“Our children would be the grandchildren of a duke and an earl. When one of the Wilson sisters can marry a titled lord and be accepted anywhere, your argument fails. We’d live in Cumbria, where the only ones to pass judgment would be the sheep climbing the fells. I’d give you as many children as you wanted, and we’d suit, Maggie Windham. We’d suit admirably.”
He was an educated, resourceful man, but just a man. Words were not winning the fair maid, and while he’d been prepared to work for her capitulation, he was not ready for her to wall herself off in specious arguments and stubborn silence.
He kissed her. He put all of his longing into the kiss, all of his determination to keep her safe and fight her battles for her. When she was sighing into his mouth and her hands were clinging to his biceps, he forced himself to pause, lest he be consummating unspoken vows on the carriage bench.
“You must not…” She drew in a slow, deep breath, their mouths an inch apart. “You cannot ravish my reason, Benjamin. I am discharging you, and we will be cordial acquaintances from this day forward.”
She dropped her forehead to his, her fingers circling his wrist where his hand cradled her jaw.
A tactical retreat might be in order, but he was not going to be easily discouraged.
“I will serenade you from the street, Maggie Windham. I will be so callow, you will marry me to save me from embarrassment.”
She smiled at his flummery. “Take me riding, and then let us part on a happier note.”
He shifted to bring his arm around her shoulders and urge her against his side. “I brought a picnic as well. Surely a disappointed suitor is entitled to a consolation meal?”
Her head rested on his shoulder, a cozy, comfortable posture that did nothing to still the hammering of his heart in his chest—and that after a single kiss.
She smiled and did not sit up. “If we ride the way I want to, we’ll need the sustenance. Tell me some more about your sisters.”
He told her. As they saddled up and rode the pretty lanes of Richmond, he babbled. He found himself recalling memories of his siblings from before their lives had been blighted by the assault of one and the physical injury to the other. He described Blessings in all its great, bucolic splendor, and he listened to Maggie wax just as eloquent about the Morelands estate in Kent.
When they handed off the horses to the groom a long hour later, the footmen had already spread the blankets and set out the picnic basket in a secluded copse along a path well away from the lanes.
In all their rambles, Hazlit had seen only one stately old town coach lumbering along, two footmen up behind, a coachman and groom in front. And still the weather held warm and fair, which could only bode well for his next bid to gain Maggie Windham’s hand—and to keep her safe.
***
It was a gorgeous day, the breeze soft and fragrant with the scent of blooming flowers and greening trees.
Maggie glanced around at the park in all its early spring beauty—for the day was genuinely an exponent of early spring—took a lungful of fresh air, and told herself it was the perfect day for a broken heart.
As a girl, she’d dreamed of one day having a husband and children, a home of her own and a family of her own—a real family. It was the same mundane dream every girl from good family felt entitled to have, and it was a wonderful dream.
And then she’d made her come out and shortly thereafter realized that if the family she already had was to be safe from social and financial harm, that simple, solid, mundane dream was not to be hers—not ever.
Benjamin, the Earl of Hazelton, had asked for her hand in marriage, and it hurt with the sweet, piercing ache of a wish that would never come true—a wish so dear she’d been unwilling to admit to herself she still held it in her heart.
A husband she could respect and care for, children, a beautiful estate far from gossip and intrigue, passion such as she’d only glimpsed recently, and the illusion of safety and peace.
For it would be only an illusion. When Bridget’s first letter found her, the illusion would crack. When Maggie’s pin money went missing month after month, the cracks would start radiating through her happiness; when Benjamin put the pieces of the puzzle together, the dream would shatter altogether.
“Chicken or roasted beef?” Benjamin knelt by a huge wicker hamper, rummaging in its depth as he spoke. “This is a momentous decision, as it determines which bottle of wine I open first. And we’ve forced strawberries.” He glanced up at her. “I will wrestle you for the strawberries, be warned.”
