Page 10 of Rules for a Bastard Lord (Rogues Gambit #2)

When a gentleman takes liberties, it is laughed off with good humor. When a bastard takes liberties, the experience is too exquisite to laughat.

M aybelle knew he was about to take liberties. She could feel it in the caress of his hands on her legs. In the way he smiled so sweetly. And, most especially, in the way he leaned into her body, moving himself closer in the guise of adjusting her foot in his lap.

It was a ruse—and an obvious one—but for the first time in her life, she had trouble resisting it. Certainly, lots of men had tried to take advantage. A few she had allowed. But this man with his tale of pain and betrayal, this man with his honest eyes and lying hands—this man was a contradiction who tempted her.

She wanted him to touch her. She wanted him to spread her legs and teach her what she’d missed all these years. But even more than that, she wanted to know what this man was like with his lovers. She’d seen him protect Dicky, even though he knew Lord Linsel was about to betray him. She’d seen him angry enough to force a kiss from her, then soften almost immediately. And then he’d come to apologize. He was a complicated man, and she was fascinated to see all the different aspects of his personality.

Or perhaps she wanted to feel him touch her. Large hands rough with callouses slowly spread her thighs. She resisted, of course, but not hard enough to stop him. And not forcefully enough to rouse herself from the sensuous spell he’d cast over her.

She sighed and put her hands over his, where he pressed his thumbs deep into the topside of her knee. It felt wonderful, but she stilled him nonetheless.

“You know I cannot do this.”

“I know you must keep your virginity. There is much that can be done without losing that.”

She brought one of his hands to her lips, forcing herself to rouse enough to cup his strong fingers in her palm. “You will think me a whore. Or worse, a fool.”

“I know you are neither.”

“Mr. Hallowsby—”

“Call me Bram. I want to hear my name on your lips.”

“Bram, you cannot have me. Not without a wedding ring.”

He arched his brows, his expression boyish. “You would marry me?”

That thought pulled her straighter in her chair. She knew he was not truly offering, but the idea took root immediately. Without her willing it, reasons for and against listed themselves in her mind. He was more interesting than Charlie, that was for sure. Smarter in a worldly way. And in the few days that she’d known him, he’d never been dull.

But he was not respectable. He was a bastard, and the more time she spent with him, the more her own worth came into question. Not in her mind, but in everyone else’s. After a lifetime of fighting for respectability, she could not give it up so easily.

“No, I wouldn’t,” she said gently. “You are a bastard, and I want to be respectable.”

He nodded as if he expected as much, but there was vulnerability in his eyes. Did he want her to overlook such a flaw? She couldn’t because he wasn’t truly offering.

“Do you know…” Bram said, as he pressed his lips to the inside of her calf, “I spent years trying to be respectable? I said the right things, acted the right ways. When all my friends—legitimate children of proper parents—were cheating at cards or seducing women, I remained pure.”

She heard the echo of his words in her life. She too had spent so much time acting correctly when all those she knew cheated in one way or another. “It’s terribly hard.”

“And lonely.” He looked into her eyes. “And pointless. Those who will look ill upon you will continue to do so. No amount of correct behavior will change that.”

She knew that to be true. The vicar, for certain, would not think well of her until she proved her connection to her father.

She touched his face. “So you bid me throw morality to the wind? Open my thighs, and let you do as you will?”

Sudden heat burned in his eyes, and his nostrils flared. He knew it hadn’t been a true offer, but he responded as if she was truly offering. His hands tightened, and when he spoke, his voice was raw.

“Do what pleases you, Bluebell, and forget the rest.” Then he brushed his chin across the top of her knee. Once. Twice. The roughness of his stubble set her senses to tingling.

How she wanted to do it. Her belly was trembling, her insides liquid. Her breasts felt heavy and her eyes languid.

“I will not bed you, Bram. Not without a ring.” She said the words by rote, though her voice slowed over his name.

He closed his eyes, a tiny shiver going through his body. “Say my name like that again.”

“What?”

“Bram. Say it again.”

“Bram,” she said.

“No. Soft. Throaty.”

“Mr. Hallowsby.” She’d meant to chastise him. She’d meant to put more distance between them. But even with his formal name on her lips, she heard the hunger in her tone. The throaty purr around the syllables of his name. And he reacted by opening his mouth and biting her knee gently. The scrape of his teeth made her skin tingle, even as he spread her legs a fraction of an inch wider.

“What do you want, Bluebell? Tell me what you want.”

She wanted more of that. She wanted him, but she didn’t say that. She couldn’t. It was too bold, and it was not what she told herself she wanted. “I want to force my father to recognize me.”

He stilled, but he didn’t look up at her. “With a copy of the register? In Oxfordshire?”

“Yes.”

“I will take you,” he said. “I will take you there and help you confront your father.”

She swallowed, her body growing cold. “If I whore myself to you?”

“If you let me show you how it can feel. If you let me touch you—just my hands—and you come for me.”

She didn’t fully understand his words, but she gathered enough of his meaning. “That is still whoring.”

“Maybe,” he said, his word a bare whisper. “And I am a bastard. But I will honor my word and tell no one.”

