The French Duchess

by Rue Allyn

  If she let go, surely he would release her. She couldn’t possibly want him to kiss her, could she? But the stroke of her fingers along his nape and the tease of his tongue at the seam of her lips exposed the lie in her thoughts. His gentleness was unexpected given the fury she’d seen moments before. Forget her doubts and reservations about handsome, aggressive men. She leaned into his caress, surrounding herself in the passion that vibrated through him. She tugged on his shoulders. She needed the heat and strength of his body. Her mouth opened of its own accord. His tongue swept sweet passion within, then teased her to return the caress.

  She pressed her body to his, glorying in the sweep of his hands over her, the tiny pain of his coat buttons digging into her breasts, the hard throb of his erection against her inner thigh. She shifted, nestling that turgid flesh where her need was greatest. His lips feathered kisses along her jaw, down her neck, and across the tops of her breasts. Fingers pulled at the loose neckline, and his mouth fastened on a nipple. Cool air caressed her thighs and bottom, followed by a heated palm that scorched her flesh. She should make him stop, but she didn’t want to. They were alone. No one would know.

  “Lord, Mari, you are so sweet.” He nibbled on her ear. “Tell me you want this, need this as much as I.”

  She wanted his embrace; that was a certainty. She needed to be touched, desired, linked with someone. She’d been alone for so long. She turned her head to kiss him. “Yes,” she whispered against his lips. “I need you.”

  With her skirts ruched around her waist, he eased her down to the cushions, then knelt beside her. His fingers drifted across her cheek, her mouth, her neck, and lower, his eyes dark with unspoken emotion.

  She trembled but refused to let fear of the unknown stay her course. What would it be like to be loved by this man, even for a little while? Since her future appeared no better than her past, she would take what joy she could find now. “Touch me, Richard, please. All of me.”

  He smiled as if she’d opened the gates of heaven, then released her.

  “Richard?”

  He removed his coat then grasped her shoulders and raised her to his kiss.

  His strong arms came around her, pressing her to him. His lips urged hers apart, and he plundered her mouth until she melted in his embrace. His fingers stroked and played at her back.

  He bent his head and plied kisses along her collarbones, over the swell of her breasts, pushing her bodice away as he went. Then he licked a trail around one nipple before shifting to suckle the other.

  Desire tugged sharply at her belly. She forgot to wonder when the buttons on her dress and the ties of her stays had been released. She arched her back, needing more of the exquisite sensations he created.

  He lavished attention on her nipples, squeezed the delicate globes of her breasts, and slid one hand under the skirts bunching at her hips. His heated palm smoothed upward over the top of her thighs and came to rest on her mons.

  Her eyes opened wide. No one had ever touched her there. Heat flooded her body, and she grew damp.

  With his fingers, Richard traced the seam at her juncture. Her hips swiveled and begged for more of his touch, overruling any momentary embarrassment. What he was doing felt entirely too good.

  One finger traced then penetrated her wet opening.

  “Please,” she begged, not certain what it was she pleaded for.

  He lifted his head, and her breasts felt bereft.

  “Soon, darling, soon. Be patient. We have all night, and I want to pleasure you.” His fingers continued to play at her entrance.

  Her heart raced. “I don’t know how much more I can stand.”

  “Trust me. Give yourself to me. Let me care for you.”

  How long had it been since someone wanted to care for her? She nodded.

  He left off his playing long enough to arrange her legs on either side of the bench then settled between them.

  The hair on his legs scraped against the skin of her inner thighs. He’d lowered his trousers.

  She started to rise, but he pressed against her with his body, and longing flung her back to the cushions.

  He rubbed circles on her mons with his arousal. Suckled her breasts and plucked open the barriers to her most private places.

  She twisted beneath him, needing, wanting. “Please.”

  But he held still, braced above her on one arm, poised at the entrance to her body, the fingers of his free hand circling, stroking ever closer.

  “Look at me, Mari.”

  She opened her eyes. When had she closed them? She stared at his features, the angles and planes of his face limned in moonlight. The tenderness she saw there echoed his touch.

  She longed for more with him, but once was all they would have.

  He ceased his play. His erection replaced his fingers.

  She panted, waiting.

  “Grasp my hips.”

  Mari did as he requested.

  “Now pull them forward. Slowly.”

  She felt his body tremble, his neck arched with strain.

  “Please, Mari.” His blue-gray eyes blazed with the same yearning his caresses had built in her body.

  “Yes.” She pulled gently, and he moved forward between her thighs. Pressure built at her entrance as she stretched to accommodate him. Heat prickled over her skin, and her body tightened. Still she pulled him forward, panting, taking him into her, caring for him as he had said he would care for her.

  When she could pull no farther, she dropped her hands. “I can’t do any more.”

  He gave her a tender smile. “All right. We’ll just wait a bit.”"

  He lowered his head and stroked her breasts with his cheek, letting his hair feather across her tender flesh. He licked, suckled, nibbled, and tormented her until she had to move or die from longing for some unknown more.

  Her hips twitched, and she felt his penis slide forward.

