“Watch.” Exeter rasped a whisper, nibbling the lobe of her ear.

A tingle ran down the length of her neck—she felt entirely decadent, but unable to resist peeking through the small opening. A faint glow filled the adjacent chamber, but there could be no doubt who was perched on the edge of a table. The silver feathered demi mask did little to disguise her identity. Mia recognized the Contessa Castiglione with her skirts hiked up to her hips. And that must be Etienne Artois’s hand between her legs.

She gasped and Exeter covered her lips with his finger. “Might have known we’d run into them here.” He opened a few buttons and pulled the neckline of her dress over her shoulders, effectively pinning her arms to her sides. She felt immobilized, vulnerable—her breasts were completely exposed. Exeter took a small mound in each hand, and they both watched quietly as Etienne dropped his head over the Contessa’s bared bosom.

At the instant Etienne sucked the Contessa’s breast, Exeter plucked Mia’s nipples. She thought she might explode from the intensity of such pleasurable sensation. “Do that again.” She leaned back against his chest, and he plucked her nipples until she became weak-kneed.

Gathering the back of her gown, he methodically folded the ruffles of her skirt. “Remember to watch, Mia.” Slowly, purposefully, he untied her bustle and placed the contraption on a side table. His hands wrapped around her waist and untied lacy French drawers. He edged them over her hips, and they slipped to the floor.

“Step out of the pantalettes and spread your legs.” A soft-spoken demand, but a demand, nonetheless. Mia’s heart pounded blood to her nipples and clitoris. She wanted him to touch her there . . . and there. A cool draft of air wafted up the inside of her thighs as she waited for his caress.

Finally she gasped, “Touch me.”

“How impatient my little voyeur is.” Soft-spoken words—more of a tease than a reprimand, still he covered both breasts and rolled her nipples until she moaned.

His fingers slid up the inside of both thighs, and she trembled as he reached the apex of her pleasure. “Oh, Exeter—please.” Her whole body throbbed for him—and the cat urged her on. Skillful fingers entered moist folds, slick and smooth, he stroked back and forth lightly. He uttered a deep, husky groan and nuzzled the hair behind her ear. “You’re so very wet, love.”

He moved to her side and placed a finger on her clitoris, while his other hand stroked between her legs from the rear. He used his mouth to caress the length of her neck, and his erection rubbed against her side. She answered him by rocking her hip gently back and forth against his straining penis. They were both in a reverie of sensation. “Just as we are enjoying the Contessa and her homme de fille, we are likely being watched by others.”

Mia stiffened slightly. “You are beautiful; let me arouse you.” As if to prove the statement he turned her enough to suckle a nipple, and her pleasure soared to a new heights.

His finger circled her clitoris, while his other hand went deeper—swirling one, then two fingers inside her. He scissored enough to find the spots that made her gasp and moan.

Mia’s eyes grew wider still, as she watched Etienne through the opening. He walked around the table and presented himself to the mouth of the Contessa. Mia eyed the handsome penis that sprung from his trousers. She managed to tear her eyes away and turn to Exeter. “Unbutton me.”

Exeter hesitated at first. When she raised a brow, he removed the top of her gown. He took a moment to admire her bare torso. A thrilling kind of excitement quivered through her body. She would bare herself, presumably, for all the world according to the Contessa Castiglione. She moved to unbutton Exeter’s trousers and liberate the man’s impressive shaft.

Now that she had something to compare it to, she thought his penis handsome—and nicely large in scale. In her brief visit to the Contessa’s den of iniquity, she had been exposed to more male appendages than she had ever seen in her life, with the exception of Exeter’s medical books and pornography collection.

He teased her by removing his hands from between her legs. “Untie me.”

“I believe it is also your turn to watch.” Sinking onto her knees, Mia took him, not quite fully, in her mouth.

Fully would have been impossible.

Exeter flattened both palms to each side of the window and rocked in and out of her mouth—gently at first. Groaning his pleasure, Mia knew he aligned her ministrations to the scene in the adjacent room.

There was something altogether exotic and mysterious to these sex games, and she found herself, shockingly, an enthusiastic player. And she delighted in giving Exeter pleasure. She ran her lips and tongue over his throbbing, velvet shaft, lightly cupping his sac, and caused the most wonderful utterances from him. Lovingly, he stroked the crown of her head and begged her softly not to stop.

She felt the jerk—the telltale sign of his oncoming climax. And she took all of his seed into her mouth, laving and sucking, draining him, until he bucked and signaled the end of his pleasure.

Pulling her up off the floor and into his embrace, Exeter buried his head in the slope of her neck. “Mon Dieu, love.” His whispers only served to elevate her arousal, as he turned her toward the peephole and rucked up her skirts. He slipped his shaft between her legs—lubricating himself between her labia, rubbing out more pleasure for himself.

Exeter bent her over and she groaned loudly as he planted himself deep. She could see through the window that Etienne’s cock was firmly embedded into the Contessa, and the comely woman was near tears of ecstasy.

Exeter thrust in and out—still hard, even after that explosive climax. His fingers slid into her labia from the front as he plunged deep inside her from the rear. His manipulations were slow and firm, with an occasional light circling of her engorged clitoris. “Come for me, Mia.” A slick finger traveled between her buttock cheeks and pressed into her anus, wiggling, tickling the tight opening. “Give me a climax—I want it now.” His fingers quickened their strokes—as he explored deeper and deeper.

