The Princess and the Diamonds Page 5

  “Thank you for coming,” she said.

  “You’re welcome.” He offered nothing more, but simply waited for her next words. Her next move.

  She smoothed her skirts again and paused, almost as though she was grappling with her next words. Finally she said, “I find myself in a bit of a situation.”

  “Oh? And what situation is that?”

  She bit her lush bottom lip and dropped her gaze to the floor briefly before she lifted her chin, looked him straight in the eye, and said, “I need my diamonds back.”

  Mathias held his tongue. Any response and she likely wouldn’t elaborate. He wanted her as much as he wanted to know about her.

  For the life of him, he couldn’t understand what all the secrecy was about. Why the desire to disguise herself?

  He doubted Gaillard cared a whit if his mistress played some Basset—illegal or not. And if he were willing to provide her with a lavish home such as this, he’d likely be inclined to cover any of her losses.

  His silence worked. She continued. “The diamonds are . . . very important to me, you see. I cannot lose them. I am willing to compensate you for them.”

  His groin tightened. Every fiber in his being anticipated exactly what compensation she was offering. Still he kept silent.

  His gaze dropped to her hands. He noted she was clutching them tightly. Dieu, he knew the diamonds were important to her, but he hadn’t anticipated her being in such distress over them. It was palpable.

  “If . . .” She stopped and started anew. “You give me back my diamonds and I’ll . . . rather . . .”

  Out with it, Gabrielle, she told herself and pushed the rest of the words off her tongue. “I’ll be . . . yours for the night.”

  The flare of hot interest in his eyes made her sex clench. All right. She’d admit it. She was hardly being the sacrificial lamb here.

  You know as well as I do any carnal encounter between us would be heated, delicious, and intense. His words had been haunting her for days and even more so at night.

  The King would select her husband soon. She’d heard that copulation with a husband for the purposes of procreation was entirely different from sex with a lover. Before she was married to a man who would likely ship her off to some isolated château, she wanted to know what it would be like to couple with a man who heated her blood the way this man did.

  She’d never met anyone like him. As it was, he was making her pulse race just by his presence.

  The more she’d contemplated the proposition on the way home, the more it held appeal. She’d enjoy an amorous encounter, experience firsthand some of the physical pleasure she’d heard about, and gain back her diamonds.

  The benefit to her was twofold.

  Slowly, he approached, all that tall strong masculine beauty coming her way. Gripped by anticipation, her insides quivered.

  He stopped before her, forcing her to lift her chin in order to look him in the eye. Dear God, how she loved his height. No, more than just his height. There was so much about him that she found physically appealing. His gaze dipped briefly down to her décolletage, her nipples hardening at the mere glance.

  He slipped his fingers under her chin, leaned in, and slowly grazed his lips up the side of her neck. She closed her eyes, her breathing instantly quickening. The sensations felt so good, so decadent. It rippled all the way down to her toes.

  “You’re going to let me have you any way I want?” he murmured in her ear.

  There were different ways? “Yes . . .”

  “And you want two diamonds for your body . . . for one night?” Ever so lightly, his hot mouth retraced its tantalizing path back down her neck to the curve of her shoulder.

  “Hmm? Oh, yes . . . two . . .” She licked her lips. “Both diamonds.” This was so much better than anything anyone had described.

  Lifting his head, he hauled her up against him and claimed her mouth, his tongue driving past her lips on her gasp. She fisted his justacorps and held on as his tongue swirled and stroked hers with mind-spinning intensity. He tasted so good. No, he tasted better than good. Better than anything she’d ever known. Hungry for more, she matched him stroke for stroke with the same famished zeal. She’d never been kissed before, never knew a man this exhilarating. She rubbed herself against the hard bulge pushing against her belly. His groan spiked her need and moistened her sex, the light pulsing between her legs growing stronger with each skillful sweep of his tongue. She’d no idea how he had the ability to awaken her long-dormant body, to set every nerve ending quivering with excitement.

