“How will you know who to choose?” Lucianna said.
“Argel has a niece, Mali. I have spoken with her, and she seems a nice lass, my lady. I have asked her to help me disrobe you. This will give you the opportunity to see if you like her.”
“Very well,” Lucianna replied. “I expect if she pleased you, she will please me too.”
Mali was awaiting them in the new countess’s apartment. She curtsied deeply as Lucianna entered the rooms. She could not have been older than thirteen, Lucianna thought, greeting her. She had a plain, freckled face, and, smiling shyly at her new mistress, she revealed a row of surprisingly perfect front teeth. Her dark brown hair was pulled back, but even so, several recalcitrant strands insisted on sticking out. Aware of them, Mali was forever attempting to put them in order.
Her brown eyes were full of eagerness to please.
Balia began instructing the girl in simple tasks. “Take off my lady’s slippers and stockings,” she instructed her. “Put them aside, and I will show you afterwards where they belong.”
Shyly, Mali set to work to complete her task.
“It was a beautiful day,” Balia remarked. “Your mother would have enjoyed it.”
“Perhaps, but she would have been surprised by all the estate workers asked to join in the festivities,” Lucianna said.
Balia laughed. “I suppose that is true,” she agreed. “She would have been filling your ears with her plans on how to improve everything here, and would have even offered to remain to help you do it.”
“My father might have let her, and then hurried home to Florence by himself,” Lucianna said. “I think it better my mother was not here today. I do not know if Robert could have borne a year with her, for she would have remained here at least that long. Luca will go back to London shortly, though he will still share the London house.”
“What of your youngest sister?” Balia asked. “Would your mother have left her behind? I don’t believe she would have.”
“No, she would not have, but at least I would have had Serena here to amuse me. Perhaps she might have found an English husband too,” Lucianna said thoughtfully.
Mali listened to all this conversation, for it had been spoken in English, and not that funny foreign tongue they sometimes used when they were together. She wondered if she might learn it, but then decided no. There was too much she had to master first to be a good maidservant to her ladyship. Even being second in the new countess’s personal household gave her a certain ranking among the other servants, which she had to admit she would enjoy. Especially with those two boisterous housemaids who had come into service with her from the village. They were noisy lasses, always giggling together and flirting. One of them had gone off this evening with the mistress’s brother. Mali knew it was her quiet demeanor that had recommended her to Balia.
“Where shall I put her ladyship’s shoes?” Mali asked the older woman. She knew that the stockings would go into the laundry.
“You will find racks for them in the wardrobe chamber,” Balia told her. “Then come back, and help me with these skirts.”
Mali did as she was bid, hurrying to put the shoes away.
“She seems biddable,” Lucianna remarked in Italian.
“She is,” Balia answered her in the same tongue. “She is a quiet maid who keeps her own counsel. I did not want a chatterbox or gossip like so many of these other English girls are. And she is clever enough to learn all she must learn quickly. These English winters are difficult. What if I grew ill? You must have someone to care for you besides me. Especially now that you hold rank, my lady. Your husband should appear stingy if you did not have at least two personal servants.”
“Like the king, except with his mother and his wife,” Lucianna said, with a smile. Then she switched back to English. “Robert is everything that is good and kind. I am fortunate.”
“So is he!” Balia replied, with a smile. “Ah, Mali, here you are. Let us get these skirts off my lady. We will need to brush them before they can be stored away.”
Lucianna was soon divested of her wedding finery. She bathed, lightly smiling as Balia instructed Mali to refill the pitcher and see it placed in the hearth to keep warm in the night. The bride noted that her new serving girl shyly kept her eyes from her mistress’s nakedness.
Well, Mali would get used to it in time, Lucianna decided as Balia slipped a silk sleep chemise over her.
“See to the bed, lass!” Balia instructed her junior, indicating that Mali should turn back the coverlet so Lucianna might enter the bed. When it had been done, they helped her settle herself. Then both women curtsied and, bidding their mistress good night, left her.
Lucianna sat quite still. The room was very, very quiet. A small fire burned in the hearth. It was the bedchamber’s only light. One of the bedchamber windows was open a bit, and she heard a night bird begin to sing. The birdsong seemed different here. Her ear was cocked for the sound of his footstep in the hall. When would he come? Her second marriage, her first wedding night, Lucianna thought. What would it be like? What would he be like as a lover? Her mother always had said even an inexperienced woman could tell the difference between a good lover and a poor one. Was that really so, or was it something Orianna had said to reassure her daughters?
She heard a soft click, and he stepped into the chamber through a small door in the wall she had not even noticed, but then she had had no time at all to inspect these new rooms. An involuntary sound of surprise excaped her.
“You did not know there was an entry between our bedchambers?” he said. “I am sorry to have startled you.”
“I had no time to seriously view these new rooms,” she told him. “Balia and her new assistant were in too great a hurry to ready me for bed. Tomorrow I shall walk about and see if there are any more surprises for me.” She saw he was wearing a nightshirt.
