She kept contact with his incredible eyes. “After Kenny is free. Or if—” She rolled her lips in. “Or if he isn’t.”
“Are you asking what will happen between the two of us in that case?”
“Yes.”
He studied her. Then leaned forward and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers curling around the lobe. “That too will be your choice. I make no promises. I can’t. But I will not intentionally hurt you. To some, virginity is a sacred thing. For my own reasons I do not find it such. I value much more the choices one makes than the actual state of one’s chastity.”
“You have slept with so many?”
His eyes darkened. “Not so many as I see reflected in your gaze. While I find the pleasure usually to my taste, it takes much for me to find a partner that invokes it.”
“Then Carla?” She had been wanting to ask that question for weeks.
He looked amused. “Your maid? No, not to my taste at all.”
She thought of the pleasured noise the maid had made. The abundance of information he had gleaned.
“Ah, but you don’t believe me.” He tipped her chin up. “There is no way for me to prove it, and little reason for me to try at this stage. But I did challenge you to try and read me. And you were doing remarkably well.”
She looked in his eyes. Read the fire and truth there.
“The end of this endeavor may be a slippery thing. But the challenge will remain.”
His lips touched hers, just a fleeting touch.
“Do you continue to accept it?”
“Yes,” she whispered. Confused and warm. She wanted to understand him. She wanted the comfort and security she felt in his presence. She wanted him.
She just had to give up the control. Such a minor thing. Such a major thing.
He divested them both of their clothes quickly and pushed her against the wooden support of the four poster. Rocked her into it, teased her against it.
He took control just as he had before. Every time. Teasing and taunting her. Pulling her strings tight. Demanding her response. Responses her body was more than happy to give.
He laid her on the bed and connected them fully.
“What do you see in my eyes now, Marietta?” He pushed into her slowly. She could barely think straight. Could barely keep her eyes open and focused.
“What do you see, Marietta? Come, don’t make me punish you.” He withdrew so that just the tip of him was encased, making slow circles at her entrance, her hands bunching the sheets beneath to keep from hugging him and forcing him back inside.
“I want to know what those lovely brown eyes see.” He made a quick stab, only halfway in, and her breath caught, a gurgle escaping her throat. “Tell me, Marietta, come on, lovely one,” he coaxed.
What was he trying to get her to say? She’d tell him anything at this point!
He thrust all the way in, pushing her up the sheets, and her entire body moaned. Her hand wound around his neck, into the silky dark hair at his nape. He stopped moving, another form of torture. She tried to move beneath him, but he had her pinned below. He was leaning fully on his hands, the muscles in his arms bunched and tight, so the top half of her was free, but the pivotal point for her to move below was in his total control.
She squeezed him inside, desperately trying anything, intuitively doing the only thing left that she could. He went totally still. She squeezed him again, and a third time, the squeezes getting weaker but her desperation growing—hoping that they would make him lose control and move again.
He leaned down and chuckled in her ear, his hips rotating and making her forget to squeeze. “You are a naughty woman, Marietta Winters. I think your naughtiness should be rewarded. But first you have to answer my question.”
He thrust deeply again. Darkness covered her vision for a moment, her mouth opened in a silent scream. He pulled back so that he was almost out. An ache throbbed through her so intensely that she nearly begged for him to end it. To continue it. To give her more.
A tongue swiped her nipple. His roughened cheek grazed her throat, her cheek, as his lips trailed across her and settled on her open mouth. She kissed him, pulling him against her, her hands still wrapped in the hair at his nape. His tongue invaded her mouth and claimed her. He slipped a little farther inside her from the movement and she tried to squeeze him again.
His mouth pulled away from hers and she found herself looking into brilliant green eyes, brighter than she’d ever seen them, almost too bright to look at, no more than a few inches above her own.
“I see desire.” She licked her lips, the taste of him all over her. “And secrets still beyond my understanding.”
