Cheryl Holt (25 page)

“So you concluded it was best to avoid me?” Even her censure was gently tossed.

“I wasn’t going to return, at all.”

“Why?” she reproached kindly.

“I like having you here.” The revelation stunned him, even as he privately chastised himself for expressing the sentimental drivel.

“What a sweet comment.”

Stupidity! Why encourage the woman’s flights of fancy? The manner in which she was regarding him—as though he was smart, benevolent, and extraordinary—terrified him. He appreciated how women viewed carnal dealings, how they processed intercourse. They read
love
into it where naught but lust existed.

Lest he create a mire from which they couldn’t extricate themselves, he had to exercise circumspection. Despite how attracted he was to her physically, he had no intention of allowing any sort of idiotic emotion for Sarah to flourish.

“What we’re doing . . .” He started prudently, not anxious to hurt her with the truth. “It’s not right.”

She set a finger to his lips, quelling any further voicing of regret. “Whatever ensues between us could never be wrong. And I won’t listen to your saying so. This is a special time we’ve grabbed for ourselves. Let’s just be content with what
is
.”

Nodding, he accepted the sagacity of her statement for
wasn’t that exactly what he’d deduced, as well? He planned to seize the moment.

“May I make love to you again?” He kissed the tips of her fingers.

“That depends.” She moved her hand down his neck, to his chest, where she rubbed in slow circles. “Have you been with another woman since we separated this afternoon?”

“No,” he was relieved to respond. He hadn’t even
spoken
to a female since then.

“You haven’t been to the secret room?”

“No,” he repeated.

“Because I have to admit, I was frantic that you might have.” She blushed a flattering shade of pink. “When you weren’t here, I looked through the peephole, but someone had covered it so I can’t see inside.”

“I’m the culprit. I didn’t like that you’ve been observing what goes on.”

“I’m a grown woman,” she felt compelled to indicate.

“Yes, you are,” he acceded, “but that doesn’t mean you should be exposed to the lewdness in this house.”

“The only
lewdness
I witnessed was your shenanigans.”

“And I’m exceedingly embarrassed by that fact.”

“Really?”

“Aye.”

Startling him, she chuckled. “So . . . you’ve—once again—appointed yourself as the guardian of my virtue?”

“I suppose,” he grumbled.

His rigid phallus nudged against her thigh, his naked legs tangled with hers, and the ludicrousness of their situation shook them. They laughed together, then it died away to a companionable silence.

“When you didn’t return,” she stated, “I was so worried.”

“You needn’t have fretted.” But oh, how splendid to discover that she had! He was inordinately pleased.

“I wasn’t sure how to find you and, after last night, I was afraid to search.”

“Good,” he remarked. “Perhaps I’ve finally talked some sense into that thick head of yours.”

“Perhaps,” she agreed, and the quiet played out, once more. Almost shyly, she announced, “I was terrified that you were visiting a lover.”

“Is it so important to you that I not?”

“Extremely so.”

The implication flustered him. She was pleading with him for a pledge of fidelity! Her request was so far-fetched that he could scarcely grasp it. Monogamy connoted fealty, a promise he could never make because he could never begin to keep it.

He didn’t believe in the ridiculous kinds of everlasting Grand Passion espoused by the poets. Even if he was stupid enough to become romantically entrapped, he’d never let it happen over such a fine, upstanding woman as Sarah, because he could never be the man she supposed him to be, and if they wound up together, she’d suffer eternal disappointment.

Reality was a bitter tonic to swallow, and he didn’t intend that she ever detect how divergent her illusions were from the actualities of his circumstances.

Clearly, she’d developed erroneous assumptions about the type of person he was. Probably, she’d credited him with assorted asinine attributes that were merely fantasy, but he’d revel in her daydreams. Just this once he would pretend to be whatever she wanted him to be.

She was hunting for a hero, and he didn’t aim to disavow her of her perceptions. He had no desire to inform her that he thought faithfulness impossible, loyalty absurd, and long-term commitment nonsense. He couldn’t fuck and love conjointly, and he never misconstrued the two. Sex was a method of assuaging his erect cock, and he fornicated in order to achieve mitigation for his masculine drives, but she didn’t need to be apprised of his convictions.

