After Adam’s close brush with death and the ensuing weeks of uncertainty, she realized she was tired of being afraid. Tired of hiding. Whatever lay in the journey ahead, she would explore it…by her husband’s side.
“Yes,” she said, her voice trembling. “I want to go with you.”
Blatant approval blazed in his eyes. He brought her hand to his lips, and her entire being shivered with anticipation.
“I’ll make the arrangements,” he said. “We’ll leave the day after tomorrow.”
20
After an extended farewell with the children, Adam whisked his wife off two mornings later. He’d chosen the hunting lodge in Hertfordshire because it offered both proximity to and seclusion from London. He’d come to see that his amnesia was not the only barrier between him and Gabby. He didn’t fully understand the workings of his marriage, and he wanted this time alone with her so that they could get reacquainted without the distractions of everyday life.
Or, in truth, they might be getting acquainted for the first time.
Looking at his wife seated on the opposite side of the carriage, Adam felt a hot stirring that wasn’t just about lust. Beneath her brown velvet toque, her hair was an autumn blaze in the sunlight. Knowing the bounty that lay beneath her fussy, frilly russet carriage dress necessitated a discreet adjustment of his trousers to ease the tightness, but his attraction to her was more than physical.
She was nibbling on her bottom lip as she looked out the window, watching the sharp angles of the city fade to the flowing curves of the countryside. Thus far during the trip, she’d assiduously avoided his gaze. Yet he could sense her mood, that heady mix of uncertainty and anticipation, and it filled him with equal parts of tenderness and lust.
How a woman could be so unaware of her beauty and worth was beyond him. He had no clue why the old Adam Garrity had eschewed romantic notions. Yet when Gabby spoke of his old self, it was always with pride and adoration, to the point where he sometimes felt jealous…of himself.
Ridiculous, but there it was.
He was her husband now, and he wanted her to see him for who he was. To want him as a woman wants a man…and to fall in love with him. The way she’d grabbed hold of his heart since he’d awakened.
Three weeks into this marriage and he was already certain that he had the wife of his dreams. He didn’t have to know the past to know that he wanted her. And he hadn’t even kissed her yet. He might not remember who he’d been, but he did know himself now. The soul-deep hunger and possessiveness he felt for the woman across from him. He was driven and ambitious; his natural tendency was to take command. When he wanted something, he went after it.
He wanted his wife. More than anything.
“Penny for your thoughts?” he asked.
Gabby’s gaze flew to his. “Oh…I was, um, thinking of Fiona and Max. I hope that they won’t miss us too much.” Her smile was rueful. “And that they won’t run amok while we’re gone.”
“They gave me their word they would behave.”
“You mean you bribed them with the promise of presents.” She wrinkled her nose in that way of hers that he found adorable. “You do spoil them, Adam.”
“It’s my intention to spoil their mama as well.”
Tell-tale roses bloomed in her cheeks. She was thinking about what lay ahead in the next five days for them. Particularly, he guessed, in the intimate realm.
“Nervous?” he asked gently.
“No. Well, yes. Maybe a little?” Twin furrows worked between her curving auburn brows. “I don’t know why I’m all aflutter. It seems ever so silly.”
“If it helps at all, I have a touch of nerves myself.”
“You do?” She tipped her head to the side. “But you’re never discomfited by anything. At least, you weren’t before the accident.”
“Every man is bothered by something.” For instance, the thought of eating your pussy while you scream my name gets me into a lather. “Perhaps I just didn’t show it.”
“Perhaps.” She gave him a doubtful look. “Why do you have nerves now?”
He decided to be direct. “Because I feel like a bridegroom on his wedding night.”
Her cheeks turned even pinker. “We’ve been married for eight years.”
“None of which I remember. This is all new to me, and I want to do everything right. To be a good husband and father.”
“You’ve been wonderful with the children,” she said instantly. “They adore you, perhaps now more than ever. You’ve helped to build Max’s confidence ever so much. And Fiona’s too, in a way. I think that the more time she spends with you, the less she feels she needs to gain your attention through her accomplishments.”
He felt he’d made inroads with the imps, and he was glad his wife agreed. Yet he didn’t want her to dodge the issue of how he’d fared with her.
“And you, Gabriella? Have I been a good husband to you?” he said intently.
She bit her lip. “Well, yes. Of course.”
“But I haven’t been a true husband to you since the accident, have I?”
She squirmed against the plush green squabs, her voluminous skirts rustling. Her gaze dropped to the vicinity of his waistcoat. “You’ve been ill.”
“Look at me, Gabby.”
His groin heated when she immediately raised her eyes to his. His gut told him that she liked having him be in control, liked relinquishing her worries and inhibitions under his command. As his was a dominant nature, he found her sweet capitulation more than a little arousing.
“I’m not ill now,” he said. “And I find myself quite eager to resume my husbandly duties.”
Her lashes swept higher. “Here? Right…now?”
“Here and now.” He patted his lap. “Come here, sweetheart.”
Her gaze darted to the window, the view of the rolling farmlands. “But anyone could see…”
He didn’t give a damn what cows and clodhoppers thought of his marital activities. For her modesty’s sake, however, he reached over and twitched the curtains closed.
