Black Silk (7 page)
“But you want to, don’t you?”
How she did.
Magic coursed through her skin, a spell of desire cast by his powerful fingers crooking into her wet cunny, by his harsh, heated breath coasting over her neck.
“If you came here seeking Georgiana, you are a woman who doesn’t fear risk. Yet you are too shy to have a man watch us.”
She froze. Did her every action reveal her character? He was still trying to decipher her identity, she was certain of it. Why? Why couldn’t he just discount her as another lightskirt?
Because she wasn’t behaving like a lightskirt.
But even if Swansborough guessed she wasn’t a jade, he thought her a fearless rescuer—he’d never realize she was Maryanne Hamilton, shy and retiring bookworm.
“The only risk here,” he continued in a honeyed growl that spoke of sin and temptation, “is trust.”
Trust! She couldn’t trust him—he was a notorious rake, a man so thoroughly debauched it was rumored he had never spent a night alone. He couldn’t trust her, after all—he didn’t even know who she really was. And she’d already dropped him into trouble. Marcus would have Lord Swansborough’s ballocks if he learned she’d surrendered her virginity.
“You have the most luscious and tempting derriere.” Swansborough released her waist, grabbed the stays and dropped to his knees. The floor of the basket almost dropped out beneath her.
“What are you doing?”
Before her stomach stopped its flip-flops, she knew. A hot kiss teased the skin of her rump. Suspended in a balloon above Hyde Park, he kissed and licked the cheeks of her bottom.
“You must stop.” Though she wanted him to do this forever. “We’ll fall.”
The balloon dropped a little as if in answer.
He stopped his kiss long enough to promise, “We are perfectly balanced, love.”
She wished she could trust him on that. They rose again, and she went rigid. “How far will they let us go up?” With the startling view, she could see the threat of sunrise, the warm pink and gold of dawn just touching the horizon.
Dawn. She would have to get home. Someone might come into her bedchamber and discover she had disappeared for the night.
But she hadn’t found Georgiana. She couldn’t flee yet.
She was high in the air in a balloon with Lord Swansborough. She couldn’t flee at all.
She should stop him, but what did it matter now? Her barrier was broken and couldn’t be mended.
“I’ve no idea how far they will let us go.” Hot, solid, lean, and long limbed, his body pressed along hers as he stood again. He used the fire to heat the air again, and they rose. Just as her heart lurched up with the balloon, his hand slid between their bodies. Something hot and hard bumped her bottom. His cock. She arched back, stroking her warm, naked rump against his length.
His hand moved between her thighs, parting her hot nether lips. She was soaked still from their lovemaking, bubbling with her creamy juices and his.
“I’m going to slide my cock into your snug cunny.”
“But is this the correct…position?”
“Ah, love, would you be willing to move into another one?”
He was laughing at her, but she couldn’t resist joining him. “No.”
Thick, hot, his cock slid between her legs, and she choked on her laugh. Good lord, he was enormous. He sawed the massive thing between her thighs, the broad head nosing through the lips, the shaft rubbing her aroused clit.
“Go inside me,” she whispered. “I need you inside.”
“Yes,” he groaned.
In a burst of bravery, she let go of the basket and guided his cock into her. Her fingers barely closed around the full shaft, and with a whimper, she stirred her passage with the head. She took charge, tipped her hips, and took him in. How she loved this, the first slow thrusts. His body, controlled and graceful, arched forward. She moved back, seeking his rhythm, moving slowly and carefully. She was slick now, opening so easily for him, welcoming his cock inside.
She clutched the basket again and it jostled as he pumped into her. Fear lurched inside her, but she was hot and wet and loving this so.
Madness! Delirious madness.
His groin smacked against her bottom; the head of his cock bumped her womb. Her cheeks vibrated with each slam of his lean hips. Pleasure rippled through her from each thump, and she thrust back as hard as he pounded forward. The basket rocked precariously, and shouts below warned that the men had to strain to hold the ropes—he’d forgotten to control the balloon.
