Ralston’s muscles ached as he stood, expectant and waiting. Anticipating what she would want of him next. It was a delicious feeling. Dark and difficult and so full of poignant possibility.
He wanted to say something, but there were no words.
He wanted to reach for her, pull her against him. But his hands stayed behind his head.
“You want more, mon grand?” Her voice was husky and deep.
“Oui, Madame,” he graveled.
He saw just a hint of a smile at the corner of her mouth before she stepped back, removing her warmth and her touch.
He nearly stepped toward her, instinct urging him to reclaim her closeness.
“Lower your gaze.”
He did so immediately. “Oui, Madame.” The words barely managed to form past his clenched jaw.
“I want to give you more,” she murmured quietly, intimately.
A shiver danced over his skin as he realized her French accent had all but vanished. It was Miss Dickson who spoke.When he flicked his eyes upward just enough to see her hands at her sides, he saw how her fingers curled into her palms, as though she were resisting something inside her.
He almost broke position then. Almost looked into her face. Almost reached for her.
“I shouldn’t,” she whispered as she took another step back. Then another, as she started to merge with the shadows that reached from the edges of the room.
“Why?” He risked the question, knowing it could push her further away, knowing it could bring everything to an abrupt halt.
“This isn’t what I came here for.”
She sounded oddly uncertain. Not at all what he’d become accustomed to in this room. It was not even the bold insolence he’d come to expect from the Miss Dickson he’d encountered in society.
In a moment, she would be gone. And he wasn’t certain she’d return.
He looked up met her wide and expressive gaze. “Don’t leave.” His single firm command, spoken sharply with a hint of the panic rising in his chest, brought her to a brief halt.
Then she tensed. Her eyes flashed.
“You forget yourself. I give the commands in this room.”
His heart thudded against his ribs.
Then command me to touch you! Command me to take you.
The words shouted through his mind, but aloud, he muttered only, “Oui, Madame.”
“On your knees.”
He lowered himself immediately.
“Hands to your thighs.”
“Oui, Madame.”
She said nothing about lowering his gaze so he continued to stare at her standing half in shadow, half poised to flee, willingher with his stare to stay with him. If he’d been allowed to speak freely in that moment, he’d have asked her to remove her mask, to be with him as herself, to return to his home where he could bring her to his bedroom and do all the things he could imagine to bring her pleasure and earn her praise.
“This can go no further.”
Ralston tensed as a growl rose in his throat. “Was this always your intention?” he asked gruffly. “To inspire…this wicked hunger inside me and then desert me to the aching pain of going unfulfilled?”
