Drawing Lessons Read online

  Long minutes passed until finally she spoke. “So what am I supposed to do?”

  “Touch me. Start with my hair.”

  He held his breath while she worried a small lock of his hair between her fingers. He rolled his eyes beneath the blindfold.

  “Sit here, Marie.” He patted his chest.

  “On you?” Her voice cracked.

  “Yes, on me. You won’t crush me.”

  He felt her gingerly straddle his chest, careful not to settle her weight fully on him.

  “Ah!” she cried out when he slid his hands down her thighs and pushed out on her knees, causing her to land on his chest with a gentle thud.

  “That’s better,” he said. “Now let’s try this again.” He found her hands and plunged them deep into the roots of his hair. He bit back a groan and pressed his hips down into the mat. Already it was torture not seeing her face.

  “What does that feel like?” he tried to hold his voice steady. “Try to think how that might look on paper.”

  She worked her fingers through his thick hair. Each gentle tug on the roots was like a finger running lightly down his spine. She traced the wave in his hair with her palm. Her thighs relaxed a little against his chest as she wriggled her fingers through his hair some more.

  “Now try my face.” Her fingers slid out of his hair and gently grazed his face. He had to resist the urge to kiss her palm as it brushed his lips.

  Then her hand disappeared.

  “I feel like I’m groping you,” she said.

  “Don’t feel. See. Think of it as seeing with your skin.”

  Chapter 11

  Think of it as seeing with your skin.

  Marie took a deep breath and tried again. She ran her index finger along the ridge of Luc’s fine, straight nose. She looked at the velvet cloth covering his eyes.

  “Are your eyes closed under there?” she asked.

  “Yes. Why?”

  “Just wondering.”

  “It’s good to wonder.”

  His face relaxed into a smile for an instant. Marie let the pad of her fingertip touch the deep groove between his nose and lips.

  “That’s called the philtrum,” Luc said. “It means love potion in Latin.”

  “Really,” she murmured. “That’s an odd fact to have right on the tip of one’s tongue.”

  “One learns a lot about human anatomy by learning to draw.”

  Marie touched each point of his cupid’s bow, feeling for the first time how firm the line between lip and skin actually was. Then she ran her thumb over the tiny stalks of stubble on his jawline, trying to feel each hair as it scraped against her skin. Luc’s nostrils flared as she drew her thumb firmly across his lower lip. She found herself taking a deeper breath, too, trying to pull more oxygen into her lungs, and what had been the gentle warmth of her body against his was now a more insistent, probing heat working its way through her inner thighs and up into her hips.

  She was shocked at the effect just touching his face was having on her entire body. Her skin was seeing him in places she wasn’t even touching him with.

  “Are you okay, Marie?”

  She hesitated. You’ve just died and gone to heaven is what Nishi would say in a situation like this. But then Nishi had always been more of a carpe diem person. “Depends on how you define okay, I suppose,” she said at last.

  “I think you get to define okay for yourself, Marie. For me, having a beautiful woman touch me anywhere she pleases is a good definition.”

  He thinks I’m beautiful? She gazed down at his face, a face that would certainly meet anyone’s definition of beautiful, and considered the idea. She couldn’t read this man, not that she was particularly good at reading anyone, but she couldn’t tell when Luc Marchand was being a teacher and when he was being a man. Which was it right now? Was he telling her she was beautiful because he wanted her to feel good as a student? Or did he really think that?

  He flattened his palms against her thighs and gently pushed her hips off his ribs and onto his stomach. She gasped when she collided with his jutting penis.

  “Maybe we should stop,” she said.

  “Only if you want to.” He refolded his hands beneath his head.

  Marie tried to control her breathing as she weighed the obvious wisdom of stopping against the singing of every nerve ending in her skin. Her body certainly didn’t want to stop. What her body wanted was to rip off every last stitch of clothing she had on and beg Luc Marchand to make love to her.

