All About Passion

by Stephanie Laurens

  He stood before the windows as the moon traversed the sky. When he finally turned inside, lowered the lamp wick and blew out the flame, then crossed the dark room to the door, one question—only one—echoed in his mind.

  How much of a coward was he?

  Four days later, Francesca cracked open the second door to the library and peeked in. The second door lay down a side corridor, out of sight of the main door and the footmen in the front hall. If they saw her approaching any door, they would instantly fling it wide—in this instance, the opposite of what she wished.

  Gyles was not at his desk. It stood directly across the room. The chair behind it was empty, but books lay open, scattered across the desktop.

  Francesca eased the door farther open and scanned the room. No tall figure stood by the long windows, nor yet by the shelves.

  Swiftly, she entered and quietly shut the door. Moving to the nearest corner, she started along the bookshelves, scanning the titles.

  Her caution had nothing to do with her search—she wasn’t engaged in any reprehensible act. But she wanted to avoid any unnecessary encounter with Gyles. If he didn’t want her in his life, so be it—she was too proud to beg. Since the evening he’d elected to spend his after-dinner hours separate from her, she’d ensured she made no demands on his time beyond the absolutely necessary.

  He still came to her bed and her arms every night, but that was different. Neither she nor he would allow what occurred between them outside her bedchamber to interfere with what lay between them inside it.

  On that, at least, they were as one.

  She hadn’t been back to the Dower House. While she would have liked to indulge in the comfort and support of her mother-in-law and aunt-in-law, the first question they would ask was how she was getting on, meaning getting on with her husband.

  She didn’t know how to answer, couldn’t conceive how to explain or make sense of it. His rejection—how else was she to interpret it?—had been a blow, yet, stubbornly, she refused to give up hope. Not while he continued to come to her every night—not while, during the day, she would catch him watching her, a frown, not one of displeasure but of uncertainty, in his grey eyes.

  No—she hadn’t lost hope, but she’d learned not to prod. Henni had definitely been right about that. He was a latent tyrant; tyrants did not appreciate being dictated to. She had to let him find his own road, and pray it was one that led to her desired destination.

  Such patience did not come easily. She had to distract herself. Remembering her intention to find the old Bible and copy the family tree therein, she’d asked Irving about the book; he believed the Bible, a huge old tome, was in the library. Somewhere amid the thousands of other old tomes. All Irving could recall was that it was covered in red leather with a spine nearly six inches wide.

  Minutes ticked by. Half an hour elapsed as she circled the huge room. It would have taken longer, but there were few books that large on the shelves. Indeed, there was no book that large on the main shelves. Which left the shelves in the gallery.

  Built over the side corridor from which she’d entered, the gallery was fully walled rather than railed. From a corner of the main room, a set of spiral stairs led up to an archway; stepping through, Francesca looked down the narrow room lined with floor-to-ceiling bookcases. All filled. Halfway down the room, a floor-to-ceiling partition, also covered in shelves, jutted across the room, dividing it roughly in half, leaving only a door-sized gap on one side.

  The earl of Chillingworth possessed too many books. Ignoring the crick in her neck, Francesca circled the room, searching for an extralarge tome in red leather. The first room had no window; the only light came slanting through from the long windows in the other half of the gallery. She had to squint to check the titles of the few large red books she found.

  None of them was the Bible.

  Finishing with the first room, she stepped through the doorway into the other half of the gallery. Momentarily dazzled by the sunshine streaming in, she halted, blinking.

  The silhouetted shape she’d thought some odd form of library ladder resolved into her husband sitting in a large wing chair with his long legs stretched out before him.

  She gave a start, quelled it. “I’m sorry—I didn’t know you were here.” She heard the defensive note in her voice. She turned. “Pray excuse me. I’ll leave you.”

  “No.”

  She took an instant to consider his tone—absolute command laced with an underlying hesitancy—then she swung back to face him.

  His expression was impassive. “You weren’t in England at the time of the Peterloo Riot, were you?”

  “The riot in Manchester?” He nodded; she shook her head. “We heard about it sometime after—most mentioned it as a regrettable occurrence.”

  “Indeed.” Half-rising, he tugged a chair close to his; with the paper he held in his hand, he waved her to it. “Sit down and read this, and tell me what you think of it.”

  She hesitated, then crossed the small room. Sinking onto the chair, she accepted the paper, some sort of formal declaration. “What is this?”

  “Read it.” He sat back. “You’re the nearest thing to an unbiased observer, one who only knows the facts without the emotions that, at the time and subsequently, have colored discussions in England.”

  She glanced at him, then dutifully read. By the time she reached the document’s end, she was frowning. “This seems—well, illogical. I can’t see how they can claim such things, or make such assertions.”

  “Precisely.” He took back the paper. “This is supposed to be an argument against repealing the Corn Laws.”

  Francesca hesitated, then quietly asked, “Are you for, or against?”

  He shot her a dark look. “For, of course. The damned bill should never have been enacted. A lot of us argued against it at the time, but it went through. Now we have to get it repealed before the country crumbles.”

  “You’re a major landowner—aren’t the Corn Laws to your advantage?”