  The twinge was a minor thing compared with the insistent passion rising inside her. She could not let him leave. She wrapped her legs around him and pushed with her heels as her hands found his hips. He caught her cry with his kiss. He thrust his tongue deep as a sweet fullness spread within her. Soon his body stroked hers as his tongue swept deep then shallow in her mouth. She battled to kiss him back and found her hips moving to the same rhythm of thrust and withdraw. She tightened her inner muscles.

  He groaned.

  She gloried in the slick power she had discovered. She did it again, and again. Pleasure skittered from nerve to nerve. She could not get enough kisses, enough touches, enough strokes.

  Richard twisted his hips.

  She cried out against his mouth. “More.”

  He slipped a hand between their bodies and pressed his thumb just above the point where they joined.

  The world vanished. Her body grew hard then dissolved into mist. With hands she could not feel and legs grown numb, she clung to his shoulders, the only solid thing in the passionate swirl where she existed. Ecstasy washed through her over and over. When her senses finally began to return, Richard still stroked within her body, and the swell built again. Helpless before desire, she toppled from the heights as he cried out her name and poured himself into her.

  The stars still gleamed in the night sky as she came to her senses. She was lying on her side, curled against Richard’s body. His chest warded off the chill, and his arm held her close. The bench was long but narrow. She shifted.

  “Let me up.”

  “By all means.” He helped her to untangle herself and stand. As she turned to face him, her skirts fell over the sticky damp between her legs, but it was her bodice flopping at her waist that reminded her she should be embarrassed. Standing semi-naked before a man who wore far more clothing than she did was a lesson in mortification.

  His gaze roved her body, lingering on her breasts and burning away the skirts that covered her. “You are beautiful.”

  She flushed with pleasure. Embarrassment now was ridiculous. “Thank you. You are a h
andsome, talented man.” She turned her back and lifted her bodice. “Fasten me up, please.”

  He sighed. Soon she felt his fingers closing the buttons of her dress. She wanted to turn and thank him, but his hand on her shoulder kept her still.

  “Let me pin up your hair again.”

  “You have experience as a hair dresser?” She laughed.

  “No.” His denial carried amusement. “I doubt very much that anyone seeing us will mistake what we’ve been doing. But some attempt at a proper appearance must be made to salve the pride of the defeated husband I’m supposed to be.”

  “Very well, but just so you know, were you truly my husband, you would be the victor in this encounter.”

  Finished with her hair, he turned her round. “I should be your husband, Mari. I have truly ruined you, and it is only right that I take responsibility for my actions.”

  She pulled all her duchess’s hauteur about her. “Thank you, no. I will not be wed out of responsibility.”

  “And if you are pregnant?”

  “Then I will have proven the ton right. I will be a French duchess in the most risqué sense.”

  He took her hand and pulled her toward him. “Any child would be mine as well. I would want a part in raising it.”

  She shuddered. That would lead to a number of battles, for she could not see them agreeing on anything, and the child would suffer. “Perhaps we should wait and see if there is a child before arguing about how it should be raised.”

  He laid a hand alongside her throat. “Just a quick reminder that marriage to me would not be all bad.” Using his thumb, he lifted her chin and laid his mouth on hers before she could object.

  She found she did not wish to object. In fact, her fingers itched to tangle in the hair at his nape. She leaned into him.

  A titter broke the silence. Suddenly Mari was abandoned and bereft, pushed down onto the cushioned bench of the folly. How could he desert passion so abruptly? She gulped in air, trying to regain her breath and her sanity. She’d been abandoned before and survived. Her heart still raced when she finally raised her head and saw Richard standing with his back to her, still as a stone wall.

  She should have known better than to imagine anything like passion had breached his cool calculation. He’d meant to teach her a lesson. Not a lesson about the potential pleasures of marriage but the same lesson she should have learned from Malveux all those years ago: Never, never allow a man to lead you into passion. He will betray you every time.

  She rose, ready to do battle with this man who used her so casually in the name of male superiority. She touched his arm, and he whirled, jerking her against his body once more and pressing her face into his chest with enough force to smother.

  She began to struggle, and his grip eased a fraction.

  “Shh,” he breathed into her ear. “We have company.”

  His embrace eased further.

  “Oh look, mon empereur, someone else has discovered our trysting place.” The high- pitched giggle that followed could have come from any one of the empty-headed females in residence at Fontainebleau.

  “Then we shall find another spot for our divertissement and leave them to theirs.” The stentorian tones could only belong to Napoleon Bonaparte. “Come this way, ma cherie.”

  This was the closest Mari had come to the man in the short time since arriving at Fontainebleau. She was unlikely to get a better opportunity.

  “Wait,” she shouted. Slipping from a startled Richard’s grasp, she stepped around him and hurried to the entrance of the folly. “Monsieur l’emperor, attendez moi, s’il vous plâit.”

  “What are you doing?” Richard hissed from behind.

  “Trust me and stay here.” She threw the words at him over her shoulder then hurried down the steps and across the small lawn toward where the emperor and his light ‘o love stood frozen in the moonlight.