  “I’m not sure this is appropriate,” she said.

  “Appropriateness is just a value judgment.”

  “You have an answer for everything, don’t you?”

  “No.” He sighed. “There are many things I don’t have an answer for. Many, many things, Marie. But I know how to draw and I know you have to be willing to look at things. Until you are willing to see, you won’t be able to draw the way you want to. Can you honestly say that you don’t want to sit here and look at a naked man?”

  Of course, she couldn’t honestly say that. Any woman would want the opportunity to ogle a man like Luc Marchand. Marie could honestly say she’d never been this close to a nude body this perfect before. This openly sensual. He was a Greek god, a French Greek god.

  “Hmm, Marie? Can you say that?”

  “Yes, I want to look at you. But just because one wants to do something doesn’t mean one should.”

  “Why not? Who’s getting hurt here?”

  Me probably. Already she wanted more than just to look at him. And more wasn’t going to happen. When she finished touching him, then it would be on to drawing him again. Only this time she’d be trying to draw while sitting in a haze of sexual frustration.

  “You are free to leave anytime you want, Marie. But step out of yourself for a moment and look at this situation. I am blindfolded, completely naked and there’s a person sitting on top of me. You are the one in control here. Don’t you see that, Marie? I can’t force you to see things for yourself and I can’t force you to take control of the moment you’re living in. You have to do that for yourself.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “What I want is plain to see, Marie. If you’re willing to let yourself see it.”

  She didn’t want to leave, she knew that. She wanted to stay, spend the entire weekend here with this confusing man who made her feel beautiful and crazed with desire and two inches small all at the same time. She wanted to drink in the sight of his body spread out on the mat for her like a sumptuous, decadent Roman banquet.

  She reached down and rolled one of Luc’s nipples beneath her thumb, then rolled it beneath her flattened palm. She closed her eyes and concentrated on how the small nub of flesh felt against the sensitive skin of her palm. In her mind, she could see a drawing of his chest begin to take shape. She ran her hands down his chest, feeling the bony ridge of each rib, forcing herself to ignore the primal urges screaming for attention, forcing herself to focus just on how his body felt beneath her hands.

  And her body—it felt more alive than it ever had. She was beginning to understand what Luc meant by seeing with her skin.

  “Do you feel in control now, Marie?”

  She was feeling in control, she realized. Not because a man was blindfolded and pinned down by her weight, but because the man was aroused by the situation, by her. The tip of Luc’s erection was pressed against the base of her spine. She shifted her hips and she felt a soft moan rumble beneath her. This was proving difficult for him, too.

  She had never felt in control with Richard. She had simply been there to do what he wanted, to be posed and placed and displayed in whatever light best suited his life. It pained her heart to see that now.

  She stood up suddenly, only to feel Luc’s hands grab onto her ankles, holding her fast.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “Just turning around, Luc. I want to look at ... the rest of you. Is that okay?”

  “Of course.” He let
go of her ankles. “Though if you aren’t comfortable saying penis, you can say throbbing member.”

  “I’m going to look at your throbbing—” She tried to suppress a giggle, and failed.

  “Member, Marie. My throbbing member.”

  Luc’s flat, taut stomach was bouncing with laughter as Marie straddled his chest again, this time facing his feet.

  “It’s a joy to hear you laugh,” he said.

  Marie glanced back at him over her shoulder.

  “Cheater!” she cried. The blindfold no longer covered his eyes.

  He smiled and shrugged. “I’m only a man, Marie. You have a lovely derriere and this is probably my only chance to see it this close.”

  Her neck and face grew hot. “Also you’re French,” she added.

  “Oui. So I get a pass when it comes to admiring a woman’s shapely behind. But proceed.” He made a shooing gesture with his hand.

  “Are you going to put it back on?” she asked.

  “If you want.” He grimaced. “But it will be easier for me if I don’t. Lying here and thinking of England is not working so well. It might be more effective if I stare at the ceiling and count cobwebs.”

