Page 78 of Claimed By Her Forbidden Duke
He pressed his lips to her jaw as if he was already chasing that need as he tugged her against him. Already, her body was coming alive, answering his need.
“I did not say anything about wanting you to be merciful,” she whispered. “I wish to deal in pleasure and passion tonight, Edmund.”
He pulled back, his eyes gleaming. “With a dangerous man like me?”
He was slightly too breathless for the full teasing, but she smiled anyway. “That makes it all the more intriguing.”
And then his mouth was on hers, and her backside was pressed against the table’s edge, the dishes clattering to the floor.
ChapterSeventeen
As soon as Edmund’s mouth claimed hers once again, she let herself fall into it. With his fingers gripping her hips, pinning her to the table, Penelope knew that falling apart was all right. She could have this—this dizzying spiral of desire, no matter how far it went tonight.
And as he kissed her deeply, making a rough noise in his throat as if he finally let go of a rigid part of himself that he kept restrained, she told herself that she would be fine if this was a simple one-night thing. She didn’t let herself think of how it tasted like a lie.
“Penelope.”
Edmund’s voice was rougher than she’d ever heard it as his teeth scraped her lower lip,as his mouth caught hers over and over in a sweep of passion. He kissed her like he had been deprived of air and she was a ready source of it. He kissed her, and kissed her, and kissed her, all the while his hands slipped up her parted legs, cupping her knees so he could pull them around his waist once he lifted her onto the table.
“Wait,” she gasped, turning from his blistering kisses. “I—the table… I am—” He continued kissing down her neck, distracting her. “It will crack?—”
“The table is more than sturdy enough,” he told her dismissively. “Besides,” he continued in a low murmur, “when I fully claim you, it will not be on the edge of the dining table. I will have you splayed out in a bed, where you will be comfortable. Where I will have you writhing and clutching the sheets, or your face pressed to a pillow in desire. I will claim you over every surface of this house, given ample time to do so.”
The room spun around her as Edmund’s hands eagerly tore at her dress, loosening the fastening without ruining the fabric. But his impatience was there in every tug of lace, string, and ruffle, until eventually the sleeves slid off her shoulders and she was bare, in her corset, the dress pooling at her waist.
“Beautiful,” he breathed, standing back, still between her parted legs.
She bumped himaccidentally with her knee, brushing the erection contained within his breeches. Heavens, he felt large. Shivers ran through her, making her hands tremble as she paused with her fingers curled into the waistband of his breeches.
Eyes wide, she splayed her palm over the bulge, her breath leaving her in an unsteady exhale. Her eyes met his as she stroked him through the material.
“I am inexperienced,” she whispered.
“I will guide you,” he promised. “But it is not my pleasure that is at the forefront of my mindright now.”
Despite that, his hips still ground into her hand. She was clumsy with the lack of knowledge of how to touch a man, but she relished the shudder that ran through him. He pushed closer against her, his teeth scraping along her neck.
“It is all right to be nervous,” he told her, kissing the line of her jaw softly. “I will take care of you. You are safe with me, Penelope.”
Despite how the ton said he was utterlyunsafe,Penelope believed him. Feeling half ruined already, she let him take her hand and lead her out of the dining room, into the darkened hallway, and upstairs, leaving her dress in a careless heap on the floor. She ought to get it, but she could not care. Not when he held her gaze, leading her to a room he pushed their way into.
As soon as they entered the bedchamber, his mouthwas back on hers with a fierceness that coaxed every bit of oxygen from her lungs. Her back was pressed against the door, the rough wood digging into her shoulder blades, and the Duke’s hand disappeared between her legs.
He licked along her collarbone, kissing the curve of her shoulder. “Have you touched yourself since I had my fingers inside you?”
“Edmund,” she moaned, the obscenity of the question making her hands shake.
Penelope was sowarm, so heated beneath his touch and attention.
“Well, have you?”
He distracted her again with a kiss right at the top of her décolletage, his tongue working its waydown the valley between her breasts. He grunted as his fingers dug into her corset as if it were a mere barrier. He began to unfasten it, tugging it off her.
But she noticed how he stepped back from her as he unfastened it, a smirk on his face. “If you want to be touched, you will answer my questions.”
Heat flooded Penelope’s face, but her voice was long gone, lost to the burn of his touch and the sensuality of how he looked at her, spoke to her.
“Shall I tell you first, then?” he asked, tugging at his cravat, dropping it as carelessly as she haddropped her dress. “I have. As soon as I returned from the opera, I did. After our moment in the library, I did. After every moment I have seen you since I first kissed you, and you have made me ache with need, I have given in to my need for you, waiting for the moment release finally came from your body. So, if it is shame that stops you from admitting it, then leave it at the door, for shame has no place alongside intimacy. Not with me.”
