My Immortal (Seven Deadly Sins #1)(17)
Author: Erin McCarthy

"No," she said truthfully, resting her hand on Damien’s arm so she wouldn’t lose her balance as she leaned to look around him. She could never picture herself as the queen. "I would be the faithful lady’s maid watching from around the corner."

Like she was now, vicariously aroused, intrigued, fascinated, and yet surprised by that. Curiosity overcame shame, desire raced ahead of her manners, and she stared, the couple’s intensity locking her out, yet drawing her fully into their passion.

"Then perhaps the lady’s maid needs to find a footman to worship her."

"Maybe." Wasn’t that what she had been searching for for the last ten years? Her footman/Nice Guy? Her own Joe Average, the wealthy and gorgeous need not apply.

"Though I think you could be the queen if you let yourself."

Marley didn’t know how to let herself be anything other than what she was. She was a caregiver, not a queen, and she couldn’t change that, didn’t want to. But once, it would be amazingly freeing to have that kind of entitlement.

And as they watched, the queen broke, her head snapping up, her nails digging into the flesh on her knees, her thighs tensing. No sound came from her, but she rode out her orgasm, powerful, in control, owning herself and her pleasure.

Marley couldn’t look away, had to follow the climax to its satisfying end, the woman’s legs relaxing, her wiping her upturned lips, running a languid finger through the man’s hair. There was something beautifully intimate about that.

Marley’s own breathing had hitched a little, her ni**les hardening, body reacting to what she was seeing. Dampness crept along her inner thighs, and Marley blushed under Damien’s scrutiny, suddenly realizing he was watching her, not the woman on the desk, and she was sure he knew she was turned on, if only just a little.

It was just that the idea of embracing her own sexuality, taking what she wanted with no apologies, the heady thought of selfishness, had her interest, excitement, stirring to life. A wondrous shiver whispering What if you did? crept over her.

Damien leaned toward her, his body brushing against hers from hip to chest, and for a second she thought he was going to kiss her.

She was appalled to realize she would have welcomed it, with open lips and wet inner thighs.

But he didn’t kiss her. He stopped just short of her mouth and said, "Maybe you just need a king to take your queen, ma cherie."

After quickly guiding Marley through a succession of rooms, each one more graphic and boisterous than the last, Damien deposited Marley in the music room on the first floor. It was a refreshment area, sexual activity off-limits, meant for guests to regroup, to talk, to settle on what would be their next pleasurable pursuit.

It was a reasonably safe place to leave Marley for five minutes. "Do not leave this room," he told her roughly.

"Fine," she said, looking too shocked, overwhelmed, aroused, to protest.

"I’ll be back in five minutes." Damien left the room, retracing his steps to the hall and making his way to the back of the house. He shoved open a door that led to the back garden and sucked in some fresh air.

It had been a mistake to let Marley into the party. He should have locked her in the pigeonnier the minute she appeared. But he had felt sorry for her, her concern for her sister so palpable and intense, and he had given in to temptation. He had wanted to see her reaction to the entertainment, he had wanted to see her in that damn bikini.

The view hadn’t disappointed. She was lush, curvaceous, her full br**sts straining against the ties on the top, her backside perfect for grabbing on to, gripping, as a man pushed himself between a woman’s receptive thighs.

And the way she had watched the guests… her eyes wide, glazing over, her cheeks pink and her breath tumbling out over plump lips…

Damien swore, leaning against the wall, the foliage in the garden wild and overgrown, the vines and branches and leaves rushing in a hundred different directions, consuming the path, the bench, the house, the once elegant brick wall.

Marley had been aroused, and so was he from watching her. Damien pulled his c**k out of his tight pirate pants and stroked viciously, urgently. He was angry with himself for putting himself in this position, angry with Rosa for sending Marley to him, angry with Marley that she was so innocent in her sensuality, so ripe and ready to be plucked, so giving and kind and in need of a good, hard, hot f**k from a man who knew what he was doing. Angry with Marley that she was in fact the very temptation Rosa had thought she would be.

Squeezing hard, he brought himself to a quick, tight completion, body tense, heart sick, thoughts jumbled and furious. Breathing fast, he shook the result of his efforts off his hand into the dense bushes and shoved himself back into his pants. He was not going to touch Marley.

And under no circumstances whatsoever was she to touch him.

"Well, that was a total waste."

Hitting his head back against the bricks of the house, Damien wiped his sweaty forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Rosa. Why am I not surprised? You’re like mold. No matter how hard I try to get rid of you, you keep coming back."

"Oh, come on." Rosa stepped out of the back door to stand next to him. She was wearing gold stiletto heels and an orange string bikini that could double as dental floss. "Don’t be so dramatic. And why are you out here jacking off when there are twenty women inside willing to do it for you? I would even do it for you if you just asked nicely."

He gave her a mocking smile. "No one is as good at it as I am."

"Funny."

When he wanted to be, which wasn’t often. "Your question was stupid. You know why. You know I haven’t let a woman touch me in a hundred years."

"I know, but that doesn’t mean I understand it any more than I did a hundred years ago." She put her hands on her thin hips. "You’d be so much more relaxed if you were getting some."

"I thank you for the concern but I’m fine." As fine as he could be.

"If you were fine you wouldn’t be splitting your time between working yourself over in the garden and dating the most unattractive women imaginable."

Damien would never tell Rosa that he gave pleasure to plain women because he felt compassion for them, that he took his own pleasure just from watching them revel in his attention, from seeing them grow in confidence. When he put his tongue between the thighs of a shy, inhibited, insecure woman, she bloomed for him, and that was the only sexual gratification he would allow himself.

"Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder."

She snorted and rolled her eyes. "Does she know what you are?"

"Who?" He played dumb. Let Rosa spell it out.