Page 48 of The Untamed Duke
Dear God, the tight circles he was making with his hand, the way his finger rubbed inside her...she was about to twitch free of her skin with delight. Riding high on a wave that tossed her along...
“You make me forget your innocence. And that this was not intended to be pleasurable.” Nicholas’s own frustrations bled into the words.
With abrupt cruelty, his fingers withdrew, although he kept the one hand riding the small of her back. The pleasure from the impending orgasm receded into the sting on her rear, although it lingered along the edges in a very curious way. He struck her again, harder this time, sharp and stinging. After a few moments of allowing it to sink in, Nicholas silently stroked the fiery burn imprinted on her flesh.
When it eased into little more than a banked glow, Grace blew out a shuddering sigh. A strange, vague release drifted over her. Euphoric and heady.
The instant she slumped, boneless and soft, Nicholas lifted her, rising from his chair so she was pinned against the table’s edge. The dizzying swiftness of his actions surprised her. She was now on her feet, head swimming as the blood rushed away.
Nicholas claimed her mouth with a savage, hungry greediness, iron-banded arms wrapping about her. Lips, a contradiction of hard and pillowy soft, crushed her mouth. Taking what he wanted, his tongue invaded and tangled with hers with such ferocity, a tiny thread of fear snaked through Grace.
Tender and still hot from the three swats of his hand, her bottom almost landed in a silver platter of bacon just before Nicholas heaved it away. It tumbled to the floor with an ear-splintering crash as he deposited her on table’s edge. Grace curled her arms around his neck, holding on as he plundered and stole and gave back every sensation he’d just wrung from her while she lay across his lap. Her hair was still somewhat captured in a simple braid and he twisted his fingers in the loose strands, wrapping its length around his fist.
He began kissing her neck and throat, the tops of the breasts she wished were bare. There was a thunderstorm roaring inside her, drowning out everything except his hands, his mouth. The rasp of his stubbled jaw abraded hers when he cradled her chin in one large hand, tilting it up and to the side so he could feast on the slender column of her throat. His body, braced against hers so she wouldn’t collapse backward while her world spun out of control. His teeth latching onto the tender crook between her neck and shoulder, his tongue tracing over the sting and across her collarbone.
He surely left a mark,she thought dazedly.
And she slowly became aware of Nicholas’s words.
“You’ve bewitched me. I should rip this gown off you. I want you naked. I want you bent over this goddamn table so I can fuck you. Until you bleed your damned virgin’s blood on me and I can wash you away and forget you. You’d let me, wouldn’t you? Let me use you and hurt you until I’ve had my fill and no longer want you. Let me have you…give me your sweetness...wrap it around me, around my cock. Until I tire of you.”
It was a rambling litany, lust spoken aloud, spewing as though he’d lost control. Most of it wasn’t even English, but a bewildering mix of French and Italian, love words and curses. It should have shocked Grace, but when his hand closed and tightened around her wrist, she did not recoil. Her fingers gripped the ascot at his throat as though she might strangle him with the depths of her own desire.
“Nicholas…please…”
Grace’s choked sigh broke through the haze wrapped about them. Nicholas tore away as if she’d scorched him. Staring at her in horror, he moved until the chair toppled in the wake of his retreat. The clatter it made was abnormally loud in the stillness.
With the quickness of a cobra strike, he jerked her off the table, uncaring when she stumbled. His grip on her wrist released just as fast.
“Get out of my sight…” The harsh command was ripped from the depths of his soul. “Go now.”
Chapter 18
Ifight
Like wolves
Trapped
Snarling
I wait
I quiver
A pathetic beast needing her touch
~Nicholas August Harris March
Ninth Duke of Richeforte
Grace reached a hand toward him,a beseeching gesture.
“But the library—”
Her bewildered expression had Nicholas closing his eyes. “Ask a footman, Martha, anyone…but get the hell out of here, and do not seek me out today.”
Wheeling, he presented his back, ears pricking at her soft exhale of breath.God help me, if I turn around, I’ll take her. On this very table.
