“Please, Emily.” It was as though he had been on the edge for so long, he had forgotten how it felt not to be seconds away from spilling everywhere. “Please, darling. Have mercy on me. Let me taste you. Let me touch you. Please, go slowly.”
A smile spread across her lips. “I like it when you beg.” She took him in her hand. “Do you want me to stop?”
“No.” When she pumped her hand, he near whimpered. “Perhaps,” he said, tugging at the restraints just enough that hefeltas though he was trapped there. His entire body trembled with the force of sensation—the pressure in his wrist where he was bound, the press of the blankets wrapped around his chest, holding him in place. The solidity of the bed behind him. At least it was not a flimsy thing; he had faith it would catch him if his knees gave out.
“I am so—” A gasp shuddered out of him as she paused again, right on the brink, sensing from his body language when he would pass the point of no return and stopping just before it. She was an adept student, and he was more than happy to be the means by which she experimented.
Again and again, she denied him just before his peak, until he felt as though she had melted him into a puddle of wax. Eventually, she raised her head.
“Now,” she said, “it’s your turn.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Emilyhadn’tintendedtoyield any part of herself to Oliver. She had enjoyed teasing him, enjoyed it so much the steady ache between her legs had turned slick, her arousal smearing every time she moved. The urgency to appease her own need rose—but more than that, she wanted to reward Oliver for allowing her this. For enjoying it, even, when it was all done at her whim.
His eyes pierced through hers, the pupils blown so large his gaze was near black. “My turn?” he rasped.
In answer, she reached behind him and fought with the knots; his squirming had tightened them, but not irreparably so. Then she stepped back and began to unlace her dress. Her heart hammered. Her fingers were slick with nervous sweat.
This had never been part of the plan. Yet he looked at her with such hunger.
“Don’t touch me,” she said. “Not yet.”
His face was flushed, but he merely stared, watching her as though if he did so much as blink, she would disappear. “Your wish is my command.”
Finally, she finished with her dress, pushing it down her legs. There were so many more layers for a lady to remove, but though she saw his fingers twitch as though he longed to assist her, he made no movement to help.
That was good. Good.
She inhaled sharply as cool air finally hit her skin. Her nipples, already peaked, pinched still further. Oliver looked at her face, and then, as though her silence were permission enough—and indeed it was—he turned his gaze down the rest of her. She had to stop herself from covering all her most intimate places—her breasts and the thatch of reddish-brown hair between her legs. The press of her ribs against her skin. The hollow of her stomach.
But Oliver’s expression didn’t change. If anything, it grew sharper. And his erection twitched, as though it sought her.
“Oliver,” she whispered.
His gaze snapped back to her face. “Please,” he said, and although she had enjoyed making him beg with her mouth, this was different. Deeper, so much more viscerally needy. “Please, Emily. Let me touch you.”
Eyes still on him, she lay back against the covers, opening her legs to give him a view of what lay between. He sucked in a quiet breath, and it was as though with that single gesture, he had sucked the air from the room. She felt hot all over.
“Here,” she said. “You may touch me.”
He closed his eyes briefly, as though thanking some unknown gods for her benevolence, and knelt at the end of the bed, his good hand fastening around her thighs. His skin was not tanned, but the contrast against her extreme paleness—she was so whitethere the veins shone blue under her skin—made her stomach flip.
He pressed his lips in a chaste kiss against her inner thigh, then looked up at her through his golden eyelashes—searing, molten. “I am your servant, Emily. Tell me what you need.”
“I—” She knew men used their mouths on women, and Marlbury had even mentioned he would like to try it, but at seventeen, she had been too afraid to let him near her. It seemed wrong, somehow. A level of intimacy too far.
Only he had convinced her to use her mouth, and she had enjoyed it more than she had thought she would. Although he appeared to hold the power—and indeed he held her hair and made use of her—she had been the one to dictate his pleasure. It had been her actions that had made his eyes roll back in his head and his jaw drop and his seed to spill.
But in the end, they had never gone beyond that; he had never used his mouth on her, and she had never asked him to.
But with Oliver, it felt different. With Oliver, everything felt different.
“I want you to use your mouth,” she said.
“Have you ever had this before?” he asked. She shook her head. “Then I will do my best to please you. Guide me if I do it wrong.”
He brought his lips between her legs and licked.