  He broke the kiss sooner than she wanted. A protest escaped her throat. She snapped her eyes open, her breathing sharp and shallow, and there, in those sensual light-colored eyes, was the very same hot need scorching through her blood.

  The sight weakened her knees.

  “Wh-What say you, Mathias? Do we have a bargain?” She was dying to touch his skin. To explore every inch of his powerfully sculpted physique.

  No, more than that. She was dying to know the feel of him inside her, their bodies joined in a lovers’ embrace, a connection she’d never craved before.

  He cupped her breast and rubbed his thumb across her distended nipple through her clothing. His rhythmic strokes over the sensitized peak made her shiver, the sensations lancing into her core. She had to swallow down a moan.

  “Ah yes, the bargain . . .” The sweet torment on her nipple was driving her to distraction.

  “Yes?” she prompted, desperate to get on with it. “What’s your answer? What do you say?”

  “I say . . .” He dropped his hand away. “I don’t pay for sex. Ever.” With a turn of his heel, he started toward the door.

  In her heated haze, it took a moment for his words to register in her mind. Her heart lurched. She raced up and jumped into his path, stopping his progress.

  “Surely you jest! You’re not actually leaving?”

  She sensed his anger and struggled with what to do. What words would convince him to stay? He couldn’t leave her like this. She wanted him so badly, it hurt.

  “When a woman gives herself to me, it’s for one reason. Only one reason. Because she wants to.” He reached inside his dark gray justacorps, pulled out a small pouch, and tossed it onto the side table beside them. Next thing she knew, he was lifting her off the floor, as if she weighed nothing at all, and set her bottom down on the side table, too.

  “You want your diamonds? Here are your diamonds.” He picked up the pouch beside her and shoved it into her hand. “Open it. They’re both in there.”

  She loosened the ties to the dark blue velvet pouch and peered in. Just as he’d said; the King’s diamonds were indeed both there. She closed up the pouch and met his gaze, perplexed.

  “You’re going to just give them back to me? Without any compensation of any kind?” Her body screamed, No! Take me!

  “They are yours. No conditions attached.”

  “But . . . But you could have used these as leverage, to force me to—”

  “Give me sex as well as information about you? I’m quite aware of that. I won’t use coercion. What you give me is going to be of your own free will.”

  She was astounded and moved beyond words. She didn’t know any man who wouldn’t have used the situation to his advantage. No man she knew would have returned the diamonds without making some sort of demand for some kind of gain. His gesture was generous and touching and for the first time she saw him in a totally different light.

  It made her want him more.

  He pulled the pouch from her hands and dropped it beside her on the wooden surface. Setting his palms on her knees, he gently spread them apart and stepped between them, his actions taking her by surprise. A thrill shot up her spine.

  With her legs apart, she was all too aware of his proximity to her slick sex, aching to be filled.

  He gripped her bottom and pulled her tightly against him, her sex coming in quick contact with the bulge in his breeches. She gasped, their cloth
ing muting none of the delicious sensation. He then rolled his hips, plying the most exquisite pressure. She lost her breath and grabbed his sleeves, the bud between her legs now throbbing fiercely.

  “You don’t have the diamonds to hide behind any longer,” he said, his mouth so temptingly close to her own. “So if you want me to take you, you’re going to have to admit to it. Ask for it. What is it going to be, Silvie? Are you going to give yourself to me?”

  Her sex answered with a warm gush. She wanted him to be the one to introduce her to carnal delights.

  In her life she’d never wanted anything more.

  Her hands flew to the front of her gown. Feeling his heated gaze on her all the while, she quickly opened the fastenings and slipped off her sleeves. She attacked the stays next, spreading and pulling, her breaths ragged, her fingers fumbling, eager to free herself from the confines of her clothing for him.

  She wasn’t in the least bit embarrassed by having him see her in a state of undress. Not when she was burning for him, her clothes feeling hot and suffocating.

  Not when she had to have him or die.

  Seeing her struggling, he lent an expert hand here and there until he finally pulled off her gown and tossed it to the floor, then stepped back in between her opened thighs.

