-18-

Jem

The effects of the nitrous oxide were curious. To begin with, Jem found them irritating and somewhat dulling. His thoughts became woolly and thick. That sensation had quickly passed to be replaced with one of muscular power and invincibility that stole through his body, starting in his chest and spreading out through muscles and tendons to his extremities.

Clarity of vision, a sharpening of his senses followed, or rather his mind became unburdened. When he stubbed his toe as he moved, he found it did not hurt. No wonder Davy had collected a coterie of poetical barnacles to his person.

And then… Then there was Eliza. Eliza who was all and everything. His greatest desire and a folly he ought not to commit. It would get back to Linfield. The man had no real talents to speak of but a nose for sniffing out subversion, and Jem couldn't let that happen. He had to protect Eliza, ensure her reputation.

Simultaneously, he would not pull away from this. Here she was in his arms, a dream come true, groaning from their kisses, her agile fingers tugging on the front of his shirt as if she meant to tear it from him. This could be his one and only chance to be with her. The events Linfield might demand of him this very night were rapidly spinning his future out of control.

Lord help him. Knowing she wanted him as ardently as he wanted her only made holding back so much harder.

Would she hate him come tomorrow?

Why was everything so monstrously muddled?

He'd put such hope into the gas, imagining it was his route to freedom, but realistically, while it certainly brought a pleasant tingling to his extremities, he couldn't swear that it was responsible for his current rise. No, in all truthfulness, his current priapism was down to her. To Eliza. Her taste. Her presence. The sweet promise of her honeyed cunt enveloping his prick. She did not need to touch him. She simply needed to be. Of course, when she did touch him… Well, then there was no escaping the thrall she held him under, and nor did he desire to. Every little thing about her called to him. Her voice, the sweet-luscious curves of her body, her mind. Predominantly her mind. He loved that she was not meek, nor a mild-mannered infant dressed up and paraded as breeding stock. She had her own thoughts and her own plans, and if there were a way to give her all that she desired, he would do it in a heartbeat.

Pity then, that in truth he could offer her little more than this moment. To promise more was impossible. He had not the funds to keep her, and besides, if he was forced to comply with Linfield's diabolical plan, then she'd likely hate him forevermore.

Dammit! The only reason he'd ever fallen into Linfield's trap was because he'd been so desperately trying to relinquish his desire for Eliza… and forget Joshua, and all that had happened between the three of them that day.

Lord, did he ever want to tup her, but he was not such a cad as to go ahead and do it, not knowing that she would regret it come the morrow.

Jem broke off their kiss. Her eyes were glittering brightly. Her skirts spread all around them while she rose her puss against his eager cock. "I'm going to shuffle down the chaise. I want you to stay right where you are."

"And do what? I'll be perched practically on your shoulders if you lie flat."

"Yes," he agreed. "You could perhaps grasp the back rest here." She cocked her head perplexed, but obeyed. Jem shimmied his body down between her thighs, until his head was lost beneath her skirts. A smooth expanse of bare skin stretched from where her garters held her stockings in place to the thatch over her muff. Jem tickled the split of her cunny with his tongue then dived in deep, covering himself with her honey. It'd been a long while since he'd lain with a woman, and there'd never been any he'd cared strongly about. Such occasions had been fleeting transactions, indulged in to service an itch. This was different. Each inch of him wanted every inch of her. His cock was like rock and the rasp of his shirt over it almost painful. He didn't let it dissuade him from his goal. He meant to bring her to bliss with his mouth in the way she'd dissuaded him from doing the previous night.

"Oh! Oh!" Her gasps which started out as mere murmurs were like a siren's call to him. They spurred him to greater effort. He sucked on her nub and licked it until it stood out taut and eager for his touch, until she trembled with each passing of his tongue and then wrenched all her skirts aloft so that she could tangle her fingers in the strands of his hair and watch what he was about. "I hardly know what you are doing to me, but don't stop. I beg you, don't stop. It feels…"

"What does it feel like?"

"Like everything is becoming tight. Like it's building towards some sort of crescendo."

He purred against her skin. "Well, that is the idea. I like watching you come, Eliza. He'd left her the previous night with fire in his veins after watching her spend on his fingers, and since facing Linfield with such a stick in his breeches would have led to much hellish awkwardness, he'd tossed himself off ahead of rendezvousing in the drawing room again. Bell had won the game and compelled them all to their beds as his prize alongside taking their guineas.

"Come…" Eliza echoed, tipping back her head and giving in to the sensations. "What a curious way of putting it."

"Does it not make you feel as if you'll come apart into a myriad of pieces?"

"I think… I don't know. I may need to experience it again to properly quantify the experience."

"Then it's a good thing I'm here to serve."

