My Lord (The Rothvale Legacy Book 2) Page 3
"Well, that is…really surprising to hear, Ivan."
"I know, but there hasn't been anyone I've wanted to invite here before I found you," he said clearly, his green eyes twinkling at me. "I'd love for you to feel at home here and to stay for as long as you wish."
"You realize this is a lot more than just a weekend to get a leg over, as was suggested when you kidnapped me from the wedding.”
"I know. And I thank you for being such an accommodating captive. You get an A+ for attitude and pluck, Miss Hargreave. But I'd hoped you were feeling much the same as me—this has become a lot more than just a shag weekend." He kissed me again because it's just what Ivan did whenever we talked. He kissed his way through our conversations. "Certainly been a lot more than that for me. Although, I should probably tell you you've been the very best leg over I can ever recall, Miss Hargreave."
"Why thank you for the compliment, Mr. Everley." I liked hearing those words from him, I must admit. It was always wonderful to hear you were needed by another person. With Ivan I'd already heard it from him many times. And didn't that just make him all the harder to resist?
“Would you like a tour?” he asked in that way of his making it extremely difficult for anyone to say no. Charm came easily to Ivan and I could see how he used it to his advantage. I had to watch and learn if I had any hope of coming out of this experience in one piece.
“Of your art collection? Yes, of course.” I was assuming this was what he was referring to, considering we’d done nothing even remotely art related since he’d brought me here under the guise of evaluating his paintings. Hah! I’d done some evaluating all right, but it had nothing to do with art. The art of sex maybe. If his painting collection stacked up against his skills in the bedroom, then I was going to have a hard time resisting coming back to Donadea. Who was I kidding? I’d never be able to resist returning when I knew how badly he wanted me here, plus the promise of uncovering art treasures hidden away since God only knew, if the small sample of what I’d glimpsed from moving room to room around his house was anything to go on then I was in for the motherlode. I had a strong feeling his collection was going to be newsworthy for the art world.
“I thought I’d take you outside first if you don’t mind.” He smiled and gave me a peck on the lips before sitting up on the side of the bed. His body was a thing of male beauty to ponder as he sat looking down at me. His sculpted back curved in my direction while his hips faced away and out of sight. Now he’s being modest? Ivan’s physique was on the larger side, but his muscles were lean rather than bulky. Beautiful. I resisted the urge to reach out and touch him. Anywhere would do—arm, thigh, shoulder, ass—all were good places to start if you asked me.
“I’d like that actually, and Mr. Finnegan said he had my clothes from last time, so I don’t have to wear my dress from the wedding,” I told him while pulling the sheet in from the side to cover my nakedness. I suddenly felt extremely vulnerable lying exposed and bare in his bed.
He stilled my hand to prevent me. “No, lovely thing, don’t ever hide yourself from me when we are behind the door.” His hand moved to a breast and clutched it before finding the nipple and giving it a tight pinch. The sharp sting forced a soft pleasurable moan from between my lips. “And that is exactly the reason right there. The sexy sound you gave me just now? I want to enjoy you and hear more of those sounds coming out of your mouth when I touch you.” He smiled down at me, just one side of his mouth curling up. “And look at your beautiful body with my eyes. And to have you give to me your complete trust. I won’t ever do anything you don’t want me to do.” His eyes flicked up and down the length of my body with purpose and appreciation. “All I can see is an incredibly beautiful creature who, I think,” he paused with emphasis, “understands what I’d like from her.”
Wow. He had no trouble expressing his desires. In a way, his directness relieved me. It was honest. The only way I could operate anymore. He’d said he wanted me submissive when we fuck. The “when we fuck” was key to his request. It was also the only time I would consider such a thing. Yeah, I’d learned that lesson the hard way.
“I understand, Ivan,” I said, realizing he needed a gesture of consent from me. “I know what you're asking of me.”
“And?” His expression didn’t change beyond the raising of an eyebrow and a slight tilt of his head.