She didn’t care.
Never had she imagined anything like this.
This was soaring.
Powerful strokes lifted her onto her tiptoes as he thrust his cock deep inside her. Expertly he shifted his hips on each plunge, changing angle, making her gasp as fire-hot delight roared through her.
Her clit ached like a slippery trigger. Did she dare—?
It meant trusting him completely, for she wasn’t holding on, but she unfurled her fingers from the braided wicker rim. She touched her clit—just as his fingers slid there.
“Yes,” he groaned. “Let me hold you while you play with yourself.”
His hoarse command sent a spike of delicious agony through her legs as she stroked her own clit. Gently at first, to draw out the exquisite pleasure. Her hand between her thighs made him pant hard as he watched her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him open the vent, controlling the balloon while making love to her.
She arched her rear back, wild and wanton. She had to widen her legs to push back against his hard, incredible power.
Oh, heavens, it made him go so deep.
“Rub yourself now, sweetheart. I want to feel you come around my prick.”
Men were blunt and forthright while they fucked. It was just as her courtesan authors’ books described. Men didn’t waste time making pretty claims of love; they gave directions to their women on how to be erotic and enticing.
What would he think if she did such a thing? “Touch me, too,” she whispered. “I want you to touch my clit.”
“God—” He groaned sharply. His long fingers nudged hers aside, his touch so different than hers. The feel of his hands there was pleasure unsurpassed.
“Harder,” she directed. “I like that.”
“As do I.” His hips sped up again, and his fingers rasped her, igniting pleasure. Blending strokes—the wild thrusts of his big cock; the slow, sensuous touch of his fingers. Tension wound in her, and she sought it, grinding clit against fingers and derriere against hard, male abdomen.
“Come now,” he murmured in a hoarse baritone that excited as much as his touch. “Come for me.”
He was close—she knew that in the tightness of his voice. He wanted her to climax first; he was holding on to his control to please her. She was making it impossible for him to hold on.
The thought of that—
With him—
She rubbed hard against his hand, and pleasure burst inside. Her cunny clenched around him, pulsating. Her eyes closed as she tumbled into delight. He knew, of course, and let go of the ropes to caress her sensitive breasts. Her nipples…oh, yes. He plucked them, and she arched.
“Be merciless,” Maryanne hissed, for it was so good.
He laughed, drawing his cock back, and he pumped again.
Her cries spilled out into the night sky and flew out over London. Her screams shattered the quiet of the park—below came male laughter, and then cheers.
She should be shocked. Embarrassed. But she was still rocking with her climax.
Dash knew he couldn’t last longer, and the basket jerked as he grabbed the stays again and braced to fuck hard. Verity was tight and wet and still coming around him, and her screams were loud enough to wake slumbering London.
Raucous shouts of congratulations came from below, but he ignored them. He never let another man’s chants urge him, affect him. This wasn’t a competition or sport, this was blessed heaven—he focused solely on fucking, and his reward was escape from pain.
Her bottom was slick with their sweat and juices. It would be rubbed raw from the rough hair on his groin, but she was urging him. “Hard and deep. Yes!”
One more…just once more and he could surrender.
“Oh!”
The signal he could let go. His orgasm exploded inside, ripping through his brain, shooting down his back, roaring from his balls. God, it took him so ferociously he almost stumbled. His eyes shut, his face contorted in agony, and his body bucked as his seed shot out.
Deep into his luscious Verity.
He felt the jerk of the basket, the fight of the balloon—it tossed them about.
He wrapped one arm tight around Verity and moved his hips back. On a flood of hot juices, his cock slid out.
“What is happening?”
“They are lowering us, love. We’ve completed the task.”
Even after two passionate climaxes, her mask was in place, keeping her a secret. She possessed an air of innocence—she was most definitely an ingenue but not untutored. And even the most willing virgin knew to barter that precious barrier.
So why had he never encountered her before?
Dash opened the vent, leaned over the edge of the basket, and saw the torches come closer. The basket shuddered, swayed, and his gut jerked with the motion. Christ Jesus, his head swam and began to pound again.
