“Do you like this?” he whispered, touching her gently between her legs.
She nodded. “Yes, that. No, that.”
He smiled wolfishly. He’d moved his fingers ever so slightly and had apparently found the spot that most gave her pleasure.
He rubbed, very softly.
“Oh, yes.”
And then in circles. “Like this?”
She nodded frantically.
“I can do even better.”
She didn’t look like she believed him.
“Just you wait,” he murmured, and then, before she could possibly figure out what he was up to, he flipped her over, scooted down her body, and planted his face right between her legs.
She shrieked with surprise.
He licked.
“George! What are you doing? You can’t—”
“Oh, I can,” he said, taking just a moment to look up at her. “You’ll like it, too.”
“Are you sure?”
He paused again. “If you don’t, tell me.”
She nodded. At least she trusted him in this.
He’d done this before, but not often. The courtesan his uncle had sent him to at the age of sixteen had assured him women loved it.
“They’ll be yours forever,” she’d said, right after giving him a condescending boop on the nose. “Provided you do it well.”
He was fairly certain he had learned to do it reasonably well, but in truth, it had always felt like a bit of a chore to him.
He was not unselfish; he did care that a woman felt pleasure in their joining. But for him, it was frankly a little boring.
No longer.
Kissing Charlotte so intimately was a revelation. The taste of her, the heat . . . the sounds she made with every tiny lick and nibble . . . Her pleasure sparked his in a way he had not known was possible. Each time she moaned and squirmed, he felt himself growing impossibly harder. He didn’t know how much longer he could possibly maintain such excitement, and yet something within him would not let him stop.
He was going to make her explode. It had become his life’s ambition.
He slid a finger into her.
“Oh!” She let out a breathy squeal. It made him smile against her.
“You like that, do you?” he murmured. He turned the one finger into two.
Her hips bucked, and she cried out his name. “Wait!” she gasped. “I can’t!”
He smiled again. She could and she would.
And he would bring her there.
“No more,” she moaned. “No more.”
He looked at her, wondering if she could see the way she glistened on his skin. “Do you really want me to stop?”
“No!” she practically howled, jamming her fingers into his hair and pushing him back down.
He laughed with delight and redoubled his efforts. She could say she didn’t want him, but they both knew the truth. He would bring her to climax, and she would never be able to say she did not desire him.
She might someday decide she did not like him, but he would always know that she wanted him.
“George,” she panted again. “George George George.”
He moved his fingers as he licked her, mimicking the movements of lovemaking but adding a little twist and then—
The next time his name left her lips, it was a scream.
He slid up her body until his face was a breath away from hers. “Enjoyed that, did you?”
She could not speak.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” He positioned himself, nudging her already slack legs wider. “Are you ready?”
She gave a dazed nod, and he thrust forward.
She was gloriously wet, but this was only her second time, and he knew he had to give her time to accommodate him. “You will tell me if I hurt you,” he said.
She nodded furiously.
He went still. “I’m hurting you?”
“No, I just mean I’ll tell you.”
Thank God. He would have pulled out. He would have. But it might well have killed him.
He moved slowly, or at least as slowly as he could, until he was finally fully within her. “Charlotte,” he moaned, because truly, in that moment she was his entire world. He pulled back, the friction sending shivers of pleasure down his spine.
Her fingers gripped his shoulders, and her hips arched up, and he plunged forward. And then again, and again, until his movements lost all rhythm, and all that was left was need.
The bed shook and creaked, and he kept slamming into her, but she was meeting him thrust for thrust, and then he felt her climax again, squeezing him so tightly it sent him right over the edge.
“Charlotte!” he cried, and he poured himself into her, spending of himself like he’d never dreamed possible.
He collapsed, rolling to the side so he would not crush her.
“My God,” he said.
She just breathed. Heavily.
“That was—that was—” He had no words. Truly. She had robbed him of sense. It was probably ironic.
“Did we make a baby?” she asked.
George turned his head, startled by the question. “We won’t know for a bit.”
“Really?”
He felt himself frown. “I thought you said someone explained it.”
“They did. They said we might have to do it many times, but I assumed we’d know right away if it worked.”
“It’s when you miss your courses. That’s how you know.”
“I know that,” she said, sounding a little impatient. “I mean, I know what it means to miss one’s courses. I just assumed that one already knew by then. That . . . somehow . . .”
“You could tell when it happened?”
She nodded.
“No,” he said, returning his gaze to the ceiling.
She made an irritated noise. She did not like being ignorant—he had already learned this about her.
Frankly, he could not blame her.
“Well,” she said. “I suppose you should go now.”
“Go?”
“You’re in my bedroom.”
Yes. And he thought he’d stay there. She’d spent the night in his bedroom when they’d done this the night before. But that was before she’d turned so cold and distant.
She sat up, holding the bedcovers to her body. For warmth? For modesty? That seemed absurd, given what he’d just done to her. Women made no sense to him, and she the least sense of all.
He’d thought she liked him. She’d given every indication that she thought him a worthwhile human being. He’d left his bed this morning, brimming with joy. But by the time he saw her again, late that afternoon, she was cold. Somehow she had realized the truth about him. Or if not the truth, an approximation of it. He was not worthy of her. Quite possibly, he never would be.
“Well?” she said, tipping her head pointedly to the door.
“You’re truly asking me to leave?” he asked. “After”—he tipped his head toward the bed—“that?”
“That changes nothing.”
He whipped back the covers, unmindful of their nudity. “Apparently not.”
“It is our duty to make a baby,” Charlotte said. “Nothing more.”
George attempted to retrieve his dressing gown from the foot of the bed. Their exertions had been so acrobatic that it had tangled itself around the post. “Nothing at all,” he grunted, yanking the damned thing free.
“I’ll see you in two days,” she said primly.
He tied his belt into a savage knot. “And not a minute before,” he growled.
“It shall be my greatest delight not to see you.”
“Indeed,” he returned in kind. “The sooner you are with child, the sooner we can cease this”—he motioned toward the bed with his best royal disdain—“performance.”