The Mistress of Trevelyan

by Jennifer St Giles

  Taking both of the blooms, I went to my mother’s resting place, looking for the white wooden cross marking her grave. Only it wasn’t there. I swung around, thinking I’d mistaken my way, but I hadn’t. I was exactly where I should be, but…

  Moving closer to the beautifully carved granite head-stone, I looked with disbelieving eyes. There, etched in stone, was my mother’s name. I read the words he must have remembered by heart: Her life was as finite as the earth, but her love reaches beyond the stars. He’d added another line. Beloved and missed by her loving daughter Titania Lovell. Tears filled my eyes and ran unchecked down my cheeks as I knelt near the headstone. Just as Robert had, I took my finger and lovingly traced every letter engraved upon the stone. Then I cried, not from sadness, but from the love bursting inside of me. Only one person on this whole earth had known of my precious wish, and his caring struck me deeply.

  Taking lavender-scented water, I washed myself, scrubbing every part of me to a rosy, tingling awareness. Then, leaving off any undergarments, I put on a soft nightgown, one that I’d yet to wear from my treasured collection of clothes from Mrs. Talbot’s Fashion Emporium. I followed that with my robe and slippers and brushed my long hair to a silky shine. Finally, I was ready. I could no longer deny my love, deny myself the memory of his passion. The grandfather clock struck the eleventh hour. I gathered my lamp and entered the schoolroom.

  My hand trembled as I placed the key in the lock and turned it. The soft click seemed to echo in my mind. After tonight, there would be no going back. I’d chosen, and that choice would forever be etched upon my heart.

  It took only a moment to descend and press open the panel to Benedict’s room. He stood looking out the window of his room, wearing only his trousers, a drink in his hand. He didn’t turn my way, though I knew he heard me. He could see me reflected in the glass. I set down the lamp, slid off my slippers, and slowly untied my robe, letting it fall from my shoulders into a puddle at my feet.

  I watched him watch me. He took a drink, downing what was left in his glass in a single gulp.

  “You should not be here, Titania. I am not strong enough for this, and I do not think you realize what you are asking for. I cannot marry you.”

  “I never thought that you would. I want to be here,” I said.“And I do not want you strong. I want to feel and know your weakness for me, for I have a weakness for you that knows no boundaries, no shame.” Stepping closer, I undid the top button of my gown.

  “I cannot marry any woman,” he said harshly.

  With each step, I let loose another button, until I reached his back. “I am not asking for marriage,” I said softly. “Only to know you.” Then I pressed myself to him, wrapping my arms around him, laying my cheek against his warm, supple skin. He smelled of fresh sandalwood, and his skin was slightly damp, as if he too had just washed. I shut my eyes and breathed deeply several times.

  I knew without a doubt that this was what I wanted, to know this man that my heart ached for, that my body longed for, that my mind fought for, that my spirit sang for.

  “Please,” I whispered softly. “Please do not turn away from me. Do not deny the passion that I never thought would be mine. Give me the gift and pleasure of being in your arms.”

  “Your gift is infinitely more worthy than mine.” He groaned deeply, and his shoulders slumped as if he could no longer bear the weight resting upon him. When he turned to me, there were unshed tears in his eyes.

  “Titania, my midsummer night’s dream,” he whispered. Laying his hands upon my cheeks, he directed my gaze to meet his. Then, holding my gaze captive, he kissed me slowly, with an exquisite gentleness that melted my soul. He spread kisses over my face, and with each brush of his lips, desire fanned hotter. I kissed him back, kissed the indentation in his chin, his bottom lip, and his corded neck. He threaded his fingers into my hair and kissed me harder, his tongue thrusting and seeking mine. I met him eagerly, my hands questing for every treasured nuance of his male body, the supple strength and power of his shoulders and back, the rugged ridges of his chest, the pleasurable intrusion of his hard thigh between my legs.

  Instinct had me clamp my thighs around his, forcing his leg tighter against my femininity, so that when I arched to him, pleasure coursed through the damp flesh that ached to know his touch more intimately than before.

