She stared at him—indeed, she didn’t dare glance away. Jude looked as dangerous and as sharp as the knife he held. Reaching behind her, she untied the bows, one after the other, that held up her petticoats. Then she hesitated.
Without them, she would be clad in her corset and chemise, her drawers, her garters, her stockings, and her shoes. She would be covered, yet…she would feel nude. Why that bothered her, she didn’t know. Only a day ago she’d been naked atop him, riding him as if he were a stallion, using his body in every way she could imagine. Doing what she wanted. But to disrobe there, now, stripping deliberately for him under his command, knowing what he ultimately would demand…somehow that was different.
He had no patience with her qualms. With brusque impatience, he reached for the gown and the petticoats.
With a rustle of starch and cambric, she dropped them into a rich pool of blue velvet and white lace.
He stared at her body, stared with a hunger so stark and fierce she felt like Aphrodite rising from a pool. There were only the two of them united in silence and precarious intimacy. Caroline didn’t hear Daisy humming as she thrust the bed warmer between the sheets, didn’t know anything beyond the world of Jude and Caroline. With audacious boldness, she slid her hands down the sides of her corset to her hips, outlining her curves for Jude.
She heard the hard pull of his breath. With the toe of his boot, he hooked the gown and the petticoats and dragged them toward him.
She stepped free.
He examined the swell of her breasts over the top of her corset, the lace trim on her chemise, her cambric unmentionables. The silence between them pulsed like a living being while she waited, trembling, for his next command—
When across the screen, Daisy’s cheerful voice said, “So, Miss Ritter, I’ll come and take yer clothes, then.”
Caroline jumped. She looked between Jude and the gap that opened into the bedchamber. Escape! Without volition, her muscles bunched to run.
“Send her away.” His voice barely reached Caroline’s ears.
She shook her head.
He smiled, but he wasn’t in any way amused. His eyes were cold, fixed on her, determined to bend her to his will, and the knife made a lazy arc in the air before he caught it again. “Send her away.” His voice was a rasp and a threat.
“Miss?” Daisy called.
This was not the fop. Not the tender kisser. Not the amusing companion. This man commanded his world—and Caroline had tied his hands and used him. If she didn’t do as he bid now, he would come for her another time, and she would never know when or how he would take his revenge. Her courage failed her…or perhaps her passion overcame prudence. “D…daisy?” Caroline kept her gazed fixed on that wicked blade. “You may go. I can finish by myself.”
“Oh, Miss, you don’t want to do that. You’re tired.” Daisy bustled toward the screen. “Let me assist you.”
“No!” Caroline snapped. Gathering her composure, in a determinedly normal tone, she said, “No. Truly. I want to be alone. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Aye, Miss, in the morning,” Daisy said, her tone puzzled.
Caroline stared stiffly at Jude until the door closed behind her maid. “What are you doing here?” she asked in a whisper. “How did you get in?”
“Take off your clothes.” It was not a request; nor was it an answer. “Take them off until I tell you to stop.”
“Why would I do that?” She toyed with the lace at her bosom.
“Because you don’t have a choice. If you don’t, I won’t give you what you want.”
“And what, good sir, is that?” The heat of his gaze made a sheen of perspiration break out all over her body.
“Me.” The knife started its casual arcs in the air again. “You came tonight. When I was under your skirt, licking you, you came against my tongue. I tasted it, felt it, heard the noises you made.”
She couldn’t believe he would speak aloud of an event that caused her such mortification…and such satisfaction. Every nerve leaped to arousal. “Shut up.”
He paid no heed to her words, but watched her expression like a lion on the prowl. “But that wasn’t enough. You want me to take you, to make you come again and again. You want the stroke of my cock inside you, probing deep, touching your womb, sliding out—”
“Stop.” Her nipples were so hard they chafed against her corset. Her legs trembled. Deep inside, she ached with need.
“Take off your clothes.”
