Master: An Erotic Novel of the Count of Monte Cristo (20 page)

“Everything has been quite perfect, madam,” Maximilien Morrel replied jovially. “Thank you for a delightful evening.”

Mercédès gave a brief nod. “I’m gratified to know that. And so, if you’ll excuse me, I must be off. I seem to have lost one of my gloves.”

The gentlemen bowed, but Monte Cristo was the only one to speak. “In the gardens, madam? I fear you will find them a bit . . . chilly this time of night. Perhaps you might wish to wait until daylight.” The warning in his voice was unmistakable, and she felt Georges hesitate.

Mercédès replied calmly, “In fact, I did find it quite drafty and unpleasant earlier this evening, but I’ve no fear that will happen in this instance. If you will excuse us . . .”

She turned and, with a subtle tug, directed Georges to walk with her, despite the fact that he appeared to be a bit disconcerted. Well, she would soon disabuse him of the notion that the Count of Monte Cristo had any control over her.

Once they were out of earshot of the others, Georges seemed to regain his confidence. In fact, they were close enough that the sounds from the party still filtered through the air so that Mercédès could identify the high-pitched laugh of Madam Villefort, and the answering guffaw of Baron Danglars. The remnants of light from the house reached this far, if only to give a faint illumination to the tops of the hyacinth bushes and boxwood, adding to the glow of the random lanterns hanging at knee height.

Georges led her into a small arbor that was covered by a wickedly thorny rosebush soon to be covered by a profusion of yellow flowers. Mercédès willingly went into his arms, her body already beginning to hum with anticipation and need, her aborted arousal quickly flowing back to life when his lips covered hers.

Arching her hips, skirts and all, into his, she closed her eyes and accepted the deep swipe of his tongue, feeling rather than hearing the soft grunt of his pleasured sigh. His arms tightened firmly around her, crushing her breasts against his solid chest as he delved more deeply, cradling her head with one hand. She matched his mouth with hers, smoothing her palms along the broad width of his shoulders—the other thing that had initially attracted her, those broad, strong shoulders—and closed her mind off to everything but the man holding her.

The gentle spiral began to unwind in her belly, slowly, and she kissed Georges with more passion, desperate for it to grow, so she could let it loose. In response, his hands moved, loosening their embrace and sliding around to find the swell of her breasts between them, cupping them through layers of clothing and boning. She arched toward him, wanting more, wanting the same pounding pleasure she’d had earlier that evening.

But the texture of his mouth, the taste, the way his hands moved over her breasts—too tentative, too worshipful, too slow and delicate—wasn’t enough.

It wasn’t enough.

The little rise of desire that had begun to rekindle in her belly faltered, even as she kissed Georges desperately. Even as his fingers gently moved down beneath her bodice, finding her half-mast nipples and stroking them, but the faint hum of pleasure merely turned into a buzz. Yes, her nipples hardened. Yes, the damp between her legs grew warmer, but it was not the same. Yes, her tongue slipped and slid around Georges’ hot mouth, and she felt the insistent ridge of his cock pressing into the bone above her sex, but it was nothing more than reflex.

No whirlwind, no breathlessness, no spicy spiral that made her knees weak and her head light.

At last, she pulled away, and Georges’ hand slipped out from her bodice. He reached for her again, the desperate avidity on his face evident even in the dim light, but Mercédès demurred, taking a small step backward.

“Mercédès,” he groaned, grasping her hands, and falling onto his knees in front of her. “Please,” he said, “let me taste you.” His hands were moving beneath her skirts; she felt them over her slippers, then up along her stockinged legs.

“Georges,” she said, feeling the welcome prickle of awareness along her thighs as his fingers came closer, “I . . . no, we cannot.” A faint shudder of want tingled between her legs as he continued moving up along them. Her skin trembled beneath his touch, smooth and tantalizing on the sensitive flesh, and her mouth dried as she realized her arousal was growing.

