Mermaid of Penperro Page 25

  On the wall there was a painting, this time of a stern-looking man in the dress of a cleric. She looked from it to Tom, raising her eyebrows in question.

  “My father. He died shortly after the Eustice debacle.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Tom gave a quick shrug. “So am I. I would have liked him to know I did not remain the complete rotter he thought me at the time.”

  “Have you other family?”

  “Not living, no. The Trewellas were never a particularly prolific line.”

  As interesting as this was, it wasn’t the most conducive of topics to what she had in mind. Neither did she particularly relish the idea of making a seduction attempt while the disapproving Papa Trewella watched on. She set her candle down atop a short stack of books on the bedside stand, pleased to see that the painting receded into the shadows.

  “Are these all your own books?” she asked, squatting down and picking up a leather-bound volume.

  He set his lamp on a dresser and came over to squat down beside her. “For the most part,” he said, taking the tome from her hands and reading the spine. “The India Sapphire. It’s an exciting story, if you want to borrow it,” he said, handing the book back to her.

  “Perhaps I will,” she said, taking it and meeting his eyes. He broke the gaze and started going through the other books.

  Konstanze frowned, chewing the inside of her lip. She had led him up here to seduce him—or at least to invite him to seduce her—and things were not going quite the way she had expected. Wasn’t the mere sight of a woman in his bedroom supposed to inflame a man’s passions? But Tom just searched through his books, as if she were a chum in need of reading material.

  “The Lost Land of Timbuktu. It’s about the legends surrounding the city, and the utter failure of any white man to reach it,” Tom said, holding out the book. “Does that suit you?”

  “Do you have anything like that other book?” she asked.

  “The India Sapphire?”

  “No, the… other book. The Memoirs.”

  That caught his attention. “Are you serious?” he asked.

  “Although it is only a novel, I am finding it quite informative. One always hears warnings against the way of life of the heroine, and yet no one ever offers to explain the details.”

  His eyebrows drew together, rising up over his nose. “And you want to read more of these… er… details?”

  She shifted from her awkward squatting position onto the floor, her legs tucked up to one side. With one hand on the floor she leaned toward him. “I do.” He met her eyes, looking into them for a long moment, then abruptly stood, looking down at her with an almost angry expression. “What are you up to, Konstanze?”

  She got to her own feet, her courage fading and embarrassment burning her cheeks. If he didn’t know what she was up to, then it might be better not to continue. Despite what he had done with her in back of the church, and down on the shore, there was a part of her that was not confident of his desires. With an effort she tried to ignore that mewling voice of cowardice.

  Instead of backing away, she stepped forward and laid her palm against his chest, and, leaning close, she looked up at him, her face mere inches from his own. She could feel the increase in his heart rate.

  He took hold of her hand as if to lower it, but held it where it was. “I should take you home.”

  “I don’t want to go.”

  “Konstanze…”

  “I want to stay here with you.”

  “You can’t. We can’t. There’s no good to come of it.”

  “I think there is.” She brought her other hand up, smoothing her palm over his waistcoat. She didn’t know what manner of touch would please him, so she sought to please herself. She ran her hand under the open front of his coat, then up to his shoulder, his skin warm beneath the layer of fine cloth.

  His grip on her other hand loosened, and she tugged it free, reaching up with both hands now to touch lightly over his face, exploring the contours and texture. He closed his eyes as her fingers drifted over his brow, down his nose, and across his lightly stubbled cheeks. She let a fingertip glide along his lips, then back again, fascinated by the smooth feel of them. She wanted to taste them for herself, and slid her hands into the hair behind his ears, holding his face and pulling him down to her.

  She brushed her lips lightly over his, once, twice, enjoying the feel of them. She had not known there could be as much pleasure from touching as there was from being touched. Her worries about his reaction dissipated, her delighted senses blocking off all else but the man before her and her own body’s reactions.

  She kissed him then, gently, letting her lips speak silently of her love and desire. His arms came up around her, one in the small of her back and the other cupping her head. He deepened the kiss, taking her tenderness and turning it into something fiercer. He pulled the white cap from her head, his fingers digging into her bound hair and, unfortunately, her healing wound.

  The pain made her jerk, and he loosened his hold on her, pulling his head back.

  “Sorry,” he whispered, his voice husky. His fingertips probed gently through her hair until they found the place of her injury, then retreated. The interruption seemed to bring a faint stirring of conscience back to him, and he loosened his hold further. “Why are you doing this?” he asked, looking as if he did not want to hear the answer.

  “Why did you do the same to me?” she asked, playing with his earlobe, pressing her chest up against his. She wished she were wearing one of her own dresses rather than the stays that made a wall between them.

  “I’m trying to remember that you’re a married woman.”

  “On paper only. In my heart I am free. In my heart I know that this is what I want. You better than most should understand that what we know to be right is not always what we know to be lawful.”

  “I don’t know if this is right,” he said softly, and leaned his forehead down onto hers. “And I’m very near to not caring whether it is or not. I don’t want to be the villain, but I want you, married or no. God help me, I do.”

