There was only the two of them in the library this afternoon. Grace had cried off with a headache, and Mr. Lioni was nowhere to be found. Emma was inclined to believe the two were together. Abby was in her room packing. There was no one to interrupt them, yet they were ten feet apart from each other.
“I didn’t mean it as though I were abandoning you.” Richard stood, straightening his vest as he walked over to her and sat beside her on the sofa. “We have an agreement that will take us to the end of September.”
Ah, yes. The agreement.
Too many weeks to become further entangled in her feelings with a man who had no intention of staying with her. Who had no intentions of falling so stupidly in love with her as she had with him. A very small part of her had hoped he might change his mind. That he would stay on with her for the rest of their days. What a foolish dreamer she was.
She pursed her lips as she wrapped her charcoals in a cloth. She could not concentrate on her drawing with her husband sitting so close to her.
“You’re having fun at me. It’s not kind.”
“But you’re rather adorable when you’re piqued.”
Richard rubbed the back of his knuckle over the gathered pleats on the short sleeve of her day dress.
She shivered with the contact. Her eyes closed briefly as she felt the warmth of him seeping through the fine material. What would happen if she revealed the depth of her feelings? Would he leave sooner? Would he stay on longer to humor her? Could he possibly return those feelings?
“It’s a great likeness of Abby,” he said. “Will you show her?”
Wiping her hands on her apron she’d donned to protect her dress, she leaned forward to set the sketchpad and charcoals down on the table. “Not till it’s painted. And you’ve changed the topic.”
“I merely redirected it.”
He took her hand in his, turning it over to study the dark stains from the charcoal.
“You seem flushed, Emma. Should I call for lemonade?”
She pulled her hand away and wiped it on her apron. So he knew what he did to her … how he made her feel whenever he touched her. Instead of giving him the satisfaction of an answer, she glared at him. The second he had taken a seat so close to her, she knew what he was about. What he wanted.
Damn her for wanting it, too.
“When we’re in Town, we should visit the music hall. Maybe do some shopping,” he said absently. As though going about Town with her was an everyday occurrence. “I have invitations to a few private dinner parties I’ve yet to accept. Would that please you, Emma?”
There was a great buzzing in her head. She swore her heart swelled so much in her chest that it would burst right through her breast. This reaction shouldn’t take her by surprise. He didn’t want to divorce her. He wanted to keep her happy long enough to get her pregnant—that much was obvious.
“That would be nice,” she finally muttered. More than nice, to be in his company for a few nights. Her eyes grew misty at the thought of him caring enough to show her around Town.
To distract him from that embarrassing fact, she mustered as much calm as she could and untied the apron she wore. She lifted it over her head. Taking her time to fold the apron, she set it on the chair beside her.
When she turned back to her husband, his right eyebrow was raised.
Words clogged in her throat with the emotion welling up in her. He wasn’t going to abandon her once they were in London.
She leaned in close and kissed him full on the mouth. It was a clumsy attempt and she pulled back just as quickly as she’d collided with his lips, but Richard’s hand was strong and firm on her back to keep her from moving too far away.
Leaning forward again, she took her time in meeting his lips. She splayed her hands over both sides of his smooth face, lingering with her lips over his, and closed her eyes. Pecking softly at first, then growing bolder by tasting first the top lip, then the lower with her own parted mouth. This was what she would miss most when he left. Kissing him. She loved everything about kissing him.
He broke away. “I see that you approve wholeheartedly of the plan.”
He reached around to lift her over his lap, one leg on either side of his thighs, her skirts fanned around them. His hands found their way beneath all the silk and lace, landing on her cotton-covered thigh.
“I should tease you more often if it gets you on my lap so easily. You’re a darling creature.”
One of his hands reached under her skirts and around to her bottom. He squeezed her left buttock before sliding his hand forward, closer to the vee of her body.
“The door isn’t locked,” she said. But she made no move to get off his lap. She really wanted to continue. So much so that she tilted back so his hand was closer to where she wanted him to rub her.
“We’re decently clothed.”
She gave a short laugh. They wouldn’t be decently clothed for much longer.
His fingers moved back and forth over the spot she needed touched between her thighs. There was no need to rouse her passions; they were already blazing inside her, the evidence of that wetting his fingers through the material of her pantalets.
What a wicked man her husband was.
Bearing down on his hand harder, she silently demanded more from him. Truly vixenish behavior, if she did say so herself. “You’ve accomplished what you set out to do. You’ve scandalized me.”
“Hardly, Emma. You still hold back.”
She sat down on his hand, stopping the sweet caress that was driving her to distraction. She ran her forefinger over his parted mouth. Her tongue darted out to wet her upper lip. She wanted to taste him.
His tongue shot out to taste, then suck her finger into his mouth.
“You make me want to be very wicked, Richard. Make me want to do and say such naughty things.”
His hand moved closer to its goal even though she was crushing his hand. He still managed to slip his finger through the slit of her drawers and into her pulsing sheath.
His head dropped back to the sofa, his eyes closed on a groan. “Always so damn wet. I want to suck all the cream from you and then fuck you senseless.”
