Trapped in Time Read online

  She seemed to feel a bit awkward sitting down in the half-bath, as though she had never been in one before. Which was curious, since she had one in her rooms, which her maid Mary Ann used to help her bathe on a regular basis.

  Nevertheless, she sat down willingly enough and the water came up to her waist and covered her thighs. Her knees were hooked over the edge of the tub so that her feet were planted on the carpeted floor. She started to sit back against the porcelain back of the half bath but then she jerked away with a little hiss.

  “Oh! That’s cold!” she exclaimed.

  “Lean forward and I’ll pour a little warm water down the back of the bath,” Richard offered. “Then you can relax in warmth and comfort.”

  He did as he had offered and soon Caroline was able to lean back with a little sigh of pleasure against the now-warm back of the tub. She looked up at him, her big brown eyes both shy and expectant.

  “Well?” she asked softly. “What now?”

  “Now I bathe you, my darling.” Richard had to fight to keep the eager growl of pure desire out of his voice. His greatest fantasy was coming true—Caroline was finally opening up to him—finally allowing the intimacy she had denied him so long.

  Going to the mantelpiece, he found a small bar of Francais-milled lavender soap and a sea sponge. Mother Griffith’s was careful to stock everything a nobleman might wish, should he choose to spend the night in the spare room. Now Richard was glad of it.

  He wet the sponge in her bath water and worked up a lather with the soap. Then, taking Caroline’s right arm, he began to wash her, from the tips of her dainty fingers all the way up.

  Caroline sighed and relaxed as he bathed her, leaning her head against the high back of the tub and closing her eyes in apparent pleasure as he took his time washing her limbs. At last, however, her arms and legs were clean and patted dry with a soft bit of fabric and Richard was ready to move on.

  “I’m going to bathe your breasts now, my love,” he murmured in her ear. “Unless you think the sponge will be to rough on your sensitive flesh?”

  Caroline’s eyes flew open and she gave him an uncertain, but longing look.

  “I…yes, I think it might be too rough,” she said. “But…maybe you could just use your bare hands?”

  Fill his hands with her heavy globes and stroke her sensitive peaks with his fingers until she moaned for him? Gods…Richard had thought his shaft couldn’t get any harder, nor his fangs any sharper, but she had proved him wrong with her soft words.

  “That would be my pleasure,” he told her, his voice rough with desire. “If it is truly what you want.”

  Caroline nodded, looking more decisive.

  “It is,” she said and thrust out her chest, as though to give him better access. “It really is, Richard.”

  “I shall come around behind you,” he told her. “It will be easier to reach you that way.”

  “All right,” she whispered. “But hurry. I want your hands on me.”

  Her soft words sent another jolt of desire to his shaft and he hastened to get into position. Kneeling behind the bath, he was at just the right height to reach around her and whisper in her ear at the same time. As he lathered his hands and reached around to cup her full breasts in his palms, he could not help but remember the pleasure he’d had from sucking them the last time she had allowed him to get close to her.

  “Gods, my darling, your breasts are so full…so ripe,” he murmured hoarsely in her ear as he soaped her generous curves and then tugged lightly on the pink tips of her nipples.

  “Oh!” she moaned, writhing against the back of the tub. “Oh, Richard!”

  How he loved hearing his name on her lips! But even better was knowing that she was moaning it in pleasure—pleasure he was giving to her. Gently, he twisted her stiff peaks and then palmed them lightly to vary the sensation. Caroline moaned and writhed again—how sensitive she was! And how responsive to his touch.

  “Richard…Richard, please!” she begged softly. “I need…need more.”

  “Do you want me to wash you lower?” he murmured in her ear. “Shall I stroke your soft little sex as I did before, my darling?”

  Her answer was immediate.

  “Yes—please!” As she spoke, she spread her thighs for him and arched her back—it was as though her whole body was begging for his touch.

  Richard was more than happy to gratify her need. After rinsing the soap from her breasts, he let his hands wander lower, down to her welcomingly parted thighs. Beneath the warm water, he cupped something much warmer, feeling her curls tickle his palm before he pressed inward and felt the heat of her inner core envelope his seeking fingers.

  She cried out as he found and circled the tight little bud at her center. The sound of her pleasure was nearly too much for Richard. He loved touching her but there was something he wanted far more—something he needed.

  “You’re so soft here, my darling,” he growled in her ear. “So hot and wet. But it isn’t my fingers I want to use to bathe you—it is my tongue.”

  “I…what…what are you saying?” she gasped breathlessly, craning her neck around to look up at him.

  “I want to taste you,” Richard told her bluntly. “I want to spread the petals of your sex with my tongue and lap your honey right from the source.”

  Caroline bit her lip, clearly uncertain. “I…I don’t know,” she whispered at last. “What if…what if I don’t like it?”

  “Then I’ll stop,” Richard said firmly. “I would never do anything you were unwilling to have me do, my darling.”

  After a moment, she nodded.

  “All right. You can try it,” she said softly. “I just hope…hope it’ll be okay.”

  If Richard had anything to say about it, the experience would be nothing but pleasure for her, though he knew society at large would not have approved of it.

  This practice of the Kindred—their need to taste their mates—had been one of the main factors in his people’s loss of favor in the prim and proper upper classes. The practice of “kissing below the mouth” as it was discretely called, was deeply frowned upon. There were even books about marriage for young brides-to-be where they were specifically warned against it.

  But Richard couldn’t help himself—no Kindred male could. The need to taste their females was as deeply ingrained as their need to breathe and no male could be content without it. Bearing that in mind, he was determined to make the experience a good one for Caroline—one she would never forget and even come to crave from him in the future.

  He helped her up from the bath and dried her off, patting her rosy skin with the soft fabric towel until she was quite dry. Then he lifted her and cradled her close to his chest as he brought her to the bed.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Caroline protested. “Don’t have to carry me around like that.”

  “But I want to.” He pressed a kiss to her mouth before depositing her gently on the blue and green checked quilt. It was homemade but soft and clean and Caroline looked lovely lying there naked upon it.

  Richard arranged her so that she was positioned with her lower legs over the side of the bed and started to get on his knees before her. But she stopped him.

  “Wait,” she begged softly. “Lie beside me for a while first. Kiss me some more—my mouth, I mean—before you, uh, kiss me lower.”

  He was more than willing to accede to her request—hadn’t he promised himself to take things slowly?

  “Of course, my darling,” he murmured, lying down beside her and stoking her hair. “I love to be close to you.”

  “Can you open your shirt?” Caroline asked, plucking at his buttons. “I…I’d like to feel your bare chest against mine,” she added shyly.

  “You can open it yourself if you like.”

  “Mmm, I do like.” She gave him a smile and went to work on his buttons.

  Richard smiled at her eagerness to comply with his offer. In short order, she had him stripped down to his trousers. But