She stumbled and he lifted, bringing her to sit on his lap.
Where everything she’d not wished revealed suddenly was. His shaft, firm and long beneath her bottom, evidence of his need. She had to keep her hands occupied, woven in his hair, tangled in his shirt, to keep from touching him there. He clutched her hip, fingers curving in possession and drawing them into a negligible but convincing dance. A sensual grind reminiscent of the push and pull of sexual congress. This, she recognized.
“Alex,” he murmured against her lips, her name drawn out in a ragged whisper.
She could only hum, wiggle, sigh. Yes, yes, yes, if he was asking.
Yanking her skirt to her waist, he shifted her until his leg was wedged between hers. Her body shimmered, fevered, her skin heating, sweat breaking out in a fine line along her lower back. A cascade of pleasure rippled through her, racing forth like sunlight as he began to move her atop his muscled thigh. Incredibly, the beginnings of an orgasm roared within reach. By her own hand, and her own hand only, she recognized this feeling.
In the span of one second, the kiss spun into another realm.
She swayed, her lips leaving his to trail down his jaw, biting and sucking as he urged her into a fury, riding his leg, the most erotic act outside the act she’d ever performed. She’d lost what was left of her inhibitions and her mind. His hand slid low, curving around her bottom, moving her even more suitably from this vantage point. His groan flowed down her throat and into the pit of her stomach. Oh, to be touched like this. With such hunger and need.
It was heaven for a woman who’d gone so long without. Gone forever without.
Her nipples tightened, her corset a severe restriction when she wanted to be free of every restraint. For once in her bloody life, free.
“My bedchamber,” Alexandra whispered into the moist patch of skin beneath his ear. His whiskers were dense and grainy against her tongue, her seeking lips.
He halted, his hand having made it halfway from her hip to her breast, where she’d imagined it curving around the plump globe and squeezing until she melted into a puddle on her planked scullery floor. They were sensitive and had never been given enough attention.
Blinking as if he was coming out of a coma, his gaze struck hers, his expression adorably confounded. “Your bedchamber,” he mouthed in endearing repetition.
She licked her lips, delighted when his pupils flared, sparks of gold flaring in mossy green. “Where we can do more, Cort.” As in, more. Naked, blissful, screaming more. Destroyed bed and ripped sheets more.
Fantasy bits she now imagined might be possible after all.
He shook his head and moved her an inch away, not an inch closer. A grating slide down his hard thigh that didn’t ease the storm brewing inside her. “I thought…” He exhaled, struggling. “When you, this, that you meant…” He frowned, recovering, a hard edge entering his eyes. His bandage had come loose on one side and was dangling over his eyebrow. “No, oh, no,” he whispered and hoisted her off his lap.
She stumbled into the block, reaching to gain her balance, her skirt dropping with a wispy lament around her ankles. An uneasy ripple coursed through her, though she managed to keep her tone steady. Successfully hiding the feral beat of her heart, her racing pulse. “Is this not what you wanted?”
Cort scrambled to retrieve his crutch, jammed it under his armpit and rose shakily to his feet. As this was the first time she’d stood this close to him since he’d left for boarding school—he’d either been sitting, unconscious or across a ballroom the other times—she was shocked to realize how tall he was. How broad of shoulder and chest. A stubbled jaw and an expression fit for a vexed god, he looked more like a brigand than a man of society.
Honestly, like the lemon scones, he looked good enough to eat in two tasty bites.
“I’m confused,” she said because, truly, she was. Three-quarters of the way to pleasure, and he’d stopped? She’d invited him to her bedchamber, albeit not very tactfully, and he was saying no? His shaft was tenting his trousers, so arousal wasn’t the issue. She was leagues out of practice enticing a man. “Why are you leaving?”
Cort tapped his temple, grimacing as he inadvertently grazed his wound. “This kiss was supposed to get you out of here, not embed you deeper.” He yanked the bandage free and tossed it to the floor before beginning a wobbly circle of the scullery. Definitely an agile man, the crutch nonetheless presented a laborious journey. He made it to the window, where he stood staring out, his shoulders rising and falling. She heard him mumbling beneath his breath but couldn’t make out the words.
Alexandra had the sudden understanding that she was dealing with more than a kiss. Men could, she knew, be sensitive creatures. “I’m missing something.”
He glanced over his shoulder, flashing a hostile smile. “You always have, Lady Amberly.”
She thought back to their childhood. Cort had visited Hampton Court more than Knox, always underfoot, always teasing. Napping in the stable loft, stealing oranges from the conservatory, volumes from her father’s library. Too young for her, of course, a lad in leading strings when she’d been well out of the nursery. Nevertheless, he’d been persistent, trailing behind, seeking attention. And there’d been that kiss, brief and awkward, before he left. Why, he’d been no more than fourteen or so then.
Like the flare of a matchstick, the answer came to her.
She coughed, a delighted peal of laughter rolling past her lips, amusement she should have stifled. “The boy was enamored with me, and the man is discomfited. Goodness, Cort, why be embarrassed? I was little more than a silly, young fool myself.”
At her words, he was across the chamber before she could stop him, placing more weight on his injured leg than he should, pushing through the doorway and stalking unevenly down the corridor, the crutch tapping the floor in angry pops.
“I’m not laughing at you, it’s more startled surprise!” She took her skirt in hand and raced to catch him. “The kiss was lovely.” Lovely? Dear heaven, it had been magical. Her feet were inches off the ground still, her skin aflame, her knees beyond weak. Perhaps, if she handled him gently, he’d accept her offer to see her bedchamber. Glide beneath her sheets, between her thighs, and do wicked things to her. “Cort, wait, stop!”
But he didn’t hesitate, his long-legged stride taking him swaying down the hallway.
For the first time in history, her butler, Cosgrove, materialized from the shadows when she’d rather he remain hidden. He likely suspected the antics that had been going on in the scullery. “My lord, how may I be of assistance?”
“I need to return to Herschel House immediately. I have business affairs to attend to. Repairs to the roof. And something else I can’t recall at the moment. Rotting planks in one of the parlors. Or maybe it was the library.” Scowling, he snapped his lips shut.
