Page 73 of About a Rogue
“You can stop me with a word,” he breathed against her temple, his thumb rolling over her nipple.
Bianca raised her head and looked him in the face. “More,” she whispered.
It took mere moments to strip him of his breeches and drawers. Max muttered curses as he peeled off his stockings, his eyes fixed on her as she shrugged off the nightgown. The sharp burst of embarrassment, to be naked in front of a man, lasted only until Max’s scorching gaze slid over her. He flung aside his second stocking, and caught her to him with a groan of joy.
Together they tumbled onto the bed. Bianca couldn’t touch him enough, and she wasn’t shy about urging him to do the same. Her body remembered, intimately, every wicked thing he’d done to her in Vauxhall, and wanted all of it, all over again. He was the one who laughed quietly and whispered that there was no rush, he meant to please her from now until dawn. But when she spread her legs in mute, shameless appeal, he went still, and his languid whispers grew short, and when he slid down and put his mouth on her, Bianca gripped his hair in both hands and begged for more.
“I love you wild like this,” he said in a guttural whisper, sucking at the flesh of her inner thigh. “And this.” His fingers were inside her, tormenting her. “And this.” He moved over her, pausing to lick her breast until she shivered. “And this...” He shifted his hips and edged inside her.
She strained against him. She had thought of this every night. “Max,” she pleaded. “More.”
He pushed forward in a sudden motion. For a moment he was still, and then he let out his breath and began to move, riding her with long hard thrusts that made her gasp. His hands roved, stroking, squeezing, holding her in place for his ravishment.
She came, almost too soon. She had wanted him so much, and been so worked up by the cricket, he hardly had to do anything to make her succumb to that tidal wave of feeling. She clung to him as her body convulsed, and she sobbed against his chest.
Max held her tightly until the storm subsided, then pushed up onto one arm. “That was for you, darling,” he whispered, smiling down at her with predatory intent. “This one shall be for us.”
“What?” She could barely speak, her toes still cramped and her heart still pumping furiously.
He lowered his head until his nose touched hers. “Now I intend to pleasure you thoroughly.”
Bianca couldn’t comprehend his words. She was already glowing. What else could he possibly do?
He showed her. Even though he was still hard and thick inside her—and reminded her how hard and how thick, with long languid thrusts of his hips—it was his hands and mouth that laid waste to her body. Tears ran down her face as he suckled at her breasts. He bid her hold her own knees apart to bare herself for his touch as he kept up his relentless, maddening strokes into her while he parted those damp curls and made her shake and twist.
“Max,” she sobbed, lifting her hips to meet him in desperation.
“Yes, darling?” He nipped at her throat, his fingers driving her mad.
“I want you,” she babbled. “God help me, I do—I want you, I want this,please—”
He rose up, hooking first one then the other of her legs around his waist. He braced his arms on either side of her head and gazed fiercely down at her. The tendons in his neck stood out, and his arms were like iron. “Touch yourself,” he commanded between his teeth. “As I did.”
She blushed furiously but did it; her body was throbbing too urgently not to. She slid both hands down her belly and did as he told her.
Max growled; his eyes glittered in the lamplight, and his hair fell in damp ebony waves around his face. His thrusts grew hard, sharper and faster. Bianca’s breath solidified in her chest as she stared at him, at his beautiful face so ferociously hungry for her, stroking herself until another climax came upon her.
At her first convulsion, Max sucked in a deep breath and drove all the way inside her, holding her until she collapsed, utterly spent, beneath him, as he shuddered in his own release.
Sometime later he slid trembling arms around her and rolled them both over, leaving her draped atop him. He was still inside her, and when she moved a little, his entire body quivered. But he pressed a kiss to the top of her head and folded his arms around her, and Bianca thought she had never felt so blissful in her life.
Eventually, even pressed up against the heat of him, she grew cold. When she shivered, he raised his head. With a low whisper, he sat up and eased her off him. Bianca huddled against the pillows and watched as he got up, naked, and moved about the room, putting out the lamps and closing the window against the night air. Then he flung back the blankets and held out one hand, inviting her to stay.
Without hesitation she did so, and he slid under the covers, lying on his side, facing her.
“Why didn’t you seduce me like that in London?” she whispered, tracing one finger down his chin.
His mouth curved. “Who seduced whom, madam? You came into my room, you unbuttoned my shirt, you kissed me.”
She smiled. “I did. You’re fiendishly handsome, you know.”
His amusement faded into a brooding, almost wistful look. “But not half as beautiful as you, love.” She pursed up her mouth at that empty flattery, and he laid one finger on her lips, as if to forestall any argument. “By God above, I mean that. You have an inner fire that makes you entrancing. Everyone in London saw it. Why do you think Serafina Dalway and Clara Farquhar put you in that dress for Vauxhall? They were laughing at me the whole night, knowing my brain was melting with lust every time I looked at you.”
“Was it?” She couldn’t stop a small smile, even though it was shocking to hear him say that. “Now I’m sorry I returned the gown.”
Max gave a rough laugh. “It’s not the damned dress. I wanted you even more when you lifted your bat tonight after the short fellow hit you on the hands. You looked determined to send the next ball right into his forehead, and I’ve never been so aroused by a woman.”
Bianca snorted with laughter. “You must have played a thousand cricket matches! No one bats like that their first time. We must have seemed terribly inept to you. It was magnanimous of you to join our side at all.”