He had to stay focused. He had to discover who had been here. And he had to control the blasted balloon as they descended.
Verity was a warm bundle in the crook of his arm, her heartbeat pounding deliciously against his palm. Alive. Still recovering from the little death. Her scent was rich with sex aroma now, but he still caught the trace of demure lavender. A simple perfume, when most courtesans used exotic brews to entice.
He wanted to push everything aside and delve into the mystery of Verity.
He wanted to forget about that night when he had let his cousin Simon die—when he had been blind and soulless with rage and had let an innocent man die.
Dash saw the ring of men in torchlight and realized Verity was trying to smooth down her skirts. Beneath his hand, he felt her heart speed up; it was now fluttering inside her chest. She was truly frightened. Perhaps she feared the other men would want her now? If it frightened her, he wouldn’t allow it.
“Easy,” he murmured by her delicate ear. “I won’t let harm come to you.”
They were close enough to see the men’s laughing, leering faces. The gypsy’s face was like reflective bronze, dark eyes alight with admiration. “Congratulations, my lord. Madam. In truth I didn’t think it could be done.”
“Blast, you mean we’re the first?” Dash asked as young Tanner swung into the basket to replace him at the flame.
“Aye, that you are,” the balloon tender answered. “You and her ladyship”—he jerked his head toward Sophia, who sat in her carriage giggling with Ashton—“are well ahead of the pack.”
Dash stared thoughtfully at Ashton. Did the duke still hold a grudge over the time he’d shot Ashton’s leg in a duel? The duke looked interested mainly in nuzzling the swells of Sophia’s breasts.
“The blond courtesan—was she here?” he asked.
“No, my lord.”
Dash drew a bundle of notes from his pocket and allowed only the gypsy to see them. He eased them back into place. “I believe I am to receive a clue?”
With his arm around Verity’s waist, he lifted her out of the basket. Poor sweet—she held tight to the basket and gave a sigh of relief as her slippers touched earth. He took her hand and led her back toward his carriage. The gypsy, as he’d hoped, followed.
The other men restrained the balloon as Sophia swept down from her lover’s carriage to experience what had been Dash’s most unusual setting for lovemaking.
“Who employs you?” he asked the gypsy. “I want the name of the man who pays you and where he can be found.”
“Mr. Phibbs.” The gypsy rattled off an address in the City.
“What is he like, this Phibbs?”
“Slight and pale. Wears spectacles. A rabbit, milord.”
“So I expected. And who employs him?”
“I don’t know, milord. Not my business to know. And here is your clue, milord.”
As the card was thrust at his hand, Dash slipped a few notes to the gypsy. Tipping his cap, the swarthy man turned and sauntered back to the scene at the basket. Sophia was laughing with delight, lifting her skirts to climb aboard.
Verity was nibbling her lower lip. “She must be in trouble. Why else would she not be here?”
“Because she’s on her back with a lover? I’ve never known Georgiana Watson to claim a friend amongst the female sex. I wonder what exactly she had planned for you.”
“What do you mean?” Fire flashed in her eyes, dark and mysterious behind the mask.
He leaned close, wrapping himself in her scent—simple and pretty and combined with the earthy smell of sex. A feminine allure that provoked his libido, even in his sated, exhausted state.
A wave of his hand brought his carriage forward, horses snorting, traces ringing melodically as hooves clattered on gravel. Impulsively he tipped up Verity’s chin, held the point of it between thumb and forefinger. “Come home with me—for an hour or two. I don’t want our night to be over yet. I’ll tell you then.”
“R
emove your mask, love.” Lord Swansborough dropped his black tailcoat to the floor. His waistcoat followed.
Her mask! She didn’t dare take it off.
Maryanne took an unsteady breath, still shocked to look around and think
I am in his lordship’s bedchamber watching him undress….
What had she done?
She had agreed to come to his home. He had asked, his dark eyes had been so intense, and she had lost her head.
He wanted her to stay.
