Chapter Fifteen

The heat of the water permeated her cold body and Rosamunde didn’t even try to stop the appreciative moan that escaped. She’d done more today than she did most days and it was barely afternoon. Being out in the unexpected storm hadn’t helped.

Her muscles ached, but it was a burn she’d keep forever if it meant more days like this. Walking outside, snowball fights. Watching people ice skate.

Kissing Bryn.

Her body trembled and she squeezed her thighs together, trying unsuccessfully to stop the onslaught of memories reliving his kisses gave her. Skin hypersensitive, she shifted in the tub and breathed through her nose, trying to calm down.

As she finished washing herself, her arms brushed along her pointed nipples, drawing a whimper of anguished need from her. This wasn’t fair. Swallowing back her desire, she moved the rag down over her belly and on. She moaned as her fingers brushed her core.

She ached there and wanted something to take it away. No, not something. Someone. Bryn.

Worrying her lower lip in her teeth, she thought about her day. More like she thought about Bryn. Gut clenching, she sucked a sharp breath and tried to wrangle her thoughts. They were wild and running in directions she didn’t want them to go. Thousands of them and all with a singular destination.

A man who she would willingly give her innocence to if only he would take it. A man above her station. A man who members of the ton liked to scorn when he was not before them. But even if they wanted to shun him, they wished they could be his friend, warm his bed or learn from his training for boxing.

For all the bad things people spread about him, she’d found in him an integrity that she hadn’t seen in others. And while it impressed her, she wished just once he would let go of those morals and burn her with the heat she felt when he touched her.

“Bryn.” His name slipped from between her lips on a sultry moan.

“I do love the way you moan my name, lioness.”

She screeched and lowered herself in the hot water, attempting to hide her body from the man who stepped from the shadows of her afternoon-lit room.

“You can’t be here.” Water sputtered from her mouth as she wrapped her arms around her breasts, trying to keep them under the water and hidden. Her legs tightened together, like her attempt at hiding would block her from his view.

How long has he been there? How much did he see? Could she just die and forgo ever having to face him again?

Bryn prowled around her and she gulped as she took him in.

He made her mind think of nothing but body parts intertwined. Sweaty skin. His stubble turning her skin red from how it abraded her tender flesh.

Behind her, he braced his hands on either side of her, long tanned fingers gripping the edges of the tub which held her. A tub that was far too small to keep her hidden from his view.

“Then scream for help.” He lowered his head so she could see it in her peripheral. Strong jaw, covered with that dark bristle she wanted to touch once more. “Call out and have someone come.”

“You’d get in trouble and would be in trouble for compromising me.” She shook her head. “I’m not ruining your life like that.”

“You are killing me, lioness. You should be worried about your virtue. Unmarried. Naked . With a man leaning over you, greedily taking in all God graced you with.”

She tried to curl tighter even as she sank until her lips barely hovered above the waterline.

His arms closed in tighter to her.

“Your virginity should be your concern, not what it would do to my life.”

Cold seeped back into her bones as the reality of the situation smashed into her. He was leaving. And despite knowing this from the start, it was harder and harder for her to be okay with it because her feelings for him were deepening the longer she spent with him. She didn’t care about her virginity. Her future had been decided for her, but this man didn’t deserve to have his life ruined. And it made her angry. Unreasonable? Perhaps. But this entire journey they were on together was different and unique. Logic had long vanished.

Bitterness coated her tongue and she wished it would leave her alone. “Because you can run away to America? Hide from responsibility?”

That square jaw tensed as he took a deep breath. “I don’t hide from my responsibility, baby. I’m pointing out that you should think about yourself, not others.”

“Isn’t that what I’m doing?”

His gaze dipped to her lips and back to her eyes. “By sitting in a tub with a man near who’s hungry to lay his eyes on the curves you have, to watch the water sluice down your petal-soft skin?”

Was it her imagination or had his voice gotten deeper?

Emboldened by the bone-deep trust she had for Bryn, knowing he would never force himself on her, she unclenched her legs in the tub and sat up enough that the tops of her breasts broke the surface of the water.

He sucked a harsh breath, the sound unfurling something deeply feminine within her, making her long to arch her back and purr. It was a heady feeling, being able to pull such a needy groan from the man behind her.

“I know I’m safe with you, Bryn. You won’t take it, not even if I offered. And you told me I had to get used to a man looking at me. Why not do it with one who could simply walk away?”

His heavy gulp echoed in her ears followed by a low string of words she didn’t understand.

Like it was the most natural thing in the world, she picked up her cleaning cloth and added her soap to it before running it over her arms.

