“Spread your legs.”
She parted her thighs, spreading her legs wide, for his bed was not narrow, and he fastened each ankle to the posts at the end. He straightened, looking at her as he held the last neckcloth. She was like some feast for a god. Her body pink and white against the green and brown of his coverlet, her hair long and silky, spread upon his pillow.
Her eyes were not afraid, but they were wide.
He walked to the head of the bed, drawing the neckcloth through his fingers. “And now I blindfold you.”
TEMPERANCE WATCHED AS Caire bent over her with the neckcloth. His face was grave, his sensuous lips drawn tight with strain, and his sapphire eyes had darkened to near black. She knew she should feel fear, but all she felt was anticipation.
Exquisite anticipation.
He placed the soft folds of linen over her eyes, and all was black. She listened to the sound of her own breathing, louder somehow, as she felt him tie the neckcloth firmly. His hands left her and she cocked her head, listening for his movement. He had paced around the bed, she thought, near the foot, but he stopped. She nervously fingered the carving at the head of the bed. What was he doing? What did he wait for? Her thighs were parted widely, air cooling her most intimate flesh.
“You are so lovely.” His deep voice was near her left side and she started.
“Shhh,” he murmured, and she felt something—a fingertip?—on her left shoulder. The touch was so light she wasn’t even sure it was there.
“Your skin is like silken velvet,” he said, close to her ear. His fingertip skimmed down to her breast, slowly circling. “A pearly pink, so fine, so sweet.”
He withdrew his fingertip from her skin, and for a moment she was untouched.
Something wet touched her nipple.
She inhaled at the suddenness. It was his tongue, it must be, but it was the only part of him that touched her. He circled her nipple and then closed his mouth about it, suckling. Shivers of sparkling sensation ran from her nipple straight to her center. She squirmed without conscious thought, but the binds at her wrists and ankles kept her from moving much. She must simply wait and submit to his attentions. Submit to what he wished to do next.
Was this the allure, then? This helpless wanting, this anxious anticipation?
He let go of her nipple suddenly, and she felt cool air blow against her damp skin. She shivered, both nipples now at a peak.
“So sweet,” he whispered, and she felt his breath against her belly.
The bed depressed between her spread feet, and she realized he must be down there, sitting or lying, so close to where she was embarrassingly wet. There was a moment of silence, and she imagined him simply looking at her, exposed and waiting.
She grew wetter.
“I wonder”—his fingertip landed lightly just behind her right knee—“are you sweet everywhere?”
She caught her breath as his touch wandered up her thigh, delicately, seemingly in no hurry.
“Shall I taste?” he asked idly.
She bit her lip, trying to catch her breath, though she made no exertion.
“Temperance?” he asked, his voice deep. “Shall I?”
Dear Lord, if the cloth wasn’t over her eyes already, she would’ve hidden her face. He wanted her to ask for it.
“Perhaps here,” he whispered as he grazed her inner lips with one finger. “Or maybe here?” He circled her clitoris.
“Please,” she choked.
“I’m sorry?” he asked politely, his finger still lightly—too lightly—touching. “Did you say something?”
“Please taste me,” she gasped.
“Certainly. Whatever you wish.”
And she felt his tongue, wet and sure and, thank God, so firm. He licked her in strong strokes. He missed no part of her, thoroughly laving her quivering, sensitive flesh. When he at last got to her clitoris and bore down on it with the flat of his tongue, she went a little mad. She twisted in her bonds, panting and muttering who knew what, feeling the warmth building inside of her until it turned liquid and ran all through her veins. She arched, pressing her pelvis into his face shamelessly, seeking more, and he gave it, thrusting two fingers into her as his tongue rapidly flicked over her peak.
She’d had enough—she was done—but he would not retire. He brought that tiny bit of flesh into his mouth and sucked and sucked until she wailed her surrender, her body concussing with the explosions of her pleasure.
She was weak and warm and still tied open for his desire.
“I think,” he said, his voice husky and low as it blew across her wetness, “I think you may be ready for me now.”
He lifted from her and then she felt the brush of his breeches on her inner thighs, the weight of his body, and the probe of his penis. It was smooth and hard at her entrance. He swirled it against her moisture and then with one quick thrust seated himself within her. She felt the depression of the mattress on either side of her shoulders, as if he held his upper body up off her with his arms. Then his mouth was against her left nipple as he set a leisurely pace. He thrust and withdrew firmly, but without any haste, as if he had all the time in the world. As if she were his private plaything that he might amuse himself with for as long as he wished.
He tongued her nipple, then moved to the other, his penis moving in and out of her without pause. It was maddening. She tried to thrust up, but the bonds prevented her.
“Please,” she whimpered.
“What is it?” he whispered like some devil in her ear.
“Please.”
“Tell me.” He kissed her ear.
“Harder.”
There was a split second’s pause and then a low, muttered curse. He hitched himself up her and slammed himself into her as if he’d lost all control. Fast and hard, as she’d asked, and it was pure bliss. White light burst behind her eyelids, hot and blinding, and she would have cried out had he not covered her mouth with his. He kissed her deeply as he continued to pound into her, taking his pleasure on her helpless body.