He patted his lap again. “Come here.”
To his everlasting satisfaction, she crossed over to him. The motion of the carriage made her sway, and he caught her by the waist, guiding her down onto his thighs in a flurry of taffeta and petticoats. Her pretty toque fell unheeded to the floor.
Her hands on his shoulders, she protested, “I don’t want to hurt you. I…I’m too heavy. Your injury—”
“I’m recovered. And I don’t want to hear another word about you being anything but what you are: perfection itself. You will trust me in this and all things.”
He infused his tone with sternness, to allay her worries and assuage a need in him to assert his will. For the past month, he’d played the part of an invalid, one that had had its benefits—mainly the sweetness of having his wife fuss over him—but it wasn’t his preferred or natural role. Perhaps that was why he’d had trouble connecting with her on a sensual level: he’d been too tentative, too lenient when she’d avoided intimacy.
He needed something different now. And, his instincts were telling him, so did she.
“This is where I ache, Gabby.” He captured her hand, bringing it to the placket of his trousers. Pressing it over the unapologetic bulge of his erection. “I’m harder than a steel pike for you, sweetheart.”
The gentle spasm of her hand injected pleasure through his veins. He didn’t miss the increased cadence of her breath, her breasts rebelling against the restraint of whalebone and fabric. Her eyes were wide, a little dazed, that of a doe who doesn’t know whether to run or stay. When he took his hand from hers, her palm didn’t budge. It remained quiescently, obediently where he’d positioned it. All of this spoke volumes about what his wife truly wanted.
And it made him harder than ever, his cock straining beneath her touch.
He tipped her chin up. “I want something from you.”
“What…what do you want?”
She wetted her lips, a n
ervous, enticing habit. He wondered if she knew that her body gave her away. The flick of her pink tongue over her bee-stung lips. The expanding well of her pupils. The excited flutter at her wrist that sent butterfly reverberations through his rigid prick.
She was as hot and bothered as he was. He could practically see the wicked scenarios forming in her head: the favors she imagined he might ask of her. His intuition told him that his naughty minx would be quite willing to fulfill any one of those fantasies…because they would also be hers.
He was tempted. Christ, he was.
What he wanted, however, was more than a quick fuck in the carriage. He wanted to start afresh with his wife. To lay his claim on her so thoroughly that she would never doubt that she belonged to him, as he was now. Now and forever. He wanted this bonding to imprint itself upon his own mind as well: if and when his memory returned, he wanted his old self to never again take for granted the gift he’d been given.
To that end, he’d spent a great deal of energy strategizing how to go about seducing his wife body, mind, and soul. Hence, this trip and the intimate game he was about to initiate.
“Kiss me, Gabriella,” he said.
Her widening eyes made him speculate whether he’d asked that of her before. To initiate rather than be a passive recipient. Right now, he wanted to know that this was about her desire as much as his…and he wanted her to know it too.
A heartbeat passed.
Timidly, sweetly, she brought her mouth to his.
God’s blood, her lips were as plush as they looked, fitting perfectly to his firmer edges. Even though he knew this wasn’t their first kiss, it was his first taste of his wife since he’d awakened. And her kiss was everything a woman’s kiss should be: soft and demure, a hint of wantonness in the way her mouth shaped so readily to his.
Her kiss spoke of a longing to please that aroused him utterly. He could tell she wasn’t used to being in command, for she was attuned to his slightest reactions, her instinct to follow his lead. When he tested this by running his tongue along her mouth’s sweet seam, she parted her lips immediately, welcoming him into her honeyed, feminine heat.
His wife might be shy, but she was no novice. She was a temptress, a goddess who seduced through the art of yielding. It called to his deepest carnal fantasies, and he took what she offered as his due.
One arm around her waist, his other hand at her jaw, he held her still for his plundering. He delved into her cavern, his tongue claiming her warm, satiny treasure. He tasted her moan, felt it in the throbbing insistence of his groin. Her hand still cradled his cock, now so hard that it threatened to rip through the thin wool barrier. He flexed his hips, pressing his erection into her touch, letting her know her effect on him, as was her due.
He slanted his mouth over hers, deepening his penetration. Thrusting into her wet hole and luring her tongue to play with his. She whimpered, squirming delightfully against him, the shy rub of her tongue threatening his self-control.
It would be so easy to toss up her skirts. To take her then and there, sheath his turgid, aching prick in his wife’s pussy—the pussy that belonged to him and that he’d yet to claim.
But that wasn’t his plan.
He lifted his mouth from hers. It took a moment for her eyelids to slide up, revealing her gloriously disoriented gaze. It made him want to kiss her again, but there was something else he wanted too. Something essential. Something that took precedence over the fire she ignited in his loins.
Rubbing his thumb over her kiss-swollen lips, he gave his second command. “Now tell me about a past kiss.”
Her long lashes fluttered up. “Wh-what?”
