Rules of Engagement

by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  For long moments, she shook, every muscle clamped tight.

  The peak of silvered, sublime excitement coursed through her. Her groan was deep, pulling from the heart of her and tearing at her throat. The pleasure washed over her in wave after wave.

  For long moments, she laid recovering, with little after-shocks sizzling through her. “Oh my dear God…!” she whispered in wonder, her voice strained.

  Cian lifted himself over her. His smile was small and heated, as he settled between her thighs.

  Instinctively, she spread her knees as his shaft pressed against her. With a start, she realized the slick dampness would aid this moment.

  The thick head pushed between her flesh, unerringly finding the aching channel. Cian’s gaze was steady. He watched to measure her discomfort, she realized.

  “Deeper,” she breathed.

  He eased deeper inside and her innards tightened as he paused once more.

  “Take a breath and let it out,” he told her.

  She drew in the breath and let it out. Her body relaxed around him.

  Cian pushed even deeper, easing her open. Her flesh spread around him. Gripping him.

  His hips and pelvis pushed up against her. He was as deep as he could go. There had been no pain or tearing or any of the horrible sensations other women had reported when their maidenhead was broached.

  She felt full. Complete.

  Whole.

  And very alive.

  Her breath was still uneven and rapid. Cian did that to her.

  Cian propped himself over her. He did not squash her with his weight, though. He brought her knee up by his hip. “This makes it better,” he told her.

  Automatically, she raised the other knee and he settled even deeper inside her. A soft moan escaped her. Deep was good. Tight was good. Hard was incredibly good.

  Cian moved. She gasped at the sensations, as his shaft withdrew then slid back into her. “Oh!” she whispered.

  Cian’s mouth brushed hers, only he was breathing as deeply as her as he worked over her. His body was a furnace against hers. The motion of his shaft and the beat of his hips against her scattered her thoughts once more. Her inner flesh gathered around him, and the tingling of pleasure she had experienced once already built again.

  Eleanore opened herself up to the sensations, reveling in them. This was glorious!

  Cian’s breath was ragged. Every muscle seemed to flex at once. He stiffened and gave a deep groan and she recognized the same peak of pleasure which had visited her was tearing through him. Her body rippled with the knowledge.

  When he seemed capable of movement once more, Cian slid his hand under her hip and rolled carefully onto his side, turning her, too. She faced him once more, her thigh over his hip and his shaft still inside her.

  “Oh, this is much better,” she breathed. “I would not have noticed the squall at all this afternoon, if we had been this way.”

  Cian gave a small laugh. “My thoughts exactly.”

  Eleanore rested her hand on his chest. “Why did you not take me then?” she asked softly. “You could have. I would not have stopped you.”

  Cian pressed his lips to her forehead. “I wanted you to find your way through the storm on your own. Then you would know, without doubt you had faced it and won.”

  She kissed his chin, all she could reach without dislodging him from her body. “I won more than that, today,” she breathed.

  His smile was warm. His eyes danced.

  “Why on earth have we not been indulging ourselves this way all along?” she demanded.

  His smile faded. “You know why,” he said gently.

  “A child, no vows, yes, yes,” she said dismissively.

  “And a Prince who expects a maiden in his bed on his wedding night,” Cian said gently.

  “Then why now…?”

  He cupped her cheek. “Because I am selfish. Because I couldn’t stand living another day without this. Because I am weak, when it comes to you.”

  “Weak is the absolute last thing I would call you,” she whispered, her heart beating faster.

  “I am weak. I have complicated things far beyond the snarl they were already in,” he said.

  “It wasn’t only you who did that.”

  Cian’s gaze met hers. For a long moment he didn’t speak. Then he said softly, “Shared guilt, Ellie?”

  “I won’t let you carry it all.”

  “I would shield you from the consequences, if I can.”

  “You cannot,” she said. “This was my choice, too.” She hesitated. “Only, it would please me greatly if you keep calling me that.”

  “Ellie?” His smile returned. “Does no one ever shorten your name?”

  “My uncle called me Nellie, once. I stamped on his instep.”

  Cian’s body shook with subterranean laughter. “How old where you?”

  “Perhaps eight. I don’t remember. Everyone has called me Eleanore, since.”

  “So, only me…” He picked up her hand and threaded his fingers between hers. He held up their joined hands and studied them. “We stand together, then, Ellie?”

  She understood what he was saying. “This is as much my fault as yours, so yes. We face whatever the consequences may be together.” She met his gaze. “As long as it does not make you feel less of a man.”

  Cian laughed. It was not a low, soft sound, but a full belly roar she felt though her whole body. He brought her hand to his chest and held it there as he chuckled. He kissed her lips, hard and quickly.

  She watched him quizzically, not understanding.

  “You have no idea…how could you?” Cian said. He let out a breath and the last of his laughter. “You have never met my mother or got to know any of my family.”

  “I’ve seen them many times at season functions,” she reminded him.

  Cian shook his head. “Those are public functions. It is completely different.”

  “It is?” she asked, startled.

  He nodded. With a flex of muscles and a shift of his hips, he turned on his back, bringing her with him.

