But he wasn't done with her.
A hand captured hers, and he spun her back against him, breathing hard. Kincaid pressed her against the wall, and this time he held nothing back. The hard planes of his thighs melded against hers, until she found her own legs parting, just slightly, and then there was something else pressing against her quite intimately.
Something hard.
Something that hit her at exactly the right spot.
Ava caught his wrist, flinching as a shock of sensation ran through her. Her skirts were crushed between them, and her body at his mercy. It was overwhelming to know she had no control in this moment beyond her consent.
And thrilling in a peculiar, utterly breathtaking way.
"I'm not kind," Kincaid breathed in her ear. "And if you're still interested in having me relieve you of your virginity, then you need to know it won't be sweet, or intriguing, or satisfying to your sense of curiosity. That clever little mind of yours won't be taking down notes while we do this, kitten. It won't be an experiment."
She sucked in a sharp breath, but his hips thrust, and her eyes almost rolled back in her head as his erection pressed directly against that special spot again. "Oh."
"Look at the painting, Ava." A whisper. A demand.
She complied, her nipples aching, and her eyes taking in the flash of pale breasts, and the man with his face between the woman's thighs.
"Do you want that?" Kincaid demanded hoarsely, and this time he bit her sharply. "Do you want me to fuck you? To lick your sweet little cunt until you scream? To consume you? Because that is the offer on the table."
Yes. Her hands curled into fists in his collar. She didn't even need to say the word, he saw it in her eyes.
And his own darkened, stormy seas of pure desire that set her aflame. "God damn you, you've the worst sense of self-preservation."
"Do your worst, Mr. Kincaid." She couldn't resist daring him. "I'm not afraid of what you could do to me."
"No?"
"No." She licked his jaw tentatively, feeling as though her body wanted to burst its seams. Her skin felt too tight. "You were right. I had no true understanding of what I was asking. But now I do. And I want it. I want you."
I want pleasure, and abandon, and sensation. I want to feel like a woman, with a man who looks at her as though she steals his breath... even when that woman is just me.
She'd never be able to tell him what it felt like when he looked down at her as though she was the most beautiful woman in the world. Ava shivered, stroking his jaw.
The breath shuddered out of him. "You'll be the death of me."
Why is he trying so hard to warn me away from this course of action? From him?
A kiss stole her breath, and then her wits. Ava pressed herself against him, draping her arms around his heavily muscled shoulders. The hunger reared within her, and somehow she knew her eyes were black, and her vision darkened, even with them closed. It didn't matter. All her senses became more acute as she gave herself over to her primal nature, reveling in the firm hands that slid up and down her waist. His thumbs brushed her breasts, and Ava moaned into his mouth, arching her back shamelessly, begging him for more.
But he needed one last hint of permission from her. Kincaid drew back breathlessly. "You won't be in control here, Ava. I am. Do you want that? Will you submit to me?"
She didn't know what was happening to her. All she knew was she wanted more of it. "Yes."
Then her skirts were being dragged up out of the way in bunches. Kincaid pinned her wrists above her head with his mech hand, and she was strangely helpless, yet not in a way that roused the panic inside her. Their eyes met again.
"Spread your thighs," he told her.
His thumb brushed over the tops of her garters, and Ava flinched. She'd never been touched there before. Not by someone else. Heat spilled through her cheeks. Taking short, sharp breaths, she took a step to the side, parting her legs just enough.
"Wider." The look in his eyes dared her.
Her cheeks had to be crimson. Ava gasped in a short breath. Yes.... No.... It felt dangerously exposing. And she... wanted to do it. Slowly she let her legs fall apart.
"Wider," he whispered, brushing his mouth against her lips in the faintest of caresses.
Cool air brushed against her inner thighs. With her skirts bunched between them, she was more exposed than she'd ever been in her life. That thumb stroked across her garters, exploring her stockings slowly as he gauged the expression in her eyes.
Then his touch was drifting higher.