“Have you given any thought to who you will set me up with?” She rinsed off her arms then lifted one leg free of the water. His knuckles went white at the motion. “I really liked Remington and Piers. You trust them and I think they would be kind with me.”

“You seem to like taunting me, lioness. Talking about allowing men who I will kill if they touch you the opportunity to settle between your thighs.”

Bryn reached out with his right hand and dragged two fingers up the inside of her leg, which she still had exposed for washing.

Heat slammed her, body slickening with preparation for something. For him.

His darker skin made her paleness even more prominent, and she swallowed. Hard. He didn’t stop until he got to where her leg once again disappeared under the water.

“Like I’m going to allow them the pleasure of watching your skin flush as your arousal grows.” He stroked away from the waterline, the heat from his body surrounding her in a way that made the water seem almost cold by comparison. Then he reversed direction again.

She shifted on the bottom, her other leg spreading of its own accord. The material fell from clumsy fingers and her forearm brushed over her nipple, drawing a gasp from her throat.

So sensitive. Brushing against the taut tip shot thousands of shocks through her and the pleasure-pain mixture was so intense stars flickered before her eyes. The second it faded, she wanted it again.

And again.

“Damn it.”

Goosebumps popped up along her skin from his sexually frustrated tone.

“You’re a goddamn Venus, baby. I’m going to hell in twelve thousand different ways for this. Let me touch you.”

“You are.” She tipped her head back to view his face.

Bryn’s gaze burned where it touched her. His chest lifted and fell in a jagged rhythm. His fingers tightened on her inner thigh but as much as she longed to watch his touch on her skin, she couldn’t find the wherewithal to tear her stare from his.

Raw.

Honest.

Hungry.

And something more. Something she’d never seen in the gaze of anyone who happened to look at her for more than thirty seconds. This man was aware of her. Saw her in a way no one else either cared to view her or wouldn’t.

Bryn, however, he saw beneath the polished smiles. The dutiful curtsey she gave, the deferential behavior she put forward, how she showed everyone the good daughter she was, despite how they spoke about her.

Her breaths came faster, harsher, shallower. Her head was spinning from Bryn’s intoxicating smell as he continued crowding into her body as he remained behind her in what should be the most inappropriate way fathomable, but she craved more.

“Baby.” He gulped and her gaze dropped from his eyes to follow the motion of his throat then bounced back up. “I need the words.”

Deep down she knew this was going to end in heartache. Hers. But she didn’t care, this need, this burn within her ignited hotter for one person and he was right here with her. This… this was the experience she sought.

“Touch me.”

Bryn lost the ability to breathe, and not for the first time since he’d snuck into Rosamunde’s room only to find her in the tub.

Naked.

Suds sliding over those curves he dreamed about whether asleep or awake. She’d taken up residence in his mind and he wasn’t able to dislodge her. Not that he was sure he needed her gone.

Had he been a better man, he would have left when he realized she relaxed in the hot water.

A better man wouldn’t have come in the room in the first place.

There. It was accepted he wasn’t a better man. Because he had snuck in, and not only that, he’d stayed. He’d approached her, his nose assaulted by her evocative scent of violet and mint and a light hint of the fire.

Now he leaned over her from behind, her deep chestnut hair slick with water and begging to be wrapped around his hand as he had his way with her. Christ, his cock jumped and he struggled not to reach down and adjust himself. This woman had a body made for the most carnal of desires and damn if he didn’t long to experience all of them with her.

Standing as he was, he could see beneath the water and her full breasts were pinker than her shoulders at the moment, he assumed from the heat. He wanted to make her stand up so he could see all of her.

Taking the shell of her ear in his teeth, he nipped her lightly and she jumped but didn’t squeal. No, no. Of course not. She moaned, tipping her head slightly to the left in silent invitation.

She doesn’t need lessons on how to snare a man. She’s seductive all on her own.

Possessiveness swelled within him at the thought of someone else seeing her like this. Making her skin flush with desire. He pushed that down with an angry shove. He shouldn’t be thinking about that right now.

Running his nose along the elegant curve of her neck, he took a deep breath and allowed her fresh, warm scent to flow into him. There was something intrinsically feminine about her and he wanted to simply indulge.

Gripping the edge of the tub with his left hand so hard he feared there would be an imprint on his skin, he slid the fingers of his right hand up and down her inner thigh. He wouldn’t dream of marking her skin.

Would I?

Because were he to be truly honest with himself, he would love to see his marks on her creamy skin. To know his lips, his scruff, his teeth had created them.

“Do you touch yourself?”

He heard her gulp, not seeing it. But the hesitation was there.