“I must thank them,” he teased her gently. Knowing her history, he realized how tense she must be right now. However, he also realized it would do no good to encourage her fear by delaying the inevitable. He pulled the coverlet back and climbed into the bed next to her.
Lucianna stiffened. She didn’t want to, but she could not help it.
“You must not be wary of me, amore mia,” he said quietly. “I am not here to hurt you, and you well know it.”
“Do not, I beg you, make me feel any more foolish than I do,” Lucianna said to him. “Passion is not something I am familiar with, Robert. I have never known it, though I am twenty-two.”
“Yet your kisses tell me there is passion in you,” he responded, and as if to demonstrate, he gave her a long, deep kiss to which Lucianna eagerly responded. “See,” he said as he released her lips.
“Yes,” she agreed, “but then tell me why I feel like such a foolish maid when I am a woman long grown?”
“Yet still a maid,” he said softly. “I think it will be easier between us once your virginity is gone,” he told her.
“Then, my lord, you must relieve me of that impediment so we may be ourselves again,” Lucianna said to him.
Robert Minton laughed. “In time, my pet, in time.” His arms wrapped about her. “Just let me hold you, for the week has been a long and exciting one for us both. Now that you are my sweet wife, we will spend the summer months learning to know each other better, and enjoying the joys that both passion and Wye Court can offer us.”
His words were soothing and comforting to her. Now that the initial moment was over, she was beginning to seriously realize what she had done. She had wed a man who was really barely known to her. She had allowed him to sweep her away to the countryside, and cajole her into a marriage. He did not need her fortune. He might have asked the king’s mother to choose a wife for him, thereby binding him closer to the Tudors. Instead, he had picked the daughter of a Florentine silk merchant to be his countess, and permitted nothing to stand in his way
to have her.
It was flattering, and yet she worried. Her husband seemed an honest man. He claimed he loved her. Love was not a word Lucianna really understood. Love, to her small knowledge, always seemed to lead to tragedy or unhappiness of some kind. Her oldest sister, Bianca, had given up everything for what was called love. She had deserted her family, her church, her city, without a moment’s hesitation to go to a man who already had two wives. Was she truly happy?
And what of her second sister, Francesca, who had first given her girlish heart to a Venetian gentleman who married another. And then that sister had the good fortune to find brief happiness as the Duke of Terreno Boscoso’s duchess. Until a traitorous servant had murdered Francesca’s husband and left her alone to raise their children. She had obviously had enough of marriage, for she refused to take another husband.
Lucianna, the third daughter, had been obedient to her family’s wishes and had wed an elderly man. Alfredo had been her friend, but never her lover, for he simply had not the stamina for it. Once widowed, she had never discussed it with anyone, even her mother. Only Robert, for she had not hesitated to tell him her whole story. He had not made a jest of her late husband’s inabilities, but had simply accepted them. Nor had he attempted to take advantage of her position to seduce her.
He had instead offered his friendship to her when she arrived in England. Introduced her to the king’s mother. Declared his love to her. Swept her away to Hereford, and convinced her to wed him. Her question to him broke the silence of their bedchamber. “Why have you wed me, my lord, when you could have made a more advantageous match for yourself?”
“Because I love you,” he said simply. “I realize love does not play a part in many marriages, but I love you and wanted you as my wife.”
“I do not understand this word in either your tongue or mine,” Lucianna told him.
Raising himself up on an elbow, the earl looked down into his bride’s lovely face. “The mere idea of anyone else claiming you for himself, touching you in an intimate manner, taking you to his bed, can send me into a black rage, Lucianna. From the first moment I set my eyes upon you, I knew that you were mine, and I, yours. Are you then already unhappy to have agreed to be my wife?” His look was very concerned.
“Nay, my lord,” Lucianna quickly assured him, reaching up to stroke his handsome face. “It is a good union between us. We are friends, which I have always believed a necessity in a marriage. Each of us has our own fortune. I know you did not wed me for my wealth, which reassures me that you do care for me and will respect me.”
“But you do not love me yet,” he said.
“I care for you, aye, I do!” she told him earnestly. “I just do not truly understand love.”
“Then I shall have to teach you,” he said with the confidence of a man—a man in love.
Chapter 11
His sensuous mouth was suddenly possessing her own in a deep and passionate kiss. Lucianna wondered if toes actually could curl as she experienced the kiss throughout her entire body. She tingled with the sensation of both his lips and his hard body against her. When he released her briefly, Lucianna pulled her sleep chemise off even as he drew his own up, and, taking both garments, he tossed them to the floor.
She felt a blush warming her cheeks as his blue eyes devoured her naked body.
“God!” he groaned, “You are so very beautiful, my love.” He reached out to caress her gently, and his touch sent a thrill through her.
“How does a man in love feel?” she asked him, honestly curious.
“Like this,” he said, kissing her again, slowly, deeply.
She felt the emotion filling him, the rising need for her as he began to caress her tenderly, but Lucianna pulled away from him. “Is it more than just desire to couple with me, Robert? Is love just passion? Or can it be something else? Remember, there are those who will say, and rightly so, that you have wed beneath you, my lord.” She saw him swallow hard as he struggled to control the lustful emotions that had begun to fill him. What was the matter with her that she was, at this point, asking him to justify himself?