The sight of Etienne thrusting into the Countess matched Exeter’s deep strokes and light touch. Mia uttered a gasp, unable to stop herself from crying out as she edged ever closer. His fingers invaded every possible orifice; she felt as though three men attended her every desire. The climax ripped through her—shattering her reality, taking her to a faraway place of pure sensation. Her belly shuddered and her knees wobbled at the depth and strength of the pleasure she was experiencing.

Stroking softly, Exeter held her up, drawing out the last of her ecstasy. For several moments, she rested in his arms. “That was—” She could hardly express herself. “I hardly know what to say.”

“I take it the cat is sated.” There was a smile in his voice. He rocked her gently in his arms. A low-pitched vibration came from the depths of her body and she purred for him.

He snorted soft laughter against her temple.

Mia knew her peak had not coincided with that of the couple in the dark room beside them—her cries of pleasure had come later. Somewhat mortified, she straightened. Eyes wide, she found herself confronted by Etienne. He was peering at her, as curiously as she was looking at him.

The Contessa winked.

Whipping around and shoving her skirts down, Mia knew Exeter had seen the look on her face and had surmised they had been discovered post coitus. Fast witted, as always, he closed the small door to the window and tied up his drawers.

It took only moments for Etienne to drag the disoriented Contessa from their dark little den to the adjacent room. Exeter slipped Mia’s pantalettes into his coat pocket and settled her bosom into her dress. Breathing hard, they stared at each other until they both snorted a soft laugh.

“Mes amis!”

She and Exeter pivoted an about-face and stood primly beside one another. The unfortunate part was they were both laughing—which was neither proper nor worldly wise. And certainly not clever. Even so she tried to maintain a stiff smile.

Luckily, Exeter was coherent, for Mia was still flushed and speechless from her pleasure. The doctor nodded formally to the trysting couple. “Monsieur Artois . . . Countess.”

Etienne sauntered over to the small window on the wall, opened the diminutive iron door, and peered through it. Turning back, he wore the look of a man with an advantage.

“Well, now, I hope it was as fine and rare for you both, as it was for us.”

“Exceptionnel,” Exeter offered, perhaps a bit too quickly.

Rejoining his lover, Etienne and the Contessa returned Exeter’s compliment with a pleasant nod. “Glad to be of service, Baron et Baronesss de Roos.”

Mia could not stop the upward twitch to her mouth, and soon the smiles of both she and the Contessa were as much in evidence as were both men’s snorts of laughter. Etienne spoke first. “The next time you two choose to become voyeurs, have a heart and let us in on it.”

“Mais oui, but won’t that spoil the enjoyment . . . knowing?” Mia asked with an innocence she did not pretend to hide. There was no use fooling these two.

“Mes no, chouchou, Etienne and I often delight in a bit of—exhibitionnisme.” The Contessa winked at Mia a second time.

As they exchanged a few risqué remarks and bawdier jokes, Mia and Exeter were escorted out from behind the tapestry and deftly slipped back into the crowded hall. “Enjoy!” The Contessa called over her shoulder. With a snap of her fan she pointed in the direction of a large table of refreshments.

Etienne turned back. “A warning, perhaps? There are some gentlemen here—Anglais, I believe.”

Chapter Twenty-three

MIA COULD ONLY WAGER A GUESS, but she suspected Exeter ran a worst-case scenario over in his mind. A cloud of perplexed thoughts whirled behind those sensuous, hooded eyes. The Anglais Etienne had mentioned would likely be gentlemen of the ton, peers whom Exeter might run into at a social event—or club members. She searched his face. “You’re worried.”

“Ordinarily, I would call it circumspect. But since we have tossed caution to the wind this evening . . .” He shrugged a shoulder and fashioned a reassuring simile. “We are masked. And from what I understand, no one makes acquaintances at soirees of this nature. Anonymity is de rigueur.”

As they circulated among the fornication and flogging, Mia would stop now and then to stare. She couldn’t help herself, it was all so . . . titillating. “I had no idea how shockingly wicked I could be and how easily I am brought to such depravity.”

“I blame myself for exposing you to such immoral salaciousness. Are you repentant over it?”

Mia hoped her blush was more dazzling than demure. “On the contrary, I am most humbled by my lack of regret.”

This time Exeter stopped to stare.

She started to pivot—to have a look at the sought-after, seductive woman he found so beguiling . . . and then it struck her. He was staring at her.

A slow smile, something decidedly masculine and feral, tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Hungry?”

She glanced about, as her hand swept over the buttons of his trousers. “I believe I have what is called—an appetite.” She kept her touch light, and quickly found what she searched for. That she openly dared such risqué foreplay appeared to kindle more than a glimmer in his eyes.

She stood with her back to a buffet table, entranced at the sight of a nude woman bound in leather and suspended by ropes in midair. Exeter coated pieces of dried fruit from a chocolate fountain and fed her bites of plum and berry.

“M-m-m.” The woman was being denied orgasm by her partner and it made Mia’s lower anatomy begin to thrum and quiver. She leaned back against Exeter and whispered in his ear. “Will he ever let her climax?”

“Depends how prettily she begs for it.”

Exeter pulled her to one side of the table, to a darker corner of the room. “I almost forgot.” He pulled the emerald collar from his coat pocket.

She swallowed. “Where did you find it?”

“Prospero’s bedchamber.”

A rush of heat flushed her cheeks. “I . . . we . . .” She lowered her eyes.

Exeter tilted her chin up. “For the moment, what happened between you and Prospero is not important—as long as you weren’t hurt.” He slipped the collar around her throat and clipped on the silver chain. “I thought we could use a fetish.”