“Please, Mercédès, my love. I want only to pleasure you,” he said earnestly, the weight of her skirt and crinoline billowing up in an awkward pile of fabric over his arms. Only his face showed above the froth of lace and silk, shadowed by a nearby lantern. The sight of his full lips, moist from her kisses, and the pleading in his eyes caused her to waver. One of his fingers moved gently over the front of her sex, teasing the moist hair there, and sending more prickles of need scattering over her skin.

“Georges,” she began, but he’d read the acquiescence in her face, and gave her a little push. She sank onto the bench built into the inside of the arbor, leaning back against the wall. A little prick of thorns teased the back of her head and the tops of her shoulders, but it wasn’t sharp enough to bother her, for they grew on the other side of the trellis, and Mercédès had suddenly become much more invested in what was happening below.

He was between her legs now, his face hidden. A sudden eruption of fabric tossed up and onto her torso left her legs uncovered once again in the pleasant night air, and her view of the top of his head was obstructed.

But . . . her eyes sank closed as she felt the warmth of his fingers, the short, hot puffs of breath there on thighs bare above her stockings. Her pip swelled, suddenly pounding in anticipation, as full as it had been earlier at the hands of the Count of Monte Cristo. And when Georges pulled her thighs wider and put his face to her sex, she nearly came off the bench. She seized up and closed her eyes and thought about the hands and tongue of a tall, dark man . . . not a broad-shouldered, ginger-haired one.

One gentle stroke of a tongue over her engorged and sensitive tickler, and she was shuddering and undulating there, the orgasm short and sharp . . . and empty.

A reflex. A simple release.

And one she already regretted.

In the early hours of the morning, Haydée slipped from her chamber and padded along the carpeted hall.

At last, the household was asleep, and, she hoped, so was her prey. It had been a difficult night after their master returned from his dinner engagement, with Haydée and his manservant, Bertucci, bearing the brunt of it.

Haydée counted three doors from His Excellency’s apartments, and at the fourth one, she paused, took a deep breath, and silently turned the knob.

Inside the small room, there was little but a set of drawers and a narrow bed placed along the darkest wall, far from the two windows. The rug beneath her feet, however, was just as lush as that in her own apartments. As she closed the door behind her, she realized that the bed was flat. Even though there was no light in the chamber, a starry sky that was beginning to pale in the East revealed that there was, indeed, no sign of a slumbering giant.

Confounded, she stopped and was just about to turn back when she saw him.

The pale light streamed through the window, coloring everything near it pale blue-gray, and shone on Ali. He was on the floor, surrounded and supported by numerous pillows and cushions piled in the corner.

She walked toward him, silent as air, and knelt. His breathing was deep and even, and she felt a wave of prickling anticipation sweep over her. A smile curled her lips, and she felt her eyes crinkle at the corners and her mouth go dry.

She had him now.

But first . . . she bent near and inhaled, her hands pressing into the cashmere blanket that draped over him. Her eyes closed and she breathed in his smell: unidentifiable, but strong and bold, spiced liked mint and tinged with the musk of patchouli.

Moving back onto her haunches, she pulled off her silk caftan—the only article of clothing she was wearing—careful not to disturb the air or brush it against his skin. She suspected Ali, trusted servant and bodyguard of His Excellency, slept with one ear and one eye always alert.

She also suspected that he slept in the nude, and it was with delight that she determined this was indeed the case when she carefully lifted the single blanket on the side closest to the window. The cool blue light clearly showed smooth, gleaming ebony skin that made her mouth water and her stomach flip in anticipation.

Haydée expected him to awaken at any time now, but since he was mute, she had no fear he would shout and raise an alarm. Again, she smiled, a devilish curl to her lips as she slid her naked body onto the plump cushion next to him.

He was warm and solid, and she felt the moment he awakened and became aware of her presence. Ali went rigid— everywhere, she noted with satisfaction—and, with a low, guttural grunt, immediately tried to push her away. But by then, she was already sliding her slender body over his, straddling him with wide legs as he rolled from a side position onto his back in an effort to move away.