“Stop talking, woman,” he said fiercely. “You are more skittish than a new colt.” He tried to kiss her again. “I adore the very ground you tread, and I do not give a damn that anyone will dare to say I married beneath my station. I love you, Lucianna! And I would make love to you if you would but let me.”
The mixture of frustration, caring, and impatience was so plain on his face that Lucianna could not help but laugh. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I do not understand why it is I need so much reassurance, my lord.”
His hand caressed her red-gold head. He kissed her forehead gently and smiled into her eyes. “Because for all your experience in your father and brother’s world, and despite your previous marriage, you are still a girl, a virgin, and I have overwhelmed you by hurrying you into marriage, Lucianna. But I could not bear the thought of not having you, my beautiful love.” His lips lingered on hers in a kiss that gave truth to his words.
Lucianna slipped her arms about his neck. “My mother will hold Luca responsible for allowing this marriage without her,” she said. “He was supposed to protect me. My father, however, will not be unhappy.”
“We did not run away,” he said, enjoying the sensation of her body against his. “I just did not share my plans with anyone, but then I did not share them with you either. Your father suspected I wanted to wed you. Would your mother have preferred it if I took you as my mistress? I think not. I suspect she will not be unhappy to have her daughter a countess, even if I am an Englishman.” His kiss touched her slender throat.
“Make love to me, Roberto,” she said softly in her Italian tongue. His smile sent her heart soaring. He did love her. She could see it in his blue eyes. She was his wife, his mate until death parted them. And knowing that, Lucianna suddenly realized she was not unhappy or unsure any longer. He was hers, and she, his. As his hand caressed her, she felt herself thrill to his touch. The feeling was gentle, and yet at the same time possessive. She had never imagined such a sensation.
When she had instructed him in her native tongue, it had sent a thrill of excitement through him. It told him, as nothing else could have, that she was ready to be his wife in every way. Her body was exquisite.
It was slender where it should be, and fuller in equal proportion. He could feel his own heart beating wildly with the excitement he felt.
Her skin was like her finest silk, soft and wonderfully smooth. The very sensation of it beneath his fingers set him aflame with his need to complete his possession, but with supreme self-control he proceeded slowly. He was aware that removing a female’s virginity could be both pleasant and difficult at the same time. There was no easy way.
Her lovely round breasts were so tempting. A hand fondled them slowly, enjoying the enticing feel of the alluring flesh. She murmured a sound of pleasure that encouraged him further. Lowering his head, he licked at a nipple several times before taking it into his mouth and suckling upon it. Lucianna groaned low but made no move to stop him.
His mouth on her was arousing. She shivered with the deliciousness of it. The sensations arousing her now moved lower, first to her belly, making it quiver nervously, and then lower to that secret place between her thighs. Then suddenly his other hand moved to cup her there. Lucianna gasped with surprise and tried to pull away. Was she ready for such intimacy?
“Nah, amore mia, let me touch you there,” he murmured in her ear, kissing when his words ceased.
Lucianna said nothing but ceased her retreat. He was her husband. Her body was now his. He would not harm her. A single finger gently stroked several times between her nether lips before pushing between them and finding the most sensitive portion of her flesh. She wanted to resist, but the finger rubbing that nub took away all her resistance. Lucianna found she did not want him to cease. Her body, seemingly of its own volition,
rose up to meet that probing finger as he pushed it gently into her body.
It was very much as he had expected. She was wet and ready for him, but she was also very tight. He considered the size of his own manhood, and as he withdrew the one finger, reinserted two and then after a brief time, three fingers that moved slowly, carefully within her.
By the time the three fingers had entered her, Lucianna was growing quite excited with a feeling she had never experienced. She heard herself moan but one word. “More!” When his big body covered her, she could scarcely contain her excitement. Then she felt his manhood beginning to enter her body. She gasped with surprise. It was nothing at all like his fingers. He was hard, and it was demanding of her as slowly he pushed forward until he almost filled her sensitive sheath. “Santa Anna,” she whispered, “it is so large.”
“Yet it fits you well,” he groaned, moving slightly on her.
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Am I a woman then, Roberto?”
“Not quite,” he told her. “Your virginity is tightly lodged, mia amore. When you are ready, I will have it of you.” Jesú! He was dying to have all of her, but she must be more than willing. She must be eager.
He moved gently within her, stroking her excitement.
The sensation of him was wonderful, Lucianna thought, but there was more. Much more. And she wanted it. She wanted it now. Instinct instructed her. Wrapping her legs about his torso, she whispered fiercely into his ear, “Sí, Roberto! Now! Take me now!”
He thrust hard through the shield of her virginity, wincing at her cry of pain, and now fully lodged, caressing her, soothing her as he began to fuck her slowly at first, increasing his tempo as he felt her eager response. Her nails dug into his shoulders. Her gasps of open pleasure excited him wildly. Then suddenly he could not hold himself back a moment longer. His boiling tribute flooded her.
Lucianna Page 15