Jem felt the tick tick of her pulse beating against his tongue, the firmness of her nub as it swelled, growing tight and hot as his prick grew tighter and hotter too. He wanted this moment more than anything else right now. This explosion would see him through the dark days that were surely ahead. He gave her pearl another long suck, then licked the flat of his tongue against her opening before jabbing the tip between her swollen lips. The taste of her exploded more fully on his tongue.

Lord, he wanted so much more.

So very much more, but he'd content himself with this. His tongue inside her opening, the gasps, and rough noises of her pleasure playing like music for his ears alone. He'd take this offering and stow the moment away in his heart.

Delving deeper with his tongue he met resistance. She was virgo intacta. Hardly a shock, yet it brought home exactly the manner of fire he was playing with. God help him for the fool he was, but he wanted her.

"Don't you want to put your prick in me?" Her cry was practically a siren's call for him to do just that.

"Yes," he gasped. "So much, but not here, not now, not like this." When it happened—if it happened—he wanted it to be on terms they both fully understood and were happy with. He would not have her regret it afterwards. He would not have the memory of their first time together tarnished by the secrets he held. Truthfully, he wasn't worthy. But still, he was taking what little he dared. Fucking her with his tongue, his arms curled around her thighs pulling her fast to his mouth, sealing them together so that when he felt the rush against his tongue and her cries sang out, he was right there with her until the very last pulse of it died.

She sagged with a cry, her fist pulled tight against her lips, as she slithered down his body to kiss him while his lips and chin were still covered in her dew. "I feel almost completely boneless, like I should just like to lie here for an age and hold you fast." She lay against him as if to do precisely that. "Yet, part of me is still eager and desirous of more. I know how to make sure there are no unwanted surprises from us lying together, so you needn't fear, if that's what holds you back."

He brushed the escaped wisps of her hair back from her face. Her eyes were shiny, alight with desire and love he didn't deserve. "Bell is still next door."

It was an unnecessary reminder. Ludlow would not disturb them. Likely enough the fellow had his eye to the keyhole, which was reason enough not to strip every inch of fabric from her and tumble her until they were both so exhausted that they could do nothing but fall asleep. However, it was also an acknowledgement that the world existed outside of these humble laboratory walls.

"But we surely cannot leave you so" —she traced a line along the length of his shaft— "risen."

"I will not prick you now, Eliza."

The fine row of her teeth dug into her lower lip. "Then, will you at least allow me to lie here beside you and watch you toss yourself off."

He coughed out an ‘O' of surprise, then lifted his head to better look at her tucked against his shoulder. "You want to watch me toss myself."

She was all impish delight. "Aye. I do. Rather fiercely to be truthful. It's something I've wondered over. I know it's a thing that men do. Why even the smallest of boys seem to have a rapacious fondness for playing with their bits."

"I prefer not to think of small boys, but you are not wrong. Big boys like playing with their cocks too."

Impudent miss that she was, she reached down and tugged his shirt tails out of the way so that his erect prick was displayed in all its glory. "Show me."

He laughed, though nevertheless cupped himself. "You want me to show you how I coax myself into spending, is that right, Miss Wakefield?" he asked, stroking up from the base to the tip. "Is this a serious study? Shall you take notes?"

She bopped him on the nose. "It most definitely is, Mr Whistler. I will restrict myself to observations and record my findings later. Will you shoot yourself in the eye, do you think?"

"With you here watching? Aye, I just might."

Her gaze remained rapt upon him as he stroked, though it flitted between his hand and his face. Jem knew he'd pinkened around the cheeks over the scrutiny, but her presence coupled with her studious, yet excited expression kept him focused on the task. Did he draw it out a little, make a show of it for her? Well, of course he did. Who the hell wouldn't? Linfield sometimes got it into his head to make Jem stand about in the altogether tossing himself, but that was about power not fascination. There was no love in that act, whereas now it was all about the connection.

"It's coming," he warned her, his breathing getting away from him so that his words became drawn out, the syllables stretched by the pleasure congregating at the base of his cock. She watched him come apart. And while he didn't shoot himself in the eye, he did make a proper mess of his waistcoat.

Eliza provided him with her handkerchief, a large practical cotton square embroidered at the corner with her initial. As he made to mop himself off, she leaned over and kissed him. "Your eyes are so shiny right now, and so green at the centres. Thank you for showing me."

"Did you like the display?"

She rolled over and hopped off the chaise, shaking out her skirts. Much of her hair had come loose from its pins. "I did. Rather a lot. I think I should like to see it again. Perhaps with you naked as a newborn."

"Being naked as a newborn with you certainly appeals." He straightened his clothing out as best he could, though he had to abandon the waistcoat. Then he went to check on the chemical equipment. It was still bubbling away merrily, though he suspected he had more than enough nitrous oxide now to send Linfield into a state of extreme theatricality. Perhaps that would even be a good thing. Not because it would enable him to fuck his wife, but because he might be rendered so indolent in his rapture as to forget to summon Jem to assist with the task.