“You play the pianoforte?”
She had expected him to take her upstairs to her lodgings, to her parlor where there was more room—although she quickly realized he wouldn’t know that. Instead he stopped in the middle of the area that separated her counter from the walls of bookshelves that ran perpendicular to it, faced her, and released his hold on her. She nearly snatched back his hand. “My mother insisted. When I was a lad, I hated the lessons. But she told me if I practiced diligently, I would acquire very deft fingers. I’ve found they make me quite popular with the ladies.”
The seductive way he looked at her made it difficult to draw in breath, and when she thought of his fingers doing more than touching her cheek as they had earlier, she had a strong urge to unfasten lacings and hooks and invite him to play a tune over her skin. Why was it that when she was with him, she wasn’t content to be separated by a few inches? Why did her musings conjure up images of bared flesh and limbs entangled, kisses and embraces?
Bowing slightly, he held out his hand. “Miss Trewlove, may I have the honor of this waltz?”
She didn’t know why she was more nervous than she’d been at the ball, why it was imperative she not trip over her feet, but dance to perfection. She wanted to impress him, to demonstrate that her lessons hadn’t been a waste of Mick’s coins. With a sigh to calm her rioting nerves, she placed her hand in his, taking comfort from the surety with which he wrapped his fingers around hers. His other hand came to her waist, and she placed hers on his shoulder, her posture perfect.
He began humming and, with the slightest dip, glided her over the floor, past the shelves that housed books on various countries, continents, and wildlife, around the edge of it, and up the aisle where one could find information on constellations, down a row where biographies brought long-ago personages back to life. They circled round and round, past romantic novels and detective stories, past Dickens, Brontë, and Austen. This waltz was better than any she’d had earlier because he took her along a route that encompassed all she loved and adored.
All night she’d longed to have a man look at her as though he’d waited his entire life to have her in his arms. Matthew never took his eyes from hers.
She liked thinking of him as Matthew rather than Mr. Sommersby. As they journeyed around the room, an intimacy swelled up between them, like an ocean wave leading a tempest toward shore. She was aware of everything about him. He carried the fragrance of bay rum, but beneath it was the very essence of him, and a hint of the scotch he’d had earlier. Before coming to her, he’d not bothered to tidy himself up with waistcoat, neck cloth, or coat. She rather appreciated that he wore only his boots, trousers, and a shirt, a few buttons free of their moorings so she had a clear view of his throat, a glimpse of the edge of his chest.
She was willing to dance in his arms until dawn. But he ceased his humming and slowed their steps until they were still and quiet, the only sound their breathing. Although he didn’t release her, not completely. One hand remained on her waist, while the other slipped away from hers and came to light upon her cheek. He skimmed his thumb over her lips. Everything within her tightened, as though he’d taken that thumb over places that had never before been touched by a man.
“May I kiss you, Miss Trewlove?”
His voice was raspy, like that of a man lost in the desert who’d gone years without water. Her mouth was suddenly dry as well. She barely nodded, yet he noted it and slowly lowered his lips to hers.
A gentleness accompanied his actions, as though he feared breaking her—or perhaps he sensed that he was the first to ever take such liberties and sought to ease her into it. On her waist, his fingers jerked before closing more firmly around her. His other hand left her cheek and his arm circled her, pressing her steadfastly along the length of him until her breasts were flattened against his chest.
To her astonishment, his mouth opened slightly, and his tongue lapped at her lips before urging them to part. Then his tongue was stroking hers, over and under, rough and silky. With a deep groan, he took the kiss deeper until she felt its effects in her toes.
Oh God. She wound her arms around his neck before her knees gave out and she embarrassed herself by tumbling to the floor. Numerous times she’d caught her brothers kissing their wives, but she’d never understood what a wondrous compelling thing it was. How it warmed one throughout and caused tingles between one’s thighs. How it made one long to have deft fingers working some sort of magic, and even as she wasn’t quite certain for what precisely her body was reaching, she knew he possessed the means to assuage the yearnings that were building to a fevered pitch within her.
She was vaguely aware of him backing her up. Her bottom struck something hard, the counter her addled brain realized. Then, with his mouth never leaving hers, he lifted her onto the polished wood, scandalously parted her knees so he could stand between them, nearer to her, and, with a low growl, began to plunder with more earnestness, exploring every hollow as though his life depended on his being able to describe her mouth in exquisite detail.
Aware of soft sighs and keening whimpers echoing around her, it took her a moment to realize she was the one making them. The sensations he was stirring to life within her were threatening to cause her to come undone.
He dragged his mouth over her chin, along her throat, and up to her ear, where he nibbled on the lobe before whispering, “May I have permission to kiss your breasts, Miss Trewlove?”
Dear Lord, she nearly melted into a puddle of desire on the spot. Scandalized, she knew what her answer would be.No. No. Absolutely not.“Y-yes.”
His mouth slowly trailed along the décolletage of her gown, while his hand glided up to cup her breast, to squeeze, to plump gently. Hooking a finger in the silk, somehow he managed to free the orb until it was straining toward him. He took her nipple in his mouth and began to suckle. Pleasure jolted through her. With a small cry, she dropped back her head and wrapped her legs around him, pressing her most intimate spot to his. Good Lord. Her actions were met by the hard ridge of his desire, and she wanted nothing more than to rub against it with no clothing separating their skin.
His tongue swirled over the areola soothing what he’d tasted. She was vaguely aware of her fingers tangled in his hair, her palms pressed to his scalp, as he once more closed his mouth around her breast. It felt wicked, so very wicked, to have so much of her flesh within the heated, cavernous confines, stroked lovingly by velvet and silk. She’d never known a sensation so sublime, so intoxicating, so... necessary. Her entire body called out for him to continue, to go further—even as she wasn’t quite certain what all the further might entail. Oh, she’d seen dogs rutting in the mews, and while she knew that was the eventual end of this journey, she hadn’t thought the getting there would include such a vortex of pleasure.
Not that she had any plans to allow him to reach journey’s end. They could only engage in the beginning, the start of the trek. As long as he was asking permission, and she remained in control, but every nerve ending, every muscle, every inch of flesh screamed for her to give in, to relinquish her hold on remaining proper and above reproach, to allow him to carry her to the ultimate climax. Her mewling grew louder, her sighs higher in pitch. She was fairly squealing with abandon.
A screech and hiss—
“God’s teeth!”
His mouth was no longer working its magic over her breast, and she jerked out of her wondrous state as reality crashed in on her in the form of Dickens crawling onto her lap, seeming to claim her as his. As much as she loved him, at that particular moment she was a bit put out at him for his intrusion.
Shaking his hand, Mr. Sommersby moved back slightly.
“Did he claw you?”
“Poked me. Didn’t break the skin.”
“I’m so sorry.” Lifting her cat, she gazed into the slumberous green eyes. “Bad Dickens.” Then she set him aside on the counter, where he promptly leapt down and wandered off. “Let me see your hand.”
“It’s fine.” Leaning in, he peppered kisses over her sensitive flesh before tucking her breast back into her clothing.
She could sense his retreat, and wicked girl that she was, she wanted him to remain. “You’ve left one completely unattended.”