He went on like that, teasing with a grave face, feeding her all but three of those strawberries, and plying her with a fruity, sweet white wine between every bite of chicken. When the meal was finished, Maggie realized the coach was gone, taking grooms, footmen, and horses with it.
“I’m alone with you, Benjamin, and you’ve been suspiciously charming for the past hour. What are you about?”
“I’m not sure.” He started repacking the hamper. “Enjoying the condemned man’s last meal, maybe. Why won’t you marry me, Maggie? The real reason, not the polite excuse.”
Because he was pretending to be busy with the plates and bottles and glasses, Maggie had a moment to study him. As he efficiently put away the detritus of their meal, she knew he was listening to her, even watching her.
She could not offer him explanations, and after today, gentleman that he was, he’d not ask for them. He’d resume his busy life, one foot in an earldom, another in the shadows of Mayfair, missing his home, fretting over his sisters, and politely nodding at Maggie Windham on the street.
The ache in her throat that had started with his proposal threatened to choke her.
“Will you kiss me good-bye, Benjamin?”
He sat back on his heels, the last bottle of wine in his hand, his shirt sleeves luffing gently in the spring breeze. Without answering, he put the bottle in the hamper and closed the wicker flaps. He met her gaze, his eyes a peculiar amber hue in the dappled shade. “Yes. I will kiss you, Maggie Windham.”
He crawled the few feet across the blanket, looking like some dark jungle cat on the scent of prey. Maggie sat, knees drawn to her chest, until Benjamin was nose to nose with her.
And then he was on her, literally and figuratively. She was on her back, his body caging hers, his mouth a force of nature against her own. This wasn’t like any kiss they’d shared before; it wasn’t like any kiss she might have imagined.
This was a pillaging, plundering kiss. A kiss that drew the passion right up through her body and had her clinging to him without thought. Desire, hot and needy, roared to life in her vitals.
“Benjamin…” She held his head still with her hand fisted in his hair and drew on the tongue he’d sent raiding secrets from her mouth.
“Don’t think, Maggie. Just kiss me.” His hand closed over her breast, and Maggie arched up into the pleasure he gave her. This was wrong, dangerous, stupid… and necessary to the survival of her soul. She kissed him with everything in her, kissed him against years—more years—of isolation and despair. Kissed him as if he were her last hope of passion—because he was.
She felt her skirts drifting up against her legs. She was about to whisper at him to hurry when he lifted himself away from her.
“Where are you—?”
He sat back not even a foot from her side and, still holding her gaze, undid the falls of his riding breeches. “I will not take from you what only a husband should accept, but by God, Maggie Windham, I will make you rethink your refusal of me.”
He tossed back her skirts and crouched over her. “Stop me now, Maggie, or let me give you the pleasure you deserve.”
Her eyes went to the place where his clothing was undone. She wanted to see him, to touch the part of him a wife might touch, to know the intimate scent and feel of him.
She lay on her back, knees drawn up, drawers exposed to the pretty day and to Benjamin Hazlit’s hot gaze. “I wouldn’t stop you if I could, Benjamin. This once, I want
… I want you.”
“Not all of me.” His fingers went to the tapes of her drawers. “I won’t ruin you, Maggie, though you have certainly ruined me.”
And then with a lift of her hips, her drawers were off. He balled them up and tossed them to a corner of the blanket, and before Maggie could slap her knees closed, his hand was trailing down her thigh.
“I’m going to look, Maggie, and I’m going to touch, and you’re going to let me.”
He already was looking, staring at flesh Maggie herself had never seen and rarely touched with her own fingers.
“God above, you are gorgeous.”
His thumb traced over her mons. She closed her eyes and memorized the sensation. All the frantic need of the previous few minutes drained down into the place he was touching, coalescing into a slow, throbbing ache.
“Your hair is a shade darker here. Do you like this?” The question was almost conversational as he drew his fingers through her curls, slowly, repeatedly. “Or maybe you prefer a more intimate approach.”