  Eleanore caught her breath as he arranged her knees on either side of his hips and his shaft pushed even deeper inside her. He held her hips, settling her properly and looked up at her. “Some men consider this a position of weakness,” he said.

  “You do not,” she guessed.

  He lifted his hips. She gasped as his shaft shifted inside her.

  “No, I do not,” he said. “Lift up, just a small bit.”

  She complied and his shaft eased from her, almost all the way. It was instinctive to lower herself back down.

  Cian gave a soft groan. His fingers tightened.

  Eleanore enjoyed having that effect on him. She repeated the action, watching his face, as the excitement took him. With delight, she realized she controlled his pleasure. She could extend it, or hasten it, or toy with him in ways which would dictate how much or how little he liked it.

  The thought made her heart leap and her body to throb. Oh, the possibilities!

  She experimented, tightening her muscles, changing the speed and angle of her sliding body, and enjoyed the sight of Cian writhing beneath her. His temples dotted with perspiration as he groaned and shifted. She orchestrated his responses, reveling in the mastery of it. She had not suspected such control existed, not in the bedroom.

  Finally, Cian gasped in a voice not his own, “Enough, Ellie…”

  She gathered herself, driving him to the peak she had kept from him for long, long minutes, until with a soundless cry, he arched beneath her, every tendon straining.

  With a final sigh, he lifted her from him and put her back on the bed beside him and dropped his arm over her waist. His breath slowed. His eyes were closed.

  Eleanore touched his jaw, marveling at the insights and education he had given her this night. “What happens to us now, Cian?” she asked.

  His eyes opened a sliver. “You mean…tomorrow?”

  “And the days after tom
orrow.”

  His answer was a long time coming. “There are…barriers, still,” he said.

  Those barriers were hers, she realized. Her family, the Prince, the old feud. She sighed. “Why must it be so complicated?”

  Cian pressed his lips to her cheek. “Let us only look to tomorrow for now,” he breathed. “That is as far as I dare look.”

  It was not a comforting answer.

  Chapter Eleven

  Eleanore didn’t need Cian to explain to her that discretion was the highest priority. She woke in the early hours of the morning. She was stirred by the bustle in the kitchen beneath them, or the growing light in the sky beyond the window where Cian had stood last night.

  She laid with the covers over her and Cian’s long body behind her, his arm over her waist. He was soundly asleep.

  Eleanore eased her way out from under his arm and put the silk wrapper back on, then crept across the corridor to her room. There, she washed and dressed carefully. Unlike most mornings when she took care of her own wardrobe, today she ensured every button was looped and every tie was properly tied.

  It occurred to her that since she had recovered her memories and returned to London, she had rebelled against the strictures in her life in every small way she could. Carelessly leaving buttons undone, drinking, smoking and gambling, outrageous parties, cricket…it was all shocking, but minor.

  Now she had rebelled in a way would do far more than horrify her family. She had taken an irrevocable step, one which would ruin her reputation and utterly change her life if it were revealed.

  She paused, her fingers about the last button on her sleeve, considering it. Perhaps she should let it be revealed. The natural reaction of a family to a daughter’s indiscretion was usually the use of a shotgun to oversee a hasty marriage designed to snatch back respectability.

  Only, James and Coleman, even her mother, would be inclined to use the shotgun upon Cian instead, if they learned what she had done. They would blame him. And they would shove her at Prince Ferdinand and force-march her down the aisle to cover up any consequences.

  No, it was better to keep this to herself for now. She wanted to reflect upon how it changed things, with no pressure to meet family expectations in the meantime.

  She wanted time for herself, now she had reached this pocket of peace in her life. The monster which had sat on her shoulder for years was gone. Storms would make her uneasy, still, although the immobilizing terror would not rise again. Not after yesterday…how could it? Just the memory of gusting wind made her think of warm lips against hers.

  She smiled and finished buttoning her sleeve, then went downstairs to beg a pot of tea from the inn keeper’s wife.

  Eleanore was on her second cup when Cian pulled out the chair opposite her and sat. His toilet was as immaculate as hers. He gave her a small, polite smile and caught the inn keeper’s wife’s attention and lifted his hand. “May I have a cup, please?”

  The lady bustled over with a cup and saucer and spoon and offered them meat pie or kippers for breakfast, with oat cakes and honey. Then she hurried back to the kitchen.

  Cian raised his brow. “How did you sleep?”

  “Very well,” she said, her tone polite. Her gaze met his.

  For a heartbeat, she saw heat in his eyes, which made her body throb in all the good places.

  She returned her attention to her teacup.

  “I have been considering,” Cian said. “Today I should return to Innesford. I’ll have Travers shut up the house in London. The season is all but at an end, anyway. Lisa Grace can return to Marblethorpe with Travers.”

  Eleanore put her cup down. Her heartbeat a little faster. “I suppose I should return to London. Or perhaps I should go straight to Durham.”

  Cian’s gaze met hers. His eyes were steady. “Why would you return to London? I think you should come to Innesford.”

  Her heart jumped. “If I were to come to Innesford, then I would meet your family, wouldn’t I?”