He could not bear to let her go.
She had thought those mad things and had said yes.
“Your mask,” he prompted as he pulled down his trousers. With a smile, he fell back on the bed and sprawled on his soft, white sheets. His long legs were splayed, the lightly tanned skin and dark hairs a startling contrast to the silky white. His hand lazily stroked his half-erect cock, his thick, dark curls. “No secrets between us, Verity.”
“But isn’t the truth dangerous, my lord?” She was stalling and let her gaze dart desperately around his room. Draped in soft velvet curtains of black tied with crimson ribbons, his bed looked as if it belonged to Lucifer. Thick crimson drapes hung at the windows. The firelight cast a cozy, reassuring glow and kept the room wonderfully warm, but she felt ice cold. He could, if he wished, tear off her mask. She would be unable to stop him.
“And you told me you weren’t dangerous,” he teased.
She turned away and almost collapsed. His room held a secretary, but instead of pens, a blotter, and correspondence, the ornate piece held coils of silken ropes, gleaming lengths of silver chains, and slender ivory rods very like the one he had used in her bottom.
Never would she dream of touching such intimate things, but it gave her an excuse to avoid his request. She strolled to the desk, though her legs trembled beneath her skirts. She picked up a length of black silk, obviously used to tie up one partner for carnal pleasures.
“All right. But you must close your eyes and allow me to prepare.”
“I trust you, sweet.”
She turned to find his eyes closed, and her heart dropped to her toes. How adorable he looked, lips curved in a smile, thick black lashes lying on his cheeks.
As soundlessly as she could, she approached, the length of black silk held taut between her hands. She held it over his lovely closed eyes. Heat flooded her at the result. At the black mask that highlighted his autocratic features and tempting mouth.
Her cunny grew wet and aching at the sight.
She lowered the cloth.
He jerked as the silk landed on his eyes, then lay still. Trusting. He laughed. “Clever woman. So you will remove your mask because you have blindfolded me.”
Maryanne nodded and then realized he could not see. “Yes.” Would he agree to it?
“Since you outwitted me, I have no choice but to acquiesce, love. But tell me, is your identity such a secret? You can trust my discretion.”
Yes, and she could also trust he would be shocked and horrified to learn whom he’d deflowered. He and Marcus were friends.
He levered up onto his arms, then sat up, and she had to scramble to keep the strip of silk in place. Would he trick her? She’d grown up with two sisters, after all—she knew to trust his honor but not to think him above deception.
A quick knot at the back within his raven hair secured the black silk blindfold. She held her hands an inch above his shoulders, moved to lower them, but stopped. Did she dare touch as she wanted to? Those shoulders made a straight line of smooth skin, tinted gold with firelight. Glinting light skimmed over fine hairs, bronzed skin.
Holding her breath, she touched her fingertips to the edges of his shoulders, touched hot, satiny skin. She had to stretch her arms wide to do it. Solid and powerful, his muscles flexed beneath her touch.
Flattening her hand, she coasted her hands down over the large muscles that defined the broad, tapering vee of his back. A jolt of sensual agony hit her belly, weakened her legs.
He groaned softly and half turned, so the light danced on his profile, made exotic by the blindfold. “What do you plan to do to me, my sweet?”
She crawled onto the bed, still wearing her rumpled gown. Tentatively she traced the line of his spine, down, down to the sweet hollow of his low back. Just before the tempting cheeks of his rump.
“I don’t know.” And she truly didn’t. “Doesn’t it make you nervous because you cannot see?”
“No, sweetheart. I can concentrate on everything else. The enticing pleasure of your warm, erotic touch. The scent of you—and I can still smell my scent on you, love.”
So could she. And it meant every breath aroused her.
“Mmmm.” He sighed. “And I love the sound of your breathing—how quick it became as you stroked down to my arse.”
Trembling, she touched down there again. Let her fingers dip into the valley of his bottom. A glance over his shoulders showed his cock slowly growing.
“Your mask, love. Our bargain was that you would take it off.”
