Page 51 of Scandalous Nights With the Earl

‘Then show me, Phillip.’

He kissed her gently, with no force in it, laying his forehead against hers as he finished, trying to take stock of what next might happen. And then she kissed him back, her hand on his cheek pulling him in, demanding more. She nipped at his lip, her tongue coming over the spot, showing him in her actions she did not want too much caution.

All restraint in him escaped and he leant in to undo the buttons on her gown, one by one by one, the billowing layers of green silk slipping down easily from her body and pooling around her feet as she stepped away from it.

Before him stood a goddess in a sheer lawn petticoat, garters of lace around the tops of her stockings and absolutely nothing else. No stays. No drawers, no concealing shift.

‘I dressed for the occasion,’ she whispered and he had to laugh because there was always this juxtaposition with her every time they had talked, this quickness and this humour.

‘And I appreciate it.’

With care he bent to pull the garters threaded with white ribbon from her thighs and with them the sheer pale cream silk of her stockings. There was only the petticoat left now but her hands came up to indicate she would like this to remain, her nipples hard buds against such sheerness, rose pink under the gauziness of lawn.

Her body held curves in every place that it should, her breasts, her hips, the roundness of her stomach. She reminded him of the sirens in the paintings that he had seen in Paris on a trip taken a year or so before he’d married Gretel. Erotic, splendid paintings of the sensual form. He had never forgotten them.

She watched him closely, reading his expression, a smile in each corner of her lips. She knew how beautiful she was and did not try to hide it. She stood there in all her glory and lifted her chin.

‘My husband was never pleased with my body shape.’

‘Was he blind?’

‘He liked thinner woman. He thought I was licentious. That was a word he used and I had to look it up to find out the meaning.’

‘Sexually unrestrained?’

‘No, not that. He would certainly not have liked that. I think he leant more to the other side of the word. He did not wish for me to tempt men, is what he said, and made me dress in clothesthat were several sizes too big. He said that my body was lewd and that many would find it offensive.’

‘Hardly.’

His hand reached to one breast and he stroked the fullness of it before his fingers fell lower to the curve of her waist and then the shapeliness of her hip.

‘I have scars on my left leg. You have not yet seen those but if I tell you now they will not be such a surprise.’

‘Do you really think I would care?’

She pulled up her petticoat and he looked because she seemed to want him to.

‘How did it happen?’

‘My husband’s telescope fell.’ Words under words. Lionel St Claire had been a bastard. Everything she said made that fact truer.

One hand came across his arm, the small, well-kept nails, unadorned fingers, and smooth skin.

‘You are safe here, Wilhelmina.’

‘I know.’

Removing his jacket, he loosened his necktie and disposed of that as well. He was a good five inches taller than her and he could see down the front of her petticoat, everything showing. With care he lifted up a strap and pushed it down over her arm, his mouth falling to her nipple, claiming the largesse and sucking hard.

She took in a breath, quivering in surprise. Earlier he had been tentative but tonight he was not. He wanted her to understand the power of sex, not the shame. His other hand moved down, hiking up the lawn. Finding the warmth between her thighs, he stopped. She looked at him then, her golden eyes challenging, her heartbeat faster, the sheen on her skin of pure, damp want.

‘This is your centre.’ He thought she needed the words. ‘This is where women rule men. This is the place of a woman’s potency and a man’s privilege.’

She opened her legs and invited him in.

But not yet.

Moving her back against the wall, he knelt and placed his mouth where his finger had been, tasting the sweetness, lathing his tongue up into the folds, finding her, finding himself. Softly and without force. It was a quiet path to ecstasy, not a blunt one. Any wrong move now and she would stop him. She was like a yearling learning to be broken in.