The Rules of Seduction

by Madeline Hunter

  She stood near a window and looked down again. “I expect the garden will be magnificent in summer.”

  His hands circled her waist. “I will tell the gardener to make some changes and plant some new things this year. Roses, I think. And a large bed of violets.”

  “You have your own fortune, but it is not a middling sort, is it? It appears that for all my negotiations, I neglected to ask. I might have guessed if I had weighed it much. That necklace, for example—”

  A kiss on her neck caused the last words to disappear into a long inhale. The heat of that kiss, the silk of his hair on her jaw, the power so close behind her—in an instant her body returned to the excitement that led to that wondrous release, and well along the path at that.

  “The necklace was my mother’s. My fortune is not of a middling sort, and I am pleased that you forgot to ask.”

  “Do you not worry that I may not be up to managing households of this size?”

  He caressed up her back. She felt the hooks of her dress begin to loosen. “I do not doubt that you will manage whatever you choose. Except me, of course. It would be a mistake to attempt that. If I had wanted to marry a woman with my aunt’s tendencies, I would have chosen from among the hundreds I know and would have wed years ago.”

  He stepped away. She turned to see him shedding his coats. He threw them over a chair, then sat to deal with his boots. She watched, feeling awkward. Then she walked to another chair and began undressing too.

  The expectation of pleasure teased her, but the daylight made her uncomfortable. She had anticipated his coming to her at night, in the dark, almost invisible. In the least she thought that today he would immerse her in pleasure until she found herself beneath him again, much as she had in the attic. Instead, they engaged in this deliberate ritual.

  She propped a foot on the chair and rolled down a stocking, too aware of the man ten feet away. The truth, if she wanted to be honest, if she wanted to allow the silenced, hidden girl to speak, was that she found this a tad too calculated and domestic. Eventually matters might devolve to acts so relentlessly matter-of-fact, but this was her wedding day. She had counted on their feigning that there was more than marital rights and carnal pleasure today. It would have been easier, less unsettling, if he had just undressed her right there at the window while they kissed.

  A spike of pique stabbed her. She did not slide the stocking over her foot carefully but yanked it too hard. The gossamer silk shredded beneath her clutching fingers.

  She stared at the ruined stocking in her hand, astonished that she had been so careless. It was the finest stocking she had ever owned. Her brain calculated the cost of replacing it.

  “We will send your maid for new ones in the nearby town,” Hayden said.

  She looked over at his chair. He had not progressed far with his garments. He sat comfortably in trousers and shirt, with his elbow propped on the chair’s arm. His thumb and crooked forefinger held his chin in a pose of casual deliberation.

  He had been watching her undress. She looked down at her naked leg, still propped on the cushion. Her chemise fluttered around her thighs, barely covering her private parts. She suspected he could see her dark nipples and the hair on her mound through the thin fabric.

  Carrying on seemed scandalous now. He smiled slowly, acknowledging her sudden disadvantage. He appeared very charming and devastatingly handsome.

  Feeling her face redden, she set aside the ruined hose. She set down her naked foot and propped the other on the cushion. Suddenly this disrobing was not so ordinary and matter-of-fact. It possessed a seductive power. The bed waited right there, and they both knew what else did too. The silence all but buzzed with what would occur.

  She rolled down her hose. By the time she reached her foot, she had realized something important. It came to her as a brilliant insight, the kind of truth no one ever told you about.

  This was what this man wanted, and little else. He had said so when he proposed. Being a good wife meant first and foremost being accepting and sensual in bed. If she pleased him there, she might have a good life. If she did not, she would be a barely tolerated intrusion on his world.

  She bent to slip the silk off her foot. She realized with a start that the pose made her chemise hitch up too far in back, exposing her bottom. She snuck a glance in his direction.

  His expression had become intense and hard.

  She set down her foot and faced him.

  “No one tells us that our husbands will want to watch.”

  “Actually, it is not a common custom between husbands and wives.”

  “So husbands do watch, just not their wives?”

  “Something like that.”

  “It appears it will be different with us.”

  “It will be any way you want it to be, Alexia. We can draw the drapes if you prefer. You can hide in the dressing room and swaddle yourself in an undressing gown. You can be shy and delicate.”