“I think I need a little time to consider it,” I said softly, steadying myself to tell him the rest, “because it's been a long time for me to be in this kind of…relationship with someone. I—I don't know if I can—or if I want—to do it again."
My words just seemed to make him more determined to convince me. I could see the wheels turning inside his pretty head as he switched on the persuasive charm and blasted me with it. "I'm sensing a dominant partner hurt you in the past, and did terrible damage to your trust, confidence and most of all your self-worth. It ended badly, and while it's not my place to ask you to share any part of that story with me, you can if you ever want to. I'd love to know the name of the fucking shit so I can make his life a sodding misery for daring to harm a hair on your lovely head," he told me while touching a finger to my hair and tracing it firmly, and I might even say, possessively around my ear.
A smile threatened to break through at the thought of my lord Ivan protecting my honor by challenging Kent to a duel or something. He was now rubbing circles below my ear right against my neck, distracting me further. A deliciously sensual spot he'd discovered on my body. Ivan already knew where he should be touching me. How was this possible?
I was beyond understanding how it all would work. I didn't even want to try to figure it out. Ivan didn't seem to be worried a bit. He had enough confidence for the both of us. So, I let him plead his case. I leaned into his caress and allowed him to continue with his closing arguments most convincingly.
"I do know it's not good for you to deny yourself something you need, though. It also doesn't work that way. You cannot deny physical needs. You need the submission as much as I need the domination. And you're going to seek it out with someone at some point, and I believe that someone should be me, of course." He pressed his lips to the spot he'd been caressing with his thumb. "I'll take care of you here. We have a pretty damn perfect sexual connection already even without the kink, you know?" He stroked a single finger down from my lips, over my chin, down my neck, and then kept going determinedly until he reached a breast, stopping at my nipple. He circled the tip of his finger over my sensitive flesh, teasing it to attention with the added pinch between his thumb and forefinger. I couldn't help the intense jolt of pure pleasure that grabbed me any more than I could prevent the little moan that escaped my mouth. I could only observe the response of my body to his touch as my nipple budded up hard and tight under his fingers. "Am I right?"
"Yes." At least I wasn't lying to him. I could wholeheartedly agree that the sex was addictive even without kink. It was so good. So good.
"And Donadea is private and safe and don't forget the bonus of the art gig. You're going to be paid very well for a large job which could take an awfully long time to complete. It's the perfect arrangement in so many ways."
"But the university will be credited with the evaluation, not me. I won't be paid personally. My salary is from—I work for U of L—"
"Yes, you will be fucking paid, Gabrielle. My contract will be with you alone. I no longer have a contract with the university as of the morning after you left here the last time. Paul Langley called me out, chastised my stupid arse for sexual harassment of his student, and then dropped me as a donor to the university."
Whoa. I had no idea about Paul dropping Ivan. He'd mentioned before that Ivan was a big donor, so it must have hurt the budget a lot to cut him loose. I felt a twinge of guilt for turning him in to Paul, but he did proposition me and accuse me of being a sex worker. I truly believed he was mentally unstable. God, that situation with us the first time I came to Donadea was a complete clusterfuck of misunderstanding from start
to finish.
"So… the art evaluation is a private contract between you and me?"
"It will be. I'll have the original redrawn and you can look it over tonight before you sign."
"Don't forget I'm still a student in a graduate program. Any new works I bring in will still have to be certified by an official body like the university to be taken seriously in the fine art world. Nobody will accept the observations of a mere grad student. If I'm all on my own here, it won't be a sanctioned evaluation until you bring in someone official. Don't you want this to be an official cataloguing of the Donadea collection, Ivan?"
"When you put it like that," he said thoughtfully, stroking his stubbled chin in a way that made me insanely jealous of his hand, "I'm only more determined that it just be you, Gabrielle." He gave me a devious little wink, making me note his successful fake-out. "The fact that you're so passionate about protecting the provenance of the Donadea collection before you've even had any kind of look at it, and willing to forgo payment even, just further convinces me that you're the only person I want for this job. Can I make myself any clearer on the matter?"
