Lady Ines Scandalous Hobby-Chapter 55 - Fifty Five

Ines, still crouched at his feet, her face a burning, furious red, finally found her voice.

She tucked a stray strand of her reddish-brown hair behind her ear, a small, nervous gesture. "Well," she said, her voice a low murmur, "from what I’ve read... it said that it... the ’release’... it only happens when you... when you join body with a woman."

She had said it. It was the plain truth, as she knew it.

Carcel’s expression did not change, but she saw something flicker in his eyes. Amusement?

"That’s not always the case," he said, his voice a low, rough growl.

He’s correcting me, she thought, her pride pricked. But... the books...

"With proper... stimulation..." he continued, and the way he said the word made her entire body tingle, "...you can reach climax without... that. Without ’joining,’ as you say."

He paused, as if the words were costing him. "And... if the stimulation stops completely, it can just... go away. It might take a while, though."

He was, she realized, trying to reassure her. He was telling her that this... state... was temporary. That he was not in pain. That it would... resolve itself.

Her gaze, as it always did, went to the evidence. She was observing it. She looked at him. At the front of his trousers. At the still-prominent, still-pulsating, still-very-much-not-gone-away proof.

It had been, she calculated, a full two minutes since she had... experimented. And it was, she noted, not "going away."

She looked back up at his face, her head tilted, her gaze one of pure, innocent, confusion.

"But right now," she said, her voice a small curious whisper, "there’s no stimulation. I am... I am not touching it. I am not even looking at it." (This was, she admitted, a small lie. She was definitely looking at it.) "So why...?"

A long, slow, shaky breath hissed out of him. He closed his eyes for a brief, pained second.

When he opened them, she could see a man who was on a rack, and who was, for some reason, confessing.

"With you looking at me like that, Ines," he said, his voice a low, pained groan, "it can’t go down."

Her mind... stopped.

It was not a thought. It was a jolt. As if the world had just shifted, violently, on its axis.

She just stared at him.

He... What?

"Does... does me," she whispered, her voice a tiny, awestruck squeak, "does me staring at you... get you aroused, too?"

This was new. This was fascinating. This was not in any of the books. The books were always about the man doing things to the woman. The heroine was the object, the hero was the... the force.

He didn’t answer with words. He moved.

He bent, a slow, deliberate, graceful movement, bringing himself down to her level. He was no longer the tall, towering duke. He was... with her. On the floor.

He braced one hand on the carpet, his strong, tanned, shirtsleeved arm just inches from her knee. And with his other hand, he reached for her.

She flinched, but he was not fast. He was slow. He was, she realized, giving her time to adjust.

His fingers, warm and calloused and impossibly gentle, did not touch her face. They slid into her hair, at her temple, a soft, intimate, possessive gesture. He pushed the thick, reddish-brown curls back from her face, his hand cupping the side of her head, his thumb resting, with an agonizing, electric lightness, just behind her ear.

He held her. He made her look at him.

"Yes," he said, his voice a rough, dark, guttural growl that seemed to vibrate from his chest, through his arm, into his hand, and straight into her skull.

She could only look at him. She was trapped. By his hand. By his scent. By his... his eyes.

"When your gaze lingers on me," he whispered, his own gaze dark, and hot, and completely, utterly, fixed on her. "When I watch you... watching me... yes. It does."

He leaned in, his face just inches from hers. She could feel his breath, hot and tasting of brandy, on her lips.

"When your scent..." he continued, his voice dropping, "...the smell of you... of soap, it... touches my skin..."

His thumb, the one behind her ear, began to make a slow, hypnotic, maddening circle.

"And when our skins," he murmured, his thumb stroking, stroking, "touch like this..."

He let go of her head, but only to take a long, thick, soft curl of her hair in his hand. He lifted it, his gaze, for a moment, on the reddish-gold strands.

"It sends chills," he whispered, "down my spine."

He brought the lock of her hair to his face. To his nose. And he... he inhaled.

He breathed her in, his eyes closing for one, long, shuddering, ecstatic second.

He was not a man who smoked. But this... her... this simple, clean, female scent... it was more potent than any spirit. It was an opium. It made him feel drunk. It made him feel high.

Ines was... gone.

She was watching this man, this dark, powerful, beautiful, haunted man... be undone. By her. By her smell. By her gaze.

And in that one, crystal-clear, world-shattering, heart-stopping moment, the final, most important, and most terrifying truth of her entire life, clicked, hard and perfect, into place.

He’s aroused.

The thought was a bell, ringing in the silence.

He is aroused... because of me. He wants me as much as I want him.

And with that thought, came the next. She looked at him. His face, his beautiful, pained, exquisite face. His eyes were still closed. He was still, even now, fighting for control. He was, she realized, uncomfortable. He was in pain—the "pain" he had denied, the "release" he had spoken of.

And it was because of her.

Her entire world, her entire purpose, which had, for two weeks, been about taking... about learning, asking, seeing... it shifted. It turned inside out.

It was no longer about her. It was about him.

What should I do? her mind, no longer a writer’s, but a woman’s, whispered. He is... he is like this. Because of me. What can I do?

What can I do... she thought, her gaze, soft and new and full of a strange tenderness, ...to make him feel comfortable?