  He would permit that, but he would prefer she not be shy. He had begun things differently this day for a reason. There was nothing between them but passion, after all. It was the only reason she was here.

  “I will not be hiding, Hayden. Nor getting shy or delicate. I was prepared to be your mistress, and you made me your wife. It seems unfair that you should sacrifice your pleasure by doing the right thing.”

  “I do not intend to sacrifice much, even if you want to be shy at first. I have a lifetime to teach you about pleasure.”

  That certainly made his intentions clear. “It sounds as if you would like me to be your mistress as well as your wife. A courtesan in marriage, so to speak.”

  She received a charming smile for that. “I would not have put it that way, but it is a provocative suggestion.”

  His eyes contained enough heat to show he contemplated the possibilities. Her confidence ebbed fast. Saying such a thing had been rash.

  “You did say we would negotiate the details. I assume that your promise about that still holds,” she added.

  “Certainly. Right now, for example, I want you to remove that chemise. You can negotiate, however.”

  Remove her—She looked down at her garment. If she removed it, she would be standing in the daylight totally naked!

  “It would be a very small thing for a woman as bold as yourself,” he said. “Insignificant for a woman who refuses to hide and be shy. As for a courtesan in marriage, such a woman would welcome the chance to display her beauty.”

  He was teasing her. Challenging her.

  Exciting her.

  Standing here almost naked made the flutters beat in her blood and her body tingle with anticipation.

  It really was a small thing. There wasn’t much that wasn’t visible already. Still, her face burned as she reached for the shoulders of her chemise. She felt very shy as she slid them down her arms. The fabric skimmed her body while it floated to the floor. She looked down in astonishment on her full nakedness.

  “You are an amazing woman, Alexia. And very beautiful.”

  He got up and strode toward her. His expression made her heart jump. She began to cover herself with her arms, but it was too late. He pulled her into a tight embrace, stretched his fingers into her hair, held her head firmly, and kissed her furiously.

  It was a stunning kiss, starkly passionate and frankly possessive. Just shy of violent, it was also a kiss confident of a response, and she could not control hers. While he commanded her mouth, his hands moved over her skin, over all of her, touching virgin flesh unused to exposure and caresses. He blazed new paths of excitement on her back and shoulders, down her hips and bottom, and to her damp inner thighs.

  The spiraling desire entranced her. Her nakedness made it more erotic. Her body loved every titillation. The urge for more began its chant.

  His palm closed on her breast, and the pleasure became more delicious. His arm arched her toward him, raising her so he could cover her neck and shoulders with firm, hot kisses. A delirium of want and relief vanquished
her. She did not realize they moved until he gently pushed her shoulders and she floated down to the bed.

  He stripped off the rest of his clothes, but there was no real separation and no pause in what was happening. His eyes aroused as surely as his mouth and hands. She lay there under his visual caress, watching his body emerge from his shirt, fascinated by the way his muscles corded with his movements. She had seen male bodies only in art before and was surprised at how similar those sculptures and paintings were to reality in their depiction of a man’s taut hardness.

  Her gaze locked on a scar that marred the perfection. Very long but surprisingly thin, it drew a line from his right shoulder to left hip, like half of an X over his torso.

  “It is a war wound. There is a another just like it on my back.”

  “It does not look like it was deep, at least.”

  “It was not meant to kill.” He began to unfasten his trousers, but paused. “How bold are you feeling?”

  “Bold enough.” Very bold, actually. Desire made her a different person, reckless and free. Her body waited for his. She was sensitive all over. Her breasts rose high, and she could not wait for him to touch and suck them again. She was beyond embarrassment, she was very sure.

  She was also very wrong. In one area of the male body, the artists had not been very accurate. Of course, she had never seen a statue where a man was hard and aroused before.

  He knelt on the bed, hovering over her, and kissed her again. His tongue played at her teeth and lips, inviting her to participate. She gingerly touched his tongue with hers, then the sides of his mouth and his palate. The intimacy of doing that surprised her. It was so clear that a part of her was inside him.

