Page 66 of A Gentleman's Wager
“No, it’s no flattery. I can feel it.” She rocked against the bulge, which gratifyingly swelled. “It’s very substantial.” She placed her hands before her, flat upon his abdomen, better to keep her balance as she rocked. Though he didn’t reach for her, he made no attempt to stop her.
“Bella, it would be very, very wrong of me to take advantage—”
She slapped him across the midriff. “I swear, if you make mention of my brother again, I may box you around the lugs.”
Lucerne protectively covered his ears.
“In any case, who’s to say you’re the one taking advantage. Am I possessed of no autonomy?” She took advantage of his hands being raised to his head, to slip the buttons of his breeches.
“Bella,” he warned, clamping a hand around her wrist. It left her quite free to curl her fingers and stroke the line of his cock from base to tip.
“Shit!” he gasped, as a shudder rolled through him. He followed it with a … sigh. “Witch.”
“Uh-huh,” Bella agreed. She fanned her hands in an arch, wiggling her fingers as she did so. “See how you succumb to my wicked spell. How you’re entranced by my words. All you desire is right before you, here for the taking.” She leaned down and kissed his lips.
For an awful moment, Lucerne’s mouth remained closed, and she feared she’d underestimated his resolve, but then his arms came around her, fingers sliding into her hair, and his tongue flicked against the seam of her lips seeking entrance.
The tangling of tongues and exchange of heated breaths washed welcome heat into Bella’s chilled limbs. They kissed for a long time, neither ready to let it end, their twinned groans deepening as it went on.
“I won’t tell if you don’t,” Bella whispered.
“I ought to turn you over my knee and spank you for your deplorable behaviour.”
“I’ve heard that’s the sort of thing gentlemen enjoy in town, though more often it’s their bottoms they desire to be reddened.”
“Bella, you’re a menace, and I fear to know where you learn these things.”
“Sometimes I attend the assizes for fun. They can be very salacious.” She kissed along the line of bruises on his jaw and nipped his earlobe. “If you won’t fuck me, will you let me suck you?”
“That doesn’t sound like a wise plan.”
“Don’t you like the idea of having your cock kissed?” The way he bucked against her palm rather suggested he might. “You know it’s entirely your fault that I’m this desirous. If you hadn’t done what you did last night, I wouldn’t be nearly so needy. The two of you were playing with me, teasing quite mercilessly. And then that kiss… You set my dreams alight. I’ve never seen a man kiss another man, and then the two of you kissed me as if you meant to take me together.”
“Hush you, now. That’s wild talk.” Lucerne touched her lips, then he was kissing her again, while driving her down against his covered cock creating friction.
“I dreamed that’s what you did. I woke with the images of it still in my mind. That’s why I went out, that the wind might blow such thoughts aside, but it didn’t. Is it something you’ve done, Lucerne? Have you ever pleasured a woman alongside another man…with Pennerley?”
In answer, he toppled her onto the thick Persian rug, following her down into its pile so that his body covered hers. He traced the line of her collarbone, then the neckline of her dress to the front lacing. Bella watched him as he cogitated, agile fingers picking at the ribbon Vaughan had earlier snapped. Then, giving into his desire, he trailed his lips into the hollow at the base of her throat as he pushed one sleeve from her shoulder. Bella struggled to free her other arm in the same way, eager to feel his skin against her own, and to be free of her wet clothing. She wasn’t yet certain if this was actual capitulation, but whatever is was, she was eager for it.
On his knees between her thighs, Lucerne tugged loose his cravat. He worked the buttons of his waistcoat open next. Bella helped with the bottom row, then assisted in lifting his billowy shirt over his head. It ballooned as it arched through the air, the limbs inflating like an invisible presence occupied it before it puddled on the floor. His form was every bit as perfect as she remembered. Gloriously masculine, sleek, and sculptured. His nipples like two bent brown pennies.
“I’ve waited for the chance to see you in the altogether again,” she confessed, while reaching out to trace the golden line of hairs that ran down the centre of his abdomen. “Ever since that day—”
“You caught me tossing myself off by the river.”
“Yes.”
They laughed at the memory.
“I just… Let me look at you a moment.”
Lucerne reared up so that she could better see him. He was flawless, muscled in all the right places. His body hard where hers was soft. A mottled bruise stretched across the right side of his ribs, stretching from just below his armpit to a point about three inches shy of his navel, more consequences of his fight with Wakefield. Curiously, there was a bruise upon the rear of his shoulder too, more red than purple and brown, and deeper in colour at the edges rather than the centre. Almost as if he’d been bitten.
“What is it you want to see? A bit more of this, perhaps?” He fondled his gargantuan erection, folding his big hands around it and drawing it up the shaft so that the palm rode up over the tip before descending again. He made a couple more strokes in the same way. Bella gobbled up the vision, getting lost for a few moments in the aesthetics of it. He was confidence embodied, his earlier hesitation over the notion of them entirely forgotten. If she had anything to do with it, she’d keep it that way. She liked this confident, seductive version of Lucerne much more than one doing his best to be an upright citizen.
“Let me see you too. Let’s get you out of this.” He lifted her muddy hem and swept her dress over her head. Bella freed her wrists from the tangle of clothing, pleased to finally be rid of the musty cloth. “That’s more like it.”
Lucerne unclasped her stays and negligently cast them aside, not allowing his gaze to leave her bosom for a second. He pulled down the front of her shift so that he could bury his nose between the fullness of her breasts and made an echoic groan of contentment.