Her thinking that he was a better man, a different man, was positively enchanting. What could it hurt to humor her? If it bothered her that he might carry on with his licentious
distraction in the Viewing Room, it was simple to placate her. Appeasement justified the consolation it brought.

“I won’t go again.” Not while she was in residence anyway, but he figured he wouldn’t advise her of all his awful truths. A few lies were permissible between lovers, weren’t they?

“It would break my heart if you did.”

When had anyone ever cared about him so much, admired him so much? They were barely acquainted, yet she was so assured that virtuous character lurked deep within him.

That he could be the man she visualized! Instead, to his shame and consternation, he was without scruple or restraint, beyond redemption, a ne’er-do-well who used women for his own despicable purposes. Didn’t she see? Didn’t she recognize him for who and what he was?

The agony of confronting his faults, of having them so distinctly displayed, was too excruciating. She dredged up his imperfections and failings without even mentioning them. Just by lingering in her presence, he found himself questioning his entire mode of living, focusing on his individual defects as though they could be corrected or transformed.

He didn’t have the patience for perpetual self-assessment. His pride couldn’t take the immutable recrimination and evaluation, yet since he’d met her, he’d been besieged by old memories, forgotten grief, foibles and fiascoes, and he wasn’t going to waste any effort contemplating the varied paths he might have chosen. This quagmire of indecision and perplexity in which he was enmeshed was pointless, and he had to shift them back to a realm he comprehended.

Hoping to accomplish only one thing—that being carnal pleasure—he sought out women to grace his bed. A gifted, skilled lover, he could dally to maximum effect, and women flocked to copulate with him because of his seductive abilities. Sarah was the same as all the others. She’d chased after him, seeking an erotic relationship that she
presumed—with misguided design—would turn emotional, but she was too inexperienced to realize the improbability.

By debauching her, once again, he could bring their rendezvous back to safer ground, to where he would be honed in on the only important goal: satiation. If he was lucky, perhaps he’d be so involved in his quest that he’d manage to slake his infernal preoccupation with her before it drove him mad.

Innocently, he brushed against her lips, not tarrying as he’d love to do, but refraining as was most wise. Kissing her was dangerous. Better, saner, to employ his mouth in more fruitful, innocuous endeavors.

He declared, “I thought about you all evening.”

“And I, you.”

“Did you enjoy our afternoon encounter?”

“Every second of it.” She winked wickedly. “I came back for more, didn’t I?”

“So you did.”

Feeling grand, he laughed and flipped them so that she was on top. Spreading her thighs, he adjusted her till her tantalizing pussy was directly over his cock, then he braced his hands on her hips and painstakingly flexed along her cleft.

“I’ve been so hard for you ever since we parted.” He nodded toward her body. “Remove your nightgown. Show me what you learned today.”

Sarah glared at him, dismayed by his cool command. In her naïveté, she’d fantasized that they’d forged a new understanding and would now come together with kisses and professions of devotion.

One corner of her mouth twitched with a smile, and she bit it back. How imbecilic of her, assuming that a simple afternoon romp would have altered their relationship. He wasn’t the sort prone to poetic prose or flowery welcome. He was who he was. A complex man, he’d never cuddle or coo, but then, his rough edges and belligerent attitude were what attracted her so desperately.

As usual, he was being crude and demanding, but surprisingly, she realized that she could easily tolerate his high-handed manner. While she might have bristled had they been elsewhere, in this secluded situation, poised on the brink of sexual ecstasy, she was thrilled by how he ordered her about.

Regularly, he sought out women who were predisposed to decadency. By his own admission, he had strong manly drives that demanded routine alleviation. Though he’d favored her for his partner, he hadn’t ascribed any specific significance to the selection, but she wasn’t about to consider his lack of deference an indication of defeat. He’d returned—after incessantly debating as to whether he should—which she would take as a sign of progress.

