She swallowed, her lips parting. “I do not want to be a mercy bedding.”
He almost laughed aloud at her peculiar phrasing. “Believe me, you would not be anyone’smercy bedding. Any man who takes you to his bed will do so because you are desirable and beautiful and because he cannot stop thinking about how soft your lips will be beneath his, or how your nipples will feel in his mouth. He will do so because he will look at you and think about lifting your skirts, trailing his hand from your ankle, up your calf, all the way to your thighs. He will lay awake at night, taking himself in hand as he imagines what you taste like, what you feel like, how deliciously tight your cunny will be as you take his cock.”
He stopped when he realized just how much he had revealed.
Too much.
Far, far too much.
Jo’s eyes were wide. Her cheeks were flaming.
She looked so gorgeous, his chest constricted, tightening. His cock was already erect beneath her, from the combined product of her nearness, her squirming in his lap, and the trip his imagination had just taken—not for the first time, it was true. He had been thoroughly abusing himself to thoughts of Lady Jo Danvers before he discovered her list. His hunger for her had only grown after the list she had drafted appeared in the midst of the Lady’s Suffrage Society pamphlet manuscript.
Her lips moved soundlessly, as if she tried to form words but could not find her voice. And then, in the next instant, she shocked him thoroughly by slamming her mouth into his.
Her movement was so forceful, so sudden and without a hint of finesse, that the result was a violent mashing of lips and teeth. For a fleeting moment, he expected to taste the copper tang of blood. It was, undoubtedly, the worst kiss he had ever received.
And yet, it inflamed him more than any of the kisses which had preceded it. Because the raw, unadulterated desire in that kiss, in that action, was the most potent, heady thing he had ever experienced.
He lost himself as well. To the devil with kissing her the way a seasoned lover ought. He was desperate for her. Provoked to the point of madness. Her innocent kiss made him ravenous. It fashioned him into a beast who could only be sated in one manner: claiming and possession.
His hands were both in her hair now, fingers sliding into the silken mass. He angled her head and took control of the kiss, slanting his lips over hers. Decker kissed her tenderly and yet with all the savagery within, fierce but controlled. He fitted his mouth against hers and sucked her lower lip.
She made a soft, kittenish sound that landed somewhere in the vicinities of his cock and his heart both. And then she opened for him. His tongue dipped inside the velvety recesses of her mouth, tasting her, finding her.
Her arms twined around his neck, and then her nails were tunneling through his hair, raking his scalp as she kissed him back. She sucked his tongue. Her movements were choppy, inexperienced. But her enthusiasm—bloody hell, it was the stuff of fantasies. He never wanted to end this kiss. Never wanted to exit the carriage. He could happily remain here, her in his lap, her mouth on his, for all eternity.
Decker found hair pins—prim, cool opposition. He narrowly resisted the urge to pluck them from her coiffure one by one.Later, he promised himself. He did not give a damn if she returned home with her hair cascading down her back. Anything keeping him from reveling in her long, brunette locks was going to be savaged and removed when the time was right.
He did not stop kissing her. Could not stop. The carriage rocked over London roads. Her hair unraveled down her back. Her lips firmed over his. Her aggression receded, replaced by gentleness. She moved her mouth in a mimicry of his, learning, teasing, testing.
The irony was not lost upon Decker that he had bedded more women than he could count, and yet this simple kiss—begun in such inexperienced, awkward fashion—was the most erotic, compelling kiss he had ever experienced. He wanted her so much more now. More than he could put into words. His hunger for her was like an entity all its own, festering and rising inside him, demanding to be answered.
He kissed her harder, exploring what she liked. Decker kissed the corners of her lips, then the tempting bow. He sank his tongue deep again, plumbing the depths of her mouth. And she moaned. She moaned into his kiss, her tongue moving against his.
So much for the notion of him kissing her breathless. He was quite sure she had accomplished the feat in the opposite. Sweet, innocent, quiet, secretly wicked Lady Jo Danvers had taken command of his mouth and kissed the hell out of him.
And he had relished every second of it.
So much that he had lost control.
Now? He could not stop kissing her. Not if his life depended upon it. Already, he had forgotten his every carefully laid strategy for the evening. All thought had vanished into the ether, replaced by the yearning and all-encompassing desire he felt for the woman on his lap.
But then, reality intruded, as it was so oft wont to do, in the form of a rap on the carriage door.
“Mr. Decker?” asked his man from the other side of the closed carriage door. “We have been parked for a quarter hour. Do you wish to proceed, or has there been a change of plans?”
Right. Damn it all.His stupid plans.
Decker tore his lips from Jo’s, exercising every shred of control he possessed to manage the feat. He sucked on his lower lip and gazed into her face. Her mouth was swollen from his kisses, her expression dazed.
Good.
Pleased at how affected she had been by their interlude, he removed her from his lap, settling her alongside him once more with the greatest reluctance. He found her hat and returned it to her head, flipping down her veil before inspecting his handiwork, making sure she was impossible to recognize.
“No change,” he called to his driver. “We shall commence with the evening as planned.”
Chapter Six