“What? No.” She put her hands on her hips, but thought that pose looked provocative. She put them on her stomach, then let them dangle…when had her own hands become objects that could so easily provoke a man? “Do you think you can sit there and demand whatever you want?”
“Strip slowly,” he whispered, his voice rasping along her nerves. “Seduce me.”
“I don’t want to.” She wiped her palms down the cambric legs of her drawers.
“Tonight isn’t about what you want. Tonight is about what I want.” He chuckled with moody amusement. “Strip…slowly.”
She stood there in the dim little corner of the room. She was too warm. She was nervous. She breathed in short pants. She wanted to run away almost as much as she wanted to stay. And in some primal corner of her mind, she knew if she did run, he would spring after her, chase her, catch her…and that aroused her past bearing. This should have been her worst nightmare. Instead it was an opulent dream that existed in a secret corner of her mind—and Jude had discovered it. Jude was making it come true.
She didn’t know where to start. Her corset was pink, laced at the back, and very useful in keeping her upright. Her drawers covered her legs and, more important, the feminine mound between them. She could take off her shoes…
“Start with”—he used the tip of the knife to point—“those.”
Her drawers. “But then I’ll be…”
“Revealed. Yes. I want to see your legs. I’ve been thinking about them, how I want to cup your thighs in my hands and spread them, step between them and glide inside you…”
For a single heartbeat, she envisioned that—and capitulated. One by one, she stepped out of her heeled shoes. With clumsy fingers, she untied her drawers and slid them slowly down her legs. Her legs, bare and so long. Too long, she’d always thought. Her stockings were tied with a garter at the knee, a pretty garter in shades of blue. Caroline remembered asking Daisy what difference it made if her garters matched her dress, for no one was going to see them. And Daisy said, “Now Miss Ritter, when ye’re pretty all over, you’re cheerier, that’s all.”
Cheery, Caroline decided, was the wrong word entirely. She was not cheery, especially as she slowly straightened, sliding her hands up her own legs and cupping them over her exposed mound.
She didn’t dare look up, but she could feel the strength and the power of Jude’s gaze on her.
“Take down your hair.”
To take down her hair would require that she lift her arms and display herself, all her long length, to him. She didn’t think she could do it.
“Take it down,” he said, before she could shake her head. “I want to hold the silkiness in my hands when I’m inside you.”
She wanted that, too. He painted pictures in her mind, each one more graphic and glorious than the last. Yearning weighed on her like a lover until she was desperate and embarrassed and aching with desire.
But it took all her nerve to lift her hands away from her body and up to her head.
Jude flinched as she did, as if the sight lashed at him.
While he sprawled in the chair watching like a sultan entertained by his dancing girl, Caroline removed each pin from her hair and one by one dropped them on the floor. As she did, her gaze lowered to his lap.
His manhood strained at the buttons of his trousers.
She thought she was discreet, but he chuckled, a noise so rough it almost sounded like anguish. “Yes,” he said, “I’m so damned desperate I could take you here and now right on
the floor.”
“And why don’t you?” she dared.
He half rose in his chair, the knife clutched in his grip.
Her eyes widened, her heart thumped.
Then he subsided. “No, you shan’t taunt me into taking you. This time, you’re performing on my command. Finish taking down your hair.”
So he balanced on the edge of passion. One move on her part could move him to action.
As she pulled the last pin, the strands slipped into her cupped hands and she brought the shining mass over her shoulder. Releasing it, she let it tumble over her bosom in perfumed profusion. She tossed her head. The chestnut curls danced across the pale skin of her bare chest. She leaned down to put on her shoes, and as she did her breasts slid free from the support of her corset. Her chemise scarcely covered her nipples, and she heard the rough intake of his breath. She straightened, taller in her heels and feeling oddly victorious. With her foot, she pushed her gown aside and stepped between his knees. Grasping his shirt near his waist, she pulled the tails free of his trousers. “Let me…” she whispered.