“We didn’t actually make a
bargain
, my lord—”
“I thought we did.” He spoke with aristocratic command.
Hesitantly she reached for the ties behind her head. “And you will not remove yours.”
“On my honor.”
She dropped her mask into his outstretched right hand. He frowned. “So you do trust me, Verity?”
He was blindfolded. It gave her remarkable freedom. She would touch where she wished—explore his tight, hard buttocks or climb about and play with that intriguing cock and his furred balls. Strange that because he couldn’t see her, she felt so much more brave.
“Did you truly let a woman drip wax on your chest?”
He laughed and let her mask dangle from the strings. “Does all of England know that story?”
“But did you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Sweetheart, the very reason you are asking the question is the answer. It fascinates and frightens you, doesn’t it? You think it madness but it stirs you at the same time.”
“No, I simply think it madness.”
He twisted beneath her hands, caught hold of her arms, and tumbled her down to the bed. How he moved so quickly, she didn’t know, but he had her pinned. “Take off your gown, my love. Sleep with me.”
Sleep with him?
She couldn’t.
He rolled her onto her tummy. Heavenly to be caught between his hard, naked body and the soft, freshly scented sheets and mattress. Her lids flickered. She was indeed tired.
But she couldn’t fall asleep. She didn’t dare.
By feel, he was undoing the buttons of her gown, loosening it. He certainly had an adept touch with women’s clothing.
She couldn’t leave now, though. He might insist she used a carriage; and even if she summoned a hackney, how could she leave without revealing where she wanted to go? And she could hardly tell him she lived close enough to his house to walk!
Her corset dug into her, her gown an uncomfortable tangle of skirts and sleeves. It felt so good to help him to strip it off. Her fingers bumped his long, strong ones. He grinned at her, even though he couldn’t see.
“Too drunk and tired to get hard enough again,” he admitted.
A glance down showed his reluctant statement to be true. His shaft had softened, as if slumbering itself, lying along the sensuous join of thigh and groin.
He gave a yawn that made her giggle.
“But one last taste of your cunny before we sleep.”
Even though blindfolded, he parted her legs with an expert’s ease and bent to her quim. Perhaps he actually could see?
But he bumped his nose to her pubis and muttered, “Blast.”
Before she could let her nervous laugh escape, he lay between her thighs and kissed her vulva. His tongue slicked out.
She should try to escape.
Oh, but not now.
It astonished how quickly she relaxed beneath him. She knew to trust his touch, knew to let him pleasure her. But still, she did shift her hips just a bit…because she wanted that wet, firm tongue to hit just…
Oh, yes.
There….
She arched to him, lifting in the rhythm she wanted, and without even a word between them, he knew. He stroked her clit with his tongue.
Tension built, tightening her muscles. She gripped her breasts, hard, needing to squeeze, to roughly knead.
She pinched her nipples, pinched hard, pulled on them as his tongue licked her clit with hot, velvety strokes.
He stopped to promise, “I could do this for hours, love. Taste you. Enjoy you.”
Desire and panic exploded in her chest. That sounded like heaven. In her authors’ books, some gentlemen did not even do this to their ladies, preferring instead to have the women pleasure them with lips and tongue. Lord Swansborough appeared to take great pleasure in it. She felt him chuckle against her nether lips, and a blush hit her cheeks.
But she couldn’t stay in his bed for hours!
“Play with your breasts,” he urged. “Pleasure yourself.”
In the stories she read, jaded courtesans made knowing jokes about gentlemen who thrust their tongues in a lady’s passage and assumed it would make her come.
His lordship’s tongue filled her cunny, sliding inside. She gasped at the luscious sensation, the ripple against her snug walls.
She clutched silken sheets, dug her heels into the downy soft mattress. She met the thrusts of his tongue.
But the authors were correct—this was so wonderfully intimate, so deliciously good, but not quite—
He moved. His warm mouth covered her pulsing, swollen, eager clit. As his mouth suckled, his fingers slid inside. Two fingers opening to fill her passage. One finger gently teasing the puckered rim of her anus.