  “If the only measure used is immediate financial gain, then yes. However, the overall effect on large estates, such as mine, or Devil’s, or a whole host of others, is negative, because of the social costs.”

  “So your principal argument for repealing the bill is a financial one?”

  “For the Lords, the financial arguments must be strong, but to my mind, the other arguments are stronger. Having legal title to their estates didn’t save the French aristocracy. Those who won’t see that, who refuse to see that times have changed and that the populace in general has rights, too, are denying a self-evident truth.”

  “Is this what you’ve been researching—how to repeal the Corn Laws?”

  “That and a number of related issues. Reformation of the voting franchise is the key, but we’re years away from getting anything passed.”

  “What’s this idea about voting? Tell me.”

  “Well—”

  He explained, and she questioned. A spirited discussion arose over the extent of the franchise necessary to satisfy the inherent demand from the presently unenfranchised.

  Gyles was surprised to see the sun slanting low, surprised to realize they’d been talking for hours. Although her experience was foreign, she, too, had seen the need for wider suffrage, for establishing a broader common goal.

  “Waterloo was the end of it—the point where everything became clear. We’ve been distracted with the French for over two decades and not paying enough attention at home. Now there’s no war to bind us together, to keep people and government acting as one, the social fabric’s starting to unravel.”

  “And so things must change.” Francesca nodded. She’d risen and started pacing sometime before.

  “Times change.” Gyles watched her parade before him. “And the survivors will always be those who adapt.”

  That was a truism and applied in many circumstances, in many arenas.

  She nodded and paced, her expression alive with intelligence and her own intri
nsic energy. He couldn’t escape the obvious—that with her beauty, understanding, and vitality, he couldn’t have found a more suitable wife to partner and support him in the political sphere. That had been the consideration furthest from his mind in arranging his marriage, yet how very important it would indeed be. If he took her to London, she would become one of the political hostesses, socially adept, quick-witted, and manipulative—all in the best interests of their cause.

  He knew she had the power to manipulate men—that she knew how just as she knew how to breathe, knew how to make love with him. But she’d never made the mistake of trying to manipulate him, not even in these last days when he would almost think her justified.

  For one of her temperament, that couldn’t have been easy.

  Times change.

  And those who wish to survive adapt.

  She swished past him and turned. He reached out and curled his fingers about her wrist, locked them. Surprised, she looked down at him.

  He met her eyes. “We’ve discussed politics enough . . . for the present. I have something else I’d like to discuss with you. Another matter on which I’d value your opinion.”

  His gaze locked with hers, he lifted the papers from his lap and dropped them beside his chair. Rising, he stood beside her, and with his free hand gripped the high back of the chair and pushed it around until it faced the windows. He stepped around it and sat, drew her closer, drew her down. She let him sit her across his lap, facing him.

  Her neckline was cut wide and scooped but modestly filled in with diaphanous gauze, opening shirtlike from the point between her breasts to fold back in an open collar. Closing his hands about her waist, he bent his head and touched the tip of his tongue to the bare skin at the top of her cleavage, then he stroked slowly upward, nudging her head back, feeling her shudder between his hands as he set his lips like a brand to the base of her throat.

  She was his, so totally, unquestioningly his, he was starting to believe he must be hers.

  Within seconds the atmosphere in the small room changed from the politically charged to the intensely passionate.

  Intensely erotic.

  That was his idea, one she fell in with eagerly, searching his face only briefly before complying with his command to turn and face the windows. He lifted her slightly, settled her bottom on his thighs, then, sitting upright, his chest not quite touching her back, he bent his head and trailed his lips up the column of her throat from the curve of her shoulder to the sensitive spot beneath her ear. “Place your hands on the arms of the chair.”

  Without hesitation, she did. He glanced up, out of the window. “See that large oak—the one directly in front?”

  Her head rose and she looked, then nodded.

  “I want you to watch the top branches. Don’t look away. Don’t think of anything else. Just think of those branches.” Releasing her waist, he trailed his fingertips—just the tips—up and around to tantalizingly trace her breasts. Her spine locked. “Concentrate on the branches.”

  She shifted slightly. “But . . . they’re bare.”

  “Hmm. There’s one or two leaves yet to fall.”

  He didn’t touch so much as tease. One hand administering to each ripe mound, he watched from over her shoulder as he mirrored the movements of his hands, circling but never touching the tightening peaks, his fingertips whispering over the fine fabric as he enticed her body to respond, to react.

  Her breasts swelled and firmed. He could see her tightly furled nipples taut beneath the restricting bodice. She shifted in his lap.

  “Are you concentrating on those branches?”

  “Mmm. Gyles—”

  “Think of how bare they are.”

  How bare she wished to be; he didn’t need telling, but that wasn’t in his rapidly yet expertly designed script for this afternoon. Gently, he cupped her breasts, tested their firmness, then he took his palms from her. “Totally naked.” Using only his fingertips, he closed them about her nipples, gently at first, then with increasing pressure. She gasped, and tilted her head back. “Totally exposed.”

  He squeezed, and her back bowed, then he released her and returned to his gently teasing touches.

