Rake's Guide to Pleasure. (29 page)

Her eyes opened slowly, and she watched him through her lashes as her mouth slid down, all the way to the edge of her hand.

Hart groaned aloud. His whole body shuddered as pleasure wound tighter and tighter, suffocating all thought and rationality. Desire was a heavy, perfect weight that began to pull him toward the edge. And her mouth . . . so wet and warm and unknowing.

He could not last. And this was part of his fantasy too, Emma drinking him up as he spilled his seed. But some hesitation stopped him. He clamped down on the rushing need and cupped his hand around Emma's head to slide her back.

She was panting, her bottom lip still pressed to his cock, breath rushing over him in cold puffs of torment.

He had to slow down. He wanted more than this. He wanted everything he could take.

"Enough," he groaned, taking her hand to pull her to her feet.

She watched him, pupils wide with lust, lips bruised. Primal possessiveness crashed over him, pressing the breath from his lungs. She was almost innocent despite her lustful nature. And he wanted to keep her for himself, seduce her, teach her things that she would do with no other man.

Then the thought of what she'd meant to do with Marsh fell like a rock through his twisted, stormy thoughts.

He was losing control here, treating her as if she were different, as if she were precious when he'd meant to show her she'd become
less
to him. Meant to show her that their strange friendship had ended and she was just like every other woman he'd had.

Hart refastened his trousers and her brow crinkled.

"Let us go through the ground rules first, shall we?" He strolled over to the tray to pour himself a glass of wine. He didn't offer her any as he returned to stand in front of her tempting form; he didn't dare hold out a glass and reveal his shaking.

"You will not speak of me to anyone. You will not confirm or deny our relationship. If I hear even a hint, a whisper, some intimate knowledge that has been passed on, I will cease to know you. Not only will our interlude come to an end, I will cut you dead. Understand?"

The lust had faded from her eyes, leaving them narrowed against hurt.

"There will be no other man in your bed while I am there. And there will be no further flirtations. When the affair ends there will be no tears, no hysterics. This is purely physical. It is not love, it is not the start of love. It is only the natural end to a mutual attraction. Is that clear?"

Her mouth was tight with rage. "Is this the speech you give all your lovers?"

"It is."

Her head jerked back a tiny bit. "And how do those women react to this list of demands?"

"Some look at me as you are doing now . . ." Oh, she did not like that at all. Did not like being compared to nameless, faceless women. "And some seem cowed. But they all agree."

"Arrogant coward. Are you really so afraid?"

He shrugged and took a sip of wine. "I prefer to be in control."

"Oh, but not always." Her eyes drifted down his naked chest to rest on his lap.

Hart was quite happy with the anger that raged back to full strength at her words. "I am in control
now,
Emma, and that should be all that concerns you. Remove the rest of your clothing."

"You insult me."

"Ha. You may pretend at your outrage, but you have wanted this from the moment we met. Almost as much as I have."

Her jaw jumped at his words. "I did not want
this!'

The last of the wine quenched his dry throat, but it did nothing for the angry want that was stretching his skin tight as a drum. He only felt angrier when he tipped the glass down and met her gaze.

"You came here knowing I was a man on a razor's edge. You knew I was half drunk and damn near violent, and you came to me. You may not want this, Emma, but you
need
it.

"And I. . ." He smiled, smiled until her eyes fluttered with nervousness. "I am pushed too far. Everyone in the world is talking about me right now, my sweet. Laughing at me. Discussing me, my life, my stupid, lustful, unwise heart. They are looking at
me,
Emma. And I will damn well have tonight even if I never deign to speak your name again."

He let his rage free with one wide sweep of his hand and the fragile crystal shattered in a musical crash against the door.

Emma backed up one step.

Hart rolled his shoulders and willed his boiling blood back to a simmer. "Now. Let's start with the corset, shall we?"

Chapter 17

The corset was squeezing her, pressing her lungs too tight. She couldn't draw more than quick, useless gasps of air that did nothing to help her find reason. Instead, every shallow breath sent little bits of sparkling pleasure to her sex.

She was afraid, afraid of Hart, and that only made her body throb with more intensity. Between her fear and that arousal, Emma couldn't think what to do. So she turned, and Hart began to work on the tight lacing that held her in.

As soon as she felt the ties loosen, Emma reached to free the hooks. Suddenly, she could breathe. Blood seemed to fill with life and rush to every nook of her body. Emma had expected to feel relief, but there was no ease in those breaths. Instead, an urgency overtook her.

The final hook gave, and she let the corset drop to the floor.

"Now the shift," Hart murmured, and Emma drew it over her head, thinking of him staring at her naked backside, knowing how much he would like that.

"The shoes," he said. "The stockings."

She could not fathom how he knew her so well. Was it simple recognition on his part, like knowing like? Or was it etched on her skin, a terrible heritage writ in subtle code that Hart had seen from the start? Or was it possible that every woman wanted this?

Rolling down her last stocking, Emma reveled in the thought of how exposed she was for his eyes. When she turned and found that Hart had undressed as well, the sight of him seized her heart. His body was lean and tightly muscled, his cock thick and rock hard. He would be inside her soon, and she felt she had waited her whole life for that.