“This is what I want from you, Gabriella: to be my wife in body and mind. As my amnesia has robbed me of our past conjugal bliss, you will be my memory,” he told her. “For the duration of our trip, for every physical pleasure we share, you will share a story of it from our past. Our first time, our best time, even our worst…I will leave it up to you what you wish to tell me.”
“I don’t know if I can say such things aloud.”
As charming as he found her maidenly modesty, he wouldn’t let it stand between them.
“You can because I’m your husband and you’re my wife,” he stated. “I wish there to be no secrets between us. Moreover, your memories of our past might trigger my own and hasten my recovery.”
As she chewed on that and her tempting bottom lip, he went on, “There is no guarantee when or if my amnesia will resolve. But I’m not going to let the future of our marriage be dictated by that uncertainty. You have my word that I will guide us through this journey, Gabby, but it would be a damned sight easier if I knew what baggage we’re carrying. Will you give me what I ask? Your honesty, loyalty, and commitment as my wife?”
“Yes.” Her instant reply filled him with satisfaction. “I…I’ll do my best.”
“Which kiss will you tell me about? Our first, best, or worst?” he prompted.
God help him if he’d ever bollixed a kiss. Or anything else. Yet if he had, he wanted to know.
“Since we’ve never had any bad kisses,” she said softly and to his profound relief, “I suppose I could, um, tell you about our first time.”
“I’m all ears, sweetheart,” he said with simmering anticipation.
Each bump and sway of the carriage seemed to add to Gabby’s state of overstimulation. It wasn’t just the kissing, which in and of itself had set her nerve endings afire, but also the talking about the kissing. When Adam had asked her to speak of their past intimacy, she hadn’t known if she could. Never in her life had she spoken of such things. Never had he asked it of her.
Yet the husband with her now was not the same man she’d married. Nor was she the same woman, she realized with a small shock. The years of marriage had changed her, and these past weeks in particular had cracked open her deepest fears: of losing the man she loved, who’d made her feel safe and protected, who’d given her a place to belong.
Walking through fire had made her realize that although her marriage had satisfied the needs of the girl she’d been, the woman she was now yearned for more. Her dreams…they’d somehow changed along the way. She wanted more than security from her husband, wanted things that were risky and terrifying. Wanted these things so badly it hurt.
Despite the crisp chill outside, the inside of the carriage felt steamy. Sitting on her husband’s lap, Gabby was flushed with humid heat as she recounted their first kiss in the gallery after he’d proposed.
“Did you like my kiss?” he murmured.
“It was my first.” Her candor was rewarded by the flare of possessive heat in his gaze. “I didn’t know what to expect. I remember being worried that I might do it wrong…and that I ought to have brushed my teeth after lunch.”
His masculine chuckle eased her embarrassment. “Nothing could detract from your sweetness, love.” He grazed his knuckles against her cheek. “And you’re a natural at kissing. You couldn’t do it incorrectly if you tried.”
“At least I’m good at something,” she said jokingly.
Her reply was met with a curious silence.
“You are good at many things.” His intensity was a bit unnerving. “When it comes to being a wife, mama, and lady, no man could ask for more.”
“That’s ever so kind of you to—”
“Gabby.” The steeliness in his tone cut off her protests. “I’m not being kind; I’m being honest. And I won’t have you discounting my compliments as if they are meaningless.”
“I’m not discounting them…” She trailed off, frowning. Was she? Her response had been so habitual that she hadn’t stopped to think about why she’d said it.
“Then do you hear what I’m telling you? Do you believe me?”
His eyes bore into her, his keenness thrilling and scary at the same time. There was no escaping him, his words, the force of them deepening the fissure inside her. Self-doubt oozed from the crack, leaving in its wake a relief deeper than pain. More pr
ofound than pleasure.
“I believe you,” she said, her voice trembling.
“Good.”
She didn’t know why his firm reply stirred her so. Or why it gave her courage.
“When you kissed me that first time, I knew that you were the husband I always dreamed of,” she admitted softly. “That you would be…my everything.”
I love you. I’ve always loved you. Could you love me back?
His nostrils flared. An instant later, his mouth slammed onto hers. And she returned his kiss with all the desperate hope thrumming in her heart.
21
They reached the hunting lodge by midafternoon. It had taken Thompson’s discreet knock to alert Adam to the fact that the carriage had stopped. His wife had proven quite the distraction; the hum of unrequited lust still buzzed pleasantly in his veins as he alighted first, turning to help her down.
As her hand quivered in his, her eyes hazy with feminine need, he knew he’d made the right decision to delay their mutual gratification. Waiting, allowing the anticipation to simmer and build, would make their reunion all the more explosive—and from what he’d sampled in the carriage, Gabby was already the female equivalent of a Roman candle.
Cold-natured, his arse.
Behind her shyness and inhibitions lay a hot little wanton, praise God.
As he told her, he wanted more than her body. The ride over had answered some of his questions about the intricate—and sometimes convoluted—workings of Gabby’s mind. It was her insecurities, not lack of interest, that had led her to shy away from his initial advances. He didn’t know the root of these anxieties that blinded her to her own worth, but he meant to find out what they were this week and eradicate them for good.
Regarding the Duke Page 17
