A Love by Any Measure, page 11
August didn’t answer, but instead removed his robe and tossed it next to her cloak on the chair. He stood before her in only his undergarments, and already the thought of what he was about to try was causing his arousal to become visible beneath the cotton shield.
He made his way to the far table and to the graduated hour glass.
“Goodness, five and a half minutes already?” he asked coyly as he situated the plug and slowly filled the sand to the appropriate mark. That knowing grin widened when he considered that their next occasion would make the specialized time piece with a maximum ten-minute capacity insufficient. August turned back to her and brought his mouth right up to, but not touching, her ear, so that the heat of his breath danced over the sensitive skin.
“I apologize, Miss O’Connor,” he started in a low, husky voice. “I forget sometimes that you have never felt a man’s touch. I forget that while your kisses light primal fires in me, the sensation to you is very new and disorienting. I should tell you how sorry I am that I caused your body to escalate so quickly into what it might not have been ready to interpret.”
August leant down to her, his hands ghosting over her frame but never, never touching. Maeve began to tremble more with each word, her composure easing with every additional utterance.
“I should not have thrown up the fact that we both had the misfortune to be born into stations of life neither of us would have otherwise desired as a wall between us. I should not have been so dismissive of your willingness to enter our agreement.”
He lowered his jaw and spoke into the valley between her breasts. Beneath the thin cotton covering, August saw her peaks pebble as his heated gasps called them to attention. Her breathing picked up pace, and the fact was making him anxious and eager.
“As I told you the first night, you are free to end our contract at any point you desire, knowing the consequences. You are still here tonight, and so you desire to be with me, and I am pleased by that fact alone.”
She grimaced but kept her eyes closed. August could tell she was fighting a longing to lean into him as his mouth found hers, but still did not make contact.
“You know why I’m here,” she whimpered. “So that I have a home to go to when you’re done using me. I am here for your pleasure, Lord Grayson, not my own. You made that perfectly clear.”
“True,” he agreed, ever so delicately blowing on Maeve’s lips. They parted as though expecting a deeper answer, but he withdrew. “But that’s only because you don’t know what pleasure is, Maeve. If you knew what your body was capable of, if you knew the things I can help make your body do, of the feelings I can create for it, around it, inside of it … That’s the reason for this ‘knowing’ smile. Because I do know what I can do to you. And I do know that what pleases a man most is giving a woman that … pleasure.”
August turned back to the table and removed the catch holding the sand at bay, letting it fall into the bottom chamber in a slow and steady stream.
“What would please me tonight is to share that knowledge with you.” His fingers reached the cotton folds of her knickers and he was delighted to find her wetness already soaking through. “Now,” he pushed his finger over the apex of her legs and clutched her, causing her eyes to shoot open and her breath to go staccato, “lay back, and let me show you what happens … ” He slid his hands under the waist of her knickers and into the moist heat beyond, making one quick twirl into her with his fingers and causing her knees to tremble. “ … when I keep doing this.”
Maeve gasped. She fell back fully without hesitation as August eased her knickers down over her hips and past her ankles, tossing them unceremoniously on the floor. He pushed her back so that she rested comfortably and pulled her legs open slightly. Mysteriously, she surrendered herself completely to the action.
August inverted his right hand to a better angle and pushed two fingers into her. Even the first stroke shook her frame, and she threw her arms to the side, fisting the quilt in her hands. He established a steady rhythm of pull and push, arching slightly on the outbound, stimulating the bundle of nerves within her, certain she had never had a clue that they existed. Her breaths grew staggered and crisp as delicious, meager ahhs rose from the base of her throat.
Much to his chagrin, half the sand allotted for their subscribed time had fallen away.
Without disrupting his hand’s labor, he pulled his body alongside hers and licked the rim of her ear. “This is about where we left off before.” He unclenched his hand and moved the thumb over the pearl of her pleasure, echoing the rhythm he had already established, then speeding it. Her essence flowed freely, covering her thighs and his hand. Her whole body gave a tremendous pulse as she felt the tensing of her muscles in response to his efforts.
