“This is close enough to a bed,” she muttered against his mouth.
Her wants were simple.
All she wanted was him.
Here.
Now.
But he was in no mood to oblige her.
On a tormented groan—oh, why did the man insist on torturing both of them—he wrenched away, reaching for her hand again, leading her inside his private study, through a secret door in a bookcase—she would be asking about that later…after—and up a dark, narrow staircase. Halfway up the stairs, she reached up and squeezed his taut arse. Of its own accord, her hand snaked around and dragged across his hot, swollen manhood.
His step faltered. “Delilah,” came a warning without much conviction behind it.
She sensed she could have him here.
But he wanted her in a bed.
And she supposed she was learning relationships were about compromise.
Then they were stepping inside his bedroom. The only lighting was a low fire in the hearth and a few dim sconces on the walls. But there was enough light for her to see this was very much a duke’s bedroom—all done in deep blue silks and velvets, impeccably tasteful and immaculate. She would expect nothing less from Sebastian.
He turned and caught her about the waist. “At last, we made it to a bedroom.”
She laughed. She couldn’t help it.
Then she met his eyes, and the dark intention within, and her smile slipped as he shrugged off coat and waistcoat. He closed the distance between them, then his hands were making short work of the buttons on the side of her dress. It hadn’t yet reached the floor before he was turning her around, loosening the knots of her stays, the garment slipping off her body to join her dress. She took the silk tips of her gloves between her teeth and tugged them off, leaving her clad in naught but chemise, stockings, and slippers. Then the chemise was over her head and joining the other garments on the deep-piled Aubusson carpet.
“The mask can stay,” said Sebastian. His serious, golden eyes slowly raked over her, growing black in the flickering firelight. “There’s something I want you to do.” He hesitated. “And you can say no.”
She reached up and clasped her hands around his neck, stretching her naked body against his fully clothed one, a smile curling her mouth. No doubt it was a wicked one. “There is nothing you could ask of me that I would say no to.” Her tongue swiped across her bottom lip. His gaze followed the motion. “So,ask.”
“I want you”—he took a step forward, coaxing a step back from her…a step for nearly every word he spoke—“to lay on my bed”—his mouth met her ear—“and spread your legs…wide.”
A feeling, dark and sinuous, snaked through Delilah. What he was asking of her would push her limits.
And she understood something she hadn’t known before.
She wanted those limits pushed.
“Then I want you to touch yourself.”
The backs of her knees bumped against the bed. Her gaze held his. “While you watch?” she asked through the frisson of mild shock that traced through her.
What a thing to want, and yet…
Didn’t she like to be watched?
“Yes.”
Oh, the flame of lust that licked through her as she released her hands from around his neck and perched onto the foot of the bed. He grabbed a chair and sank into it, his gaze hot upon her as she spread her legs…wide.
Her quim open and exposed like this… She’d had no idea this was what went on between men and women in bedrooms.
One hand planted behind her for support, the other trailed down her body, slowly, teasingly. She took a nipple between forefinger and thumb and pinched. His chest utterly still, no breath entered or left his lungs, and she understood the full extent of her power.
She had the devastating, arrogant Duke of Ravensworth in the palm of her hand. “You like that?” she couldn’t help asking.
