Page 15 of The Good Duke (The Licentious Lords #1)

S imon hid a grin.

Persephone Forsyth wasn’t one to hide from anyone . He knew that all too well.

No truer statement had ever been uttered than that one. She’d always been an intrepid firebrand—a girl and then young woman a person did not cross.

Simon had always found himself both grateful and relieved she’d been his ally and not his adversary. He’d also pitied the loons who’d earned themselves a place on her wrong side.

Now, having landed himself in that very spot any number of times since they’d reunited, Simon discovered he’d been altogether correct.

Yes, there was no doubting, he’d been lucky to have her as a friend.

But now? Now , he found himself not only enjoying but looking forward to their fiery battle of wits and wills.

With a purposeful languor, Simon got to his feet and folded his arms.

He’d be blind to miss the way her gaze darted and lingered on the slight opening at the top of his shirt, where his chest remained exposed.

A faint blush pinkened her cheeks, and she looked up quick enough to give her a crick in the neck.

He suppressed another smile.

“When you say you don’t hide from anyone,” he drawled, his tone lazy as to match his earlier movements, “ especially not me? What exactly do you mean by that?”

The saucy minx brought her chin up a smidge. “ Old Simon would have known precisely what I meant.”

“This is true,” he allowed, inclining his head. “It is just…” Simon left that to dangle there a moment.

“Yes?”

As he’d suspected, she’d not be able to resist the bait.

In deeply feigned contemplation, Simon caught his chin in his hand. “Well, you see, I’m attempting to sort out whether you mean you don’t fear me because you only see me as your long-lost friend. Or…”

Persephone compressed her lips into a firm, flat line.

Simon knew, however, she wouldn’t be able to resist. He’d give her five seconds.

One-two-three—

“And?” she said, that beautiful mouth of hers barely moving so that if another person had been present, Simon would have looked at them as the answerer.

She’d only made a three count, then.

Goodness, this was entirely too much fun.

“ Or ,” Simon continued, “whether you’d gone into hiding because of our embrace yesterday.”

“Our…?” She puzzled her brow, and then suddenly her big brown eyes flared. “Oh, that ?” She gave an impudent toss of her head. “Why, I hadn’t even thought about it.”

His eyebrows went flying up.

Persephone smirked.

Ah, how quick that shoe landed on the other foot.

Persephone turned his momentary speechlessness against him. “It is to be expected, Simon. I understand all too well suffering the advances of handsy employers is part and parcel of the assignment.”

He’d draw the line there . “I did n-not seduce you,” he exclaimed. “And you well know it, Persephone. Not the king himself could force you to do anything you didn’t want to do.”

She opened her mouth, but he didn’t allow her a word edgewise.

“Furthermore, since when did you begin referring to me as your employer ? When I found you breaking into my residence, didn’t you insist we were friends? Aren’t I just a friend who happened to offer you employment as a means to help you—”

“ And you,” she jumped in.

“And me,” Simon allowed. He didn’t bother pointing out that with all the games she’d played, he felt further away from marriage with her playing matchmaker than he ever had before.

Which was saying something, given all the women he’d courted in his youth.

“All of that is fair. We are friends. What I should have said instead is that you needn’t worry I was hiding from you—”

“I didn’t use the word hiding, Persephone. You just did.”

She continued without missing a beat. “After I left—”

“You ran.”

“I didn’t give our embrace another thought.”

With Persephone standing primly in the entryway, as stoic as an abbess at a priory, had Simon not felt her coming undone in his arms just yesterday, he’d have believed her to be unaffected by him.

For her desire wasn’t one that could be feigned. The wild thrusts of her hips against his straining cock had been proof enough of that.

Even just the memory of her frenzied movements sent blood rushing to that randy organ.

With deliberate care, Simon positioned himself behind the fortunately placed globe near the corner of his desk.

The hell he’d allow her to see the effect she was having on him . Not when she masked her own thoughts as well as the Theatre Royal’s finest actress.

Simon carefully removed his spectacles, and with those wire-rimmed frames in hand, he motioned her over. After all, with his shaft jutting against the front of his trousers, he was hardly in a position to approach her .

Despite his silent summons, Persephone remained rooted to her spot nearest the exit.

I should know better than to ever bid her to do anything.

Very well. He’d play along with whatever contest she’d thought up this day for him.

Simon tossed his glasses down, and the forgotten pair hit next to the globe with a little plink .

“I trust you’ve sought me out this morning to continue where we’d left off at our last meeting, Persephone.” He wrapped her name in a husky purr.

She dissolved into a strangled paroxysm.

Simon kept his features deadpan. “I’d be all too happy to resume—”

“ Noo. ” Her voice climbed on a high squeak.

