Page 308 of From Rakes to Riches

This time his laughter was genuine and rich. She shivered with pleasure at being the one to have produced it.

Even if it was at her expense.

She peeked out at him.

Bucking away from the bedpost, he blinked at her from beneath dark, suggestive lashes. “Oftentimes, lovers undress each other.”

“Oh...” She struggled into a seated position, clutching the sheets to her unbound breasts. “Well, I undressed myself so you wouldn’t have to.”

Raphael closed his eyes for a moment and brought his fist to his mouth where his teeth sank into a knuckle.

Suddenly uncertain, Mercy asked, “Should I not have done? Do you want me to put my nightdress back on so you can be the one?—?”

“No!” He cleared his throat. Inhaled. Exhaled. And tried again. “No... I will undress and join you there. Keep the damned covers on or I’ll not be able to contain myself.”

“I shouldn’t think you’re here to contain yourself, rather the opposite,” she teased.

“For a woman’s first time, a man shouldalwayscontain himself.” He said this as if lecturing himself.

She didn’t know enough about it to disagree with him.

The sight of Raphael’s deft fingers undoing the knot at his collar did something wicked to her insides. All her boldness deserted her as he undid the buttons of his shirt and vest, shucking them down his shoulders.

Mercy’s eyes widened at the sight of his tattoos. Black ink danced and swirled over his tawny skin, rising over broad, round shoulders and circled down one corded arm. They were a chaotic array of blasphemies. A religious icon inked adjacent to a naked woman in a suggestive pose. A raven perched on a skull. Other beasts interspersed with pagan symbols and words or verse in his native language.

One thing became instantly obvious. He was the art...the depictions were merely decorations.

The disks of his chest were smooth, unfettered by hair or adornment, and sloped down to the slight corrugations of his ribs and the deep etchings of abdominal muscles.

The only hair she could see, aside from his head, was a dark line disappearing into his trousers.

He undressed without hurrying, watching her watch him.

Touching her, all of her, without touching her at all.

His hands rested at the placket of buttons beneath which the barrel of a bulge nudged to be uncovered.

Mercy almost swallowed her tongue. Should she be anxious?

Was she?

Raphael paused long enough for her to take in a breath. “Have you ever seen a naked man before?”

She forced herself to drag her eyes back to his. “Of course, I have.”

His dark brow arched as darker questions emerged upon a growl. “When? Who?”

“Well... there’s David, of course, and various other statuary. I mean, Achilles is right there in Hyde Park for all to see.”

He seemed to relax, and when he looked at her, his eyes swam with limitless tenderness.

“There was also a medical text Felicity and I found in Titus’s office. We studied thatmostthoroughly. I know all there is to know about the male anatomy...medically speaking.”

A soft catch in his throat could have been a laugh, but he schooled his features admirably.

“But never...in the flesh?” he clarified.

That word.Flesh.It made her tingle.

---