He pressed his finger deeper inside her. Pulling one of his hands out from under her skirts, he massaged and kneaded her breast.
“No boning in your stays today.” He squeezed a little tighter around her breast since there was less to impede his searching hand.
Instead of the soreness she’d felt on waking this morning, her breasts felt swollen with need.
“I was tender from everything we did last night.”
She couldn’t say aloud that her breasts were suffering so sweetly from his overfondling. Was such a thing even possible? It must be. Not that fondling was the only thing he’d done to them, and to the rest of her.
“I’ll be gentler.” He kissed the exposed part of her bosom. “I’m going to unbutton your bodice. I want to see more. Need to.”
Emma looked over the edge of the rose-chintz sofa to the door. It was closed, but did have a habit of creaking whenever it was opened. Still, she wasn’t sure she could be so scandalous as to allow him to do such a thing, in the middle of the day and in so public a room.
She couldn’t look at her husband as his face was pressed into her breasts. “It seems risky.”
His teeth grazed the flesh before he pulled away. “But you want to.”
She looked back down into his intense gaze. His pupils were dilated from his rising passions. Aside from his firm manhood pressing into her, she could tell how badly he needed her by the stark longing reflected in his deep brown eyes.
Lowering her mouth to his, she whispered, “Yes.” Then she angled her mouth to take possession of his lips and tongue. How she loved his lips, his mouth, his tongue, his taste.
There was no other word she could use to describe what she was doing except devouring, consuming his very essence. She wasn’t afraid to taste from him as he did of her.
The hidden eyelets
down the front of her bodice were loosened quickly. The warmth of Richard’s hands seeped through her cotton corset and chemise when he wrapped them around her rib cage. His hands brushed the undersides of her breasts. Tantalizing. Teasing. A promise of what was to come.
She placed her hands over his and moved them higher. She moaned into his mouth when his hands finally covered her breasts and squeezed them closer together. She wanted to be touched the same way he had touched her last night. She ached for his touch.
Would she ache for it when he left? She shut her thoughts down, refusing to think about that. Not till the time came.
He cut off their kiss with a primitive growl. “You tempt me beyond reason, woman.”
“I don’t know what’s come over me.”
Which was the complete truth.
It definitely wasn’t like her to climb atop her husband and grind the center of their bodies together. The dew from her body was intensifying with every movement against the iron-hard part of him she wanted lodged deep inside her body.
Never in her wildest dreams did she expect to find this passion, this fervor of the flesh.
“You’re my very own woodland nymph. All beautiful and glowing with need as you rub off on me. I want to take you.” Richard’s face nuzzled into the swell of her bosom where he’d pulled down the front of her chemise. “God, let me have you, Emma. I’ll not survive the day with this cockstand. It’s not going to go away unless I come.”
“I want to, but what if—”
“They’ll turn right back around.” He was already releasing the buttons on his trousers. “We’ll look as if we’re embracing, nothing more.”
Taking a deep breath, she stared into his eyes. When he moved his hands away, indicating his trousers were undone, Emma reached beneath her skirts and wrapped her hand around the root of his member. The skin was smooth and soft, a contrast with the firmness of his penis. She gave it a light squeeze. Richard drove into her hold with a groan.
Her fingers curled around the heavy sac beneath his rod. She rolled the marbles in her palm, then the skin tightened up, and he thrust into the great volume of her skirts. She ran her hand up his length and stopped at the head. The slit at the top was wet with his own fluids. She drew circles over that part of him, spreading his juices.
“Need you now, Emma.” There was desperation infused in his hoarse voice.
Spreading the slit in her drawers, she slid the smooth tip of his instrument through her feminine fluids. She impaled herself on his great steely length easily. They were both motionless once he was up to the hilt in her. She felt a heavy pulse between her legs. A little heartbeat throbbing at her core. He flexed his cock within her.
She contracted her inside muscles around him, as though she were squeezing his manhood with her hands. It felt so good to have him in her body.
The room was quiet around them, their breaths both ragged even though neither of them moved.
“Stretch your back, love. Enough to lift your breasts above the corset.”
She did as he asked, looking down at what was revealed in doing so. The tips of her breasts were firm and a little redder than normal. A rather animalistic—dare she say, feral—gleam came into his eyes as he stared at her.
How wanton she must look, scandalously undressed and in complete disarray. Did she look thoroughly seduced to her husband? She imagined she did. It made her feel empowered somehow. On top of the world in the moment. Or at least on top of her husband.
She needed more, wanted to feel more, and pressed one breast to his mouth so he’d suckle it in deep. He did not disappoint, though he was gentler than usual. He didn’t nibble down and graze his teeth against that most tender part of her. He used only his tongue and lips as he played with the sensitive flesh.
He pushed his thumb against her nub and rubbed against it with each downward stroke of her pelvis atop his. Their rhythm was slow and easy, as though they could indulge all afternoon.
Her fingers curled around the edge of the sofa, and she threw her head back so her breasts could be licked and sucked by her husband with greater ease.
“So damn beautiful,” he murmured.
