Page 87 of Seduction Under the Southern Stars

Ahhh… I’m not going to think about leaving now, not when I finally have Elora in my arms, and her soft mouth on mine.

After a while, she moves back, pressing her lips together as her eyes meet mine.

“Okay, baby?” I ask, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear.

“Yeah.” She cups my face in her hands, stroking her thumbs across my five o’clock shadow.

“Would you like me to have a quick shave?”

She shakes her head, seemingly fascinated by the stubble, brushing across my jaw, then continuing down my neck. I tip my head back, letting her explore, feeling her touch my Adam’s apple. She dips her head, then, to my surprise, I feel her brush her tongue into the hollow at the base of my throat.

Wow. It’s such an innocent gesture, but desire shoots through me at a million miles an hour, as if I’m one of those strongman games at the fair and she has hit my feet with a mallet.

She lifts her head, and her eyes are sultry. “Will you take your shirt off?” she murmurs.

I stretch my arms out along the back of the sofa. “You do it.”

Her lips curve up, and she begins to pop the buttons through the holes, starting at the top. “This is just your opportunity to be lazy.”

I grin, and she gives me a wry look, then drops her gaze to concentrate, the tip of her tongue peeping out the side of her mouth. She undoes the buttons all the way down, then carefully parts the sides of the shirt.

For a moment she just looks. I sit there, trying to bear her hot gaze without moving, even though it makes me itch, like I have spiders under my skin. Her gaze flicks up to mine, and she says, “Can I touch you?” I just nod, and she drops her gaze again and rests a finger lightly in the center of my chest, just under my heart.

Slowly, she begins to trace my tattoos. She looks closely at the one of Noah’s Ark, following the shape of the bears, then moves across to the Lewis Chess piece on the other side. She continues to explore, and in the end I close my eyes, finding her fascination and the movement of her fingers incredibly erotic.

After a while, she returns to the center of my chest, and I feel her drawing a figure on its side—an infinity symbol, or a lemniscate—between my pecs. I open my eyes to see her looking at my face. Her lips curve up, and then she continues to stroke across to my left nipple and circle the pad of her finger over it.

I lift an eyebrow, and she giggles.

“You have an amazing body,” she says. “You’re absolutely beautiful.”

Her compliment takes me aback. This girl continues to surprise me. “Well, thank you.”

She brushes her fingers along the cord that circles my neck, then picks up my St. Christopher. She studies the pattern of the saint carrying the child Jesus on his back over the water. “I hope he keeps you safe.”

“I don’t wear it for travel.”

She lifts her gaze to me. “I thought you said—”

“I don’t only wear it for travel.” I inhale, then breathe out slowly. “Atticus never pushed his faith onto the students or talked about his beliefs, not to me, anyway. But his strong moral code became a part of my life. You all taught me how to be respectful, kind, and generous, when I hadn’t encountered those values before. That’s why I wear it.”

Her eyes search mine. “It’s been such a strange day, hasn’t it?”

“It really has. It’s like… the world’s suddenly full of light. Don’s shadow hung over me like The Lord of the Rings’ Sauron in Barad-dûr.”

She gives a short laugh—she knows the movies as well as I do.

“Every time I made a decision,” I continue, “or did or said anything, in the back of my mind I felt him watching with an evil eye. I felt as if I was wearing the One Ring, and it was slowly corrupting me and turning me into his minion.”

“It’s such a shame, because you haven’t done anything even remotely evil.”

“I know. I just felt that inside my soul must be black. How could it be anything else with a father like that?” I pick up the St. Christopher. “I wore this as a kind of talisman against the One Ring that Don bequeathed me.”

“And now?”

“I feel as though the Ring has slid from my finger and landed on the floor like it does in the movie, with a heavy thud.”

“Do you feel like Bilbo did?”

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