A rush of possessiveness and lust crashed through his veins, and his grip tightened on her. The woman veritably embodied radicalism, but knowing now what he did about her, it didn’t surprise him. She also posed an excellent argument, one he had no intention of disputing. “Then I shall endeavour to make you happy.”
* * *
All at once,their lips connected, their breath mingled, and Maria’s pulse buzzed with anticipation and desire. She clung to him, wrapping her arms around his impossibly sturdy shoulders and lifting one leg about his hip for better friction as she rubbed herself against the erection straining his falls.
She gasped at the contact, and yet she still burned for more.
Maria’s stomach swooped with uncertainty, but determination took the fore. She knew what she wanted, and he wanted her, too.
Without thought, she traced an explorative touch along the hard ridge of him.
He hissed a breath, his head thrown back and the muscles in his neck bulging. “Christ, Maria.”
Her body heated further at the sight of him.Shewas causing this reaction in him, and it was entirely empowering.
With a heated glance, Maria slowly unfastened the undamaged hooks of her costume. Jasper’s breath came quick as he followed the movement with his gaze. She let the costume drop to the floor and she nudged it aside with one foot. Next, she reached for her front-lacing stays.
“Allow me,” Jasper said gruffly.
Despite the slight tremble to his fingers, Jasper made quick work of her stays, and those, too, dropped to the floor. Her stomach fluttered and her core swelled with heat as Jasper worked. Each brush of his fingers and molten flicker of his gaze had her pulse speeding and her breath coming faster. Soon, he’d slipped down her petticoats and Maria had toed off her slippers, until she stood only in her chemise and stockings.
His gaze was hot and hungry, and her body responded in kind. Now it was her turn.
With determined movements, Maria unfastened the buttons of Jasper’s waistcoat, relishing the feel of his body against the backs of her fingers. A low groan vibrated through his chest as she slid the heavy, warm material from his shoulders and left him in only his gaping shirt.
Impatience tore at her. She’d feltpartsof him before, but she was nigh desperate to get at his chest. The teasing glimpses that she’d had that evening were not nearly enough to assuage her curiosity. Her desire.
In one swift motion, she pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it to the floor with his coat and waistcoat. And her heart all but flew out of her chest.
His hair was endearingly mussed, his shoulders broad, and his body…
Tracing her fingertips along the expanse of his pale torso, through the thick, dark, downy curls that spread across his chest, she followed the narrowing line that encircled his navel and disappeared beneath the waist of his breeches.
He was entirely breathtaking.
Jasper grunted and reached for her, pulling her tightly against his chest and taking her lips in a passionate kiss. Starting at her thighs, he slid his palms up her sides, slowly gathering the material of her chemise.
She smiled against his lips, and her belly gave another little flutter.
“Lift,” he whispered, raising the bunched cotton yet higher.
Maria obeyed, raising her arms over her head as he removed her chemise altogether.
Finally free of her restrictive skirts, Maria clutched Jasper’s shoulders and, with a short jump, wrapped her legs around his waist. He gave a muffled grunt of shock against her mouth before clutching her close, one hand on her thigh and another on her bottom.
The heat of his soft yet hair-roughened skin warmed her everywhere they touched, and it sent tingles of awareness through her abdomen. He shifted his grip on her, and the bulge of the erection trapped behind his trousers rubbed into her sex, pulling a cry of pleasure from deep within her.
All at once, she lay upon his bed with Jasper hovering over her, his body half in shadow from the golden rays of the flickering firelight.
Maria’s uncertainty came roaring back, clouding her thoughts with reminders of the softness of her belly, the width of her hips, the freckles that sprinkled her body, and the jagged scar that ran along her hip and waist from when she’d fallen from a tree as a child. That feeling, however, was short-lived in the face of Jasper’s scrutiny.
His heated gaze travelled the length of her body and back, slowly taking her in.
“My God,” he breathed. “I need to taste you.”
“Taste me?”
His lips quirked in a devilish grin before he positioned himself lower on the bed and spread her legs wide.
