Since the Duc de Vec hadn't tripled the thousand-year-old de Vec fortune on imprudence and degage disregard for practicalities, when the first drenching rush of sensation diminished marginally, he found himself swiftly glancing at the small jeweled bedside clock.
Damn, his valet Louis's timing could have been better.
And his business manager Legere's nerve could stand some bolstering.
The action on the Bourse wouldn't peak for perhaps another ten or fifteen minutes, experience and a gambler's instinct affirmed, allowing him a few moments more to indulge his heated libido. Luckily so, for his attention was riveted by the impassioned woman clinging to him with such feverish strength.
Isme's silken thighs were slick with sweat, favoring a vel-vety ease of penetration, and he felt the small silver rin-no-tama bell in her vagina again as his downstroke sank in deeply, her small suffocated scream one of pleasure, her arousal so intense, her pale flesh was suffused rosy pink. She'd taken instantly to the Japanese equivalent of "Burmese bells" when he'd introduced her to the uniquely erotic sensation some months ago and he smiled as she breathed in sighing ecstasy, "Oh God…"
Not exactly, he facetiously thought, but he too was nearing a carnal state of deliverance and this time—the clock and Louis's rapping signal reminding him of responsibilities—better be his final climax of the morning.
Feeling Isme's first tiny convulsions along the sensitive pulsing of his engorged veins, he met the orgasmic Comtesse Guimond with his own carnal paroxysm, pouring into the hot moist interior of the voluptuous woman, arching his back against the explosive delirium of pleasure. The dark bronze of his muscular body was sheened in perspiration, his hair damp on his temples and neck, his powerful chest rising and falling, trying to restore air to his lungs.
Isme's breathing echoed his own and they lay in warm proximity, overcome and quenched and breathless. When she lifted her pink lips to him some moments later, normalcy having returned to their pulsebeats, he kissed her in obliging gratitude. "Thank you for riding with me this morning," he murmured, his breath warm against the softness of her mouth. Raising his head, he smiled down at her, the stark beauty of his face framed in the dark silk of his hair, his grin as provocatively scandalous as his reputation.
"I wouldn't rise that early for anyone else…" Isme breathed, sated and purring, her heavily lashed lavender eyes half lidded in languorous contentment. "… or go to the trouble of dressing at dawn."
"And then undressing," the Duc softly declared, his smile wolfish. "I'm indebted then to your… exceptional interest." His voice was a teasing murmur, and while he genuinely appreciated her unusual effort, unfortunately, he concluded with an inward pragmatic sigh, the Bourse wouldn't wait any longer. Much as he enjoyed the Comtesse's hot-blooded passion, with his railroad stocks in imminent jeopardy, he had to be out of bed, dressed, and tending to business in under five minutes.
Propping his weight on one elbow, he swept his hair behind his ears in a swift practiced gesture while his gaze shifted to the bedside clock once more. Would Bouchart call? His dark winged brows formed into a mild frown.
"Am I keeping you?" Isme's lovely eyes narrowed slightly. Paris's current reigning beauty was only familiar with adoration.
"I'm afraid I'm late for the office. Legere is about to have an apoplexy over the trading frenzy on the Bourse." The Duc de Vec smiled again, the flash of his teeth startling white in the dark tan of his face. Withdrawing from the warmth of her body, he kissed her on the rosy sheen of her cheek. "I'm sorry, darling… Louis is going to be knocking again in just a moment." Half sitting up, he leaned back on his elbows, his firm, toned torso muscles rigidly defined in his casual reclining posture, a sense of restlessness minutely evident, his vivid green eyes shuttered against the legitimate haste impelling him.
"Tell him to go away. I want you to make love to me again… in the way I like best… the Phoenix sporting in the… Sin…"
"Cinnabar Cleft," he helpfully added.
"That way."
Etienne had become an expert of sorts on the Taoist classics dealing with the art of the bedchamber while on an anthropological expedition in Asia years ago, and Isme had been enchanted with his repertoire—as had a good number of other women in his past.
"I dreamt of you last night," she went on, "and of our outing on your sailboat last week. I couldn't sleep thinking of the enormous size of your…" Looking down at his erection, still remarkably roused despite the past hours they'd played at love, her gaze came up to meet his. She smiled, an anticipatory smile, tempting as Eve, undaunted by his commitments. "You must stay," she softly insisted with pampered self-indulgent purpose. "Louis will wait, Legere certainly can wait." A business manager was substantially less important in the hierarchy of staff. One's comfort depended on one's personal servant, after all. But they all could wait.
Isme was very lush, Etienne thought, a magnificent golden blonde bounty of female seduction. Unfortunately, she was also spoiled in that arrested adolescent way of most aristocratic females he knew who thought only of themselves… raised in a society that expected them to be merely ornaments and pleasure objects. And she was, indeed. Very lush. Very ornamental. Extremely pleasurable.
"I wish I could," he quietly replied. And if Germain Frères hadn't started buying up stock yesterday, artificially raising the price of new issues of southern railway bonds, he would have gladly indulged her and himself in the bargain. But Germain Frères would be disposing of their purchases very soon. He intended to sell at that precise peak moment before… realizing enough profit, if all went well, to buy controlling interest