  He pushed my gown down my shoulders, raking the soft cotton over my breasts before they sprang free, more than ready to feed his hunger for me. I stood naked before him as my gown slipped to the floor, but he gave me no time for shyness. Cupping my breasts, he pressed their peaks upward and laved them with his tongue, nipped gently with his teeth, then suckled my sensitive nipples to excruciating points of need.

  “Benedict, please,” I cried out to him, feeling as if I were fevered, on fire, and knew no source to bring me ease.

  He swung me up in his arms and carried me to his bed, where he tossed me in his haste. I bounced once, then my eyes widened with surprise. He didn’t unbutton his trousers; he ripped them open and shucked them down, snatching at the material covering his body until he stood naked, teeming with desire. Every movement, every ripple of his muscles, screamed that his passions were on the brink of exploding out of his control.

  I ran my gaze along the full length of his male arousal, then up the full length of his body to meet his burning gaze. He stood there, both powerful and vulnerable at the same time, for there was a deep question in his eyes.

  “I have not done this since Robert was conceived. I do not know how gentle I can be.”

  I opened my arms to him. “I welcome your passion, Benedict. I do not fear you.”

  He shut his eyes and exhaled as if he’d been holding his breath. He joined me on the bed, his hands trembling as he began exploring my body anew, setting me afire for more of his touch, for another of his kisses. This time he didn’t stop his caresses at my breast; he moved lower, delving gently into my feminine flesh with his fingers. As before, he caressed me there until my hips undulated with the rhythm of his stroke.

  “Titania, forgive me if this hurts, but the pleasure will come twofold if you relax, feel the movement, and move with me rather than fight the magic.”

  “I am ready,” I whispered, but then had to question myself when he slid a finger into me.

  I must have tensed, because he eased his finger out and stroked my most sensitive parts again.

  “Believe me. God made a man and a woman to be together, and everything works beautifully.”

  “Show me,” I said, drawing a deep breath. He urged my legs apart and slid between them. I felt the hard, insistent heat of his arousal press softly against my damp femininity. He angled up on his arms and looked down at me. Trembling with restraint, he slowly pressed into me. Just a little, then he stopped. I held my breath, waiting for something to happen, be it pleasure or pain. He moved a little more, then stopped again. My frustration over the matter built until I could no longer stay silent.

  “Benedict, you are killing me—”

  Groaning in pain, he froze, then tried to move back from me.

  “No,” I moaned, wrapping my arms around him. “You are making me insane with this infernal waiting.” I pressed my hips to his.“Can you not make this happen any faster? I feel as if I am burning alive, and you’ve no water to douse my fire.”

  He blinked, groaned as if his agony knew no end, and then kissed me more deeply than before. I’d broken through his restraining wall, and his passion flowed over me. He pushed himself all the way within me in one thrust. I felt a burst of pain, then a burning that, when he thrust again, began to tingle with pleasure.

  I opened my legs wider, wanting to feel more of him against me as his thrusts grew more and more insistent, until my body arched to meet his every move. My heart thundered, my blood rushed, and an ever-tightening need coiled in my loins.

  “Ride with me,” he demanded. “Feel me. Let yourself go with me.”

  I remembered our ride, the racing excitem
ent, the freedom, and I shut my eyes, giving myself over completely to him and the frenzy consuming our passions. His body tightened, shuddered, and he pressed deeper. The force of his thrust lifted my hips high, and he slid his hand between our bodies, brushing over me just where I ached the most. Pleasure burst within me and went flooding through my body. I shuddered uncontrollably, totally at his mercy. But he was unmerciful. He thrust hard again, lifting my hips higher, pressing my head and shoulders deeper into the bed. Again his hand brushed insistently against my flesh as if he knew some magical place to touch me. Then an even greater pleasure tore through me, ripping apart my world with unimaginable sweet, agonizing pleasure. Stars exploded before my eyes, and his name exploded from my lips. I groaned softly as wave after wave of exquisite heaven washed over me. I was a mere grain of sand upon the shore of an ocean of pleasure, and Benedict was the tide of that new world.