  He slipped his hand under her knee-length chemise and brushed the heel of his palm against her mound. She jerked at the decadent sensation.

  His smile broadened as he loosened the ties to her caleçons, then cupped her sex. The heat radiating from his hand through her drawers was melting her mind. He began massaging her slick sex through the fabric. She gripped his shoulders tightly and bit her lip, trying to keep down her whimpers and soft moans, without success, her mewls punctuating the silence in the room.

  “Your drawers are wet,” he said, seemingly pleased by it.

  It wasn’t something she could control. It was what he did to her.

  He slid the drawers off her, too, followed quickly by her garters, stockings, and shoes.

  By the time she was down to just her chemise, her fever had reached an unbearable pitch. Always guarded and reserved, it felt wonderful to be this unbridled. Unrestrained. Her life a stifling existence, she’d found a new freedom—all due to a man who incited her senses like no other.

  He pulled off the last article of clothing and let it drop to the floor. There was something wicked and thrilling about being naked before him while he was still fully dressed. She watched his gaze move over her form with male appreciation. It fluttered her stomach.

  “You’re so very beautiful,” he said, caressing the back of his fingers between her breasts, gliding them down to her quivering belly. Dipping his fingers into her sex, past her soaked curls, he captured her clitoris and gave it light pinch. She practically shot up off the side table as a cry left her throat, the sensations sending her rushing headlong toward a precipice. She was about to hurl over it when he released his hold on the throbbing bud and removed his hand. By the smile on his face, she could tell he’d purposely stopped her from falling over the edge. She squeaked out in frustration.

  “I knew you’d be as fiery in the boudoir as you are out of it. Beautiful Snow Princess, I like how you melt for me.” He rested his hands on the tops of her thigh, his thumbs so close to her needy sex. “Ask for it, Silvie. Let me hear the words from that pretty mouth. Ask for it and I’ll give you what you want.”

  She was quaking both inside and out. “I want you to . . . Will you . . . Take me.” She couldn’t catch her breath.

  Still with a devilish smile, he removed his justacorps, his vest, and opened up his breeches. “With pleasure.” His voice was so low and sinfully sensual as he pulled out his shirttails and yanked the linen shirt off, too, sending it to the floor to join the rest of the clothing.

  His solid chest was bare. She drank in its chiseled perfection, moving her gaze down over his muscled belly all the way to his sex boldly jutting out of his breeches. Once, not long ago, she’d had a glimpse of an erotic illustration. She’d even seen nudes in murals and art, but never the male anatomy up close.

  Gabrielle reached out, her hands trembling slightly, and ran them over the dips and ripples of his chest and abdomen, his skin warm beneath her touch, under her hand his heart beating quickly, racing her own.

  Taking her hand, he brought it to his shaft. Immediately, she curled her fingers around his hard length, reveling in his groan. She luxuriated over the feel of him in her hand, riveted by the pleasure etched across his handsome features as he moved her fist up to the engorged head and down to the base with long unhurried strokes. The proportions of his sex were as impressive as the rest of him. It was inebriating to watch him, to stroke him. To pleasure him.

  “I’ve been fantasizing about you since we met. Dreaming of all the ways I’m going to fuck you.” Dipping his head, he brushed his mouth against her lips. “How do you want to be taken, Silvie?” he whispered. “Fast, or slow?”

  She couldn’t stop stroking him.

  “Yes.” She parted her lips for him, eager to have him in her mouth.

  “Yes to which?” His mouth teasingly hovered over hers.

  “Yes to all of it. Both. However you want. Just do it now.”

  Softly, he chuckled. Removing her hand from his sex, he stripped off the remainder of his clothing.

  This time he spread her legs a little wider when he stepped in between.

  “The bed is over there,” she said, stating the obvious, her senses in a frenzy, desperately trying to move things along.

  He pulled her up against him, her soaked sex kissing his shaft. The slightest smile played on his beautiful mouth.

