He snuggled his hip in next to her waist, resting one hand on her stomach. “You seemed to struggle to keep your hands up.”
The flush that had filled her face and neck earlier returned. “I wanted to touch you.” She ran her fingers down his thigh. “To please you.”
He stroked her with his thumb. “You please me in more ways than you can imagine. What I want is for you to experience nothing but the pleasure of my touch. Not sight—”
“But I love looking at you.”
He leaned over and kissed her. “And I you. But there will be more intensity—”
“Thatwas rather intense.”
This was unlike her. Something was wrong. He studied her. “Clara, are you afraid of me?”
Her gaze darted to the cravat, then back to his face. “A little.” She chewed her lower lip. “I’ve—I’ve never felt anything like—”
“I will never hurt you. I promise.”
She fell silent.
“If anything I do hurts, all you have to do is tell me to stop.”
She paused, then nodded.
“Do you believe me?”
Another—brief—nod.
“Why did you want your first experience with a man to be with me?”
Her voice was hushed. “Because I am in love with you.”
“And you trust me?”
No sound, but her lips formed the wordyes.
He trailed the silk cravat across her breasts, watching as she shivered. He curled it around his left hand and brushed it along her neck and down her stomach, letting the end linger between her legs. “Touch,” he whispered, “is vital in letting yourself accept the pleasure two people can make each other feel. Sight can distract from that. And you wanting to please me can deprive you of your own enjoyment. Even a moment’s distraction can dissolve your most intimate joy.”
Clara stilled, as if mesmerized by his voice, her eyes focused on his face. He pulled the silk back up her body, swirling it around her breasts. Her nipples hardened again, and he brushed them through the silk with his fingers, his touch growing firmer as he moved from one tip to the other. Then he pulled her hands together over her stomach, whispering as he wrapped the cravat around her wrists, leaving a length of it trailing down her side. “You are my goddess. I want to give you pleasure such as you have never felt.”
He tied a secure knot in the cravat, then slowly pushed her hands up over her head. He tied the trailing end of the silk to the headboard, then gazed down at her. “Is it too tight?”
She shook her head. “But why—”
He kissed her. “You will see. Close your eyes.”
“I like watching you too.”
Michael smiled. “And you will. Just not yet.” He kissed her forehead. “Close.”
She did.
He released a long breath, then kissed each eyelid before slipping down, kissing his way down her neck and shoulder, his lips cherishing her newly aroused nipples, relishing each whimper, each sigh as Clara moved beneath him.
Yet what he was about to do made every muscle tighten with both longing and fear. His desire—a raging, overwhelming heat—battled with the terror of hurting her.
She deserves better.
The words thrown at him since he had returned to Berkeley Square—“You are nothing but a rake!”—stalled him now, echoing in his mind.“You are nothing! Who are you to take her?”Michael paused, his lips pressed against the tender skin between her breasts.
