He toed off his buckled shoes. “That was the test. I needed to know if you would place me in a different category from other men you know. I was also curious to see how deep your adventuresome proclivities were buried.”
“I am far from adventuresome,” she protested.
“You would like to believe that.” Jasper tossed his cravat on the floor, then yanked his shirtsleeves over his head.
Eliza’s knees weakened and she staggered over to the nearest chair, half-sinking and half-falling into it.
Dear God, he was beautiful. Astonishingly, breathtakingly so. She remembered how he’d urged her to touch him the first time he kissed her. He had been so hard beneath her questing fingers, like stone. She could see why. Her hand lifted to her throat. As dry as her mouth had been, it was now flooded with moisture.
She had never seen a rendering of a male body that could compare. The washboard-like cording of muscles across his abdomen and the light dusting of dark hair that thinned into a fine line were new to her. And delightful. Her gaze followed the trail to where it disappeared beneath the placket of his breeches.
Then lower…
He was hard there, too. Cupped by the expertly tailored doeskin, the outline of his erection was thick and prominent. The knot in her stomach tightened. He was such a blatantly masculine creature. Primitive in the most vital of ways. A male whose appetites were undoubtedly fierce and expansive. How could she, a woman who knew nothing about exploiting her own femininity, sate such a man?
When he didn’t move, she jerked her gaze upward to find him staring back at her. A tight smile preceded him taking a seat on the opposite settee. He had allowed her to look her fill, she realized. Unashamed of the visible proof of his lust. Unabashed.
Jasper rolled down his hose, one leg at a time. “I need you to be adventuresome, Eliza. You wouldn’t tolerate me and my profession for long if you were not.”
“I do more than tolerate you,” she rejoined softly, having lost the strength to speak louder.
He stood, and her eyes stung. She was enamored with the sight of him. Smitten as she’d thought she could never be. There was nothing she would alter about him, nothing she found fault with. In that moment, she was certain she would pay any price for the pleasure of looking upon him indefinitely. The sensations moving through her were drugging and addictive. She wondered helplessly if there was any way she could feel like this every day.
Approaching her with hand outstretched, he said, “From the moment I first saw you, I desired you and knew I had to have you. Since then, I have come to realize it isn’t mere craving that drives me. It is wanting, Eliza. I want you. I’ve never wanted anything in my life, until you. Nothing. Do you understand what I’m saying? Gaining and losing a possession means nothing to me. There is always a replacement.”
“I understand.” She allowed him to pull her to her feet. “But I don’t know what conclusion to draw from that understanding.”
He gestured for her to face away from him. “I ceased trying to find reason in it. I cannot waste any more time trying to puzzle out what I don’t know. I must act on what I do know-you are the one thing in the world I want, and I can have you. I’m also lacking the scruples that would prevent me from doing whatever is necessary to keep you. The details can be dealt with later, when I can once again think about something other than bedding you.”
His fingers went to the buttons that secured the back of her gown and released them with laudable dexterity.
“Have I no say in the matter?” she asked.
He pressed his lips to the top of her bared shoulder. “If you intend to say you have no objections, speak away. Otherwise, I ask that you give me the next few hours before voicing anything that might make my task more difficult for me.”
Eliza looked straight ahead, which was a straight-line view into Jasper’s bedroom. The bed was directly in front of her, custom-made from the size of it. The back of her gown gaped open and he pushed it free of her shoulders, then down to the floor. “Step out,” he ordered.
She obeyed, too overwhelmed to do otherwise. “You are giving me too much time to think,” she groused, averting her gaze from the bed.
Jasper laughed softly, the moment of levity sufficient to lighten some of the incertitude preying on her. “Would you prefer to be ravished?”
“I would prefer not to have these fits of nerves.”
“I should like to ravish you.” He loosened her stays. “Not tonight, when I need both of us to have no doubt that you came to my bed willingly, but soon.”
Crossing her arms over her chest, she held her loosened corset to her breasts. Jasper rounded her and backed up, putting distance between them.
“I’m almost naked,” she bit out, wanting him to do something. Why was he standing so far away? Even if he extended his arms their full length, he wouldn’t be able to reach her.
“I am highly aware of that fact.” Reaching down, he stroked himself through his breeches, his long fingers rubbing along the length of the pronounced bulge.
“Have you no shame?” Her tone was curt, her emotions high. She was a virgin, for God’s sake, and he was giving her too much breathing room. She was achingly aware of everything around her, when what she wanted was to be lost to the barrage of sensations he could so easily overwhelm her with.
“None at all. And I would like for you to have none either. Eliza…” His tone softened. “Did I not explain myself clearly? Don’t you understand that you are uniquely appealing to me? You worry that exposing your body will make you vulnerable, but I’m the one who will be left raw by the experience.”
She stood there for a long moment, lip quivering. He was forcing her to reason everything out during the one occasion when she didn’t want to think at all.
Jasper watched her with those intense dark eyes, his body made golden by the flickering candlelight. How many times had he experienced this sequence of events to be so nonchalant? Dozens? More…?
She would not be surprised. What woman could resist him?
She was resisting him…
Her jaw clenched. He was right to avoid responsibility for her choice to be here. It was her decision, and she needed to claim it. Why should she tell herself that she was acting on instinct when that was a lie?
She was not like her mother. She was not driven to rashness by passion. She knew damn well what she was doing.
Eliza launched herself at him. Two running steps and a wild leap, and she was upon him. He caught her, laughing. Lifting her feet from the floor, he spun and strode into the bedroom.
“Not adventuresome?” he teased, setting her down at the foot of the bed. He looked at her with such an expression of proprietary pride that her throat tightened.
Pivoting on his bare feet, Jasper locked the bedroom door.
“I thought we were the only ones here?” she queried, her heart still racing from her leap off the proverbial cliff.
“You are assuming I’m locking others out, instead of locking you in…”
The thought of capture excited her. She had run willingly into the lion’s den, and now there was no turning back.
He leaned back against the door, his palms pressed flat to the panels and one ankle crossed over the other. The perfect appearance of insouciant leisure. But he’d never been able to hide his predaceous nature from her. She had seen it from the first and she saw it now: the high color on his throat and cheekbones, the fine sheen of sweat on his chest, the flaring of his nostrils, and the narrowed, concentrated gaze.
One wrong move and he would pounce…
Reaching up, she began to pull the pins from her hair. She dropped them on the floor, one by one, as he’d done with his cravat. There was something oddly freeing in that carelessness. The act of tossing aside the trappings that restrained. Here in this room with Jasper, she could finally cast off the confusing strictures of society and be what she had always wanted to be-liberated and independent.