  She turned back to his throbbing member. “I’m just going to look.”

  “You may do whatever you like.”

  Marie’s breath caught in her throat, as she considered what she might like. She felt his stomach muscles clench in anticipation beneath her thighs, then she reached out cautiously and traced—with as feathery a touch as she could manage—the swollen vein that ran along his length. The tiny moan she’d heard a moment earlier was now an agonized, full-throated moan.

  She needed to stop before this went too far. He was turned on. She was turned on. If they kept going ... she couldn’t bear to think of how he would look at her afterward. She stood up, intending to go get the sketchpad so she could begin a new drawing. But quicker than she thought any human could move, Luc’s arms shot out and pulled her back down. In a flash, she was lying on top of him, her breasts pressed against his chest.

  “Where are you going?” he asked, his eyes darker than she’d ever seen them.

  “To get my sketchpad. I think I’m ready to draw you again.”

  “Fuck the drawing, Marie.”

  His chest was rising and falling beneath her. Her nipples ached. Her pulse had concentrated itself entirely between her legs.

  “What are you seeing right now?” he asked.

  She saw eyes dark with desire. Nostrils flaring with each exhale of patience. And lips ... how was it that she could feel his lips on every inch of her skin, just by looking at him?

  “I see a man I want to kiss.”

  “So kiss him, Marie.”

  She brushed her lips lightly against his and was pulling her head away, when he plunged his hands into her hair and crushed her lips hard against his. His breath was hot and sweet as he parted her lips, exploring, tasting.

  “Now you take over,” he murmured against her panting mouth.

  But her kiss was tentative again.

  “Has any man ever just given you pleasure, Marie?”

  Marie pulled away from Luc, surprised by his question. “What do you mean?”

  “Your husband, I get the impression that he is more of a taker than a giver.”

  She shrugged.

  “Today, you’re the taker, Marie. Take what you want from my body.”

  “I don’t want—”

  He pressed his erection into her hips. At her tiny cry of pleasure, a low growl hummed in Luc’s throat. “Marie.” He pulled her cheek, then her ear, against his mouth. He nibbled lightly on her earlobe, making her hips move involuntarily against his. “Art requires honesty. You can’t expect to draw well if you’re denying what’s right in front of you. Your body wants something right now. I’m offering it, but you have to take it.”

  Marie hesitated. This was one of those fork-in-the-road moments. One of those moments when you made a last-ditch sprint to catch the train—or watched it pull out of the station and disappear around the bend. How many times would she have the opportunity to have sex with a sexy-as-hell Frenchman? She shouldn’t be getting this chance, even.

  “Start with simple, Marie. Undress.” He pulled the blindfold back over his eyes. “I won’t watch.”

  She took a long, deep breath and then slowly stood up and pulled off her boots.

  “And Marie? Let down your hair.”

  “You can’t help being bossy, can you?” She pulled her cashmere sweater over her head and dropped it on the floor.

  Luc smiled. “Maybe not.”

  She unzipped her jeans. “Keep the blindfold on. See? I can be bossy, too.”

  “Hmm. I rather like bossy Marie. Even if she apparently has on seven layers of clothing.” He drummed his fingers impatiently against his stomach.

  Marie tossed her bra onto his chest. He picked it up and slid the lace through his fingers. “I do want to look at this later.”

  She glanced at her purse, slung over the back of a chair. She hadn’t thought to bring a condom. “Um, I don’t have ...”

  “In my wallet. My jacket’s over there.” He jerked his head toward the back corner of the studio.

  She tore open the packet and unrolled the condom on him. Then she sat back and looked at him. He would have to keep the blindfold on. She could only do this as long as he couldn’t see her.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to be on—” she asked, hesitantly.

  “Yes, I’m sure I don’t want to be on top. I am going to lie here and let you do whatever you want to do.”

