Page 77 of The Hunter
And still, Millie couldn’t conjure the words to describe what Christopher was to her, exactly. Assassin turned protector. Villain turned lover.
“We have an… arrangement,” Millie evaded.
“That arrangement have anything to do with the fact that you’ve been in danger and that brute out there looks like he could break a man in half with his big bare hands?” Loretta might be brash and brassy, and a bit uneducated, but she was anything but stupid.
“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t.” Millie sighed.
“Well.” Loretta twisted her hair and pinned it to the top of her head and wrapped it, letting the oils sink in and do their job before she washed it out. “You wouldn’t be the first woman to invite a dangerous man into her bed in exchange for his protection… done it a few times, myself, before I found Mr. Teague-Washington.”
“Really?” Swamped with a strange sense of relief, Millie inwardly blessed the woman for not calling her a prostitute.
“Oh sure.” Next came a mask of honey, beeswax, white lily, and lemon juice applied to Millie’s face with a wooden applicator, to tighten the skin and shrink any pores or imperfections. “Protection comes in many forms. Money, food, shelter, strength, and sometimes just a dangerous know-how and a willingness to kill. Looks like your Mr. Argent out there could provide it all.”
“Indeed he can.” Leaning back, Millie closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation of the warm, thick syrup spreading on her beleaguered skin. Many women in her profession took a “protector.” In most cases, the term only meant that she had a man who paid her as his mistress. The protection was from poverty, from starvation, and often from the fate of the cruel streets filled with foul men and, even worse, disease.
Now, when Millie confessed to having a protector, she’d mean it in a more literal sense of the word. Though the services rendered had been the same.
“You have to tell me,” Loretta whispered conspiratorially. “How are his skills in bed? Is your Viking any good? How many times did he give youla petite mort?”
The little death,that mysterious climax so many women went on and on about. The cause of the panting mewls and bellows she’d heard in her days of sharing thin walls with fallen women.
Millie fumbled to cover her inexperience with a shallow explanation. “I really couldn’t say. We’ve only—I’ve only lain with him once.”
The smooth movements paused before resuming more gently. “Don’t fear, darling, it often takes lovers a couple tries to learn each other’s needs. To become familiar with their pleasures and their desires.”
“Does it?”Millie queried before she thought the better of it.
“If I can give you one word of advice, never use your acting skills in bed. Do not portray pleasure you do not feel. You’re doing neither of you any favors.”
“Acting during—why would you do such a thing?” Millie wondered aloud.
Loretta’s voice was softer now, more motherly than it had ever been. “You’re not as worldly as you would have us all think, are you, darling?”
“I’ve not had many lovers,” Millie confessed.
A soothing noise of understanding purred from the older woman. “You’re one of the smart ones. I feel I must say, a man such as that, so large and so… well, I don’t imagine he’s gentle.”
Millie shook her head slightly, so as not to interrupt Loretta’s work.
“A man like that spends his life giving orders and having them obeyed. Women submit to him and other men follow him, he’s only ever learned by doing because no one dares issue him a command.” Millie heard Loretta’s voice warm with a wicked smile. “Know what a man like that needs in bed? I can give you the secret to his pleasure, and yours.”
“What?” Millie asked, forgetting that she need never share his bed again. It surprised her how much she desired this information. Wanted to employ it.
“A woman to tell him just what she wants.”
“You’re joking.” Millie gasped.
“Not at all. Think on it a spell.”
She did. She thought about it the entire time Loretta let the honey mask dry on her face while she rubbed an oil mixed with sugar on her arms and hands to exfoliate and remove any rough skin.
It wasn’t enough, damn you.
Those words he’d gritted out at her the night before sent a secret thrill straight to her core. It hadn’t been enough. Though she knew he’d found his pleasure, she also understood that she somehow hadn’t… finished. That the twinge of pain she’d experienced as he’d entered her had been followed by little pulses of pleasure. She’d wanted him to move deeper. She’d wanted him to touch… somewhere else. That little bud of pulsing flesh that resided above where he’d entered her. It had bothered her late into the night, aching, tightening and clenching around nothing but emptiness. She’d wanted to touch it, herself, but didn’t dare. What if she told him to do it? Would he? Argent wasn’t a compliant man, to say the least, but Loretta seemed to know what she was talking about.
“Those hot-blooded men love it when you tell them where to touch you and how. When to use their tongues, how long and how hard to take you, and in the most explicit language you can muster.”
Millie’s mind snagged on only one thing. “Their… mouths?”
