trailed a caress along her arm and along the underside of her breast. For a moment he hoped she’d shriek in outrage and demand that he leave. Instead she pressed closer, and he knew without a doubt that her once thin and sharp angles had been transformed into soft, pleasing curves. Entranced, he cradled her breast in his palm, stroking his thumb lightly over the rounded nipple. He could feel it tightening to a hard peak beneath the silk robe.
A shudder ran through her and he caught her as her knees weakened. She wound her arms around his neck and did something too seductive to resist.
She spoke his name.
The sound of it on her lips was sultry and decadent. It was a bedroom voice that promised abandon. He stroked her other breast out of greed, just to feel the eager response of her flesh. His own sex thickened within his trousers.
Lian didn’t protest when he backed her onto her bed, nor when he worked the edges of her robe open. The bodice hidden underneath was a tantalizing flash of red, embroidered with a lush orchid pattern. The garment fit snugly over her torso, accentuating the swell of her breasts.
“You shouldn’t be letting me do this,” he taunted lightly as he lay down alongside her.
“Then you shouldn’t be doing it,” she countered, but it came out as a sensuous purr that nearly undid him.
He reminded himself that there would be no release for him tonight, but that didn’t prevent him from easing the edge of her bodice downward. His mouth closed around one pink bud and his tongue circled it hungrily. She writhed against him, making him burn. Her fingers tangled into his hair to hold him to her.
A rush of power and possessiveness filled his chest. He was drunk with the taste of her skin. Lian was his tonight for the taking, if he so desired.
To his surprise, Lian began fumbling at his clothes, trying to disrobe him. He shouldn’t have been so shocked. He had never known her to be shy—at least not with him. Her movements, though eager, were unpracticed, and that was what saved her. This wasn’t some carefree and nameless dancer or song girl beside him. This was Lian, and she wasn’t meant to be used for a night of pleasure.
He took hold of her hands just as she managed to open his tunic. With a wicked grin he guided them over her head. Her wrists were slender enough for him to pin them beneath one hand.
“If you move, I’ll stop,” he warned.
Her eyes were fixed on him and her pupils were wide and black with desire. Her breasts rose and fell rapidly, half-exposed. She had no idea what would happen next, but he could see how much she wanted to find out. His hold on her would have been easy to break, yet she lay back...waiting. Waiting for him to show her.
With his free hand he reached for her skirt, sliding the silk up over her knees. She continued to watch him, her breath coming faster now as she willed him to continue. Her legs were nicely shaped and her skin glowed in the lantern light. Baozhen slipped his hand beneath the robe, but he didn’t touch her yet. If she denied him then there was a small chance he could still be a gentleman about it.
There was no denial.
Lian closed her eyes as his hand settled on her thigh and followed the shape of it upward. She bit her lower lip in anticipation just before he reached her sex. His own heart stopped the moment his fingers touched against warm, willing flesh. His mind clouded with a thick fog. She was already damp. Heaven and earth. Elation surged through him.
In slow circles he deepened the caress, gradually initiating her to a man’s touch. He was rewarded when her knees parted instinctively and her hips arched against his hand. Her head was thrown back and her cheeks suffused with color. The look on her face was indescribable. He moved just the tip of his finger over her most sensitive spot and she whimpered and moaned perfectly for him.
He wanted more of this. So much more. Women were so beautiful, with all their hidden looks and mysteries waiting to be uncovered. And Lian was the most beautiful creature of them all. He quickened his strokes to intensify her enjoyment.
His erection had become painful, and the sight of Lian pinned beneath him only made it worse. He’d become a slave to her responses, to her small cries and the sensual churning of her hips. His singular purpose was to bring her to climax and take pleasure from being the one to bring it to her.
He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers, letting the sounds of her arousal guide him.
* * *
Lian was crying out shamelessly, but soon any sense of embarrassment faded in the wake of the most devastating pleasure she had ever known. She and the neighborhood girls had always speculated what exactly it was that happened between a man and woman, but she had never known it could be like this.
This was not romance or poetry, a flight of sparrows or a fall of spring rain. This was tawdry and base and she was rendered helpless against it. There was nothing she wanted more than Baozhen’s touch on her, inside her. She was completely at his mercy and she’d die if he stopped.
He seemed to know. He ground his body against her while he stroked her with wicked skill. His touch was lightning-quick, like the beat of a hummingbird’s wings. She gasped for air, her mind whirling as she fought for some way to tell him she needed more.
Baozhen had trapped her hands to keep her still, but it was no longer needed. She was ensnared by this rapture that consumed her. Her heart was beating so fast it would surely burst. He was whispering heated words into her ear. Love words. Gutter words. The blood was rushing so furiously through her head that she couldn’t make them out. She only knew that Baozhen was there—holding her, touching her.
He relaxed his hold on her wrists to twine his fingers with hers. “Soon,” he gritted out, and she wasn’t certain whether it was a command, a question, a promise.
A sob caught in her throat as the pleasure intensified to a nearly unbearable throb. She had never cried in front of Baozhen, but she was suddenly filled with desperate longing. She wanted without knowing what it was she wanted.
A short but endless time passed, and then her entire body and soul tightened to a single, blinding point. A flood of nameless emotion swept through her. She shuddered, lost between heaven and earth, filled with light and sensation.
When she found herself again Baozhen was reaching for her. He kissed her lightly on her cheek, her lips, the tip of her chin. Each affectionate gesture seemed wholly innocent after the lightning storm she’d just experienced.
But while her limbs were waxen and languid, Baozhen remained taut beside her. She’d thought he’d joke now, and say something to lighten the mood, but his expression was strained.
She didn’t have any experience in the bedchamber, but she knew enough to understand that this was not the end of things. His tunic was open, exposing a patch of sun-warmed skin and lean muscle, solid from labor and riding. It was enough to show her that Baozhen was as beautiful beneath his clothes as he was on the outside.
Pushing all hesitation aside, Lian reached for his trousers. Baozhen moved to stop her, but she refused to be denied. The knot at his waist fell open. She slipped her hand inside, running it along the flat of his stomach and downward to find him. Baozhen tried to push her away, but all the while his hips shifted restlessly toward her.
“No,” he choked out. “Lian, wait. You’re very beautiful...it’s very difficult to stop when—”