  “There is no villainy in this.” Konstanze tilted her face, breaking the contact with his forehead as she kissed him lightly, repeatedly, tempting him to take more. There could be nothing wicked here; she had been wrong before to chastise herself for her desires, and for giving way to his touch. She loved him, and that made everything permissible.

  “I pray there is not,” he said, whatever control he still retained breaking. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her toward the bed. “For if there is, you may count me damned.” He set her on her feet beside the bed and kissed her, this time taking charge and holding nothing back, hungrily exploring the side of her neck, the space behind her ear, the place where her neck met her shoulders in a gentle slope. He moved lower and traced his tongue over her collarbone, and then he was easing her bodice down her shoulders, his deft fingers having found the pins that held it closed over her stays.

  She let him undress her, the experience widely different from the times that Hilde had performed the same task, her breath coming fast and strange currents of desire melting her muscles. Tom nibbled on her neck as he worked at the tapes fastening her skirt, and then when the material fell to the floor he knelt down, sliding his hands up her stockinged calves to the garters tied tightly below her knees. He pressed his face against the thin layer of linen chemise over her loins, and she swayed at the feel of his warm breath through the fabric.

  She balanced with one hand on his shoulder as he made her lift first one foot and then the other and removed her stockings and shoes. His hands stayed under her chemise, rising up her legs as he again stood, his palms running over the backs of her thighs and then cupping her bare buttocks in their warm grip. He pulled her against him, kissing her deeply, his tongue exploring her mouth as his hands gently kneaded. Desire was a warm, wet rush in her loins.

  He turned her around so he could unlace her stays, and when he had them loose
enough he slid them over her hips, letting them fall to the floor. Her breasts felt heavy without the support, but then his hands came around and cupped them, lifting them against her chest, pulling her body back against his.

  “You have no idea how much power you hold over me,” he whispered near her ear, his thumbs stroking over the tops of her breasts.

  “Nor you of the power you hold over me,” she said, her eyes going half closed as he continued his caresses.

  His hands moved down over her belly, one remaining there while the other covered her sex. Her legs parted. He lightly pressed his hand against the length of her, stroking up and down in short, gentle movements through the thin material, his middle finger a ridge against her own center of sensation, his fingertips touching against the entrance to her body at the end of each downward stroke. Her head arched back onto his shoulder.

  He pulled up her chemise by the fistful, and she raised her arms to let him lift it off her. She turned in his arms, and felt the chemise fall in a gentle breeze behind her, onto the floor. With his arms around her she pressed close to him, enjoying the feel of his clothed body against her naked skin, feeling both vulnerable and liberated.

  Her hair was next, his fingers moving with infinite care to find the pins and remove them, letting her hair fall in heavy locks about her. When the pins were all out he used his fingers as a comb, separating the strands and fanning them in a curtain over her shoulders and breasts, her hardened nipples showing through. He lowered his head and flicked his tongue against one, then the other, then took the tip gently between his teeth, his lips dampening her hair.

  Just when she felt she was about to lose the strength in her knees, he went around her to pull the covers on the bed down, then swept her up in his arms again, depositing her on the mattress, kissing her until she was sunk deep into the pillows. He stood back then and stripped off his own clothes.

  As his shirt came off she drew in a shuddering breath, her eyes taking in the planes of his chest and the movements of his muscles beneath the skin, illuminated by the yellow glow of the candlelight. He was nothing like Bugg, nothing at all. Her eyes were drawn to his nipples, small and flat compared to hers, and set upon broad, gently curved muscles. His chest tapered to a narrow waist and hips, and her eyes fastened to the bulge there as he undid the flaps of his breeches, dropping both them and the linen undergarment.

  She felt her eyes go round. “Good Lord!” she cried. “What is that?”

  He froze as he was bending over, the breeches still around the ankle of one foot. “Your pardon?”

  Konstanze pointed to his crotch. “Is there something amiss with it?”

  He stood straight, naked now, his penis protruding like the pole of a shop sign. He looked down at it, and it began to deflate, shrinking and sagging. “I don’t think so.”

  “But…” she said, her eyes fixed upon it as if upon a snake, “it’s so big.”

  “It is?” The member in question puffed up as if in pride, regaining its former stiff stature. “That’s to make it the better to please you with, my dear,” he said, and when she looked up at his face, he was grinning.

  She pulled the sheet up, gripping it tightly. “It’s not what I expected. It’s like something out of that book, an ‘enormous machine.’”

  “Tell me more. You are delighting my vanity.”

  “I shouldn’t see why,” she said. “If Bugg’s little thing caused me such discomfort, I cannot imagine what will happen with this.” She was having second and third thoughts, her desire of moments ago fleeing under this mammoth threat to her person.

  He came to the bed, and she moved over as he lifted the sheet and lay down beside her, propping himself up on an elbow, reaching out with his other hand to lightly stroke her cheek, his hand trailing down her neck, nudging aside her gripped hands and the sheet so that he could continue down her torso. “You’ll be pleased with it in the end, I promise you. Would you like to touch it?”

  She hesitated, but the truth was she would very much like to touch it and become acquainted. Perhaps it might not be so frightening if she did so. The thing might as well have been the appendage of a different animal entirely, compared to what had hung between Bugg’s legs.