He shifted his touch, parting folds of flesh in slow caresses. Sensation, hot and shivery at once, rippled up Maggie’s body. She arched toward him, need and frustration overcoming any pretense of self-control.
“I wish I could get you naked,” he said, staring at her sex. “I want to see your breasts, want to put my hands and mouth on you, want to feel you naked and half mad with passion beneath me.”
His voice had dropped to the register of passion, of darkness and pleasure. Maggie shifted on the blanket, the confinement of her clothing a form of torture.
He did something with his hands—used both of them to hold her intimate flesh and stroke over it at the same time. The sensation was exquisite and unbearably arousing.
“You must not.” She wrapped her fingers around his wrist, trying to communicate desperation with her grip. “I cannot bear this.”
“Shall I kiss you instead?”
For one dumbstruck moment she thought he meant to kiss her there, but then he was shifting over her, working one arm beneath her neck as he settled some of his weight on her.
“Gracious, merciful…” His weight was exactly what her body had been craving. She lifted her hips against him, feeling the hard column of his erect flesh pressing down against her pelvis. It helped, even as it increased her frustration.
He braced himself on his elbows. “Not like that.” With one hand, he rearranged billows of skirts and petticoats, and also his own clothing. “Like this, God help me.”
Ah, God.
They were flesh against flesh, the hot length of him so close to where Maggie wanted him. He’d said he would not ruin her, but why on earth not? There would be no other lovers, not ever, no one to know, no one to care…
“Please, Benjamin… I want…” There in the bright sunshine and the warm, promising air of spring, she wanted, and wanted, and wanted.
He said nothing, but hitched his body against hers. “Lift your hips. Move with me.” His voice was a guttural rasp near her ear. As he spoke, his erection slid over the damp folds of her sex.
“But that’s not—”
He shut her up with a kiss then paused, his mouth hovering a half inch away. “Move with me.”
He did it again, used the hot length of his cock to stroke at her sex. Maggie experimentally tilted her hips, bringing the pressure closer to where she craved him. His pace was maddeningly slow, but it allowed her to find just the angle she needed.
“Better?” He’d gotten his arm under her neck again, supporting the back of her head in his palm as Maggie curled up to him. For her part, she slid a hand down his back, under his breeches to the firm, smooth flesh of his buttocks.
“Not… enough.”
He gave her more of his weight, so the drag of flesh against flesh began to drive Maggie toward the dark maelstrom of pleasure he’d shown her once before. She pressed her open mouth to his throat, a low keening emerging as her body grew clamorous for satisfaction.
“Don’t rush it.” If anything, he slowed down.
Maggie seized the moment. At the precise instant he was shifting the direction of his stroke, she tilted her hips just one inch higher, so he slid home in one sweet, burning thrust of pleasure.
Six
“Jesus God in heaven, Maggie… We can’t…” He went still then started to withdraw.
“No.” Maggie sank her nails into the flesh of his buttocks, more determined on this than on anything previous in her life. “Don’t leave me. What’s done is done, and I want… I want so much…”
She wanted to weep and to draw him so deeply into her body a part of him would always remain with her. She wanted to make wild promises that would only doom him to sharing her unhappiness; she wanted to bear his children and watch them grow up on that distant, beautiful estate in Cumbria.
For long moments, while Maggie mourned the dreams of a girl who’d grown into a lonely, despairing woman, Benjamin did not move. She stroked her hand down his back, desperate to keep him close.
“Please, Benjamin. This is all I will ever ask of you.” It was all she would ever dare to ask of him.
His whole body underwent some subtle change, became more supple and somehow closer to her. “It shall be as you wish.”
He moved inside her, and the beauty of it robbed Maggie of speech. To be so close, to be held like this, desired, treasured… cherished bodily. Every part of him was attuned to every part of her, listening for her pleasure, listening and straining to please her.