  “Keep watching the branches.”

  He repeated the torture—she was a very willing victim—until she was breathing rapidly, shallowly, and her skin was lightly flushed. She slumped against him, tipping her head back to look into his face.

  She searched his eyes. “I want you inside me.”

  “I know.”

  “Well?” There was more than a hint of imperiousness in her tone.

  His lips curved. “Raise up for a moment.”

  Her legs had remained to one side of his; bracing her weight on the chair arms, she rose just a little. He drew up the back of her skirt, lifted it and her petticoat and the back of her silk chemise to him, then slipped his hands beneath the froth of materials. Setting his palms to her naked bottom, he briefly gloried in the firm contours, satisfied to find her silky skin lightly dewed. Then, grasping her hip with one hand, he sent the other sliding between the backs of her thighs to gently cup her.

  She gasped; her arms wobbled. He drew her down. She gasped again as her weight pressed her into his hand, fully exposed to his touch.

  Francesca sensed the strength in his hand, felt his long fingers trace. Heart thundering, she wriggled, then shifted one leg to swing it over his and open herself to him, to his tantalizing touches.

  “No. Sit as you were—demurely.”

  Demurely? She was finding it difficult to breathe. Both his hands were under her skirts, one splayed across her stomach, gently kneading, while the other touched her intimately, explored her.

  She could feel the slickness, feel how hot and swollen she was. Her naked thighs and bottom rested on the fabric of his trousers, a constant reminder of her vulnerability.

  “Keep studying the tree.”

  She dragged in a breath, lifted her head, and fixed her gaze on the collection of bare branches.

  One finger pressed possessively into her. She clutched the chair arms, vainly bracing against the jolt. Her lungs seized. He stroked, then pressed deeper. She felt her body tense, had never been so aware of how her nerves coiled and tightened. An ache swelled inside her. She wanted more, much more.

  Another finger slid in with the first. Her body reacted, eagerly, hungrily—she’d reached a point of strange detachment where she could feel, enjoy, yet also observe. He reached deeper, his bunched hand moving beneath her. Spine rigid, she shook her head wildly. “No!”

  The movements of his fingers between her thighs, within her, slowed. “Demanding woman.”

  His tone was deep, gravelly—taunting.

  Then he pressed his fingers deep inside her and held still, hand pressed to her swollen softness.

  “Are you still concentrating on the branches?”

  Her gaze was pointed in that direction, but she hadn’t been seeing anything for some time. “Yes.”

  “Some are knobbly, aren’t they?”

  She looked, noting what he’d directed her eyes to see. She was dimly aware of him shifting, that the hand at her stomach had slid away, that behind her he was opening his trousers, releasing himself. Impulsively, she let go of one chair arm and groped behind her.

  He slapped her hand away.

  “You’re supposed to be concentrating on branches. Knobbly ones. Something nice and thick and smooth.”

  There was only one nice, thick, smooth and knobbly object in her mind, and it had nothing to do with trees. Family trees, perhaps, not physical ones. The reason she’d come to the library floated through her mind, and out. She looked at the tree, forced herself to see it.

  His hand returned, slipping under her skirts to curve possessively over her bare stomach. “Look at the tree. Concentrate on the branches.”

  She didn’t understand but did as he asked, forced her mind as well as her eyes to focus on the naked branches, finding a thick, knobbly protrusion—concentr
ating on that.

  He lifted her slightly, shifting her back, sliding his body beneath hers. Then he eased her down.

  And she suddenly learned why she was looking at branches.

  His fingers withdrew from her but remained between her thighs, guiding his erection. He entered her slowly, deliberately, drawing her to him, filling her relentlessly until he was fully seated within her, and she was fully impaled upon him.

  And she’d felt every inch, every tiniest, most minute sensation, amplified by the fact that, with her mind and senses distracted, the anticipated had become the unexpected. He’d ensured her nerves were highly sensitized, sure to react intensely to the penetration. And they had. Eyes closing, she let her head fall back against his shoulder, sank her fingers deep into the arms of the chair. That slow claiming had been, not a shock, but a moment in which her sensual defenses had been down. She’d felt more. Experienced the illicit intimacy of their joining to the fullest.

  There was more to come.

  He closed his arms about her, his body curled around her, his head bowed beside hers. With his lips at her throat, he undulated slowly beneath her.

  It was a different kind of dance. Eyes closed, concentrating on something other than branches, she used her grip on the chair arms to shift upon him. The chair was too wide and her arms now too weak to lift herself, but that, it seemed, was not required in a chair. Not the way he managed it.

  She surrendered to his managing, to letting him dictate the pace and tone of their dance. Her senses were wide-open, more receptive than usual; she was more focused on their bodies merging than she’d thus far been. Embracing the experience gladly, she relaxed, released the chair arms and wrapped her arms about his.

  He murmured his approval and gathered her deeper into his embrace; she felt his pleasure in his slow, rigidly paced probing of her body.

  Gyles skillfully steered her up to and through a long, extended climax, stretched out so she was floating before it ended, and continued floating for long after. He seized the moments to savor her more fully, to enjoy the bounty of her body closing so hotly about his.