His voice slashed like a sword. "Lie on your stomach."

Odd that she now felt powerful when he was so clearly in control. But Emma wasn't the least bit timid when she walked the few steps to his massive bed. She stood on tiptoe to brace one knee against the silken tapestry of the bedcover, then she pulled herself up and crawled toward the pillows, picturing her own body in her mind. Tormenting him with every twitch of her hips.

She thought she heard his breath hitch, and then the cool silk was against her belly, her breasts, and Hart's hand was smoothing up her calf.

"You will. . ." she started, shocked to find her voice so weak. "You are determined to treat me as you treat every woman?"

"Ha." His humorless laugh tickled the back of her knee. Emma could feel his chest brush her heels. "Yes, I mean to treat you like any other woman, but I will fail spectacularly." He spoke closer to her thigh now. His hand caressed the tender skin behind her knee before it rose to massage higher. "I mean to take you simply and savagely, but I can't imagine how. What I want is so much more. I want to have you the way I used to have women." His mouth brushed the back of her thigh, swirling darkness past Emma's vision.

"You. . . You refer to your past? You want me to be one of those women who would . . . a companion for those. . .?" She found she could not speak of it. He was arousing her with his touch, breaking her heart with his words.

"Those secret, sinful parties? Would you like that? Would it arouse you to watch strangers having sex? To know they were watching you as they clawed toward their peak?"

"I. . ." He would make her into what she'd always feared, give her over to the monsters.

His hand smoothed up, fingers curving to fit the flesh of her buttocks. "Yes, I would take you there, beast that I am. That is what you reduce me to, Emma. The selfish, sexual animal I used to be. I want to sneak you into one of those homes, watch as you watch, as you blush and grow wet with horrified arousal. I want to be that man with you, but also something more. I'd never let them touch you. Even if you wanted, I would never share."

She froze, her grief suspended in disbelief. "I would never—"

"Good, because you would not. I would not let them even gaze upon you. But I would escort you there, and I would have you. In secret, alone, against the door of a dark chamber.

"I want you like that. And I want you like this." He kissed her, lingered over her hip as his palm pressed into the small of her back. Emma could feel his shaft now, thick and heavy against her leg. She squirmed, pressing her sex harder to the bed.

"I want you like this," he went on, voice deep and mesmerizing. "And I want you on your hands and knees. I want you on your back. I want you tied to my bed with silk ribbons."

Her gasp couldn't be contained by the pillow.

Hart chuckled. "Would you like that? Helpless, limbs spread, sex naked and open? I want to be wicked and shameful with you. I want to do things I've refused to even think of for ten years. I want to lean you over a bench in Covent Gardens, have you right there while people pass by only yards away. I want to hide you behind drawn curtains at a ball, make you come while I swallow your cries with my mouth."

His kisses worked their way up to her waist, then climbed up to her spine. His knee nudged her legs apart; his arousal was heat and strength against her thigh. Emma spread her legs farther.

"You and that bedroom voice and that knowledge in your eyes. You've reminded me of who I don't want to be, Emma."

"Yes," she sobbed as his tongue traced a circle over her shoulder blade. He sucked her flesh between his teeth, bit a gentle pressure there. His thigh pressed between her legs and she opened for him, arching her back, grinding her hot sex into the coolness of his leg. The crisp hair of his thigh tickled her skin as his muscles flexed and rolled.

"You're so wet for me. I haven't even touched you."

My God, she knew that, she knew it as she wriggled against him, needing his attention. His shaft was pressed hard to her thigh, and she wanted it between them, wanted it
inside
her.

"
Shh
," he whispered. His tongue teased her skin until he reached her neck. He kissed her a half dozen times, his touch a confusion of lips and tongue and teeth. She groaned and arched and raised her hips like a cat in heat.

"Please. Hart."

His knee shifted and she felt a sharp hope, but then he was nudging her thighs closed, straddling her legs and raising up on his hands.

"Turn over."

Emma scrambled, twisting beneath him until she was looking up into his moon-bright eyes. Holding her breath, she waited, waited. Hart eased his knees between hers, his jaw jumped and he closed his eyes as his sex touched hers for the first time.

"Yes," she breathed, "Yes, yes." But he shook his head and offered a cruel smile.

"No, not for a long while yet, Lady
Denmore
."

She was going to demand an explanation, but then he was leaning down to kiss her and she ceased to care. His kisses were deep and hot and he rocked his shaft into her
mons
in a slow, slow rhythm.

His kisses alone were a wicked sexual act. He sucked and tasted and nibbled and licked until Emma found that she could no longer breathe. But when she turned away, gasping, he simply moved to her neck where he sucked and tasted and nibbled and licked. Then down to her collarbone, her shoulder, the rise of her breasts. When he finally reached her nipple, she was desperate and sobbing, and when he caught that hard bud between his teeth, she was horrified to hear herself cry out in a tiny scream.

Hart chuckled against her. She glanced down to find him watching her face with arrogant pleasure. "That was a lovely sound. Let's see if we can find it again."

She clamped her mouth shut and considered pushing him off her, and then his tongue worked while his mouth sucked and Emma was reduced to a panting wreck.