She knew this, felt it physically and emotionally and even spiritually. And now, now when her body was lifting effortlessly toward the pleasure he’d shower on her, she wanted him to slow down, to draw out this singular experience for her, for them both.
He wasn’t hurrying, but she was. With each slow, glorious penetration of her body, she hastened toward fulfillment. Her breath shortened, her hold on him became desperate, and she became frantic until pleasure cascaded over her in convulsions so intense she lost awareness of all save the man in her arms and in her very body.
When the storm subsided, she was pressed so tightly to him her stomach hurt with the effort and tears clogged the back of her throat. She could feel him hilted in her body, still rigid with arousal, a comfort and a source of renewed longing even as she tried to regain control over her breathing.
“Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head and kissed his jaw. He sighed, his body solid and warm above her. Without thinking, she moved her hips in a languid roll, only to blink up at him as he withdrew entirely.
She felt it as a shock, a grief, reverberating from her womb to her mind to her soul.
“Any more of that, my lady, and this will truly be irrevocable.” He was braced above her, staring down at her intently. He hadn’t spent in her body. Even in her inexperience, she understood that, and he wanted to spend now. She wrapped one hand around the back of his neck, levered up on her elbow, and kissed him.
His return fire was ravenous, though he needed one hand to brace himself above her and used the other to stroke himself. She could feel the slight, rhythmic movement of his hand between them, feel the tension coiling more and more tightly as his moment approached. She wanted to bat his hand aside and impale herself on him, to share his pleasure as he’d shared hers, but then he was groaning softly against her mouth as his hand went still, and a wet warmth struck Maggie’s belly.
He hung over her, breathing hard while Maggie subsided to her back. While she heard him fussing with clothing, her own passion ebbed, leaving a hollow ache in its place. She was casting around mentally, wondering what there was to say at such a time when she felt him dabbing at her belly with a handkerchief then rearranging her skirts to some semblance of modesty.
“We are going to talk, Maggie Windham.”
His tone was truculent—unhappy—as he shifted to sit next to where she lay. She rolled to her side, giving him her back. When she would have shared with him her dim view of the benefit of conversa
tion, his hand landed on her hair. “You’re all undone, my girl. Best sit up and take your medicine.”
He sounded a little less unhappy but still brusque. Maggie wrestled skirts and a dragging fatigue to sit cross-legged beside him on the blanket. He produced a pocket comb and had his dark locks put to rights in a thrice, dratted man.
“Say something, my dear, or I will think you have sense enough to regret what just happened on this blanket.” He started to work on her hair while she tried to think of an appropriate reply.
“I don’t want to fight with you,” she said, plucking at the grass beside the blanket. “And I do not regret what happened.”
“No.” His hands were gentle as he drew her unbound hair over her shoulders. “But you’ll regret what will happen now.”
She tried to twist around to see him, but he had her by the hair. “What will happen?”
He dropped her hair. “This is my handkerchief, Maggie Windham. My formerly snow-white handkerchief.” He tossed it over her shoulder so it landed in her lap. At first she didn’t see anything except that the thing had been crumpled with recent use, then her eye caught the one faint pink streak cutting across the fabric. She smoothed out the little formerly snow-white square to see a few more streaks of pink.
“This means nothing.” She lobbed the offending linen back over her shoulder. “Not one blessed thing. What happened here was of no moment whatsoever.”
“I beg to differ. Hold still.” He used the comb to restore her part, while Maggie could do nothing but allow him. “When a man has proposed to you and then gains intimate knowledge of your person—and he is the first to have such knowledge, I might add—you are accepting his proposal.”
She was glad to be facing away from him, for the pain his words caused was stunning. “I was doing no such thing.”
“Maggie.” He bent over her from behind, speaking very softly while he held her by the shoulders. “I did not spend inside you, but you might have conceived nonetheless. Do you want our first child to be a seven-months babe?”
Lady Maggie's Secret Scandal Page 17