"Wow, that's a lot of confidence in someone you don't even know beyond a friendship with your cousin's new bride."
"Not really. Paul Langley sent you here in the first place. He said you were uniquely suited for this job in fact. He chose you. We may not be on the best of terms at the moment, but I trust department chair, Paul Langley, as the go-to-guy for knowing who to entrust with a valuable collection of bloody fucking art."
Stifling the urge to laugh was impossible. It slipped out of me. He made me smile and laugh with the stiff-upper-lipped, civilized British sarcasm he used so liberally in his speech. Even more when arguing a point—which, I might add, he did often. It seemed that Ivan had no problem at all offering up plenty of arguments for why his way was the right and correct decision. Must be the politician in him. My lord indeed. A lord in life and in personality really existed on the earth. Somehow, I'd found a unicorn. Or…the unicorn had somehow found me.
Just listening to Ivan talk was enjoyable to me for some reason. That voice of his… A mercurial beast in a Brunello Cucinelli suit. A sophisticated savage. A Greek god—my Eros asking for permission to worship at my temple. When he spoke, the words that came out of his mouth were something just so very beautiful—
Words saying, I was sexy and gorgeous. Words commanding me to take him inside me and submit to his desires. Words so very filthy, but also perfectly placed in divine moments of deliciously dirty fucking. Words kissed over my body and caressed into my skin reverently. Words laughed back at me for something witty I'd said. Words of compliment, but also of the most brutal honesty.
"The little laugh you just gave me tells me all I need to know, Miss Hargreave. Thank you for that. Because now I know you're going to sign that contract, and then we can negotiate the rest. I will require a non-disclosure for privacy reasons. Which will cover the collection's contents as well as your relationship with me, and also extend to any time you're here in residence at the estate. You can't discuss any of it with anybody. The non-disclosure takes precedence over the contract for the art evaluation, I'm afraid. I hope you won't have problem with that." He stared down at me, probably trying to read my reaction to his requirement of a non-disclosure agreement for being here at Donadea, regardless of what I was doing. Evaluating his art collection or working off the sexual tension surrounding us like a brewing storm cloud which never quite blew clear through. I'd be doing both if I accepted and signed. Yes, maintaining his privacy here at this lovely aristocratic oasis perched among the wildness of the North Irish coast was indeed extremely important to Ivan Everley. Even I could deduce that significant fact at this juncture just from our limited encounters with each other up till now. God, the night I showed up here in the rain and surprised him… He was so enraged at his privacy being breached, mistaken identity or not. It was a trigger for him. One I'd have to remember.
But it was important for me to make one more thing clear to him before he started asking for signatures on contracts. He needed to know. “Ivan, as long as you understand that the submission happens behind the door for me. It won’t ever cross over into the rest of my life, or my work. During sex is the only time I feel the desire—when I feel like giving up control to another person. The only time.”
I watched Ivan’s eyes flare before going dark and predatory. He leaned down further and boxed me in, his hands planted firmly on the bed, even with my shoulders like a panther about to spring. A gorgeous wild panther I wanted to pet and lick and have purring against my leg. I could feel the body heat radiating off him and smell the sex in the air from what we’d been doing for the last hour. And in spite of all the orgasms he’d already given to me in that time, I could still be aroused by him, as evidenced by the delicious shiver that rolled through me from him devouring me with his gorgeous green eyes. His effect upon me sexually was immense, and I was certain he knew it.
His harsh expression softened. “Perfect answer, kitten. Now I think I’ll have a shower and dress myself before I consider what else I might like to do with you behind the door. I really would like you to see more of my home than just this bedroom.” He gave me a final thorough kiss to my lips, and also a lick and a suck to each of my breasts, murmuring, “Such spectacular tits,” before pulling away and boasting a pleased grin on his handsome face.
I suppose my admission of being submissive only “when we fuck” had made his day.