  “Madame, do you know the consequence of addressing my person without prior permission?”

  “Yes, your imperial highness.” She halted and sank into a deep curtsy. “Please forgive my untimely intrusion, but I have a most urgent and private message to deliver.”

  She tilted her head so she could watch the Corsican’s expression without impertinently lifting her gaze.

  He frowned at her, apparently torn between outrage and curiosity.

  “You are the woman they call the wanton bride, non?”

  “Some call me a licentious bride.”

  “You have one minute to engage my attention before I call my guards to arrest you and that gentleman lurking in the folly.”

  Now she did lift her head, casting a glance at his companion. “In private, monsieur, I beg you.”

  “Why?” He waved the woman off in the direction of the opening to the maze.

  “I am being blackmailed, your highness, and only you can help me resolve my problems.”

  Napoleon raised his brows. “That is a unique approach. I will reward it with a moment more of my attention. Stand and come closer.”

  As she approached, he took her hand in a grip she should have expected from a soldier. “My family is threatened with death unless I poison you.”

  “Mon Dieu,” he whispered. “Have you proof of this?

  She opened the reticule she’d guarded throughout the evening and withdrew the vial René had given her before dinner. “Here. This is a duplicate of the vial you carry on your person to avoid capture, but much more potent.”

  He took the vial from her. “Why would you have such a thing?”

  “As I said, to poison you. Your enemies want it thought that you were murdered by a greedy, duplicitous Englishwoman so they can martyr you and use your death to foment more war. Their plan is to use the war to place themselves in position to grab power and subjugate the French people to their advantage.”

  “Many have tried to kill me for these very reasons. Have you any proof beyond this vial?”

  “I can provide you with the names of some of your enemies and the locations where I last saw each of them. However, you must promise to help me and my family escape their threats, or I shall tell you nothing.”

  “I could have you arrested and tortured.”

  “You could, but your enemies would escape before you could force anything from me.”

  “True. Is that man lurking in the shadows one of these enemies who threatens you and me both?”

  “No. He . . . he is a friend.”

  The eyebrows rose higher. “Not your husband?”

  “We, ah, are pretending.”

  Napoleon smiled. “Such pretense is tres amusant, oui? Bertrand has spoken with me about officiating at a civil ceremony to provide you with the license you lack. Do you wish to be wed in truth?”

  “No, thank you very much.”

  “Vraiment?”

  Mari was grateful for the dark that hid her blushes. “It is complicated.”

  “Surely you do not create such a pretense with a man you do not love?”

  “Your highness, could we please discuss the plot against you and how to escape their plans?”

  “Oui, oui, but surely your cher ami should join us.”

  She turned her head to Richard, who started down the folly steps. She shook her head at him and raised her hand. He stopped but did not retreat.

  “He does not know all and would not be able to help at this point. Perhaps, if we must meet again after you have time to consider how best you may help, I will invite him to join us.”

  “Very well, mademoiselle. I will help you escape any threat, but now you must tell me the truth of this plot to kill me.”

  The moment had come when she must risk all. But she had already revealed too much. If Napoleon did not believe her, she would be no worse off than before. Bonaparte listened quietly as she repeated the events that had brought her to Fontainebleau; only his clenching and unclenching fists at the mention of Malveux and Cochinat revealed any emotion.

  “So we have very little time before Malveux
expects you to be murdered.”

  “We must proceed with care,” he said when she finished. “We do not want to tip our hand to Cochinat or any of Malveux’s other cohorts.”

  “You are sure he has more?”

  “Most certainly. It is what I would do, have done in similar situations.”

  “Very well. I will bow to your wisdom and proceed with extreme care. But how?”

  “How indeed. I will summon you and your, er, husband as soon as I formulate a plan. Now return to your friend. Wait a few moments before you leave this place. It would not do for any watchers to see you leave behind me.”

  “But . . . ” She had been dismissed and would have to wait on Napoleon’s convenience. Time was very short however, and she could only hope he would act quickly.

  Chapter Eleven

  Her gauzy skirts swung as she approached him, a puzzled expression on her face.

  Richard could still feel her soft, smooth flesh beneath his hand, taste her freshness on his lips. His erection throbbed, desperate once more for satisfaction. But he’d already committed one act of insanity with her. He would not commit another.

  “Are you mad?” His sexual frustration mixed with appalled astonishment at her actions. Richard pursued her to the bench where she sat and stared out at the moon-silvered lawn. “What possessed you to approach Napoleon like that? The more direct contact we have with him, the more likely he is to discover we aren’t who we claim to be.”

  “He knows.”

  “What?” The bottom dropped from his stomach. He would die in a French prison. No one would know what had happened to him save for this woman and her cousin who would be condemned alongside him.

  She shifted to look him in the eye. “I told Bonaparte that we aren’t married.”

  Richard hissed in a breath and sat beside her. “Well, given the rumors, we can probably weather that piece of idiocy.”

  “I told him my family and I were threatened with murder if I did not poison him.”