  She stared at his body lying on the mat. A lazy smiled played around his lips. She imagined the skin around his eyes crinkling beneath the blindfold. Whatever you want to do. She knew exactly what she wanted. She wanted him to fix the ache that was pounding deep within her hips. She wanted him to eviscerate the ache, demolish it, douse it with gasoline and throw a match.

  “Marie? I’m getting cold down here.”

  “Sorry. Just ... thinking.”

  Luc’s stomach vibrated with laughter. “Thinking about what? Normally, this is the part where people stop thinking.”

  “I’m thinking about what to do.”

  “May I offer a suggestion?”

  “Please.”

  “Bon. Lie here,” he patted his chest, “and kiss me.”

  Okay, she could do that. She lowered herself onto the length of his body, warm and firm beneath hers. She closed her eyes and allowed herself to enjoy the feel of skin against skin.

  “Kiss me, Marie.”

  She opened her eyes. His lips were parted, waiting for her. She lowered her mouth to his, then pushed her tongue inside. Her fingers delved into his thick hair and she pulled his mouth harder into hers. His hips shifted beneath her, the rumble of his groan pulsed against her breasts.

  Still, she kissed him deeper, consumed by the need to be swallowed up by Luc Marchand, to disappear inside him. When she needed air, she drew back to his lips, tasting them, devouring them, her hunger for a man finally unleashed. Luc’s hips were rolling, the muscles of his thighs tight as he tried to remain still and let her do what she pleased.

  He wanted her. That was all that mattered right now. Luc desired her. Maybe he wouldn’t tomorrow, but she would settle for today.

  She let her lips peel off his, taking one last nip. His lips were dark and slack from her kisses.

  “Marie, I am about two seconds from begging you to just fuck me.”

  The thought of Luc Marchand begging her set her spine afire. She reached below and took him in her hand, guiding him into her. All she could think of was filling herself with Luc over and over, his rough breathing and her gasps of surprise spilling into the air around them. She was chasing the ache of desire. The faster she moved on his body, the faster it ran ahead of her until—just when she thought she couldn’t move any faster—she caught up to it and slammed it to the ground, shocked at the way the impact spread, shuddering
through her body. Luc’s hands settled on her hips, pressing himself deeper into her, holding her there, just holding her.

  * * *

  “Now draw me,” Luc said.

  Marie groaned into his chest. The two of them were sprawled, spent, on the studio floor. The light spilling in through the window had mellowed into a late afternoon glow.

  “Now is the time, ma chérie. When all of this is fresh in your vision.” He gently grasped her bottom and lifted her off his softening, satiated erection.

  “You have to keep this on, though.” Marie tugged at the edge of the blindfold.

  “Whatever you wish.”

  “I don’t want to see what you’re thinking while I’m drawing.”

  “Bon. That might be a distraction, given what I intend to think about.”

  Marie rolled her eyes, then stood and went in search of her sketch pad. As she walked across the studio, she was conscious of her nakedness but for the first time in her life, not bothered by it.

  “Marie,” Luc called out behind her. “Get a towel from that cabinet by the window. For you to sit on.”

  “Thank you.”

  She unrolled the towel onto the floor, flipped over a fresh page on the sketchpad and began to draw. Luc’s hands were once again folded beneath his head. His legs were stretched out, his hips splayed open. He looked altogether languid, serene even.

  “You were right, of course,” Marie said as she began to pencil in lines and shading.

  “I am right about many things, Marie. But about what, specifically, this time?”

  “No one has ever just given me pleasure before. I was a pleasure virgin.”

  “And I was just giving you what little you were taking.”

  “That wasn’t a little.”

  “Oh, Marie, you were merely sipping at the well of pleasure. I could bathe you in it, if you were to let me.”

  Marie’s pencil stopped in its tracks above the paper, as she contemplated the idea that what she had just experienced could be somehow more.

  “Where did you feel it?” Luc asked. “In your hips, right? In your ... throbbing member?”