He was still grinning smugly when he sauntered into the bathroom after that snazzy little speech, his tight bare ass looking mighty fine from my view as I tilted my head to admire. What a gorgeous man he was, and amazingly he didn’t act like most guys who knew they were hot and tried to pull off being artificially humble. Ivan just behaved like a man who was completely comfortable in his own skin. A confident and easy man. Must be nice, I thought—with a bit of envy thrown in—to feel so confident.
As I got up from his bed and drew on the cerulean blue silk smoking-jacket he’d gifted to me, I decided I wouldn’t tell him his habit of calling me “kitten” had a very nice effect on me.
Mr. “my lord” Everley would just have to work for the right to that knowledge.
Chapter 3
GABRIELLE
Ivan left me in privacy to shower and dress, asking me to meet him in front of the pool house when I was ready. I thought it was considerate of him to give me some alone time, because I was feeling more than a little self-conscious after all the sex. Not shy so much, but rather more of an awareness of what we’d been doing a lot of since last night. It had been a long time for me, and I had the delicious aches and soreness to prove it.
After a luxurious shower taken in the equally luxurious and recently remodeled marble bathroom, I remembered to give thanks about being so careless as to leave my muddy clothes behind when I was here before. That and Mr. Finnegan’s laundering skills had me dressed in the same jeans and emerald green shirt I’d worn the night Ivan found me lost on the road, just sans the mud. Underwear and socks included. He’d even polished up my leather ankle boots and laid out a new toothbrush for me. I really needed to find out what Mr. Finnegan’s guilty pleasures were so I could buy him a thank you gift. He was the kindest man.
I realized as I checked myself in the mirror that Ivan was going to get a dose of me au naturel today. No makeup, and damp hair that had been combed out and French braided into one braid on the side. I found a hair band in the pocket of my jeans, miraculously still in there after laundering. There wasn’t a thing I could do about it, though, and I decided if he didn’t like me this way, then it was going to be his problem. He’d seen me a mess already anyway after our swim and he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, Ivan went out of his way to tell me I was beautiful. I switched off the light in the bathroom and set out to find him, thinking it was really nice to be told you were beautiful. I wanted to believe it. So badly, I wanted to believe it. My problem wasn’t the beauty on the o
utside though. I could deal with that. It was the inside part of me I doubted. I'd been very selfish and sinful once, and for that I still must atone.
I retraced my way from what I remembered this morning when we went to the pool house for our swim. As I made my way down, I allowed myself to really take in the art displayed everywhere around me. The walls were covered and so was the grand staircase. In the daylight I could see the beauty in the paint, and it made me giddy. My throat got tight and I had to forcibly keep my excitement under control because there was so much. I knew I could get lost in these works, and it had nothing to do with the, oh-so-charming and sexy owner. He helped of course, but Ivan’s art collection could hold its own no problem whatsoever.
My eyes found a painting on the stairwell with a subject I recognized immediately. It was a slightly different version of my favorite Mallerton on display in The National Gallery. What we call a simulacrum in the art trade. The young bride on the white horse—Mrs. Gravelle. Same beautiful girl with long dark hair in her wedding finery riding a magnificent white stallion decked out for the occasion. Only in this version, the pose was altered somewhat for the horse and rider. I stared in awe. Holy shit, I was looking at another Mallerton which wasn’t even in the archives. I found his signature and leaned closer to scrutinize the structure of the letters without the benefit of my glasses. It absolutely presented as authentic from first glance. The painting was in need of general cleaning, but otherwise perfectly gorgeous decorating the grand stairwell of Donadea. I wanted so badly to take it with me back to London for further examination. It would be a dream job to bring this version of Mrs. Gravelle back to her original glory. And this was just one single painting of many, many more just waiting for some attention. I was still reeling from the discovery of the Mallerton at Hallborough this weekend at the wedding. The family portrait of Sir Jeremy and Lady Georgina Greymont with their children. That made two uncatalogued works of Mallerton's discovered in as many days. Crazy. I might need to bring in someone to help me, or at least ask Ben to come and take initial inventory photos—