thought of his full desire being exposed to her view.

He laughed, a raw, heated sound. “Not exactly what I had in mind.”

Lifting his hands to her shoulders, he turned her away from him. Then he gathered the length of her hair in one hand and swept it over her shoulder to allow access to the row of tiny buttons down her back. Moments later the dress loosened and he eased it down her body. The satin made barely a sound as it slid over her hips to pool on the floor. She stepped free of the gown, kicking off her heeled slippers. He reached for the ties of her short stays, loosening the confining garment until that too was dropped aside.

She turned to face him again in nothing but her silk stockings and a whisper-thin shift.

His ravenous gaze swept across her breasts, her belly, the length of her legs.

She could feel every bit of his appreciation. Her nipples puckered against the soft cotton of her shift. Her stomach muscles clenched with need. And the hollow between her legs grew damp and aching.

She clenched her bottom lip again between her teeth as she waited for him to touch her, her entire body on fire for the drift of his fingers and the heat of his palm.

With the back of his hand, he swept the mass of her hair back over her shoulder, exposing her further to his view. His fingers trailed gently across her collarbone, then followed the lace trim of her shift to the center of her chest where tiny white ribbons held the neckline secure.

He tugged at the ribbons, drawing them free.

Her breath caught in her throat. Anticipation made her light-headed and weak-kneed.

Hooking a finger under the material at her shoulder, he slowly dragged it down her arm. The cotton caught over the peak of her nipple, and he gave a gentle tug to free it, exposing her left breast to his view.

His hand quickly followed his gaze as he palmed the weight of her breast, lifting it gently for his thumb to brush over her nipple.

The feel of his hand covering her, shaping her, felt decadent and wonderfully wicked. She curved her back into a subtle arch as she tried to press herself more fully into his hand. Heat swirled in her belly, then pooled between her legs, and a groan threatened in the back of her throat. She swayed on her feet.

A low sound of approval rumbled in his chest before he spoke in a rough whisper. “I will take care of you, Emma. I promise.”

Then he lowered his head and closed his mouth over the peak of her breast with hot, consuming possession.

Her legs did give way then, and he grasped her quickly around the waist to hold her up for him as he devoured her supple flesh, twirling his tongue in a wicked dance over the sensitive tip. Making her belly clench tight and her head spin in a whirlwind of new sensations.

She grasped his head in her hands in an attempt to anchor herself to him. The slide of his dark hair felt like silk between her fingers.

But like the kiss, it was over too quickly and he drew back again, pushing her to arm's length. His breath was harsh, and hers was ragged.

He reached for the other strap of her shift. Slipping it from her shoulder, he watched as the thin undergarment fell to gather at the swell of her hips. His perfect lips curved into a grin that sent shock waves through her system, right before he lifted his fingers to pinch her newly bared nipple between his forefinger and thumb.

The pleasure-pain of it speared through her, making her gasp with the unexpected sensation.

Then he tugged at the material of her shift and it fell the rest of the way from her body.

Emma surrendered to the vulnerability washing over her as she stood before him clad in nothing but her stockings.

His gaze traveled hungrily, possessively over her. From the slope of her shoulders, over the curves of her sensitized breasts, past the trembling surface of her belly, and down the full length of her legs. A flicker passed through his eyes as his attention swept over the shadowed apex at the juncture of her thighs.

More delicious heat pooled there, and Emma fought the urge to clench her thighs together in an effort to contain the sensations.

“Your body is exquisite,” he murmured. “I could gaze at you for hours. But not tonight.”

He lifted his hands to her hips. His strong fingers tested the resilience of her flesh, pressing into the soft mounds of her buttocks as he pulled her into his embrace.

She melted against him, a deep sigh flowing from her lungs as his bare skin pressed against her. Her breasts flattened against his chest; her belly melded with his. And the length of his arousal jutted proudly, insistently, against her hip. She wished it were not still confined by his breeches.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as his shoulders curved over her and he bent his head finally to take her mouth again. She was ready with parted lips and bated breath. Her tongue swept forward to meet and mate with his, twirling deliciously. Her lips scraped against his teeth and a velvety groan rumbled in his throat.

The kiss created a wrenching pull on all her senses. Her body molded to his, his skin scorching her with the heat of passion. Her body was on fire from the inside out, melting with the craving for more. She undulated against him, her spine arching and releasing as she sought deeper, more intense expressions of his desire.

Then, suddenly, she was swept off her feet as he brought his arm beneath her knees and lifted her up to cradle against his chest, never breaking the kiss.

He carried her swiftly from the room. It didn't occur to her to wonder where he was taking her until he lowered her onto a silk-covered bed. She murmured in protest as he drew back from the kiss and slid his arms from around her body, leaving her there in the middle of the mattress.

She opened her eyes. The room was lit gently by the glow of a fire and a few flickering candles. Roderick stood beside the bed, his gaze shamelessly soaking in the sight of her laid out on the red satin coverlet, naked but for the pale silk stockings cinched around her upper thighs.

She pushed up to a seated position and reached for one of the garters.