Wrapping her arms around his head, she held him tight to her heart as he laved at her exposed flesh. This was as close to her heart as she could allow him. She pinched her eyes shut and concentrated on her husband. A lone tear had escaped, but would dry long before Richard ever saw the physical manifestation of the emotional distress he caused her.
His hands clasped her hips tighter as he increased their pace. She met him eagerly. Thrust for thrust, shove for shove.
Finally he let her set the final pace. His hands tangled in her loose hair and pulled her face close to his. They stared at each other in a silent moment, their bodies still heaving together, their mouths open to take in deeper breaths, and she thought for a moment she saw the same feelings she harbored lurking beneath his gaze. Could he feel the same as she? Did he have any love for her?
He shut his eyes before she could decipher the emotion she had seen. He pulled her that final fraction closer. Kissing each other to muffle their cries of passion, they both came in a deluge of ecstasy.
She slumped atop him. Unwilling to move even though they should right themselves. She held her arms tight around his head and shoulders. His hand smoothed over her back, in a soothing, ceaseless caress.
Dare she hope he felt the same things she felt? Dare she imagine a life with him always and forever?
She was oversentimental because of the moment of passion they’d just shared. She closed her eyes and held him tighter. Afraid that if she let him go now, the moment would forever be gone. Their future forever gone.
He said nothing in the aftermath of their lovemaking. Didn’t ask her to move even after their breathing had evened out.
He just kept at his touch along her spine. Up and down, up and down, until she swore she could fall asleep in his arms. It was a false security.
In two days’ time they’d travel to London.
She’d have her menses shortly thereafter and she’d know if he was going to leave her. There would be no passionate embraces during that time. No scandalous rendezvous in the parlor.
He would either wait patiently … or fulfill his lusty needs elsewhere. It hadn’t escaped her notice that he was a man with daily needs. If he found the arms of another, she’d not accept him back into her bed, or back into her heart. She’d take the money in her trust and leave for good.
Chapter 21
It has taken an age for my confidence to grow. I don’t think I could bear it if you came home now.
“What are we going to do without you?” Grace asked Abby as they hugged.
It was hard for Emma to watch her baby sister leave them. To strike out on her own. But this was obviously something their sister needed to do.
Emma’s hands tightened around her shawl. The train was scheduled to leave in ten minutes. It was too soon.
“You have to promise to write weekly.” Emma pointed her finger in reproach.
It would be strange without Abby’s company.
Abby rolled her eyes. “Stop fussing. You are only going to make me cry more.”
“Well,” Grace said, “it serves you right. Leaving us without any warning. I still say you shouldn’t be staying on with this friend. It’s not right. If word were to get back to London of what you were doing, your suitors might drop off.”
“What suitors? No one cares about me. I’m nothing but a poor relation to two of England’s wealthiest women.”
“Aside from the money you will come into on your twenty-fifth birthday, you know we’ve set aside money for you to settle on a decent marriage,” Emma said.
What else was Emma supposed to do with the money she’d saved from her paintings? She received more pin money than she knew what to do with; add to that the small fortune in selling her paintings and she was indeed a wealthy woman.
Come to think of it, she could support Abby and herself
for the rest of their days on that money. It was a thought to file away for a later date.
The first whistle of the train screeched around them, making Emma jump a little. Their time was drawing to a close too soon. Tears prickled at her eyes.
“Come, give your oldest sister a hug good-bye.” Emma wrapped her arms around Abby.
“I’ll miss you dreadfully,” Abby whispered.
“And I you. If you are bored, or not ready to do what you’ve set out to do, you know you can come home straightaway.”
Abby pulled away and gave her a smile. “I know.”
Abby kissed them both on the cheeks and climbed aboard the train with the help of the attendant. Grace stood beside Emma, wrapping her arm around her waist, and waved at their sister. Once Abby took her seat at the window, she opened it.
“I love you both,” she shouted over the crank of the wheels.
“We love you, too,” Emma called back.
Grace’s waves grew in enthusiasm as tears slid down her cheeks.
Emma waved at Abby and clutched her free hand to the locket about her neck. Is this what it felt like for mothers sending off their daughters?
“Write to us every day,” Grace bellowed as the steam engines roared to life on the train.
“Only if you promise to tell me all about London when I come back.”
The train started rolling on the track.
Abby leaned over from her seat and stuck her head and shoulders out of the window. “I love you two,” she hollered back.
“She would have married sooner or later.” Emma grasped Grace’s gloved hand in her own. “We would have had to let her go eventually.”
“I don’t much like this feeling of letting her go,” Grace confided.
“Neither do I.”
“I had hoped to have a little longer with her.” Grace put her head on Emma’s shoulder and sighed. “We’re all going our own way so suddenly. I never expected this. For things to change so fast in our lives. For us to part so quickly.”
Emma couldn’t agree more. She wrapped her arm around Grace’s shoulders and turned them in the direction of the carriage. They had no time to waste. They were leaving for London come sunrise and there was a lot of packing to do. A wedding to plan for, and a husband she still needed to figure out.
The Seduction of His Wife Page 25
