Page 46 of To Catch an Earl

His fingers tightened on the back of her thighs. “I want to be inside you. I want to fuck you all night.”

Delicious filthy words in her ear. This was the Harland she’d wanted to find, lawless, uncivilized. Free. “Yes,” she said fiercely.

He stilled and raised his head. She could barely see him, just the faintest outline, but she knew she’d surprised him.

“Yes,” she repeated, more forcefully. “And not to make you release me. This has nothing to do with that. This is just you and me.”

She had no hope of clemency. No expectation of anything but pleasure. It was just that she’d finally found someone she could trust with her body, if not her secrets. Harland wouldn’t hurt her, however much she teased andtormented him. If this truly was her last night of freedom, then she would spend it well. She would burn up in the brightness. She’d go out in a ball of flame.

His arms tightened, squeezing her ribs. She could feel his labored breathing, the rapid rise and fall of his chest against hers. He seemed to be waging an internal war; no doubt his sense of what was proper police procedure was battling with the iron-hard arousal she could feel pressing against her stomach.

She wanted desire to win. Needed it to win. Her entire body was glowing, fizzing with anticipation.

“Take off your clothes,” she said.

Chapter 25.

Her hoarse command seemed to free him of the last vestiges of control. In a flurry of movement, he turned and carried her through the doorway and into his bedroom. A rush of air, a falling sensation that made her stomach pitch, and Emmy was flat on her back with Harland’s delicious weight pressing her down into a soft mattress.

It was even darker in here. She experienced a flash of disappointment that she couldn’t see him, his expressions, that glorious body of his. But, oh, she could feel. His hands sliding over her, molding, squeezing, stroking. In a sudden move he rolled over onto his back, taking her with him, and she was on top, straddling him.

“Shirt,” he rasped, and she grabbed the hem of hers and tugged it over her head. She wasn’t entirely clear which one of them was in control now, but that hardly mattered when they both wanted the same thing.

The darkness gave her confidence. She was beautiful, invincible. Shameless.

His hand caught her hip, then slid up her side, and shesucked in a breath as he traced the edge of her short stays. She struggled to release the ribbon tie at the front. He pushed her hands aside, caught the top of the corset, and tugged. The cotton gave way with a deafening rip. Emmy wriggled her shoulders and managed to get the thing off her arms, then gasped as his warm palms covered her naked breasts.

He hissed out a breath, the sound indicative of pure, unadulterated pleasure.

“Emmy,” he groaned, and the way he said her name, almost as if it were a benediction, made her glow. “So soft.”

He squeezed, and she threw her head back, savoring the abrasion against her peaked nipples. His stomach muscles tensed beneath her as he sat up. She caught a flash of white as he tugged his own shirt over his head and sent it sailing aside, and then there was only the extraordinary sensation of his hot, hard body against hers.

She was still sitting in his lap, her knees on either side of his hips, pressing him into the bed. She could hardly believe that she was skin-on-skin with a man.Thisman. The heat was incredible, the contours of his muscles even more amazing as she stroked her palms over his shoulders, down his biceps, across the front of his chest. He shuddered beneath her touch, and she shifted in his lap, trying to get closer to the intriguingly hard part of him that throbbed and burned between her legs.

“Wicked girl.”

He bent his head and caught one of her nipples in his mouth, using one hand to push her breast up toward him. Emmy arched, offering herself as his tongue swirled and laved and his mouth provided a tantalizing suction. Yes! This was what he’d done in the conservatory. And this time, there would be no interruptions. She would give herself to him completely; no reservations, no regrets. She wanted this, needed this, with every fiber of her being.

He grasped her hips and moved her off his lap, to the side. The mattress dipped beside her, and she realized he was removing his breeches with brisk efficiency. She lay down next to him and did the same, wiggling her hips, less proficient than he was. Her elbow bumped his ribs and he grunted, half pain, half amusement.

“Wretch.”

She’d never been completely naked with a man before. In spite of the darkness, she could feel her entire body suffusing with a blush. And then there was no time to think. Harland turned on his side to face her, and his greater weight made her roll toward him. Their bodies touched all the way down. His arousal pressed insistently against her stomach, and her heart leapt in mingled anticipation and fear. She was almost glad she couldn’t see him.

Oh, God.She really was doing this.

His hand found her hip, and he uttered a hiss of satisfaction as he stroked up over her waist, her ribs, her shoulder and neck. And then he threaded his fingers in her hair and pulled her in for a scorching kiss.

“Mine,” he murmured against her throat, and Emmy could only give a wordless moan in answer.

He pushed her onto her back and moved partly over her, stroking up her arms, coaxing them up over her head. He caught her wrists, but no sooner had he taken her prisoner than he released her to trace the sensitive skin of her inner arms down to her breasts and then lower still. His palm flattened over her belly, and Emmy bucked her hips, desperate for him to move lower, to put his hand where she throbbed and ached. There was a restlessness in her that only he could quell.

“Nothing but trouble,” he groaned, and she wasn’t sure if that was a complaint or praise.

His hand slipped between her legs, and the ache turned to sweet fire. The moisture from her body coated hisfingers, and Emmy squirmed as he circled and teased. He gave a dark chuckle, as if he knew how much he was torturing her, and took her lips in a deep, openmouthed kiss.

Emmy gasped in delight and arched her back as he pushed his finger inside her, amazed by the intensity of the pleasure. Her body clenched around him as he teased; long, luscious slides that built a coiling, knotted tension in her belly. Soon she teetered on the edge of something momentous, something she needed, but couldn’t quite catch. She lifted her hips, begging him with incoherent sounds to resolve the glorious confusion he’d created.

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