Page 9 of Chloe and the Devil (Regency Spinsters Alliance #2)

CHAPTER NINE

Chloe had hoped—no, for days she had prayed— that she would never have to reveal to Lucien the fantasies she had written in the missing journal. Or admit that he was the man featured in every one of them as her sexual partner.

“Chloe…?”

She kept her head lowered as she released a heavy sigh before answering him bluntly. “I wrote down my sexual fantasies in the stolen journal, in the form of vignettes rather than actual stories with a plotline.”

“Your sexual fantasies ?” Lucien repeated in obvious disbelief.

She nodded. “They were never intended for anyone to read but myself.”

“And now this blackmailer has them?”

“Yes.” Chloe chanced a glance at him from beneath lowered lashes. Only to quickly look away again when she saw the nerve ticking in his clenched jaw and the icy coldness of his eyes glaring at her in disbelief. His hands were also clenched into fists at his sides. As if he would dearly love to punch someone.

“How did they know to take this particular journal when you said you have been writing in them ever since your father started giving them to you as Christmas presents?”

“I do not know!” she cried emotionally. “Or perhaps they did not know. Not exactly. One of my ordinary stories revealing me as being Charles King would still have been enough to demand money from me for their silence. And this was the journal sitting on my bedside table.”

“Meaning he now has a journal in his possession in which you describe your sexual fantasies,” Lucien’s voice sounded dangerously soft.

“Yes,” she confirmed with a wince.

“What do you know about sexual fantasies ?” Lucien exploded.

She looked up, her expression pained. “I might be young in years, but I am not completely unaware of what…what physical pleasure is.” Most especially so since Lucien had touched her so intimately just days earlier.

“I never said you were.” That nerve continued to pulse in his clenched jaw. “ What do you know of sexual fantasies? ” he demanded again.

Good grief, would her embarrassment, her humiliation , over this matter, never come to an end?

Chloe knew, with the damning journal no longer in her possession, the answer to that was a resounding no.

And so she told Lucien exactly what she had previously confided only to the other members of the Spinsters Alliance in regard to finding and reading her mother’s books in her father’s library.

“Books?” Lucien repeated harshly. “You learned of sexual pleasures, enough to write fantasies of your own desires, through reading books?”

She frowned. “How else would I have done so?”

* * *

Lucien had feared—no, he had dreaded —Chloe telling him that she had shared sexual pleasure with some gentleman other than him before then writing the experience down for her own private enjoyment.

He gave a slow nod. “I recall Gabriel once telling me that your mother enjoyed reading more intense love stories, which he was only too happy to purchase for her.”

Chloe gave a choked laugh. “I believe the books all contain a tale of sexual gratification, in as many positions as possible, rather than speaking of or depicting love.” She unfastened and removed her cloak to lay it over one of the chairs.

As if just talking about such things had made her uncomfortably hot. Or it could have just been the heat of the fire responsible for that. Either way, the fashionable gown she wore, in a deep shade of pink, revealed the full swell of her breasts above the low neckline.

Lucien’s curiosity was stirred anew by the becoming blush that also colored Chloe’s smooth cheeks. “You found the books…titillating?”

Her throat moved as she swallowed. “Their content was…arousing, yes.”

“And so you decided to write some of those…encounters into vignettes in one of your journals?”

“Yes.”

“Did you do so with yourself in mind as the female of the couple?”

“I am sorry to say I went one step further than that and actually named her Chloe,” she recalled bitterly.

“Who did you name as the gentleman?” Lucien demanded, feeling jealousy all over again at the thought of Chloe fantasizing about receiving and giving pleasure with any man who wasn’t him.

Since giving in to the temptation to kiss Chloe at Christmastime, he had been fighting a constant, and losing, battle when it came to resisting wanting to kiss and touch her again. Spanking her in his carriage and then touching intimately between her thighs until she climaxed on his caressing fingertips meant he had very little, if any, resistance left.

It was now intolerable to him to even think of any man but him ever giving Chloe that same pleasure.

“Tell me his name.” Lucien reached out to grasp her arms as he glared down at her. “Tell me who you imagined making love to you!” He shook her. “Chloe, answer me, damn it!”

“You,” she finally gasped. “ You are the gentleman featured with me in every one of those vignettes!”

Lucien reared back in surprise. “Me…?”

She nodded. “How could it be any other way when I have never wanted any other man but you!” She buried her face in her hands and began to cry again in earnest.

Lucien stilled.

The sexual fantasies Chloe had written included him? Were about the two of them? Together?

“When did you begin writing these sexual fantasies featuring the two of us?” he probed.

“Since you kissed me at Christmas,” she admitted brokenly. “Ever since then, I have ached for…for the two of us to do so much more together than simply kiss.” Color blazed in her previously pale cheeks. “None of my mother’s erotic novels included the woman being spanked, but I now know there is pleasure to be found in that too if it is done with the right person.”

“And you believe I am that right person?”

“You would seem to be, yes.”