  20

  “Titania,” Benedict breathed as he lowered his lips to mine. He kissed me so softly that tears sprang to my eyes. His tenderness in the wake of the passion we’d just shared touched my heart with a sweetness I had never known. I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him closer to me, wanting to feel his heart as intimately against mine as I felt his arousal within me, but he held himself back.

  “Let me hold you closer,” I said.

  “I will hurt you.” His arms trembled with the strain of holding his full weight from me.

  “I assure you, my constitution is not so fragile.” I wrapped my arms tight about his neck and pulled hard. His arms gave away, and his full weight pressed me deeper into the bed. My breath flew from my lungs, and the immediate sensation of being close to him changed to one of being buried beneath the largest pile of laundry I’d ever known. I squirmed a little, trying to adjust, but couldn’t seem to draw enough air into my lungs to function.

  “Perhaps I was… a bit hasty in my estimation of my… constitution.”

  His chest shook with laughter before, in a lightning-quick movement, he was on his back, with me on top of him, and him still inside me. I placed my palms on his chest, lifting myself enough to see his smile.

  “I find your constitution extremely pleasing,” he said. His hands slid down my back, and when he reached my bottom, he quite shockingly cupped my rear end and firmly pressed me against him. Then he continued to caress my bottom and the top of my thighs, evoking a rather disturbing response. The need that I thought he’d satisfied well enough to last me to eternity heated again. “Do you know why?” he asked.

  I shook my head, staring at him, not trusting my voice to work. He paused, and his eyes darkened as he seemed to realize how important his response was to me.

  “Let me show you.” Hooking his hands around my thighs, he urged me to bend my knees to his hips. Then he eased my shoulders back from him until I sat upright upon him. Without his body pressed to me, hiding my nakedness, a sense of vulnerability stole through me. I felt unsure until I saw the hungry look in his dark eyes. He arched a little, seating himself deeper inside me, and an increasing pressure told me he was more aroused as well.

  “Besides the fact that you’re are woman to my man, an irreplaceable and infinitely gratifying fact”—he threaded his fingers through my hair, arranging the long tresses over my breasts and shoulders—“your hair is like silk between my fingers, soft and minklike in color, especially in the sun. Many times since that first day when I checked you for an injury, I have closed my eyes and imagined threading my fingers through your hair again.

  “Your eyes are the color of the early-morning mists upon the bay that I see from my window, and the sailor in me cannot help but want to explore deeper.”

  He brushed my hair aside and cupped my breasts, making me gasp with pleasure.“You have a fullness to your body that adds grace and stature to your height, which is a more perfect fit to me than any woman I have ever met. I can touch you without fearing that you will break.” Urging me forward, he leaned up and suckled one breast, bringing it to an aching peak as his fingers did the same with my other breast.“You respond to my desire with the heat of a blazing fire. In fact, I have lived so long in the cold, I had forgotten how good a fire can be.”

  I sighed, arching to him as his thumbs relentlessly brushed over the peaks of my breasts until my hips responded to his every touch. He pressed upward to the rhythm of his strokes. Not deep and thrusting like before, just a slight rock that left me aching for more.

  Understanding his words was becoming fearfully difficult. Inside me, the tension felt like a gathering storm.

  He placed his hand over my heart. “You have a giving heart that knows no end to what it will battle for another.

  “You have a mind that captured my interest with your first words and continues to pull me ever deeper into its complexities. And you have a mouth that inflames me not only when you are lecturing, but when you are silent as well.” He lifted his finger to my lips and slid it inside my mouth, searching until my tongue brushed against his fingertip. A stab of pleasure darted all the way to my toes then back to my femininity, which he filled so completely.

  “But it is your passion, Titania, that enslaves me and fires my imagination with the thousands of ways to bring pleasure to us both.” He drew a wet line down the center of my body with his damp finger, and he didn’t stop until he found that very sensitive flesh so near where our bodies joined.

  Thousands? I wondered for a moment, but my body wanted nothing more than to lose myself within his. I vibrated with his every stroke, rocking gently, hearing the music of our lovemaking in the rushing of my blood. And he was a master caught within his own tune, because he arched off the bed like a string wound too tight, plucked too hard. This time the heaven and the stars slammed into me with the force of a runaway train, knocking the very breath from me. I fell against him, too weak to move, and he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me close.