“Of course not,” she began, only to stop when he squeezed her supple flesh.

“Don’t lie to me, lioness. Be honest.” His voice octaves lower to his own ears.

She shook her head and he nipped the side of her neck, loving how she trembled beneath him.

Bryn sank to his knees and relinquished his crushing grip on the side of the tub before sliding his hand beneath the water and giving in to the temptation he’d had since the moment he’d met this woman.

He brushed his fingertips along her side, slowly moving up toward her breast. The nipple, peaked and flushed, did nothing but make his mouth water for a taste.

“Tell me the truth.”

“Y…yes.”

No, he needed more than that. “Yes what?”

The tremors owning her didn’t subside. “I…I’ve touched myself. At night. In my bed.”

His shaft somehow got thicker. He closed his eyes at the thought of her lying there, flushed, panting, fingers dipping between her thighs, rubbing between her lips, her cream covering them.

Palm up, he lifted her heavy breast, plumping it before he angled his hand to allow his thumb to brush against her rosy nipple. Her gasp thrust more iron into his dick, which threatened to break free of confinement.

“How?” Another caress of his thumb to her tip, a following shudder. “Tell me how you please yourself, lioness.”

A slight shake of her head as he skimmed his lips against her cheek.

“I’m embarrassed. We shouldn’t talk about this.”

He disagreed. Bryn pushed her. Angled his head and bit the vein in her neck until she whimpered then he backed off, knowing there would be a mark in that spot.

“Give me the words. I need the words and so do you.”

“Lightly.” Much like her tone. “At first. I touch my breasts, eyes closed as I pull on the nipples, waiting for them to get hard.”

Bryn pinched her nipple between his index finger and thumb. “Like this?”

Her back arched, lifting her full breasts from the water. She gripped the sides of the bath with a moan.

“Yes, but this is different. More. ”

He licked her shoulder. “More? Like more of my touch or different and yet it’s more?”

She swallowed hard. “Both. I don’t know.” Her tongue swiped her lips. “That’s a lie. I do know. Please more like that. It’s never been like this.” Her body shifted in the water, sloshing it up the sides.

Mouth behind her ear, he pinched again. “Tell me what you do next. After your nipples are hard and begging for touch.”

“I can’t ever get it right, I feel empty. Even touching both of them, together.”

God he would love to fill her with his cock. Thrust hard and deep until she came all over him and squeezed his cum out. Have both hands on her breasts as he drove relentlessly into her, making her cry out his name. Or have them in his face as she rode him, using him for her own pleasure.

“Next.” It wasn’t a question, it was a demand.

“Move down my body.”

He slid his hand horizontally and rolled the other tip in his fingers, pulling another moan from her. Then he moved down even as he inched the fingers on her thigh up toward her core.

“Slowly?” He trailed his fingers over the soft roundness of her belly. “Or is there a far more urgent need pushing you faster?”

“I tried slow, but the need, the need , was too great.” Her eyes were closed, thick curved lashes resting on her full cheeks. Some freckles were noticeable and he longed to trace them.

Placing his palm against her torso, directly below her breasts, he brought his other hand closer and dragged a finger up through the seam of her pussy.

“Bryn.” His name fell from her lips on a breathy sigh even as her hips arched up, seeking more.

He circled her clit, paying close attention to her responses.

“Your touch was too light, wasn’t it, lioness?” He pushed harder against the tight bundle of nerves and she whimpered. A sound he longed to gobble up like a starving man. “You want it hard.” He licked her neck. “You need it hard.”

“Yes.”

She released her hold on the edge of the bath only to clamp it around his wrist—her hand wasn’t large enough to wrap completely around—underwater with his fingers slowly strumming her clit.

“Show me,” he ordered, readjusting her hold on him so his fingers were over hers, having her touch herself.

Two fingers circled her clit and he lost himself in learning how she loved to be touched. How fast. How hard.

It wasn’t easy to watch his hand below the surface of the water but he could make it out, and how his dark fingers slipped between her lips.

“Ankles up, baby, and hands on the edge.”

He nearly came, hard, as she didn’t even hesitate to follow his directive. There was something erotic about having this woman spread wide in a bath waiting for his next command, her limbs out of the water, steam rising around her.

Her fingers worked the grip on the edge but she didn’t move. He nipped her ear again as he circled her opening, paying close attention to her body’s responses to his touch. While he wanted to do it his way, it was important for him to know what she liked and if she didn’t know, help her find it.

Yeah, that’s me, a fucking Samaritan.

“Good girl. Never shy away from what you want.”

She cracked open her eyes, that green so dark it neared black. “I want you .”