Every little push made into her was reverberating up her torso, causing her breasts to heave. August’s mouth wanted them, wanted to taste them. He undid the ribbon that laced the front panels of her camisole and peeled it aside. Her stiff-peaked mounds were revealed as his lips surrounded them, taking one of her nipples between his teeth and nipping.
“Oh, Grayson … ” she moaned. He could tell his efforts were being properly appreciated.
August looked up at her, catching her smoldering brown eyes. “August.”
“Au … gust,” she repeated, her breath so ferociously humming in and out that stringing two syllables in one gasp became impossible. “What … is … this … ?”
He hushed her by pressing his lips to her mouth, sucking her bottom lip as he quickly pulled away, allowing her the air she needed. The air she would need soon to gasp in pleasure.
“Trust your body,” he told her. Trust me. “It knows what to do. Let it go. Don’t hold back.”
The bell of the timer rang. August ignored it, and Maeve didn’t hear it over her own racing breath. His hand manipulated her every nerve, leaving her body dancing on the edge of climax, her hips instinctively rocking against the sensations and inducing further friction.
August felt his own hips involuntarily shifting, trying to align his arousal. His control was slipping, his reluctance to take her lessening with each moment.
“Maeve, let go.”
Her body began to answer the request. August felt her tighten, and her segmented whimpers began to bleed over into each other, graduating into a sustained ecstasy-driven moan.
“Yes, that’s it,” he coaxed, quickening both pace and pressure. “Give in.”
Her hand rose from the bed, and she placed it on his cheek. Her body was so consumed with achieving its first release, however, that she didn’t notice August’s confused expression. Her hand quickly fell, skirting along his chest and falling into his lap, right where his erection was pushing against the restraint of his undergarments.
“August!” Her face contorted in a most alluring way. She licked her lips, and the image of her glistening wet tongue running over her reddened, swollen bottom lip nearly undid him. “Oh, my … August … Ungh … ”
A hard pinch of her nipple tipped the scale, sending Maeve reeling on the crest of her climax. Her moans echoed around the bed chamber, drowning out the sound of both the clock and the crackling fire. He slowed his workings gradually as the tightness that had squeezed them so delightfully washed away, leaving Maeve gasping and flushed.
“That’s what happens when I do that,” he teased, drawing a trail of her wetness down the inside of her thigh. “And ecstasy looks so beautiful on you.”
She rolled her head, her eyes meeting his. She was overwhelmed, and he was over-proud. Maeve’s lips quivered, and for a moment, it looked as though she were trying to say something.
“Yes?” August asked.
She whispered in a raspy yet confused tone. “Your … pleasure?”
August leaned in and kissed her neck tenderly, the movement surprising even him, though he felt the truth of his words as he spoke. “Feeling you experience your first delivery against my hand was very pleasurable,” he assured her. August moved his mouth underneath her ear and lightly bit, being careful in his stance so as to not press the stiff manifestation of his desire into her side.
More startling to them both was Maeve’s sudden boldness as her fingers ghosted over his cheek before trailing over the length of his arm, over his hip, and brushing purposefully over his erection.
Her eyes met August’s; desire, reproach, curiosity and embarrassment competed for control in her gaze. Not wanting her to feel any shame for her inquisitiveness, his hand covered hers, not moving her away but letting her know it was permissible to explore him.
“Does it hurt?”
Her words were so simple, so evidencing of her innocence. And in some way, his nakedness to her at the moment. Not of his body, but of his soul.
“Not hurt,” he answered. “A dull ache. Like being hungry when you’ve just sat at a table watching another feast. It’s … hungry.”
She nodded slowly, her eyes falling to have a glance at its outline through the cloth of his undergarments. “And it hungers for … what I just had,” she concluded. “Will that happen to you too?”