  “I’ve been hard for you for days,” he said, stroking his erection against her slickened folds. “You’re going to take my cock right here, Silvie.” He kissed her mouth, her jaw, the sensitive spot below her ear. “We’ll use the bed next time.” With that, he lowered his head and sucked her nipple into his hot mouth. She cried out and thrust her hips hard against him, a completely reflexive response. Unfazed by her eruptive reaction, he leaned her back, the back of her head pressing against the wall while his mouth sucked and savored her nipple. Alternating between breasts, he gave each sensitive tip its due carnal care until he had her writhing and panting. A fresh rush of warm wetness flowed from her core onto his hard cock pressed so firmly against her folds.

  He groaned. “I love that . . .” He lightly bit her nipple; she held his head to her and whimpered. “I love how you’re creaming on my cock.” Raising his head, he wrapped her legs around his waist and possessed her mouth with a kiss. It was demanding, hot and delectably fierce.

  He gripped her hips. Then his cock was wedged firmly against her opening. Her heart hammered. Her body celebrated. At last! Joy and pleasure swamping her senses. She wiggled and squirmed, gluttonous for more.

  “Easy, chère,” he rasped against her mouth. “I know you’re eager. Allow me.”

  She grasped his shoulders, just as he drove forward. A sudden sharp pain made her recoil and cry out.

  “Jésus-Christ!” exploded from his lips, his shock evident on his face. He’d only penetrated her partway, her body shaking with a mixture of pain and pleasure.

  Her need was still a strong undercurrent through it all.

  He started to pull out.

  “No!” She tightened her legs around his waist, the sudden movement causing him to sink an inch deeper. His growl eclipsed her moan. No pain this time. Just a delicious stretching. She drew her arms around him. “Don’t stop.” She rained kisses on his mouth, his face, his neck, famished for his taste. For him. “Please . . . give me more . . .” Already the discomfort had receded, overshadowed by the agony of her unfulfilled desire. Her core was pulsing hungrily, his partial possession maddening. She wanted all of him. Tentatively, she moved her hips, trying to take him in.

  “Merde . . .” He tightened his grip her hips, stilling her. The muscles in his shoulders tight and tense beneath her hands, he re
sted his forehead against hers, his breathing as labored as her own. She could tell he was grappling with what to do, given his discovery of her virginity.

  “I want you, Mathias . . . Please, don’t stop. Not now. It doesn’t hurt anymore . . . Take me . . . I want more . . .” She couldn’t believe what was tumbling from her mouth. She never spoke of her needs and wants. Not ever.

  Impatient, she tightened her arms and legs around him and tried to move her hips again, an awkward, unpracticed movement that garnered her only a small measure of success. Frustration erupted out of her.

  Another oath slipped softly from his lips. “All right, Silvie . . . Loosen your legs. Let me give you more.” He slipped his hands under her bottom the moment she complied and lifted her into his plunge, burying his cock into her with a single luscious glide.

  Her head fell back, a soft sound of pleasure leaving her lungs. Oh God . . . He was so deep. She felt so full. There was no pain, just pure pleasure. It felt better than anything she could have imagined. It felt incredible.

  “How’s that? You like that, Silvie?” he asked, his voice gruff with desire. “You want more?”

  She couldn’t speak, her body shaking, her sex throbbing. All she could do was nod.

  He reared and, hauling her to the edge of the side table, lifted her into his solid thrust, penetrating a fraction farther. Her sob of bliss mingled with his grunt. He began to move, fast and hard. His powerful plunges should have hurt, but instead his thick hard shaft sent her into delirium, his strokes so deep they drove her wild.

  “I love how tightly you’re clasping my cock.”

  She had no response. She was beyond words and burning with fever for this man. His palm was pressed to the wall, his free hand to the small of her back holding her in place as he drove his cock into her with bedeviling skill. Gabrielle simply held on, his mouth tantalizing that sensitive spot below her ear, her neck, her shoulder. She was overwhelmed with sensations.

  “You’re on the edge, Silvie,” he rasped in her ear. “You’re about to come for me, aren’t you? I can feel your sweet little clenches.”