A Certain Latitude Read Online Free Page B

swoop.
    She lost her balance, laughed and fell against him, and they tumbled down against the hen coop, she with her legs splayed on either side of his.
    He assessed the situation quickly. It was dark, although a nearby lantern threw enough light so he could see what he was doing. The helmsman was at the far end of the ship, facing the other way, and they were out of sight. If he could keep her quiet, and if a swarm of sailors didn’t rush onto the deck to do something with the sails—he should probably pray the wind kept steady—then he suspected the not-so-proper Miss Onslowe would let him do just about anything he wanted.
     
    Thank God. I would never have worked out how to seduce him .
    The suddenness of his response alarmed and delighted her. He was under her skirts almost as soon as she landed—as she bumped against his erection, one hand gripped her bottom and the other snaked its way up the inside of her thigh, warm and rough and foreign.
    “Miss Onslowe, Clarissa, you’re a miracle,” he said, his fingers probing. If he hadn’t been so enthusiastic about the wetness he encountered, she would have been horribly embarrassed by her condition. “I wanted to do this to you as soon as I saw you. I wish to God I had more hands.”
    “So do I,” she said with a silly giggle she regretted. Didn’t men hate gigglers?
    “Unbutton me. Show me your breasts. Take this damned scarf off.” His voice became muffled as he pushed the lawn scarf at her bodice aside with his lips and kissed her collarbone, wet and hot.
    “Now I need more hands,” she said, honestly confused as to which he wanted her to do first.
    “Be quiet, woman. Enough talking.” He reared up against her, the hand on her bottom leaving to grasp the back of her head and pull her head to him, kissing and kissing, his tongue doing things to hers as extraordinary and shocking as his fingers below—good God, what was he about, two fingers, three inside her, and his thumb, oh God his thumb, there, there, don’t stop, keep doing that, please, please.
    He stopped, his mouth wet and puffy, eyes bright. “Christ, you have a big tickler.”
    “A big what ?”
    “Your clitoris. It’s big. Hard. Shows you’re a lecherous woman. Insatiable. You like this, don’t you?”
    “I—”
    “Look,” he murmured, and tipped her back into the circle of one arm, pulling her skirts back with the other. He parted the folds of her quim. “Look, like coral. Hard as coral, too. Like a little cock. Pretty.”
    Sure enough, there was enough light for her to see her clitoris erect and glistening between his thumb and forefinger. Her tickler. She’d never heard it called that before. But then, how often did she have conversations about her womanly parts?
    He stroked her and laughed as she quivered. “You know why it’s so big, don’t you, Clarissa?”
    “I’m sure you’re going to say something obscene.”
    He put his mouth to her ear and licked, a lascivious slurp. “Playing with yourself, my love.”
    “I don’t—” she said as her face heated.
    “Liar,” he said with extreme cheerfulness.  “I’ll show you something else big now.”
    His hand dropped to the fall of his breeches and she tried not to show too much interest, but in reality she was intensely curious. Her only experience with an erect male member had been unsatisfactory: a glimpse of a white shirt distended by what lay underneath and then something surprisingly large and springy bumping against her in the dark. The ensuing tight shove and squeeze was surprising and disappointing at the same time, because the rest of it, the kissing and stroking, she’d very much enjoyed.
    Oh, heavens. She regarded the blatant, dark red rearing thing with trepidation. Like the rest of him, it was broad and thick, powerful, rising blue-veined from a mass of tight black curls, a drop of liquid welling at the tip. She ran her tongue over her lips. “And how did that get to be so big? You must have been playing