He packed away the pictures of her at every moment, the sound of her voice when she chuckled, the throaty laugh of real, uninhibited amusement, the sudden, serious, expression that kept transforming her face and which he could not persuade her to explain. All of these impressions he saved, learned, as he would a map of enemy territory or a complex brief from a client, storing them away for the time when they would be all he had of her. All he could ever have.
Eva pushed away her plate with a little sigh of repletion. He poured the last drops of the champagne into their glasses and gestured to the maid for another bottle. ‘Shall we go up?’
Their chamber had been cleared of bath tub and shaving water. The puffy white eiderdown on the big wooden bed had been turned down invitingly and candles burned on the dresser and beside the bed. On the washstand a bunch of June roses made a blotch of warm colour in the pale room.
‘Eva.’ Jack reached for her.
‘No.’ She held up a hand, halting him. ‘No, tonight I want to make love to you.’
‘What have we been doing up to now?’ he asked, conscious of the straining ache of arousal that had been building all evening towards this moment.
‘You have been making love to me, we have been making love together,’ she explained. ‘Tonight I would like to…to lead.’
Had he the strength, the willpower, to let her set the pace? Jack swallowed, realising he wanted this, badly, and that his imagination was already threatening to tip him over the edge. Unable to speak, he nodded.
‘Good.’ She was blushing, but determined. ‘Undress for me.’
He could not unlock his eyes from hers. By touch Jack pulled off his neckcloth, unbuttoned his waistcoat, shed it with his coat, careless of where they fell. He had hardly any recall of how his shirt got off, or his shoes, but he found himself standing there in bare feet, clad only in the light trousers he had changed into when they arrived.
‘Everything,’ she said huskily, releasing his eyes as her own gaze slid down his torso.
He was so hard his fingers fumbled momentarily on the fall of his trousers, then he was pushing them down, feeling the relief as his erection was freed from the constriction, hearing her gasp as she saw him. ‘You have me excited almost beyond bearing,’ he confessed.
‘Do not apologise,’ Eva murmured, apparently transfixed. Her intent regard made him swell harder, larger, as if that were possible. ‘Lie on the bed. On your back, please.’
Intrigued, Jack did as she ordered. This was a new experience. What was she going to do now?
What she did was to proceed to torture him by slowly removing each article of her own clothing with deliberate intent to send him insane. She took off her coat and waistcoat with prim care, hanging them carefully on a chair while he admired the tight fit of her breeches over her buttocks and the slender length of her thighs.
She eased off her boots, sliding each down her leg in turn in a way that made him fantasise about sliding in and out of her body. Her neckcloth came next. She stood by the bed untying it, shaking her head reprovingly as he reached for her and only moving again when he lay back. Then she used it to trail down his body, the featherlight touch of the muslin wafting the subtle scent of her heat to him as it teased his nipples into hard knots, then slithered over his groin.
‘Have some mercy!’ He grabbed for it, only for her to whisk it away, leaving him aching. Jack fought the urge to take himself in hand to gain some relief from this torment.
Eva began to unfasten her shirt, then turned her back on him as she slowly slid it over her shoulders, giving him the view of her slim, white back, and the merest hint of the curve of her breast as she moved. Jack locked his hands into fists in the sheet as the leather belt fell to the floor and she eased the breeches down over her hips, taking her linen underwear with them.
She was a Venus standing there, white and smooth and exquisite. But it was not a marble statue that looked over its shoulder at him but a warm, soft, curving female. How had she learned to be this provocative, this alluring? He sensed this had not been the way she had behaved with her husband. Eva was doing this for him and because of him. Unable to bear the throbbing need any longer, he curled his fingers round the hard flesh that was tormenting him.
‘No,’ she whispered, coming close, reaching down and unclasping his hand. ‘No, I forbid it.’ Her heavy plait fell forward, swinging down lie a soft pendulum above his groin, the very tip touching his swollen erection. He was going to disgrace himself, lose all control in a moment. Jack gritted his teeth as Eva loosened the ribbon and slowly, still letting the hair brush him like tiny lashes of fire, unplaited it until it swung, a silken curtain between them.
He was hanging on to his self-control by his fingertips, Eva realised, watching Jack’s set jaw muscles, the clenched fists, the magnificent, straining evidence of his desire for her. Enough teasing—she hardly thought she could bear any more herself.
The bed was yielding as she climbed on to it, knelt up and straddled Jack’s body, keeping herself raised above him as she bent her head and let her hair fall in a cloud over his chest. His hands came up to cup her breasts, taking their weight as she hung over him. Her nipples, already sensitive, stiffened into aching nubs as his fingers found them. She put her hands on his shoulders and leaned further, giving herself up to his caresses, using her hair to caress in return.
Between her thighs she could feel his hips lifting, straining to rise enough to take her. Aching for him, she lowered herself to meet him, gasping as the hard flesh touched her, wriggling to take him into her, sighing with the exquisite sense of fullness as their bodies interlocked, sinking down until she could go no more and he was fully lodged in the core of her.
She had never done this before, but the feeling of power and control was intoxicating as she began to ride him, rising and falling, slowly drawing upwards, then, as he bucked beneath her, moving rapidly so that his head fell back and he grasped her hips with fingers like iron.
Her body was aflame, she could feel her control slipping, knew her rhythm was becoming ragged even as Jack took control, reared up and turned her over so he was on top. She knew he was close, knew he was holding on to take her with him and bowed up to meet him, feeling the swirling ecstasy possess her as he freed himself, cried out, hung rigid above her for a moment, then fell down to crush her into his embrace.
‘What had you meant to with the champagne?’ Eva murmured later, against Jack’s shoulder. The candles were low, he had drawn the covers up over their entwined bodies and they had dozed lightly, occasionally stirring to murmur against each other’s skin or trail the lazy kisses of lovers who had exhausted themselves, but not their desire to touch.
‘Mmm? I wondered what it would taste like if I licked it off your body.’ Jack lifted himself on one elbow to look down at her from under hooded lids. He looked tousled, sleepily replete, yet that fire was still there, banked down perhaps, but enough to warm her deep inside.
‘Really?’ Eva pondered this. ‘That sounds nice.’
‘That’s what I thought. But it is a pity to waste it when we are both too tired to really concentrate on wine tasting. We’ll take it with us.’
‘To Brussels? But can we…I mean, where will we be staying?’
‘I am sure that, wherever it is, your bodyguard will find it necessary to spend the night in your dressing room.’
‘Armed to the teeth?’ Happiness bubbled up inside her like the champagne they had drunk earlier. This was not to be the last night after all.
‘Well, certainly fully armed,’ Jack said with a certain male smugness, settling down again and pulling her into his arms. ‘And