Slim and delicate she might be, and no match for his incredible strength, but Haydée was determined. She cupped his big shoulders with her hands and sinuously moved her body up and down along the length of his torso as she kissed in the folds of his musky, moist neck. Ali trembled beneath her, his chest rising and falling beneath her breasts, his cock—as gloriously huge as she’d anticipated—prodding in the gap between her thighs.

His hands came down onto her back, gripping her hips as though to remove Haydée from her position . . . but when he tried to lift her away, she clung tighter and rolled her hips. She felt his grip change, then, from pulling her up, to a brief caress, as though he couldn’t stop himself. No sooner did he touch her than his hands jerked away as though burned.

She smiled against his throat, tasting salt and dark, hot skin . . . feeling the rampant surge of blood coursing through the veins there, the tension in the long tendon at his neck, and the low rumbling deep in his chest. He didn’t touch her again; she could tell that his hands sort of hung helplessly above her body, as if afraid to reach for her for fear of what they would do.

“I want to be with you, Ali,” she murmured, lifting her face above his. The light was filtering in more strongly from the window, and she could better see his expression: set and still as marble, lips pursed tightly and chin raised as he half turned away. “And it’s obvious that you want me.”

He angled his face as far as he could, his eyes closing, his mouth tighter, and shook his head slightly.
No
.

Though he didn’t speak, she could feel the negation—the false, desperate negation—in his body language.

“Yes, Ali,” she murmured, and she began to slide down his body, lifting her hips in the air and inching her breasts, shoulders, and face along his sternum to the rippled belly below. He was hot and sharp-planed and hard—a quivering mass of rock-firm muscle, salty and faintly moist, tense and dark.

He bunched up beneath her as she drew closer to the massive cock she crushed into his belly with the weight of her torso, and she smiled again and paused to look at him, enjoying the feel of his erection hot and firm beneath her.

Seeming to gather himself up, he made quick, jerky motions with his hands.
No. You belong to him.

Haydée sat back on his hips, settling onto the tops of his thighs. The head of his cock poked out from where it was trapped beneath her bare sex, and she gave a smooth little move, sliding gently over it in the smallest of motions. The soft sound of wet suction, of bodies shifting against each other, sent a stronger thrill of desire zinging to her swollen pip. Ali’s throat convulsed and he closed his eyes again.

Haydée, you belong to my master
.

“He doesn’t want me that way, Ali,” she said in a low voice, serene in her control.

She shook her head and said, “Look at me, Ali.”

He reluctantly opened his eyes, but she couldn’t read what was there. Her only clues were the way he held his body so rigid it must be ready to shatter, and the irregular hitch of his chest every few breaths.

I will not take what is not mine.
His signing was sharp and angry, his large hands whipping through the air, smacking and snapping together with vehemence.
I may be a slave, but I have honor.

“Yes, I was with him tonight.”

“Yes, he did. And I went to him willingly, just as I have in the past. He asked me to run a bath for him, and he ordered me to remove my clothing.”

Ali stared at her, his eyes unblinking, his smooth, hairless head shining in the slowly growing light. He licked his thick lips, and another wave of lust coursed down from her belly to her sex. She shifted, and he caught his breath.

She lifted her hands and cupped her breasts, and his lips parted. He breathed heavily.

Perhaps this was a better approach. “I stripped in front of him and waited for his next instruction,” she said, keeping her voice low and hypnotic. “Then, as I watched, he seemed to dissolve from the cool, correct man we all know to . . . someone else. It was as if he’d released his control, and allowed his real emotions to come through. His hands began to tremble and the expression on his face became stark and cold. Furious.” In contrast to her serious words, she plucked at one of her nipples, then began to toy with it. It grew harder, the skin around it wrinkling tightly.

“He was murmuring things I couldn’t understand, as I stood there, naked, and the bath streamed into the tub behind us.”

Ali was staring at her breasts, watching her play with them. She licked a thumb and forefinger, and then brought them to her nipple, sliding them around. His cock gave a little surge beneath her, and she shifted in response. Ali groaned and closed his eyes again. His huge hands had fallen to the pile of cushions above his head, palms up, fingers curled helplessly. The golden bands at his wrists gleamed in the dark.