Disrobed and Dishonored Read Online Free Page B

rescued.’
    ‘I am so sorry. I can understand why you are angry,’ she murmured.
    ‘I am hardly angry about that. My friends dismissed it as a drunken, amorous romp—they just want to meet the lady involved, whom they think must be a most inventive playmate. No, what angers me is the fact that you saw fit to pay me for my services last night.’ He gestured abruptly toward the pearls.
    ‘I didn’t! At least, they seemed like something useful to help tie you and then I thought, you have a living to make…’ Her voice trailed away.
    ‘Not as a male whore,’ he said harshly.
    ‘Oh no, never that,’ she whispered. ‘You did me a favor. I had no thought of payment, just a gift.’ He was right, it had been insensitive, insulting. She straightened her spine. ‘I apologize. I have no idea how I can make amends. I just wish I could.’
    She saw his eyes close and the harsh line of his mouth relax into a rueful smile. ‘I am a stiff-rumped idiot to take offense. It was a miracle you were thinking straight at all, and as you say, you thought I had a living to earn.’
    ‘You haven’t?’
    Jonathan smiled, silent.
    ‘Who are you?’ He shook his head.
    ‘That is unfair,’ Sarah protested. ‘You know my name now.’
    He grinned. ‘All part of your punishment for the offense to my pride.’ The smile was positively wicked now. Something inside her tightened in fearful excitement.
    ‘Part?’
    He withdrew his hand from his pocket and there was the silk stocking, dangling from one long finger.
    She edged toward the bed. ‘You…you want to tie me up?’ Her voice rose to a squeak as the excitement turned hot and lodged low, sending shocks of anticipation into the secret places that were becoming damp even as he watched her so intently. ‘And make love to me? Here?’
    ‘Mmm. If you would like me to.’ Jonathan seemed so cool, but she could see the pulse hammering in his throat where his shirt lay open and his lips were parted, so very temptingly.
    It was madness. They would have to be so quiet— could she be quiet if he touched her as he had before? Could she trust him to untie her again? But the excitement was building, coiling, making her feel different—dangerous, reckless. Jonathan had awakened something inside her that she could hardly recognize.
    ‘Only if you promise to untie me before you leave,’ she said, trying to match his teasing tone.
    ‘I promise.’ And the look in his eyes was no longer teasing, no longer hot. For a moment she saw tenderness and melted. He locked the door, then moved suddenly, like a cat, to spin her into his arms. The robe was off her shoulders, the nightgown sliding toward the floor, even as his mouth crushed down on hers and his arms lifted her, tossing her onto the bed, gasping with laughter and a delicious, fearful anticipation. ‘I need another stocking.’
    ‘Top drawer of the dresser.’ She watched him tear his own clothes off as he walked across the room, his very urgency arousing her. He was so beautiful, she thought, feasting her eyes on taut buttocks and the elegant dip of his spine at the waist, the length of his legs and the definition of the muscles. Last night she had been too apprehensive to really look at him. Even his feet, with their long tendons and the flexible toes curling into the Chinese rug, were beautiful.
    He came back, stocking in hand, and stood contemplating the bed head. He was already aroused, she saw with gathering excitement, as he tied one stocking to each of the top corner posts, then looped the free ends around her wrists so that she was lying back against the pillows, her arms outstretched. ‘Comfortable?’
    ‘Yes,’ she admitted, wary.
    ‘I will not take any notice of demands to stop or cries of No! If you want me to free you, say Release me, and I will, at once.’
    ‘Promise?’
    ‘Promise.’ Jonathan strolled round to the foot of the bed and took her right foot in his hand, lifting it to his mouth. ‘Are you