He released her finger. His grin was so fleeting she nearly missed it. His arms tightened; he drew her back down, bent over her, paused to whisper in his dark sorceror’s voice, “Slow. As you wish. All you deserve.”

Then he kissed her.

Tony pressed deep, let the kiss, not just a meeting of lips but a melding of mouths, sink into realms they’d not previously explored. Let the drugging, absorbing effect take full hold… until they were captive, both trapped, held but not tightly within the web of their mutual desire. A desire that glowed, warm, alive, real, not yet red hot but a thing of flame.

She was with him, as committed as he to their road; he read it in her lips, through the way she met each increasingly explicit exchange, in the way her body, lithe and supple, lay lightly tensed, poised and willing in his arms.

Regardless, he held back, held his own desires in a grip of iron and focused solely on hers. On awakening them, coaxing them, stirring them—step by step, as he’d promised—into full-blown life.

She hadn’t been down this road before; to one of his experience that was clear. Her husband…was dead, of no importance now. He set himself to search out and eradicate any lingering difficulties, any unnecessary hesitations. Any instinctive drawing back. He was committed to teaching her what could be—what should be and would be between them. All the glory he was capable of summoning and laying at her feet.

Her chemise had no straps; a drawstring secured it above her breasts. He caressed, taunted, teased her breasts through the fine layer of silk, then tweaked the tie undone and slipped his hand beneath.

Closed it about one firm mound, and felt something in her, and in him, ease in sensual relief. He drew back from the kiss, lifted his head to look down as he played. As he filled his senses and hers with simple delight, with uncomplicated pleasure.

She—they—had been this far before; despite her harried breathing, despite her racing pulse, she didn’t protest, didn’t pull away. He could feel her gaze on his face, watching him savor her, watching him fall more deeply under her spell.

He glanced at her, caught the gleam of her eyes from under her weighted lids. His answering smile was tight, dangerous. Shifting his hold, he lifted her, raising her breasts, her spine bowing over his arm as he bent his head to do homage.

In that, he held nothing back. Deliberately sent fire racing through her veins, set desire chasing hard on its heels. Her fingers found his hair, tangled, clung, then clenched as he feasted. He took all he wished, all she wordlessly offered, gave her in return all the delight, all the tight, thrilling, illicitly intense pleasure his expertise could evoke.

Alicia gasped. Her body seemed no longer hers. He suckled more deeply. Taut in his arms, a soft moan escaped her, then the suction eased, and fire flared anew; hot and scalding, it raced through her to flow into the furnace building deep within her.

Her breasts were on fire, but it was the increasingly insistent, increasingly powerful demands of her body that gripped her, shook her. Unknown, as-yet-incomprehensible demands that threatened to overwhelm her, to sweep aside what wits she’d managed to cling to. She struggled against the tide; she wanted to know more, to learn what this and their next step would be. They’d gone no further than before—yet. He hadn’t even touched her curls—yet.

This time, she knew, and waited—for that knowing touch, that oh-so-illicit caress. Her whole body was taut, quivering in anticipation. Of that, of what would follow the delight, the almost excruciating pleasure he, with clear intent, lavished upon her.

His mouth was scalding as he tasted her sensitized skin. Her nipples ached with a deep-seated pain that was intensely sweet. Then he placed his hand, large and heavy, over her waist; through the silk, she felt its heat and hardness, felt her muscles leap.

He raised his head. Looked down at her breasts. Even in the dimness, she could see the possessiveness limning his features.

His gaze rose. Black, hot, it searched her face, read her features, then his eyes returned to hers. He held her gaze, held her awareness.

His hand drifted lower.

The silk softly shushed, the last barrier between his hand and her flesh. Flesh that now pulsed hotly, nerves that slowly, slowly tightened with expectation.

Almost negligently, he caressed her stomach, then his hand drifted to the curve of her hip, then followed the line of one thigh.

Tony watched her, watched her senses follow his hand, his fingers. He did nothing to break the spell, held aside his own clamorous instincts and forced himself to keep to the same slow steady pace that had, from the moment they’d entered the room, contributed to the magic.

