“It is entirely my pleasure,” she said, and the air changed between them, thickening with her words, nearly liquid with promise.
He let her lean in, enjoying the feel of her as she came closer. The heat of her, even as he resisted her lure. Even as his anger at her words threatened to overflow.
“I don’t think you know pleasure,” he said, knowing the words would rankle. Wishing them to.
Her eyes went wide, and she turned Anna, all seductress. “You think I do not understand it?”
He resisted the urge to pull her closer. “I think you are used to giving it. And I think it is time you see that when it comes time . . . when I am in control, I intend for you to do very little but receive it.”
He watched the words run over her, the way her gaze widened and her lips parted on a breath she hadn’t expected to require. He reacted to that expression with every fiber of his being. The honesty in it made him want to roar his desire. His power.
He did not give her time to reply, instead lifting a hand and running his fingers over the silken skin of her cheek. “Would you like that?” he whispered, “Would you like it if I took control of your pleasure? If I wrapped you in it? If I gave it to you over and over, until you could not bear it? Until you ached for my touch above all others?”
Her breath caught in her throat as he stroked the column of her neck, and he leaned in, slowly, pressing his lips once, twice to the soft, pale skin at the underside of her chin. “Tell me,” he whispered there, and the sound of her exhalation nearly shattered his control.
“Tell you . . .” She hesitated, the wine and the sensation making it difficult for her to think. He cursed the wine, even as he waited for her to finish. She swallowed, and he felt the swell of it beneath his fingertips. She cleared her throat. Tried again. “Tell you what?”
“Would you like it?”
“I would,” she answered, the words more breath than sound.
“What would you like?” Now he was teasing her. He knew she couldn’t think, but the proof of it was making him feel more a man than he ever had before.
“I would like you to . . .” She hesitated.
He ran his teeth along the column of her neck, nipping at the soft skin of her shoulder. “To—?”
She sighed. “All of it. I would like it all.”
He couldn’t see the color of her eyes in the darkness, but he recognized their intensity. One of her hands came to his neck, fingers curving and sliding into his hair. She did not release his gaze, and for a long, breathless moment, he wondered if, perhaps, she would be in control after all. “Do it,” she whispered, those gorgeous pink lips licking around the words. “Please.”
“Do what?” They were close now, nearly kissing. He’d never wanted anything the way he wanted this woman.
“Do it all.” Her fingers slid further, pulling him down to her. “Show me everything.”
She leaned up. Or perhaps he leaned down. It did not matter, except for the fact that they were kissing, and she was in his arms, and he wanted nothing more than to explore every inch of her glorious, perfect body. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, and he was lifting her, turning her, pressing her against the side of the house, giving her everything for which she asked.
She sighed into his mouth and he caught the beautiful sound, pulling her against him. Her lips, soft and sweet and warm, parted in perfection, and he could not stop himself from claiming her with tongue and teeth, nipping along her full bottom lip before chasing the bite with a long, slow lick that made her groan with anticipation. Or perhaps it was he who groaned.
She had him on fire. He gathered her closer and deepened the kiss, changing the pressure. He delved deeper, stroked more firmly.
And she met him at every single stroke, finally using her own teeth to tease and tempt and punish, and he groaned, grasping one long thigh in his hand and lifting it, spreading her open and pressing into the soft core where he so desperately wanted to be. He rocked against her, giving both of them a small, unbearable taste of what they might have if it were a different night.
Of what they would have when it was a different night.
The thought tore him away from her, and he ached at the way she clung to him, as though she’d forgotten for a moment who she was and where they were and why they couldn’t have each other . . . this . . . now.
He was the same way, leaning back in, taking her lips once more, firmly, thoroughly, without hesitation.
He released her thigh and her lips at the same time, pressing his forehead to hers as they both caught their breath. When he finally spoke, it was in a whisper only for her. “I will show you everything. But not tonight. You’ve had too much to drink for me to give you all I intend for you to take.”
Her retort was instant. “I haven’t had too much to drink.”
She wanted him. He could feel it in the pulse beneath his fingertips, in the breath against his neck, in the fingers that clung to his coat. “Yes, you have.”