He lifted his arms, and she pulled the fine linen off over his head, leaving his chest bare. The bullet scars were round and red, breaking the symmetry of the muscles. Yet the scars lent him a toughness that put her on notice; this man could rescue her when she faced peril…then place her in peril with a single triumphant smile.
She held her hands an inch above his arms, not yet daring to contact his skin, yet she felt his warmth. She rubbed her palms up and down above his skin, and it was as if sparks arced between them. She didn’t have to touch him. The connection was there. His flesh drew her like a magnet. In a bold rush, she pressed her hand to his chest and felt the desperate rhythm of his heart. She flirted with her eyes—ah, the old skills returned so easily—and said, “How much longer do you think you can hold out?” She smiled a languorous smile that derided his self-discipline.
“You don’t understand the forces with which you’re playing.” He slowly came to his feet. “But it’s too late. You’re going to find out.”
She stepped back once, twice, half-laughing, half-frightened.
He thrust the point of the knife deeply into the wood of the table, and the haft quivered there. He stalked after her. Each footstep sounded heavily. He stared at her. His gaze scorched her. She felt like…like a lioness teasing her mate, knowing full well what the result would be. He would take her like the animal he was, and her desires would be satisfied at last. And in the end, that was all that mattered now. To be joined, to be filled, no matter what the consequences, pleasure…or pain.
Briefly reason surfaced in her mind. She wanted him too much. She felt too much for him. When they parted, there would be pain.
Then he reached for her.
Excitement vanished in a surge of good sense. She whirled to run. He sprang after her. Her shoes clattered on the floor. She stretched out her hand to touch the door…but before she could, he caught her around the waist. He held her against him, her back to his front, and she could feel the prod of his member against her bottom, the heat of his bare chest against her back. She stood docilely within his embrace, breathing as hard as if she’d run a mile, and she waited.
“What do you want?” he murmured in her ear.
“You,” she whispered. “Now.”
“That’s the right answer.” Going to the door, he turned the key and locked the door.
When he looked back at her, she trembled. He’d lost all the appearance of a dilettante; instead, he was steely, serious, frightening in his intensity. Coming back to her, he walked her toward her dressing table. A lace runner draped it. Her brushes were carefully arranged. Her reticule remained where she’d tossed it.
With a sweep of his arm, he pushed everything off onto the floor. “Bend over,” he said. “Brace your arms on the table.”
“But—”
“What?”
But there was a terrible vulnerability to such a position. Except for her stockings, she was naked from the waist down. To bend over in such a manner would leave her so exposed…
“Do you want me to love you?” Jude’s voice was deeply stern and inexplicably tender.
“God, yes.” She looked into the mirror at the man behind her.
The flickering of the fire burnished his brown hair with gold. His eyes were shadowed with darkness. His face was strong and austere. Never had she been so aware of his height. He towered above her, a mountain of a man, unyielding and eternal. His chest was carved marble, a sculptor’s dream, and his hands…he placed his hands on her bare shoulders, and they were big and capable. He slid his palms down her arms, wove their fingers together, and wrapped her in an embrace. He looked into the mirror at them, and with a smile he leaned down to bestow a kiss on her shoulder.
It was only a kiss, and only on her shoulder, but the touch of his lips was exactly what she wanted. How had he known?
Then he lifted his head. He took his hands away. “Lean down.”
In the mirror, she saw danger and passion.
She feared his danger, but she wanted his passion.
She rested her palms on the dressing table.
“All the way over.” He would not yield.
She kept her gaze fixed to his as she glided her hands across the polished surface. Lower and lower she bent, but she must not have obeyed quickly enough, for he placed his hand in the middle of her back and urged her the rest of the way down.
Now it was as she feared. She was exposed to him. He could touch her, gaze at her, in any way he wished. It was a yielding of self such as she’d never imagined.
“Look at you,” he commanded.