“Leave them,” he commanded. The gruff sound of his voice sent shivers rippling through her. Her hand stilled over her thigh. “Lie back again. I want to see all of you.”

Emma did as he said. But she rolled partly to her side, propping her arm beneath her head so she could observe him as he stared at her. Her body burned everywhere his gaze touched. Her nipples constricted painfully and her breasts felt heavy.

His gaze skimmed over the curve of her hip and down to her knees, then her feet. As his focus slid slowly back up, she bent her knee, drawing her leg up to shield the entrance to her body, blocking it from his lusty view.

When his gaze flew to her face, his brows lowered in protest, she curved her lips into a sensual smile. Her voice was sultry as she demanded, “Remove your breeches for me.”

His eyes widened at the willful tone of her voice.

Then he smiled back at her and Emma's heart skipped two beats. She was playing with fire now. She knew it, and the thrill that went through her told her without a doubt it would be worth it.

He lowered his chin and dark locks of his hair fell over his forehead, giving him a dangerous appeal. His stomach visibly tensed as he reached for the fastening of his breeches. Emma drew her knee higher on the mattress. The movement caught his eye. He halted the progress of loosening his breeches to gaze steadily and darkly at the shadow between her legs.

Emma felt an insane desire to laugh. Not a girl's light giggle, but the husky laugh of a woman who was slowly learning the power of her own sensual allure.

“Roderick,” she reminded softly, “your breeches, please.”

He made quick work of the garment after that—kicking off his shoes, removing his stockings, and peeling the breeches down the length of his muscled legs until he could kick those aside as well.

When he finally stood tall before her—naked, proud, and so very, very male—Emma simply forgot to breathe. The narrow width of his hips drew down to solid, muscled thighs, sprinkled liberally with dark hair, and feet braced firmly apart in the lush carpet. The most alarming and beautiful part of him stood strong at the apex of his thighs.

Emma knew something about the physical act of lovemaking. Her mother had managed to go over the basic details before she had died. As Emma openly examined the hard, thick length of him, her mouth went dry and wetness pooled hotly in the place where they would join.

“What are you thinking, Emma?” he asked quietly as he stood stiff and tense, as if waiting for her acceptance.

Her mind was so clouded with the sensations roaring through her body, she answered in full truthfulness without first considering her words. “I am wondering what it will feel like to have that part of you inside me.”

His erection pulsed at her words, and Emma felt an answering pulse in her inner flesh. She squeezed her legs together at the unexpected pleasure of the sensation.

Roderick came forward to the edge of the bed, leaning over her. She fell back against the pillows as his hands braced on either side of her shoulders.

He looked down into her face. His expression was dark and dangerous.

“Don't worry, sweetheart. You will soon feel me buried deep within you, but not yet. There are so many other ways…and places…I want to touch you first.”

He lowered his head to kiss her. Their lips were the only place they touched, but the intensity of that kiss spread out to every corner of her awareness, tingled across every inch of her skin and rolled through every vein.

Roderick stretched out along her side. Propping his head in one hand, he laid his other hand flat over her low belly, splaying his fingers from sternum to pubic bone.

He observed the path of his hand as it drew up along her side, his fingers easing over her ribs until his thumb caught beneath the under-curve of her breast.

Emma stared into his face, her breath shallow with anticipation.

He gave a tiny, barely perceptible smile when he lifted the weight of her breast, plumping it, cradling it in his large palm. His circled his fingertip around the rosy peak. Her nipple constricted to a tight bud, and he leaned forward to close his mouth over her.

At the first decadent swirl of his tongue, Emma arched off the bed. The combination of velvet heat and silken moisture overwhelmed her tightly strung senses. She lifted her hand to his head, holding him to her breast as the fire he ignited spread throughout her body.

He shifted position and his mouth plundered her other breast. His lips tugging, his teeth nipping, and his tongue soothing.

Emma grew restless.

She grasped at his shoulders and arched into him. She wanted to move her legs, slide her knee up along his, feel the rough texture of his hair against her inner thigh. As he continued to lavish her breasts with attention, he threw one of his legs over both of hers, confining her movements.

She wanted to protest, but then she felt the hard length of his erection pressing hot and intimate to the side of her hip. She reached between them, seeking him. When her fingers first brushed his tip, she was surprised by just how hot and smooth his male flesh was. He jolted at her tentative touch and sucked at her breast, drawing the nipple deep into his mouth.

But she was determined, and she wriggled her hips to create space between them. He didn't allow much, but it was enough. And as her fingers closed around him, he pulsed heavily in her hand.

He groaned and lifted his head to take her mouth in a hot, openmouthed kiss. The kiss had less finesse than passion, and to Emma, it was perfect. She tightened her fingers around him, turning so she could press her breasts against his chest. His leg lifted higher over hers and she bent her knee, sliding it up between his thighs.

Planting his palm low on her back, he pulled her into the curve of his body. His kiss gentled then. The fierce passion eased into a seductive dance as he smoothed his hand over the soft globes of her derriere, sliding his fingertips along the crevice between, reaching ever lower.