“Our conversation from yes—” Simon blinked slowly. “Oh, forgive me.” With the degree he found himself enjoying this, he was certain to land himself a place in hell. “You did not wish to speak to me about the reason for your visit yesterday, before we became…distracted?”

And hell, if he didn’t manage the impossible—he’d silenced Persephone Forsyth.

Simon dropped a hip along the edge of his desk, presenting her with his side profile.

At her continued speechlessness, he quirked an eyebrow. “That is, unless the only reason you sought me out yesterday was for that mind-blowing embrace—”

“It was not mind-blowing, Simon .” His name emerged as a whispery hiss. She took a quick glance about as if verifying they were still alone. “It was…very much a brief, humdrum exchange.”

A brief, humdrum exchange?

He’d allow the first kiss they’d shared as children, years ago, had been transformative for Simon but sloppy and quick for Persephone. In the interim, however, Simon had become quite adept in the art of lovemaking.

It’s how he knew their exchange , as she referred to it, yesterday had left Persephone wet and aching. Simon hadn’t even needed to reach a hand between her legs and feel that warmth for himself to know it.

It was one thing for her to play games.

It was an altogether different thing for her to act as though she’d not melted in his arms.

He narrowed his eyes.

Persephone centered her gaze with his.

“What?” she asked, because of course she would. The dauntless spitfire.

“Oh,” he slid off his desk, “I was just remembering our brief, humdrum exchange.” With slow, lazy slides, he headed for her.

Deep rosy color cascaded onto her cheeks, but warrioress that she was, Persephone remained rooted to her spot at the front of the room.

He stopped when he was but a pace away and settled a heated stare on her.

“Ah, the rogue’s seductive gaze. We’re doing that again.” Her beguiling lips twitched. “Never tell me,” she drawled in impressively bored tones, “you intend to lay me across your desk again?”

The long column of her throat moved wildly up and down, making a liar of her and her feigned indifference.

Simon curled his lips up into a wider, knowing smile and leaned close.

Her breath hitched.

“I’m not going to stretch you across my desk, Persephone,” he whispered, his lips a breath away from hers.

“Y-You aren’t?” Her disappointment was as palpable as her desire for him.

“I’m not.”

“Ohh,” Persephone’s utterance slipped into a swift, soft exhalation as Simon caressed a palm over a deliciously ample hip.

He placed his mouth close to her ear and whispered, “I’d never be so humdrum as to do the same thing to you twice.”

Her breath caught. But she didn’t run.

“Nay, I’d propose something altogether different ,” he purred.

“D-Different?”

“Another embrace to determine if my kiss is as mundane as you claim it is or whether it was a mind-blowing one ended too soon.”

“Y-You ended it,” she pointed out, her voice trembling.

Yes, he had. He knew better than to point out she’d negated her entire argument in just three words.

He screwed his face up into a mask of deep thought. “You are correct. There is only one thing to do—”

“To see who is right,” she interjected, oh so eagerly.

Simon stared at her lush lips, which tempted him with all manner of wicked uses he had for them.

Like a butterfly’s wings in a delicate, summer breeze, Persephone’s impossibly long dark lashes fluttered. Her chest heaved, bringing Simon’s gaze and appreciation to that glorious flesh, further emphasized by her corset.

His breath came harder and faster too as he undressed her with his eyes. He imagined her attired in nothing more than her tightly laced corset.

She lifted her mouth up to his.

Simon wasn’t one to be asked twice. Catching her by the jaw, he anchored her in place to receive his kiss.

She strained toward him with the same urgency that had sent her hips bucking a day ago, and he growled with masculine satisfaction.

“Eager to begin?” he taunted. Simon tightened the hand still on her hips and drove her gently but firmly against the door. The press of their bodies sent that panel knocking lightly once. Simon pinned her there with his body. “Or eager to see which of us is correct?”

“B-both,” she panted. “I-It is c-clearly that I’m eager to begin so we might decide once and for all who is right?”

“Of course, that’s the only reason, sweetheart,” he said on a husky chuckle. Simon pressed his erection against the small of her belly.

Her hips immediately shifted and lifted against his cock.

His already rigid, painful erection grew harder.

With the same ferocity of a rampant lion mating with a hot, hungry lioness, Simon consumed Persephone’s mouth, devouring her.

“Open,” he commanded between each harsh, angry glide of their lips.

Persephone whimpered and instantly allowed him in.

“Good girl,” he praised.

There was nothing gentle about the embrace.

Simon slipped his tongue inside and dueled with that delicate, pink flesh that, just last night, had required he take himself in a fist and bring himself some relief from the memory of her.