Her climax was a delicious wave of pleasure, like biting a chocolate to discover a sweet, melting, sticky filling. It was no sudden burst but just a gentle wash of delight.
She gasped with it. Cried out with it. Surrendered to it.
Her every muscle relaxed, and his bed felt like the balloon’s basket, dancing on soft currents of air. She closed her eyes, now immersed in the dark like he, reached for his soft hair, and filled her senses. Savored the silky beauty of his hair, the scent of his sweat and her juices, even the taste of her perspiration, salty drops on her upper lip.
“I do love a woman who doesn’t just lie there. Who makes demands and knows what she wants.”
That made her eyes open wide. She’d made demands? She certainly had succeeded in fooling him. Normally she was indistinguishable from wallpaper—with her mousy brown hair, ordinary brown eyes, and mousy manner.
But here with him…well, when she had felt her orgasm building, she’d become determined to reach it. She couldn’t bear not to.
She didn’t want him to think too much about who she was.
His lordship rose up over her.
Naked, she felt exposed, as though he’d guess from her form. But how would he? Maryanne Hamilton wore proper dresses—the only skin he’d glimpsed of hers had been her neck, her upper chest, the swell of her breasts, her arms, but nothing more. He couldn’t possibly guess who she was from touch alone.
Still, she wanted to distract him.
And with him blindfolded, she wanted to explore.
His hand lifted—
Her heart stopped. “Don’t peek!”
“An itch on my cheek.” With a graceful motion of his long fingers, he scratched. How could his every movement be so enticing? So seductive?
“Now you,” she whispered.
Even with the strip of black fabric over his eyes, she saw his surprise—in the arch of his brows, the crinkles in his forehead, the sweet lines bracketing his mouth.
His astonishment gave her the advantage, Maryanne thought as she pushed him onto his back.
Dash let himself fall back into the embracing softness of his bed. Verity clambered over his thighs. He knew what she wanted to do, and a rush of blood went to his cock, but not enough to make him respectably rigid. Her sticky nether lips brushed his leg, and he groaned.
He wanted to yank off the mask. Wanted to see Verity’s slender body without a stitch. His imagination supplied a luscious picture—small, pert breasts that bobbed as she moved, a stretch of ivory belly, and slim, nubile legs.
As her wet, magical mouth took his cock inside, he knew the one advantage to being so damned exhausted he wasn’t hard. She could take him deeply into her mouth, surrounding his prick with sensations that exploded in his mind.
He had never realized how erotic it would be to lose the sense of sight. He couldn’t anticipate what she would do, what he would feel. Each lick of her tongue, each hard suck in her mouth took him by surprise.
“Do you know, I’ve never let a woman blindfold me before.”
She stopped sucking, and he knew he should have kept his mouth shut.
“Never?” she asked. “Even though you’ve let them tie you up?”
“Never.” He couldn’t explain why that was one proof of trust he could never give. As a young man he had awoken to find a pistol pointed at his head one time, a knife at his throat another. Any woman who wished to cover his eyes raised an instinctive warning—
she’s been paid to kill me.
As for the bondage, he’d learned techniques to tense his body, then relax to allow ropes to loosen. He had never once been truly bound.
Why in blazes was he thinking this way when—
Christ Jesus! Her tongue lapped at the head of his cock. Then the bewitching woman paused again. “What do you like?”
“Licking. Sucking. I love my ballocks tongued and sucked.” His voice rasped from his throat. “Sweeting, any way you want to suck my cock, that’s the way I want it.”
Endearingly sweet, her giggle floated to his ears.
A giggle that cut off abruptly as her luscious mouth slid over his length again. Damn, he was thick and big now. She was taking him in only part way. But it was good…so incredibly good….
Her quick, bobbling sucking had his cock swelling in her mouth. She clasped his balls, and his hips arched up. Hell, he’d asked her to do it, but he was on the precipice—tense, downright scared because he couldn’t see what she was doing.