Orchestrated it, built it.

He needed that magic. He didn’t just want to introduce her to passion, to take her and make her his. He wanted— needed—to expand her horizons, to bring her to know, to experience, and ultimately to want to explore the outer reaches of desire with him. To achieve that he needed to show her, to make her see and appreciate that there was a great deal more beyond the simple act.

So he held back his frustration, without compunction sacrified it to their greater good, closed his mind against the drumming insistence of even deeper instincts, those that had reacted to the thought of other men—other rakes—coveting her as he did, those instincts that still, beneath all else, prowled, prodded to possessive life by the nebulous threat of her involvement with Ruskin.

He pushed them all aside, and concentrated on her. On the tale told by her rapid breathing, the way her nerves leapt as he stroked down her thigh. The armchair was commodious; her legs were a heated weight across his lap. Against one firm thigh, he was hard as rock, rigid and aching, but relief was not in the cards, not tonight. He’d survive, but he was determined in recompense to advance their one small step.

Still holding her gaze, he closed his fingers about one knee and lifted it, shifted it, parting her thighs. She permitted it, but tensed; her breathing tightened. Intent, he kept her with him and stroked his fingers, his palm, up the sensitive inner face of her thigh.

All the way to where her tight curls brushed his fingertips. He smoothed them aside, in the same movement boldly cupped her. Set his hand to her softness and covered it. Claimed it.

She caught her breath, stopped breathing entirely. His gaze locked with hers, he held still, then, adhering to that same slow steady beat, he eased his palm back, and with his thumb and one finger began to explore her.

Alicia quivered, and followed his every move. She couldn’t do otherwise; he had her locked to him in some heightened state where she was shockingly aware of their flagrantly sexual play, where they were in some way connected so she both felt the sensations of his touch and simultaneously experienced something of his reaction.

Of what he felt as he learned her, caressed and boldly explored the soft, swollen folds between her thighs. She’d never known that part of her body to feel so hot, so wet, so achingly wanting. Pulsing, almost throbbing; her hips stirred, of their own volition lifted to his caress as if seeking more.

A glimmer of satisfaction flashed across his hard face. That he understood her body better than she did she didn’t doubt; his caresses changed, became subtly more deliberate, more potent.

More satisfying to both of them.

He was showing her, teaching her. She remembered his words as his thumb swirled knowingly about the tight pearl of sensation he’d found, that exquisitively sensitive spot that seemed pleasurably connected to every nerve she possessed. He swirled again and her whole body reacted; she arched lightly, heard herself gasp, let her lids fall.

“Stay with me.”

The deep words were an outright command. She forced her lids up, met his gaze. Tried to read it and failed. “Why?”

To her surprise, the single word was all sultry temptation. Not like her at all, or so she had thought, yet it was. Emboldened, she shifted her hands, until then slack on his shoulders, let her fingers stroke his nape.

In response, his fingers stroked, but more slowly, as if savoring the wetness they’d drawn forth.

“Because I want you to know this, and I want to know you—all of you. All that you feel, all that you enjoy.”

On the words, as if to demonstrate, his wicked fingers shifted, parting her folds, this time gently probing.

The action captured her attention. Completely. She moistened her lips; her gaze once again locked with his, she felt him ease one blunt fingertip between the slick folds.

Her body reacted, flushed, heated. She dragged in a tight breath. “One step.”

He held her gaze, his eyes black, intent. “Just one step.”

Slowly, he slid his finger into her.

Into the heated softness of her body, into the scalding furnace of her desire. Mentally gritting his teeth, Tony held tight to his reins and watched her outward attention splinter. Watched her focus inward, on the steady penetration of his finger into her tight sheath.

Her breathing was labored; she struggled to do as he’d asked and cling to the contact, to keep her eyes open, locked albeit unseeing on his.

Still keeping to their slow, steady rhythm, he reached as far as he could, gently pressed, then equally slowly reversed, until his fingertip reached the tight constriction that guarded her entrance. Then he reversed direction, deliberately pressing in, stroking the soft tissues, teasing the nerves and muscles beneath.