Lucien acknowledged it was not a declaration of love, Chloe’s tone being guarded at best, but he would not expect it to be any other way. Chloe was a proud young lady, and although he was aware of his own feelings for her, he had done little to encourage any of those softer feelings inside her toward him.

Indeed, if anything, he had done the opposite. In the belief he was doing what was best for her.

Because he believed himself to be too old for her.

Too jaded.

Too cynical.

Too arrogant.

Too—

None of those things mattered in the face of Chloe having now admitted her desire for him. Damn it, she had gone so far as to write of that desire in one of her journals!

A journal he acknowledged needed to be found, but for the moment had become secondary in importance to other, much more urgent needs.

Lucien knew he should continue to resist. That he should send Chloe away. That the two of them should agree never to speak of these things again.

Except Lucien knew that the months of celibacy he had suffered since Christmas, the lack of desire or interest in other women, was because Chloe was now the only woman he desired or had any interest in.

Whom he would ever desire or have an interest in?

Lucien believed that to be the case, yes.

Inwardly, he offered Gabriel his apologies for what he was about to do.

Outwardly he didn’t hesitate to cradle Chloe’s face in his hands and hold her startled gaze with his as he lowered his head and claimed her slightly parted lips with his own.

* * *

Having expected admonishment over her behavior, Chloe was too surprised to do anything other than kiss Lucien back with the same passion as he was now readily showing her.

It was glorious. More than she had dreamed would ever happen between them.

How long those kisses continued, she had no idea, too lost to the heat and pleasure of them as Lucien kissed her with a hunger that told her he felt the same desperation for Chloe as she had always felt toward him.

His arms were like steel bands about her waist, molding her body against his and so making her fully aware of the long and throbbing length of his aroused cock pressing against and into her.

It felt…enormous. Far longer and thicker than anything she could ever have fantasized . And it was hot. A pulsing heat that Chloe could feel even through her drawers and his pantaloons.

She wanted to touch it. To feel it. To know exactly what Lucien’s arousal looked and tasted like.

She was distracted from that desire by his dexterous fingers unfastening the back of her gown before he allowed the short sleeves to slide down her arms and the bodice to fall forward and down to her waist.

His eyes glittered with heat when he lifted his head after looking at the globes of her breasts visible through the thin material of her chemise, the nipples full and darker in color. “Is this one of your fantasies?”

“Oh yes.”

“Do I have your permission to proceed?”

She gave a choked laugh. “ That was never a part of any of my fantasies!”

He grimaced. “You imagined I would simply take what I want.”

“I did,” she acknowledged.

His throat moved as he swallowed. “Believe me, I am exerting every ounce of my self-control to force myself to wait for your permission.”

She eyed him quizzically. “Why?”

His eyes darkened. “Because I would not have you ever regret anything the two of us did together.”

“I do not remember you being so reluctant in your actions when it came to spanking me,” she derided.

He smiled slightly. “I believe, even then, I warned you of the consequences of your actions. Consequences you blatantly disregarded,” he reminded.

Chloe could find no argument against that accusation. She had challenged Lucien. Deliberately so. In order to see if he would carry out his threat. She should have known better than to doubt it! Or him.

“Yes,” she spoke huskily. “Of course you may touch me. I am sure you must know by now that you may do whatever you wish with and to me.”

In spite of having given her permission for the intimacy, Chloe still drew in a sharp breath when Lucien unfastened the tie at the top of her chemise and pulled the material down to fully reveal her naked breasts.

Her engorged nipples were already so sensitive that even the soft brush of warm air against them caused her to tremble with added pleasure.

Lucien cupped a hand beneath one of those full globes, his gaze intent on the action as he brushed the soft pad of his thumb against the swollen nipple.

Chloe gasped at the heat which instantly surged through her body before settling in the dampness between her thighs.

Lucien glanced at her. “Is your fantasy living up to expectations so far?”

“God, yes,” she groaned.

He nodded as he repeated the caress. With the same result. “You are very responsive,” he admired.

There was so much saliva gathered in Chloe’s mouth and her tongue felt so swollen that she was completely unable to answer him. Instead, she gave in to her need for more by pressing firmly against him.

“I am going to taste you,” Lucien murmured as he lowered his head.

Chloe had never experienced anything like the pleasure of having her nipple suckled into the wet heat of Lucien’s mouth. At having his lips surround and suck on that swollen flesh, followed by his tongue rasping erotically against that sensitivity.

No amount of caressing with her own hands and fingers had given Chloe the same pleasure as Lucien’s mouth and tongue now did. Long, drawing sucks on that swollen bud, followed by the satisfying rasp of that moist and rough tongue against the aching flesh. It was an ecstasy Chloe never wanted to end. She?—

They both gasped and stilled as a knock sounded on the library door.

“Yes?” Lucien prompted gruffly into the silence that followed.

“His Grace, the Duke of St. Albans has called to see you, Your Grace,” Lucien’s butler informed him evenly. “I have asked him to wait in your study.”

Dear God, her father was here!