  His gaze didn’t shift. “Yes, that is a distinct possibility.” He picked up his teacup. “I think you should write your brother and tell him you will stay with my family for a while.”

  “Doesn’t everyone in your family live at Marblethorpe?”

  “They do,” Cian said calmly. “However, they’re constantly in and out of the house at Innesford. The chances that you’ll meet them are high.”

  “James will expire if he knows I’m meeting your family,” Eleanore said.

  “I think you underestimate James.”

  Eleanore shook her head. “James is dedicated to furthering the family,” she said. “He has nothing else to live for.”

  Cian nodded. “Despite that, he is devoted to you. He only wants you to be happy.”

  “How could you possibly know that?”

  “Because he told me.” Cian shrugged.

  Eleanore stared at him. It was a jolt to discover Cian and James discussed her so closely. If she measured relationships according to her uncle Coleman, then James and Cian were mortal enemies. They should not be discussing anything at all. Especially not her. Yet Cian seemed to have a better understanding of her brother’s state of mind than she did.

  Cian raised his brow. “So? Would you like to come and stay at Innesford for a little while?”

  “No one would mind that a Neville was staying there?”

  “You have a great deal to learn about my family,” Cian said. “Write your letter. Then we’ll catch the train to Truro and to be at Innesford in time for morning tea.”

  “And what do we do when we are there?” she asked.

  Cian didn’t reply. He just smiled.

  IF SOMEONE HAD ASKED her on that first day how long she expected her visit to Innesford to extend, Eleanore would’ve told them to not be silly. Nevilles and Williams did not mix. She was risking much by arriving at Innesford at all.

  Yet when Cian helped her out of the carriage at Innesford at eleven o’clock and she looked up at the gray stone building with its elegant windows and beautiful gardens, she had no thought about the future.

  Cian led her inside the big house. There he introduced her to the staff.

  The afternoon was spent touring the property. The Innesford estate was large, and on prime shoreline of Cornwall. The cliffs were high. The coastline was open here. Eleanore stood at the top of the cliff and watched the waves rolling in. The sky had clouds, but they were white. Also, the wind howled. Yet she felt nothing, standing at the top of the cliff, except for the warmth of the sun on her shoulders.

  She realized Cian watched her carefully. She smiled at him. “It really does seem quite miraculous,” she said. “This much wind would have sent me running, terrified, only a few days ago.”

  “And what do you feel now?” Cian asked her

  “A yearning for more of the fruitcake the butler served with afternoon tea,” she confessed.

  “Then we must get you some more,” Cian said firmly.

  The tour ended with a stroll about the garden, then Cian let her through the maze. The very center of the maze featured a stone bench. It was a solitary location.

  Standing beside the bench, Cian drew her into his arms.

  Her heart jumped. Until this moment he had been in most proper gentlemen. Now she saw heat in his eyes. His lips were warm and demanding.

  Eleanore willingly kissed him. Relief touched her. Until this moment, she had been uncertain about what would happen now. She had heard lurid tales over the years about men ruining women and abandoning them without conscience the next morning. Cian has said nothing about what would come after last night, leaving her to wonder if that would happen to her, too.

  She’d not the courage to ask him bluntly. He might have answered in the negative, or not answered at all. Either response would have been hateful.

  Only, now he was kissing her. The stiff gentlemanly demeanor was gone. His lips moved over her face and throat hungrily.

  Her heart skipped and hurried on.

/>   “I cannot stop recalling last night,” he murmured against her throat.

  “I don’t know how to think about last night at all,” she confessed.

  “Do you regret last night?”

  “Not at all,” she said.

  “Then that is how you should think of it.”

  It was still not a straightforward answer, but at least he was talking about it and his kisses assured her he would not abandon her. At least, not straightaway.

  That night, she learned that abandonment was far from Cian’s thoughts.

  The butler showed her to a little bedroom on the west end of the house, warmed by the southern sun and overlooking the stable and the woodland beyond.

  This end of the house was quiet. The great master bedrooms were at the other end of the house. Beyond the windows she heard the sea rolling and the constant sea breeze whispering under the eaves.

  Other than that, the house was in silence. There was no one else in the house except her and Cian, and a great many staff, who all seem completely devoted to Cian.

  Was that why she was placed at the far end of the house?

  The room was pretty, with its odd number of doors, white walls and an antique brass bed.

  Listening to the wind, she undressed and readied herself for bed.

  When one of the interior doors opened ten minutes later, her heart lurched. She gasped in surprise.

  Cian stepped into the bedroom and close the door. He wore robes and slippers and at the neck of the rope she spotted silk pajamas. The legs of the pajamas peeped below the hem of the robe.

  He stood with his back to the door. “It sometimes seems to me this house is made for illicit seduction,” he said. “This room is connected to the bedroom on the other side of the corridor through a secret passage.” The corner of his mouth curled up. “I am using that bedroom for now.”

  Eleanore stepped toward him. She gripped the lapels of his robe. “I do not understand you,” she said. “You blow hot and cold. One moment you are Lord Innesford with your nose in the air. The next minute you do something like this and my thoughts scramble as I try to catch up.”