“And me? How will I feel about myself in the morning?”

He shrugged as his tongue slowly licked the place his teeth had abraded. The heat of it and the wet slide made her gasp.

“You will hate yourself and me, I suppose,” he said against her flesh. “I might even hate myself for you.”

She had released his hand to brace the outside of her knee. He was pressing kisses to the inside, urging her to relax. And while she focused on that, she realized belatedly that his other hand had crept up the outside of her other thigh. He was well and truly up her skirts now, and she needed to stop him soon. Very soon.

He lifted his chin. “Very well,” he said softly. “I will not take you anywhere. This will be solely about pleasure.”

That was not at all what she wanted, and he knew it. “I have no need of you to take me,” she said. “I board the mail coach tomorrow.”

“Then who is to know what you do tonight?”

“Me.”

He smiled. “Yes, you.” And his left hand slid over the top of her thigh. She shuddered, a trembling that reflected the war within her. She wanted to say yes. She wanted to learn from him. He was so large, and as his fingers spread over her leg, it felt as if he touched everything.

“I will show you such things. You want to feel them. You know you do.”

She did. And sweet heaven, he was doing things so slowly. She could stop him at any moment, and yet she kept thinking—in a second. Let me feel his hands on me for another moment. Another kiss.

And his hand crept higher.

She was not wearing any drawers. It was too hot for them. So when his long fingers brushed across the top of her mound, she gasped and drew up straight. But he was firmly wedged between her legs now. That only brought her more heavily against him. His fingers widened and one—

Sweet heaven!

One slipped between her folds. Wet and slick, the back of his index finger simply rolled against her. Hard and shocking. She cried out in surprise, and he stilled.

“Do this because you want to. Do this because you trust me not to go too far.”

“Everything is too far.”

“No, Bluebell. This is something you can do yourself in the privacy of your own bed. This is something ladies do for themselves all the time. I am simply showing you how.”

That got her attention. This deep rub of his knuckle against her. The way it made her belly quiver, and her face feel flushed.

“You lie,” she whispered.

“I do not. Do you wish me to show you? To put your fingers where mine are? So you can do this yourself?”

Yes. No. She didn’t know. She bit her lip and closed her eyes. This was wrong and yet… And yet…

He took her hand in his and guided it to where his were. He had straightened up between her, opening her legs so that everything was exposed. Then he pushed her skirt up to her belly. All of her was open to his view.

Her eyes flew open, and she felt her cheeks burn with embarrassment, but what she saw made her pause. His eyes were intense where he looked at her. And his mouth curved in a smile. Not a secret, guilty smile, but one of appreciation as if he looked on something beautiful.

Then his gaze caught hers. He must have understood her confusion because he explained as clearly as if she had asked.

“Look down,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Do you see my hand there? Dark tan against your white skin… I see your tender flesh wet with dew and my fingers entwined with yours. Your curls are springy there, your petals like a ripe peach. It is beautiful, Bluebell. And I will remember this sight until the day I die.”

He meant it. Every word was breathed with honest reverence, and she could not understand it. It was as though he worshiped at the place between her thighs.

She wanted to ask him to explain, but she had no breath. Not as he rocked his knuckle against her. A pulse of reaction burst through her body. A tightening. A gasp.

“Do you feel that?” he asked. Stupid question. She had all but jumped off the chair.

His other hand took hers and guided her fingers to the same spot.

“Put your thumb there.”

She did as he bid. She hadn’t the presence of mind to refuse him.

“Push.”

He did it for her. He pressed her thumb against her, and she cried out. Hard. Hot. Her buttocks clenched and her back arched.

“Play however you like, Bluebell. Push against it. Rub a circle. Up and down. Whatever you want.”

She wanted him to do it. She wanted to feel more now. She pushed again, and it was as if thunder rolled up her spine.

Then she felt his fingers spreading her open. His thumbs pushed her apart, and at his urging, her legs rolled to the outside of the hard chair. She was spread as wide as she could go, but she hardly cared as she rolled a circle over that place.

Oh yes. Yes, that felt good.

Then she felt his fingers push into her. She hadn’t thought she could be more shocked, but she was. This was the act, done with his finger. She knew about male organs and penetration. But not this. Not that it would feel so right to have something pushing inside her.

Deeper. Harder.

She clenched around him, and he groaned.

“Sweet Bluebell,” he breathed.

Then he withdrew, and she whimpered. She did not want him leaving her.

With his free hand, he pressed over hers, using his finger to thrust hers against herself. Her bottom was tightening, pushing her up so that her body and their fingers bumped against where she throbbed.

And then his finger was back inside her. Not just one, she realized, but two. She felt stretched by him. Opened in a way that only a man could do.

She tightened in reaction, wanting to pull him deeper, to squeeze him harder, to…

She couldn’t think.

She couldn’t breathe.

It was too much, this stroke and thrust.

Flashes of sensation.

Lightning between her eyes.

Inside. He was inside her.

Yes.

Oh!

The sensations collided.

They burst together in her mind and her body as she cried out.

Such pleasure.

Such amazing sensation.

Oh yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!