And when he jerked and broke their kiss, rubbing his face into her neck, she knew he’d found his bliss as well. He thrust once more, and again, and then his entire weight slumped against her.
For a moment they lay like that, and then the neckcloth was removed from her face. She blinked up into his sapphire eyes.
“Now will you tell me what the matter is?” he asked.
MAKING LOVE TO Temperance like this had been like a dream come true. But there had been something missing. Something small, nagging at the back of his brain, and the moment Lazarus took the neckcloth off her face, he knew what it was: Temperance’s eyes. He’d wanted to see the golden stars in her eyes as they made love. And he’d wanted for her to see his eyes.
To see him.
Those extraordinary gilded eyes shifted away from his gaze now. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He should’ve felt anger at her obvious prevarication, but instead tenderness flooded him. He pushed the hair back from her face. “Cut line, Temperance. Tell me.”
She pulled at the bonds on her wrists. “Untie me.”
He nuzzled her cheek. “Not until you tell me.”
She closed her eyes and whispered, “Mary Hope, the baby I brought home that first night we met, is dying.”
Relief was a liquid lightness in his chest. She’d told him; she’d let him in a little. “I’m sorry.”
“She’s so small, so weak. I should’ve known she would not make it. But then she rallied for a bit and I hoped…”
He was silent, absorbing her pain.
She sobbed and shook her head. “She’s dying there at the home. I couldn’t bear to watch her struggle to breathe, so I left Nell to nurse her.”
“It’s all right.” He lifted his head to look at her. “You bear so much already.”
“No.” She grimaced, as if in physical pain. “I don’t bear enough. Winter collapsed this morning. The home is killing him, I fear. I should never have left there today. I should never have come here.”
“No, you probably shouldn’t have left, but everyone needs a rest sometime. Don’t worry yourself so.”
She merely shook her head.
He kissed her forehead, thinking. An uneasy emotion he couldn’t quite identify was growing in his chest. “That home is like a prison for you.”
Her eyes flew open. “What?”
He reached to work at the ties at her wrists. “I’ve wondered for some time why you insist on working there. Do you like it? Do you enjoy the work?”
“The children—”
“The work is no doubt very admirable,” he said. “But do you enjoy it?”
She didn’t reply and he looked down at her. She was staring at him wide-eyed. He’d succeeded in shocking her into silence, it seemed.
“Do you like it?” he asked again gently.
“Liking has nothing to do with it.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“No. No, of course not. The home is a charity. One doesn’t have to enjoy charity.”
He half smiled. “Then there is no shame in admitting you don’t like it.”
“I’ve never thought about it one way or the other. I like the children, naturally, and I do sometimes feel satisfied when we place one in a good position. I must enjoy it, mustn’t I? I’d be a monster if I didn’t.” She appealed to him, as if she couldn’t answer the question herself.
He shrugged. “It’s neither good nor bad—how you feel about the home and working there—it just is.”
“Well, then, of course I—”
“No,” he said sternly. “Tell me without lies or evasions.”
“I don’t lie!”
He smiled at her affectionately. “Oh, my little martyr, you lie every day, to yourself, I fear, most of all.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she whispered.
“Don’t you?” He gave up on the bindings for the moment; she seemed comfortable enough anyway. “You refuse to admit love for Mary Whitsun or even tiny Mary Hope—I’ve seen you refuse to touch the baby. You hold yourself back, deny yourself pleasure—unless pressed. You make yourself work at a hopeless job that is killing you, and all for some ridiculous sense of unworthiness. You are the most saintly woman I know, and yet you think yourself a sinner.”
Abruptly, white lines appeared around her mouth.
“Don’t you…” She gasped for breath. “Don’t you dare tell me I’m saintly. That I don’t know what sin is.”
She was truly angry; he could see that. She yanked wildly at her bonds.
“Explain,” he demanded.
“Let me go!”
“No.”
“You don’t know me!” she screamed. Her mouth was wide, and tears had started at her eyes. “I’m not good; I’m not a saint. I need to work at the home.”
He pressed his nose to hers. “Why?”
“Because it’s a good and true thing to do. It doesn’t matter a whit how I feel about it.”
“You’re doing penance, aren’t you?” he whispered.
She shook her head, red-faced, the tears running into her tangled hair. “I don’t deserve—”
He leaned close, capturing her face between his palms. “Tell me.”
She gasped, closing her eyes. “When my husband died… when Benjamin died…”
He waited patiently as she sobbed. He’d known that something was here. Had she not loved her husband? Perhaps even wished him dead? He was prepared for such mundane confessions, but not the one that came from her mouth.
“I was with another man.”
He blinked, so startled that he let her go. “Truly?”
She nodded jerkily. “He was… Well, it doesn’t matter who he was, but I let myself be seduced by him. I was at his rooms, with him carnally, at the exact moment Benjamin was run down by a brewer’s cart. I came home, trying to decide how I would keep my sin from him, and he was dead.” Her eyes suddenly flew open. “He was dead.”