He clutched her crisp muslin skirts and cotton petticoats and shoved them up around her waist. That noisy, naughty rustle of fabric only further fueled Simon’s lust.

Persephone’s too.

Moaning long and low, she dropped her head back.

The door rattled loud enough to alert any servant who may have been passing by. The whole of London could have paraded by, and he’d not have stopped.

“Aww, my sweet Persephone,” he crooned, nipping lightly at a birthmark in the middle of her neck. “You are still bored. Allow me to rectify that.”

He palmed Persephone between her legs.

She hissed some husky, undistinguishable utterance.

Emboldened by her frantic gyrations against him, Simon slipped two fingers, effortlessly, inside her sodden channel.

“Simon,” she keened, lifting into his touch.

“That bad?” he teasingly lamented.

“W-Worse,” she panted, frantically pushing her hips hard and fast.

Keeping his features even, he bowed his head with a mock solemnity. “Forgive me. I must better apply myself.” With that, Simon worked her harder.

He continued to stroke her over and over. In and out. He teased her nub, toying with her.

Sweat beaded at his brow.

His balls tightened. She was so wet.

Persephone lifted into his ministrations. Her thighs clenched and unclenched about the hand that pleasured her.

She was close.

Simon reached a hand briefly up and freed her breasts from the bodice of her gown. Lowering his head, he closed his mouth over one of those dusky, swollen peaks.

Persephone released a tortured whimper. She grabbed Simon’s hand and guided it back between her legs.

Simon laughed softly against her chest. “Ah, you want me to continue. I must be improving, sweet.”

She gave a juddering nod. “St-still, I m-must v—”

He teased her nub with his fingers, and a hiss exploded from between her clenched lips.

“Better?” he whispered, flicking his tongue over her previously neglected nipple.

“O-Oh, yessss ,” her affirmation climbed to an exclamation as he sucked hard on that sensitive tip.

He stilled in his ministrations, and she cried out.

“I do worry,” he began.

“W-Worry?” she panted, her eyes glazed with desire and hinting at despair were he to stop.

Pure, unbridled lust. That was all this was between them. Once they finally had one another, the tension that had simmered at the surface since their reunion would be no more. If he didn’t know pleasure from her, then he’d never be sated. He’d always carry this hungering for her.

“It is just,” Simon said, “if you are to assess my embrace—”

“It is only fair for you to assess my skills?” Persephone anticipated with all the sultriness of a woman who knew something of lovemaking.

And he couldn’t be more thankful for whatever skills she’d acquired in their years apart. The fact she was no longer an innocent made all of this…simpler.

He nodded.

Persephone sighed. “I fear you are correct.”

With that, further affirming she’d become a woman in every way, Persephone reached between them and released Simon from his trousers.

His cock sprung free, impossibly hard and painfully throbbing, and that ache only further intensified as she wrapped her long fingers skillfully about him.

“ Christ ,” he hissed and lifted into her touch.

“No. Still, just I, Persephone,” she teased.

Oh, the minx.

She was relishing this.

Determined to give as much as take, he pressed a palm against her wet, hot cunny.

And then, in tandem, they began to stroke one another, until words failed and only noisy breaths, undistinguishable mutterings, left their lips. The slick sounds of their caresses filled the office.

The pressure and pleasure built. His shaft twitched. He’d never wanted to come so badly.

Simon clenched his jaw.

I’ll be damned if I spill myself like some untried youth before she reaches her climax.

He added another finger to her slippery center.

Persephone panted.

Simon increased the speed and intensity with which he stroked her.

“Please,” she begged. With a perfect grip, she tugged his cock at just the right rhythm.

“Come for me, love,” he ordered harshly.

And for the first time in their lives, she heeded his command.

Persephone’s eyes went wide like one who’d seen the heavens. Her body stilled, stiffened, and then she began to pump her hips frantically. Crying out, she came all over his fingers. She squeezed her thighs closed and continued grinding against his touch, her channel gripped tight around him.

With a shuddery gasp, her entire body sagged under the weight of her release. All the while, she continued to pump his shaft.

“That’s it,” he gritted out. “Just like that.”

Then Simon allowed himself that which he’d fought. He shifted and aimed his twitching cock at the floor. He came in long spurts until, with her touch, she’d rung the last bit of come from him.

They collapsed against the door, both sagging from the force of their releases.

As his breathing returned to a normal cadence and his heart to its usual tempo, Simon remained there with Persephone framed between his arms.

This is precisely what he’d needed. Now he could purge her from his thoughts. He’d been without a woman far too long. He’d had his fill and given Persephone hers, and now they could finally find some semblance of normality between them.