She harbored no illusions about why he hadn’t been overly enthused about dallying with her, once again. No doubt, due to her inexperience, she’d failed to fully satisfy him. Yes, he’d spilled his seed, but as far as she could discern, she’d had very little to do with it. She’d simply
been present and available. He’d toyed with her, and his ardor had spiked, but he might have engaged in the behavior with anyone, be it she or another. Given his wanton habits, any naked female would have sent him over that climactic precipice.

Yet despite his professed confusion, he’d come back to her. He’d kindly conceded that he’d enjoyed their interaction, but she was acutely aware that their tryst had been limited in quantity and quality—a circumstance she proposed to rectify as soon as she was able.

She was eager to please him in every fashion, for him to view their assignations as magical and enchanted, but perhaps she was expecting too much. For the time being, she needed to be glad that he’d arrived, when she’d been so worried that he wouldn’t.

After leaving his room earlier, she’d scarcely made it through the interminable evening of socializing without dissembling. When she’d pleaded fatigue and sped up the stairs, she’d burst into his room, confident that he’d be waiting, as impatient as she for what lay ahead. Initially, the fact that he hadn’t been pining away had been an incredible disappointment, but after she’d shrugged off her fit of pique, she’d stood in the middle of his bedchamber and chuckled aloud.

Of course, Michael Stevens would have better things to do! What had she been thinking! She’d calmed herself, then agonizingly paced. Each creak of the old house, every crack of the smoldering logs in the grate, the infrequent footstep in the hall, had set her heart to racing.

As the hour had grown late, and he still hadn’t appeared, her self-assurance had flown out the window. She’d envisioned the places he might have gone and what he might be doing. When she’d braved a glance at the peephole, and discovered it shuttered, she’d sagged with defeat, certain he was on the other side of the wall with an anonymous lover. All her scheming and planning had been for naught!

Disheartened, but incapable of remaining in her lonely, solitary bed, she’d proceeded to his chamber and lain on
his pillow, instantly pacified by his smell. Drifting between despair and sleep, she’d stayed, resolved to hash it out. He could protest and complain and deny, but they shared a destiny, and he belonged with her—at least for the next few days.

After that, what might transpire was anybody’s guess, but she’d always been an optimist. Any marvelous occurrence was conceivable.

Physical intimacy would bring them closer than words ever could, so she reached for her nightrail, yanked it up and over, and pitched it on the mattress. She straddled his lap, naked but for a pair of the exotic French underdrawers that amused him. His eyes locked on her bare chest, and her nipples responded, the tips constricting.

“Your body is so fabulous.”

Irreverently, he pinched one of the elongated nubs between thumb and finger. The move had her squirming as did the comment, and her cheeks flushed She wasn’t accustomed to compliments, especially such indiscreet ones. Spurring her hips, he tipped her forward, and her hands steadied on either side of his head, her nipples dangling over his enthusiastic mouth.

“I’m going to make love to your breasts.”

“Yes . . .” she gasped on a rush of air as he sucked at the enlarged crest. “Whatever you want.”

“I’ll keep at it until you can’t stand any more. Until you’re begging me to stop.”

“No, never. I’ll never ask you to stop.”

“Until you’re crying out my name.”

Now that was a definite possibility!

Pinning her to him, he worked atrociously, and he suckled till she was raw and distended, then he detached and shifted to the other, rummaging across her bosom like a nursing babe. He located the delectable morsel, taking it with his searching, zealous lips.

Below, his cock was rudely insinuated between her legs, and his hands descended to her bottom, squeezing and manipulating the rounded globes, and utilizing them as leverage
to stroke his aroused member. His hot flesh tantalized her silky undergarment, pushing it into the heated cleft, causing her body to weep.

His hands were at her thighs, spreading her so that her swollen mound was titillated by his slightest movement. Exhaustively, his cock massaged her, every delicious inch, so that when he fumbled with the tie on her drawers, when he glided inside with those resourceful fingers, her entire being was adjusted for the pleasure she now fathomed to be winging in her direction.

With a few flicks of his devious thumb, he led her to the yawning crevasse and shoved her over. Cognizant of the pending tumult, she freely leapt into the void, the jubilant anguish staggering. He swallowed her cry of delight, kissing her thoroughly to consume some of her rapture as she soared to the heavens then floated back to earth.