“Yes, a little differently. You needn’t … ” He stilled her hand, aware that her stroking was again playing havoc with his ability to withhold himself. “You must stop. There isn’t any need tonight to … If you keep doing that I’m going … Maeve, please, I … Oh … ”
August’s whole body twitched as her feather touch turned to uncertain, inconsistent strokes. She had no idea what she was doing. Despite the fact that such ignorance may have been laughable with any other woman, that it was Maeve now learning how to arouse and titillate a man first hand, as it were, was only more exciting to him. In his state, even with the irregular rhythm, he wasn’t going to last long against her efforts.
“Maeve, please,” he begged. “Please, this is a bad idea. If you … ”
“Trust me, August,” she mirrored back, a playful smile on her face. “What I do is entirely for your pleasure.”
He felt his body surrender to her siren call. August bit his bottom lip and tried to pull free from his undergarment his hardened instrument. When it sprang free, Maeve’s pace slowed again, as she took in the feeling of him in her hand, flesh to flesh.
He was rising to his breaking point. The combination of her hands, her flared hair, her post-orgasmic grin, the flush of her face, her deep brown eyes.
Just her presence.
“Oh, Maeve, almost … ” His breaths were deep, hefting. His stomach began to clench, and his voice was becoming rough and gravely. “Oh, you’re … Uhh … ”
It was happening. He took one more deep breath, his hips working his member in her grasp, his heavy eyes focused into her intense gaze, the friction taking him …
“August!?”
Knock. Knock. Knock.
They both all but fell off the bed.
“August?” Caroline’s insistent voice came again from the other side of the door. “August, is something wrong? I heard a noise.”
Maeve sat straight upright, ashen-faced. Before August could advise her otherwise, she had grabbed her knickers off the floor, her cloak from the chair, and the petticoat from the bed, and dove into the wardrobe, slamming the doors shut behind her.
“A moment, Caroline!” August cried, running to his chair and throwing his robe around himself. He opened the wardrobe to find Maeve pulling her knickers back up in the cramped, overcrowded space.
“Two minutes,” he whispered. She gave him a surely you jest smirk. “It’s just my sister. She’s usually asleep this late. I’ll get rid of her.”
Closing the wardrobe, he rushed to the door, throwing it open to find Caroline, dressed in a full body bolt of white cloth, complete with a sleeping hat, candlestick in hand.
“Caroline?”
She attempted to glance into the room over his shoulder. “Is everything all right? I thought I heard shouting.”
“Shouting?” August laughed, but clearly was not fooling her. “Oh, yes. I banged my foot into the bed post. I must have called out without realizing. I’m sorry if I woke you.”
“Bed post?” she questioned, uncertainty, and perhaps doubt, still evident in her voice. “Are you hurt?”
“Nothing with which to be concerned,” he assured her, placing his arm on her shoulders and beginning to suggestively pull her back towards her room. “It was nothing, and I swear to do my utmost not to be such a clumsy oaf in the future. Go back to sleep.”
At his back, August heard the catch of a door unhinge and saw, from the corner of his eye, Maeve’s silhouette lithely tip-toeing toward the stairs, the bread sack and her cloak thrown over her arms. Wisely, she had her shoes in hand, and thus stepped silently. Still, as a precaution, August raised the volume of his voice as he continued.
“I was thinking about your caller, Caroline. Why don’t you suggest that he stay Friday evening with us?” Perhaps he’ll keep you distracted. “After all, I’ll be going into town on Saturday morning to meet with Woodrow, and taking him back would be no bother.”
“Are you certain?” she jubilantly asked, turning around. He quickly spun her back to her door, opening the entrance and pushing her in.
“Yes, dear heart, I’m quite certain.”
“Oh, thank you! I’ll write him first thing in the morrow,” she said, her face absolutely beaming with joy.
Caroline’s head curved around the door frame as the foyer door shut loudly. “Was that the front door?”
