Royal Regard

Chapter Twenty-Three, Part 1

Nick stood over her in the chair, and before she could object, he leaned down and kissed her, hands behind his back, never holding her down. As she didn't object, and almost came out of her chair to follow him anytime he pulled away, he knelt down in front of her, deepening the passionate embrace until he was possessing her without using anything but his lips and tongue. She held on to the back of his neck with both hands.

Once she was weakly whimpering, trying to drag his hands toward her, he gave free rein to his mouth, dragged his tongue along her jaw, down her throat, licking just underneath the gathered lace trim of her bodice, finding one of the spots on which she used lavender oil, sending his tongue in between her breasts to taste the scent of her. He was drunk on it, and on the feel of his hands on her thighs, through muslin and satin and the forty-seven layers of linen he was sure she wore.

"I think you have worn this dress and left off your corset to try my honor, and I find I have none. Did you choose pretty petticoats, too, when you dressed for your visit to me?"

He hoped they were white with pink ribbons, like a maiden on her wedding night, not scarlet to match the dress, though he had never craved even the semblance of virginity before.

She was somehow shy even as she looked him right in the eye, biting her lip. "How do you...? A man should not notice petticoats."

He wanted to chuckle at her, but she was too earnest to tease. He smiled instead and kissed her briefly, a wordless "thank you" for the petticoats, his hands firmly stroking up and down her sides, his thumbs swiping the sides of her breasts, the stomach that drew in when she gasped, the back that arched whenever she whimpered.

She looked down and whispered, with the barest hint of the voice she used when she was trying some new bit of flirtation as she had learned how to hold her own in London: "Charlotte made me."

"I am in her debt. Tell me about the layers I will remove sometime in the next few hours."

She whimpered, "Hours? We—I—" as Nick rubbed her thighs atop her gown and its overskirt, underskirt, petticoats, chemise, and anything else she might be wearing to defend against him, fingertips inching ever closer to her center, but not close enough, and not inclined to slide up under even one layer of fabric, no matter that he had maneuvered himself between her knees, leaving her legs spread immodestly around his waist.

"White or a color? Silk or linen? Ribbons or tatting? Buttons or laces?" He ran the tip of his tongue along the whorl of her ear as he asked, "How many layers between my hand and your thigh?"

She choked, "You certainly have intimate knowledge of women's undergarments."

"I will have intimate knowledge of yours once you have told me what they look like." When he slipped the sleeve of the siren's gown off her shoulder, he was sure Bella thought he wouldn't make her say it, but he took the strap of her chemise with the dress; her shoulder was completely bared, and he still had no idea what color the slip might be.

"It is white—" she gasped when his mouth brushed her collarbone. "—linen."

Her face could be no warmer than the rest of her body, and her voice low and husky in a way he had never heard before. Her eyelids fell as he followed the curve of her shoulder with his lips, placing soft kisses on every inch of skin as he bared it.

"With ribbons," she added, as he reached the sleeve and slowly moved across the neckline toward her breast. "Very like a debutante."

"Very like an untouched maid I will soon despoil." He separated her chemise strap from the gown, and ran his tongue along the ribbon woven into the fine linen. "Pink. Perfect."