Page 139 of A Very Bellamy Christmas

She jerked her hand away at his gasp, but as he’d done last night, he caught her arm and held it in place. “That feels good.” It felt bloody intoxicating and made him burn to throw her onto the bed and bury himself in her so deeply that it would be impossible to know where she began, and he ended.

Andrew was smart enough to keep those thoughts to himself. After all, she was already skittish, he didn’t want to terrify her.

Her touch was tentative at first. Even so, he bit his tongue until he tasted blood, vibrating with need by the time she raised her other hand and caressed the neglected nipple.

A growl tore out of his chest when the soft, cool pads of her fingers lightly pinched the pebbled buds.

“Bloody hell,” he ground out, reaching unerringly for her waist, holding her easily with one arm as he tore off the blindfold and stared down into eyes that were pools of black. He began to pluck the pins from her hair. “I want to feel it loose.”

She did not stop him.

“It is as I thought,” he murmured once it fell free.

“Wh-what?”

“It is so long it covers your bottom.” He wrapped the thick rope around and around one hand and then tugged her head back. “Unless you tell me no, I’m going to carry you over to that bed and strip off all our clothing.”

Her mouth opened and her eyes widened in shock.

But then she nodded. “No light,” she added hastily.

Andrew growled. He would have liked to argue, but…

“Fine,” he said. “But first I’m going to carry you to the bed, so I don’t trip and fall in the darkness and embarrass myself.”

***

Lord Shelton lowered Stacia onto the bed and met her gaze in the dim light while he stroked her hair. “If you let me leave the light on, I can do some wonderful things with this hair of yours.”

Stacia blinked, momentarily distracted by his words. “Er, what?”

He grinned, his fingers quickly dividing the heavy mass in half. “Oh, so many uses. I could use it as a rope to tie your wrists to the bed and—”

“The lights, my lord,” she yelped.

He laughed and then across the room so quickly that Stacia didn’t even have time to consider his words before he snuffed the candles and plunged the room into near darkness, the only light the red glow of the fire.

A moment later the mattress dipped beside her and his voice rumbled close to her temple. “Change your mind?” He kissed the rim of her ear.

“No,” she said, not needing so much as a second to reconsider.

“Good. May I undress you?”

She hissed in a breath and exhaled noisily. “Yes.”

The mattress moved again as he left it.

Before she could ask where he was going, he took her ankle and set her foot on his thigh. Both his hands caressed up her calf slowly, his fingers warm as they untied her garter. He didn’t immediately roll down her stocking. Instead, one hand massaged the indentation left by her garter while the other caressed the thin inner skin of her thigh.

“You need to breathe, sweetheart.”

His amused voice broke her from her trance, making her aware of the burning in her lungs.

Shelton removed her other garter and stocking, gently lowered her leg, and then sat beside her. “We can stop any time you want—I won’t think any less of you.” His hand cupped her jaw and turned her face toward him. The faint light from the fireplace cast a warm glow over his profile but was not enough to see more than an outline.

He kissed her gently, a series of light, tender brushes of his lips until her body began to relax. “Tell me what you want, Stacia.”

She closed her eyes and tilted her head back when he nudged her chin up and began kissing her bared throat.