Quickly moving to dissuade her and pushing her back into her room, August gave the first excuse he could conjure. “Probably one of the servants forgot to close it fully. I’ll just go have a look and be sure. Good night, dear.”
With a quick peck on her cheek, he forcefully closed her chamber door behind her and raced down the staircase. Maeve was already half way across the front yard to the gate when he caught up with her.
“Maeve, wait!”
She turned, vibrant anger emanating from her face. “I can’t believe the position I let you get me into.”
“I … let you?” August repeated back at her. “Time had expired. Your necessity was filled, and what you chose to do beyond that was just that. Your choice.”
“I didn’t hear the bell,” she retorted in disbelief.
“I’d wager not, over your caterwauling, which nearly got us discovered, by the way.” He motioned vaguely to the house behind him as a playful smile danced across his face.
She clicked her tongue. “But you did hear it, didn’t you? And you didn’t stop … whatever it was you were doing.”
“Did you want me to stop?”
A curious look overcame her; contemplation, confusion, and concurrence screwing her face into a reluctant admission by expression.
“Maeve, I can’t stop.”
August couldn’t resist. When he pulled her close and pressed his lips to hers, Maeve resisted. Soon she melted into his embrace. It was short lived. As soon as she felt the response of his male body against her, she pulled away, slapping August full force across the face.
“What are you playing at?”
“There’s something happening here. I know you feel it, too. Please, Maeve. Let’s not deny it any longer. Tell me.”
She shook her head tersely. “No. I … I’m engaged. Don’t you see? That was providence just now. Providence pushed your sister to knock on your door. If she hadn’t, we may have … ”
“Your purity is still intact,” he assured her, kissing her nose. “I vow I will not steal your innocence from you.” He smiled deviously at her. “Unless you request it of me.”
“I shall not,” she assured him. “That was wrong. I should not have … Oh! My knickers are to remain on from now on, and you’ll simply have to find your pleasure around them.”
She turned to leave, but August grabbed her arm and spun her around.
“Will you please come again tomorrow?”
“Wha … ?” She hesitated, her body softening as she pulled herself away again. “Aye,” she agreed, throwing her cloak around her shoulders. “But I’m sincere about the knickers.”
He couldn’t resist the flush in her cheeks and the way the tepid moonlight bounced off her brown curls. Without breaching her skin, he pulled her again and gently grasped her knickers beneath the concealment of her cloak, feeling her folds beneath the cotton.
“And should I try the other thing again, with them on?”
“Aye, that you may do twice if you desire.”
August let her go. She made quick her escape through the gate and up the pathway. He turned and grimaced as he walked back up the yard. From the corner of his eye, August saw the light of the middleman’s cottage flash. Looking back, the curtain swung in the window.
“Damn it all to hell.” Clenching his jaw in frustration, August supposed he had more or less been caught by his middleman with his hand in the cookie jar. “Well, Friday’s tea should prove most interesting.”
Searching for that which has been lost
“Maeve O’Connor! What in the name of Saint Peter do you think you’re doing?”
Maeve had, on occasion, witnessed others on the receiving end of Patty’s foul dispositions, but this was the first it had ever been turned at her. And she was in no mood. Jared was due back from town at any moment, hopefully with news as to her father’s whereabouts. Her insides writhed as she sat wordlessly in the chair, not sure Patty intended for her to answer. Then again, she wasn’t precisely sure what she was asking after.
“I thought you were asking all those questions because you were going to try to do something with Owen, not so you could be bedded by August Grayson!”
Maeve gasped and threw her hand over her mouth. “How did you find out?”
A smug expression overcame Patty’s features as she wagged her finger in reprimand. “Ah, so you admit it! Not that you could deny it after we saw the two of you outside our cottage. For heaven’s sake, laying with Grayson? Your ma would turn over in her grave.”
Maeve scoffed. “I haven’t laid with him!”