She stared into the mirror. Her hair tumbled around her shoulders in wanton disarray. Her skin shone smooth and golden on her shoulders and her chest. As she shifted, her chemise teased at her breasts, displaying the swell of one, then the nipple of the other. Her lips were full and red; her cheeks were flushed peach. And her eyes…her eyes were shadowed with mystery and slumberous with pleasure. For the first time she saw herself as Jude saw her: beautiful, wanton, and passionate.
“Look at us,” he said.
He stood behind her, looking into the mirror, into her eyes. He was handsome in the sunlight, but he came alive in the light of flame. Each flicker of the fire bathed him in a sinister warmth that beckoned until all she craved was to do his bidding. He stood right behind her, his trousers brushing the backs of her legs, and when she stood on her toes, when she moved just right, she felt his engorged organ press exactly where she wanted it.
And she realized—they could make love like this, standing up, looking into the mirror, moving together in an odd, backward dance…and she wanted it. “Please,” she whispered. “I’ll die if you don’t make love to me soon.”
“You’ll die when I do.” He caressed her bottom, lingering as if the touch of her skin gave him pleasure.
“Wh…what do you mean?”
“Doesn’t your heart stop when you come? Doesn’t your breath cease? Is there thought in your mind, can you see, can you hear? It’s the little death, and we’re going to find it in each other tonight.” He explored her, brushing the hair, stroking up and down her slit, then gently opening her. “Many, many times.”
She whimpered from the pleasure of his touch, and whimpered more at the thought of the long hours of ecstasy. She stretched like a cat, arching her back as she tried to get close to his manhood.
It didn’t work.
“Open your legs just a little,” he whispered roughly, and when she did, he stood looking down at her most private parts.
She didn’t want to be embarrassed, but she was, and a flush spread over her chest, her shoulders, and flooded her face with heat.
“You’re beautiful, a goddess I must worship. You leave me no choice.” His finger sank into her. “I could get lost inside you and never return.”
She groaned with the bliss. Connection at last. As long as he did this for her, she could forgiv
e him for teasing her at the opera during the first act. She could forget her shock when he slid under her skirt, put his mouth on her, and forced her to unforgettable ecstasy. She could embrace his despotism now.
He drew out his finger, damp from her desire, and used it to intimately circle her. He used his thumb to capture her feminine bud, then moving up and down, stroking it with leisure confidence that made her breath catch. She quivered on the edge of orgasm, almost there, so close…
His hands left her.
On the table, her hands clenched into fists. Her muscles tensed so desperately tight her shoulders trembled. “Please…”
“Yes.” In a flurry of activity, he loosened his trousers and rid himself of them. Again he stepped up behind her, his bare legs against her bare legs, his cock brushing her bottom. “Now.”
To line up their bodies, he bent his knees, and when he placed the head at the opening of her body, she jumped. It was an illusion, of course, but his heat was so intense she felt as if she’d been branded.
He worked his cock into her so…slowly. It was as if he were testing her, relishing every inch, taking the time to experience the friction. He wore a slight, anticipatory smile. That would have made her nervous, except that the feeling of having him inside her was an overindulgence past bearing. She could think of nothing else. He filled her. Inside her, the muscles clenched, trying to keep him inside, trying to hold him out. She found herself suspending her breath in anticipation as he slid closer, farther, grew larger. My God, so much larger. The sensation of satiation hovered just on the edge of pain…or was it pleasure? She couldn’t tell. Again she sensed it in her mind and in her body; he branded her with his fire, and she would never be the same.
At last he touched the center of her, a firm contact that sent heat streaking along her nerves. She groaned, a heavy, desperate sound and pressed her bottom against him, seeking that magic stroke that would give her relief.
Instead he slid back, a slow withdrawal.
Her fingernails scraped on the wood.
He eased out so far he almost left her body.
She nipped her thighs together, trying to keep him inside.