Page 68 of When the Scoundrel Sins

She closed her eyes, not in embarrassment but because the cool air on her hot skin felt so heavenly. So did the way his work-roughened palms gently kneaded her bare breasts, how her nipples puckered impossibly tighter beneath his flicking thumbs. She moaned deeply at the throbbing he flamed inside her. Her breasts grew heavy against his hands, and the ache at her nipples pulled straight through her to the moist heat gathering between her legs.

“Dear God, Annabelle,” he rasped out. “You are so beautiful.”

His lips closed around her right nipple. She gasped at the exquisite sensation of his mouth suckling at her, at the bold way he tongued her. He released her nipple and drew back just far enough to blow a stream of cold air against her moist skin.

“Quinton!” She jumped at the sharp sensation, then moaned in sheer pleasure as his hot mouth once again closed over her, heating away the cold until she melted against him like butter. “You are…wicked,” she panted out, digging her fingers into his thick hair.

She laughed when he looked up at her and grinned impishly before moving his mouth to her other breast to start the sweet torture anew. “Very much so,” he mumbled against her bare skin.

A thrill shivered through at the delicious hope that he’d show her exactly how wicked he could be. Because if what he did to her was wicked, then it was also so very, very good.

“I think,” she whispered as she licked her lips and bit back a soft moan as he worried her nipple between his teeth, as if deciding whether to devour her slowly or gulp her down all at once, “that I know what else might feel good.”

Her fingers slipped down to his sides, pulled the lawn shirt free from his trousers, and let it hang loose around his hips. Then she slipped her hand under his shirt to touch the warm skin beneath.

“It does feel good,” she confirmed as her fingers fluttered across the ridges of his abdomen to his hard chest. Everywhere she touched, his muscles rippled beneath her fingertips. Like magic.

Her hesitant explorations grew bolder, her hands stroking higher and higher across his chest until her fingers traced over his hard male nipples. He flinched beneath the flick of her fingertips.

With a happy laugh, Belle pushed him back far enough to lift the shirt up over his head and toss it away.

“It’s only fair,” she challenged. After all, her own breasts were exposed both to the cool night and to his hot stare.

His muscular chest was bare to her now. She leaned forward to take one of his nipples between her lips and suck shamelessly, the same way he’d done to her. He inhaled sharply when she nipped lightly at him, then she soothed away the pleasure-pain with feathery kisses until he groaned.

“I know what else might feel good,” she whispered against his chest, then licked her way up to his throat as her hands moved lower, following the trail of golden hair down his stomach to his waistband.

“Annabelle,” he whispered hoarsely, her name uttered in both warning and desire as her trembling hand cupped his bulging manhood through his trousers.

She laughed again, this time in wonder at the hardness of him against her fingers, the heavy weight of him resting against her palm. Then, somehow, he seemed to grow impossibly harder and larger as she caressed him.

Closing his eyes, he hung his head as his shoulders slumped, reminding her of a giant cat welcoming her petting strokes. From the blissful expression on his face, she almost expected him to purr. But this man was a tiger, and he starkly reminded her of that as he shifted his hips to press himself harder into her hand.

Without stopping her caresses, she kissed him, outlining his lips with the tip of her tongue. “Do you like that?”

With a low growl, he reached between them, flicked open his fall, and shoved her hand down inside his trousers.

She froze. His bare length rested against her palm, and his hand encircled her wrist to keep her from pulling away. Her heart pounded furiously in her ears. Had she gone too far? Had she done something that—

“Do it twice,” he panted out.

Her heart somersaulted. Helikedwhat she was doing to him! And if it felt half as good to him to be touched like this as it had to her, then she knew he wanted it. Desperately.

Her hand folded around him, cupping him the same way she had through the trousers, but this time, no barrier prevented her from stroking the soft skin covering the steely hardness beneath. Her strokes became increasingly bolder, more confident as appreciative groans and growls escaped from the back of his throat, until she drew him free of the constricting material and he sprang straight against her palm.

She stilled. So large and thick, so long and hard—her stomach knotted. Suddenly their play had turned serious.

“Annabelle.”

Her gaze lifted to his, and she lost her breath.

His eyes stared hungrily down at her and made her shiver beneath their dark heat. This was what it was like to be with Quinton all the time, she realized, not just in his arms but every moment—a fierce oncoming storm, filled with an intensity that left her breathless.

Slowly, he slipped a hand down between them and covered her fingers with his own, then guided her in a slow, smooth stroke along his length to show her how to give him the pleasure he craved. He was patiently instructing her, just as he’d promised, and she blinked at the unexpected tears forming on her lashes.

With his free hand, he reached up to cup her face and reassuringly touched his lips to hers in a kiss so light that it was barely a kiss at all.

“Do you know what happens between men and women?” His breath had grown ragged, yet he still guided her fingers in her slow strokes.