  She pushed down the sheet and then, feeling like Sleeping Beauty reaching for the deadly spindle, touched the beast upon its head. It bobbed in response. Intrigued by the texture beneath her fingertips, she wrapped her hand around the shaft and slid her palm toward his body. He groaned, and she released him, jerking back. “What did I do?”

  “Nothing wrong. I… liked it, was all.”

  “Did you?”

  He gazed at her with desire, and she felt a little of her confidence return. It might not look as she had expected, but he seemed to think there was nothing amiss with his machine. She would trust that he was right. She scooted down in the bed, lying curled on her side facing it.

  This time when she touched it she did not flinch at the sounds he made. She brushed the back of her hand along it, her own heartbeat picking up at the contact. She almost forgot that it was attached to Tom, she became so engrossed in exploring the contours and running her fingertips along ridges, and letting the dampened end nudge her palm like the nose of a friendly dog.

  A wicked bit of curiosity got into her, and she bent her head down, flicking out her tongue to taste that salty, damp end. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her back up even with him, rolling atop of her and kissing her deeply, his member hard against her sex.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck, the size and feel of his rigid member against her welcome now that she had become acquainted with it. At the entrance to her body she felt a moistening—a desire rising within her to have Tom inside her, to have him filling a new and hungry emptiness the way the heroine in the Memoirs had been filled. The very interior of her felt as if it was alive with wanting, her flesh tingling with the need to be taken.

  His hand stole down there, his fingers repeating the same gentle game they had played upon her in back of the church. She parted her thighs, willing him to do as he wished. His mouth moved to the side of her neck, suckling above the point of her pulse.

  His fingers moved smoothly upon her, dampened with her own desire; then he slid one of them within her, deep. She arched beneath him, the intrusion welcome but unsatisfying. She pushed her hips against his hand, trying to steal more sensation from that embedded finger.

  A moment later it was gone, stroking once over her swollen folds before leaving her entirely. Tom came over her then, nudging open her thighs, the weight of his torso taken on his arm. She felt the back of his hand brush the inside of her thigh as he positioned his sex against hers, the head of it suddenly feeling three times as large as it had when it had been in her hand.

  His elbows now braced to either side of her, his face was directly above hers, his amber-brown eyes looking down with an intensity that made her part her thighs a little further, her knees rising.

  He pushed. She sucked in a breath at the surprise of it, the head feeling now like a veritable fist against her, it was so wide and her body so unwilling to receive it.

  He drew back slightly and pushed again, gaining some small entrance. Again he pulled back, and again he thrust, and this time the stretching pressure was one of pain, and with her feet and palms she pushed herself up towards the headboard to escape it. “It hurts,” she complained.

  His own expression was one of concern, his voice a whisper. “Does it hurt like the first time?”

  “It’s a little different. You’re so big.”

  He kissed her cheek and brushed back the hair from her forehead. “I’m not too big. You’re just not ready yet.”

  He moved down her body, her eyes growing wide as she saw where he was headed. He stopped with his face above that space between her thighs, and as she watched in horrified embarrassment he combed away her curls with his fingers and parted her nether lips. He glanced up at her, then with a wicked smile lowered his mouth.

/>   She dropped back onto the pillows at the luscious contact, eyes closing and all thought melting away into a starry black galaxy of pleasure. His arms slid under her thighs, his palms holding her hips as he stroked and fondled her with lips and tongue. He went on and on, exploring and dwelling, caressing, suckling against her, drawing her into his mouth as his tongue flicked quickly against her. Anticipation built within her, her whole body tensing as if doing so could hurry her to the finish she knew must await. She didn’t care now what Tom did, as long as he did not stop.

  As she was approaching the very peak of her pleasure he took his mouth from her, coming back up her body and positioning himself as he had been before, only this time once he was seated at her entrance he kept his hand below, stroking her. He thrust, and this time gained greater ground. It hurt with a dull, burning pain, but mingled with it was the satisfaction of a stretching fullness, and the continuing touch of his hand.

  He pushed again, and then once more, hard, seating himself fully within her as his fingers stroked, creating pleasure to counteract the pain. Tom moved within her, his hips thrusting against her in slow, hard thrusts, the strength of his motions taking the breath from her in small gasps, her breasts rocking on her chest. The combination of pleasure and fullness sent her over the edge, her body swept by pulsing contractions. Tom’s pace quickened as if in response, then suddenly slowed. He grimaced and pulled out.

  He came down on her, his member hard on her belly, and clasped her tight within his arms, his face buried in her hair. “Konstanze …” he groaned, and she felt his whole body go tense and hard. His manhood pulsed against her, and something warm and wet spread in spurts between their bodies.

  She wrapped her own legs around the backs of his, her arms holding him gently as he shuddered against her. The tension drained from him, and he sank upon her. It was a welcome weight, secure and comforting, but he seemed to shortly sense that it robbed her of breath, and he rolled to the side.

  “Stay here,” he whispered, and got up from the bed, going to the dressing table where there was a pitcher, a bowl, and a towel.