Emma's breath quickened with anticipation as all of her awareness centered on the reach of his fingers. Soon, she knew, he would touch her there—where heat bloomed and rebloomed and her sensitive flesh throbbed delicately for attention.

She was expecting it, waiting for it. Yearning for it.

Yet still, when he finally slid his finger along the slick folds, she gasped in surprise at the wealth of sensations he summoned in her body. She tilted her hips and arched her back, breaking from his kiss. He didn't seem to mind.

His touch grew more intimate as he pressed in along her flesh. His lips teased the pulse at the side of her throat. She inhaled sharp breaths in an attempt to retain control of her sanity.

But he was obviously intent upon driving her mad. His touch became more and more insistent, until he curled one finger and pushed it gently into her body. Her hand tightened around his erection and her hips rolled in an instinctive attempt to push herself farther into his hand.

With a low growl, he shifted. Rising up over her, he pushed her back onto the bed and settled between her legs, pressing his hard abdomen to her core. She grasped at his arms, trying to reposition him higher so she could feel him where she ached so sweetly.

He smiled at her insistence, his blue eyes intense as he gazed down into her face.

“Have patience, sweetheart,” he said, then placed a kiss on her swollen lips. “We will get where you want to go, but not yet.”

He moved down between her legs and slid his hands beneath her buttocks, lifting her hips off the bed. Lifting her private flesh to the possessive heat of his mouth.

Emma grasped fistfuls of the coverlet beneath her as her entire body tensed with the indescribable feelings his intimate kiss invoked.

He teased and tortured her with long strokes of his tongue, suckled and nipped at the bud of her pleasure, plunged his fingers into her body, insisting she surrender to the rise of sensations. She felt a force intensifying within her, building and growing until the muscles in her legs clenched and her stomach trembled fiercely.

And then it all released at once in a breath-stealing expansion of pleasure so acute, so intricate it touched every nerve in her body and sang through every secret corner of her soul. As the waves of her release rolled through her, she felt Roderick rise up over her again, and then his erection pressed in where her flesh still throbbed.

He slid in easily at first, her inner flesh softened by her pleasure. When he encountered the resistance of her innocence, he lowered his head to the pillow beside hers. His breath came in ragged puffs against her throat. Emma wrapped her arms around him and bent her knees alongside his hips. He groaned as the position allowed him to glide a bit deeper.

Then he lifted himself to his elbows as he withdrew from her. Just enough to ease her body into accepting more of him. His arms shook from the effort of his control where they pressed against her shoulders.

Then he dipped his head and took her mouth in a luxurious kiss. At the same time, he thrust forward into her body, tearing past her maidenhead and seating himself completely within her.

Emma gasped against his mouth. He remained still, his breath harsh and ragged, giving her time to adjust.

The burning of her rent virtue slowly eased away. Emma stretched and shifted beneath him, repositioning her legs and sliding her hands over his broad, muscled shoulders. She lifted her gaze and saw him watching her. His eyes sparkled and his jaw was tight, but his lips were curved into a delectable smile.

She smiled back and slid her hands up into the silken locks of his hair. Then she drew him down to her until she could flick her tongue against that smile.

He deepened the kiss, drawing her tongue into his mouth. And a moment later, he began to move. It started with just a gentle rolling of his hips, a steady rocking rhythm that soon increased in intensity. His thrusts grew longer and stronger, and the pleasure built within her again. The glide of his erection within sensitized flesh roused her senses to a trembling height.

Emma's breath came in fitful gasps as she clung to him, biting her lower lip hard as she strained toward another climax.

Just as she worried she may not reach it, he shifted to slide his arm beneath her low back, arching her body, changing the angle of his thrust so his erection slid over the tight bud of her pleasure. It took only a few more plunging strokes and her awareness exploded into a thousand points of light.

He continued to thrust into her as she throbbed around him, the lovely friction lengthening her pleasure. Then he tensed over her and the part of him buried deep inside her pulsed in a heavy release.

As the tautness of his body eased and his weight settled more completely atop her, Emma released a deep sigh. He muttered something incoherent against the side of her throat and made as if to rise, but she tightened her arms about his shoulders, squeezing her thighs against his hips.

She wasn't ready for him to move just yet. She was not prepared for what may come next.

She preferred to stay there in the lovely hazy glow of an intimacy so profound she never could have suspected its existence. Nothing had ever felt so right as those long moments when they had moved together, and now, as their bodies remained intertwined.

It was like the two halves of a whole coming together.

Emma smiled at the silly romanticism of her thoughts. But there was simply nothing rational about what she had just experienced.

She allowed her eyes to fall closed as she listened to the sound of Roderick's breath slowing and felt the beat of his heart over hers.

At one point not much later, she vaguely noted him lifting his weight and settling along her side. He immediately curled his arm around her and drew her against him. As she rested her head on his shoulder and brought her hand up to curl against the side of his throat, she acknowledged that she could not remain like this for long.

She would have to rise and dress and take herself back home to address the payment of Hale's loan.

But right now, such things did not seem extremely pressing and she figured she could allow herself just a few more precious moments with Roderick before she must return to her responsibilities.