Behind the Courtesan’s Mask Read Free Page A

affection of a man for his wife. She had been kissed in the dark of the marital bedroom, lasciviously. The former made her feel nothing, the latter a mixture of shame and disgust. She had never before been kissed with raw passion. She had never before kissed back with passion. But now she was and she did, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
    A sheet of flame enveloped them at the first touch, as if the gods were furious, or perhaps celebrating. A flash of fire between them, forcing them together, crushing each other, pushing against each other, as their mouths melded, their tongues tangled and desire roared to life.
    His hands were in her hair, on her neck, on her arms, her back. His mouth was hot, dark, sinful, just as shockingly sinful as she had imagined. Heat licked through her veins. Her nipples hardened painfully. A need, a craving, an irresistible force, took her in its grip, leaving her gasping for breath.
    â€œNo,” she said, because she knew she should, though she couldn’t imagine what it was she was denying, at the same time pulling him closer, reclaiming his mouth, her hands clawing at the sleeves of his coat. This was wrong. She had to stop. “Five thousand is a lot for mere kisses.”
    â€œOh, I expect a lot more than kisses. Or at least a lot more than kisses such as these.”
    â€œWhat other kisses can there be?”
    Once again, he was almost fooled by her seemingly genuine innocence. Troy laughed. “There are other places I would like to kiss you,” he said, touching her skirts.
    It took her a moment to catch his meaning. Color flooded her face as she did, and heat flooded her belly at the very notion of such intimacy. “Sir! You cannot mean…”
    â€œMadam, I never say what I do not mean.” He kissed her neck. He kissed the delicious mounds of her breasts, rolling his tongue over the pearls.
    â€œPlease, I cannot…”
    â€œYes, you can. Charming as this ingenue act is, there is no need for false modesty.”
    â€œI really cannot…”
    â€œTen thousand, then,” Troy said, a frankly ridiculous sum, though he barely registered it.
    Constance gasped. “You cannot mean it.”
    No, he did not, and she could not possibly expect him to offer more. No man in his right mind would have offered so much already, whether he intended to pay or not. “Ten,” he repeated.
    â€œAnd for ten thousand—what else would you expect?” She ought not to ask, but she wanted to know what more he could possibly expect, for she had absolutely no idea.
    He ought not to answer. He ought not even to think about it, for in thinking about it, he was simply torturing himself. Troy tried to assemble his thoughts, but his infallible logic, his cool business head, had completely deserted him. She felt so good. Voluptuous. Exotic. Enticing. And yet her kisses were beguilingly innocent, her touch alluringly chaste. She looked like a temptress and she kissed like a virgin. She went to his head. And other parts. He licked his way across her breasts, breathing deep of her scent. “For ten thousand, I would expect you to kiss me.”
    Constance frowned. “But…”
    â€œHere,” Troy said, and laid her hand on his pantaloons, over his aching erection.
    Constance remembered the dolls, the curved ivory shafts. This man put them to shame. Bigger. And more solid. And hot, even through his clothing. And he wanted her to kiss him there! Oh, God, don’t think about it. She snatched a breath, then she snatched her hand away. “I am afraid that ten thousand is quite—quite insufficient for such a request.”
    He ached to have her stroke him. Just stroke him. Nothing more. Definitely nothing more. “Twenty,” Troy said, a veritable fortune and a final test, though whether of her resolve or his, he was less than sure.
    â€œThirty,” Constance said recklessly, thinking that surely now he would realize