  “Whatever are we going to do?” he whispered.

  Guilt tried to reach out and pull me from his arms, but I turned my back on it, refusing to let this moment of happiness escape me.“Thousands?” I asked, not capable of saying more. I fell asleep, listening to his soft sigh.

  It was still dark outside when I awoke to Benedict’s kiss upon my neck and his hands cupping my breasts. I lay on my side with him pressed against my back. Moaning softly, I arched my back and felt the heated hardness of his arousal against my bottom.

  He slid his hand down my stomach and cupped my feminine flesh. I was surprised to feel a slight soreness there, but the brush of his finger upon that place he seemed to find so easily overrode my senses with pleasure. “Titania,” he whispered in my ear, his voice deep and rough with sleep and desire. “We should not be here. We should not be together, but I cannot let you go. Will you come to me again? Tonight?”

  I knew he spoke true. I never should have crossed the threshold of his bedroom door, but I had to know him, just as I had to love him. Just as I loved Robert and Justin. Just as my heart thirsted for more of life than I had. I wasn’t ready to let go of him. I wanted more than one night to remember.

  “Tonight will you let me show you more pleasure?”

  “Now,” I urged, wiggling against him.

  He sighed, then chuckled. “I fear you’re going to be the death of me, woman. Or I of you. You need to rest some, or you will be too sore. But I want you to think about me pleasuring you. I want you to think about my kiss, my touch. I want you to think about me being inside you, filling your every desire. I want you to think about that all day.”

  Shifting my hip, I pressed against his hand, wanting more of his touch, feeling a little out of sorts.“Why ever did you get me so… so… expectant if I have to wait?”

  “It is part of the fun,” he said. Rolling from me, he patted my bottom lightly. “Now let’s get you back to your room before we become fodder for the servants’ gossip.”

  “More like torture than fun,” I muttered, frowning at him as I sat up, clutching the sheet over my breas
ts. I stared at him with irritation as I watched him dress. His every muscle rippled with power as he moved. I couldn’t help but notice how he filled everything. His trousers stretched taut across his buttocks and thighs, and his arousal made its own impression against the buttons. His shirt covered the breadth of his chest and shoulders like another skin; its tailored cut conformed to his every contour. His presence within a room seemed to take up any empty space, so that no matter which way I turned, I was aware of him there. Yes, the man filled everything to completion, but nothing more so than me. Tonight was an interminable time away. “Does that mean you are not running away on your business trip today?”

  He turned to look at me, raising an eyebrow that said I’d best tread carefully. Then he sauntered to the bed and, with a devilish gleam in his eye, took hold of the sheet, snatching it away. His bold gaze roaming over my nakedness had me tingling everywhere. “No, I am not leaving. I am of the mind to delay that trip for a while and deal with the complexities here.” He took another look at my “complexities.” “And you, my dear, are seconds away from being completely ravaged this morning. But if you do not mind Dobbs walking in on that tableau, then…” He started unbuttoning his shirt.

  “Dobbs?” I squeaked, scrambling from the bed.“Where’s my nightgown?”

  “Here,” Benedict said, chuckling. Instead of handing me the gown, he put it on over my head, holding the sleeves out as I dressed, and then buttoned it up. He did the same with my robe and slippers, showing a gentle care in his every move. Taking up my lamp, he opened the door to the secret passage and led me to my room. Once there, he set the lamp down and pulled me into his arms, hugging me close to him. After a moment he stepped back, and with one hand on each of my cheeks, he gazed into my eyes. I saw so many things within the dark depth of his eyes that I wondered why I ever thought a woman would never be able to see his soul, because at that moment I did. I saw the soul of a man so needy that my heart ached for him, a man who’d stood alone so long that he no longer knew how to share the burdens he carried. I felt as if those burdens were going to suddenly descend and rip him away from me, for I could see the guilt lingering in his gaze, just as it lingered in my heart. But I refused to give it purchase on this moment of my life.