  His head dipped. His tongue flicked at her nipple. She gritted her teeth and her back arched, offering, wanting. Shocking images entered her head, of his doing that all over her, of every inch of her skin being licked like this.

  She gripped his shoulders to contain herself, but it did not help. Something had changed, and it left her helpless. The experience in the carriage had altered the hunger, deepened it. The more now made sense, and the climbing urges, the desperation, had a goal.

  The way he teased her breasts with his mouth and hand left her whimpering. She thought the sensations could not increase, but they did, more and more until they owned her. She slid her palms down his skin, over his chest. She barely noted the thin ridge of the scar, but its feel penetrated her daze all the same. Like a little bump on the road to oblivion, it reminded her who she would see if she opened her eyes.

  He was in her head then. His face and his scent shared the dark mystery transforming her. His voice spoke into the timeless fog while he reached down to caress the heat between her thighs to make her ready. Tonight we will enjoy each other slowly, but I have to have you now.

  It did not hurt this time. Not really. The stretching satisfied a craving. His domination of her body excited more than frightened. When he moved it felt good, a rhythm of relief that salved the ache and filled the void and awoke a new desire, one ruthless and determined, which slowly claimed her so completely that she was crying out when his thrusts got harder.

  It wasn’t enough. A maddening desperation unhinged her, much like the one in the carriage, only worse because now she knew what she sought and her essence wept for it.

  He shifted his position. He slid his hand between their bodies. His touch helped her to crest the summit and fall, fall, into the dark bliss.

  Diamonds, he decided. Amethysts would be too predictable.

  It was the first sane thought that came to him afterward, while he listened to her breath and his consciousness recentered itself.

  He braced his weight on his forearms. She still drifted, her eyes closed and her lips slightly parted. Ecstasy softened her so much. He could see the girl in her now that the sensible Miss Welbourne had lost hold of her senses.

  As if his gaze intruded, her lashes fluttered and her lids rose. A soulful acknowledgment of the power passed between them. Then the day began invading, creating little distances.

  If this was evidence of how it would go, he was fortunate in his choice of wife. She was as honest in her passion as in her plain speaking. She may hold much against him, but she did not deny the desire. That was a rare thing.

  “Do you ride?” he asked, moving off her so he could look at her body. His trailing caress over her breast made her blush. She was not so bold once the madness passed.

  “I did when I was young. My father had a good stable before he was ruined.”

  Ruined. The word hung there. She said it calmly, without acrimony, but it was a word that wanted to throw up stone walls around her. She had experienced it before, it seemed. Timothy Longworth’s fall must have seemed like a returning nightmare.

  “Gambling?” he asked.

  She shook her head, then glanced down her body. She blushed and closed her eyes. She withdrew within herself so her nakedness would not be scandalous to her. How interesting women could be, especially this one.

  He pulled up a coverlet and draped it over them. “Drink?”

  “Investments. The promise of wealth untold. The things you are renowned for, but he lacked the luck and judgment. Benjamin’s father lured him in deeply, and they drowned together.”

  “There was nothing left for you when he passed?”

  “The land was entailed to a second cousin, whose wife did not want me in their home. I wrote to Benjamin, hoping he would take me in out of guilt for his father’s role in it all. I discovered that my cousins were better than that. They accepted me not out of guilt but goodness.”

  Her rose mouth, very dark from being soundly kissed for an hour, turned up at its ends. She still did not open her eyes. She did not reject the pleasure, but perhaps she wanted to deny the man who gave it to her.

  “We have broken the rule,” she said. “Talk of them is not supposed to enter our bed.”

  “That is true, and it was my questions that led to it.” He would not make that mistake again. He was not sorry he had this time, however. He comprehended her devotion to them better now.

  Sunlight and conversation had burned away the latent bliss. She merely suffered his presence beside her now. He threw off the bedclothes and got out of bed.

  “Call for your maid. Have her prepare a bath if you want. I will show you the house before dinner. Tomorrow we will ride the estate.”

  He left his garments for his valet to collect later and strode to the dressing room and his own apartment. Her small revelations made him stop before he left.

  “Alexia, your freedom in your passion pleases me. I am not a man who thinks a woman’s timidity is virtuous. However, you are not obligated to agree to everything.” He almost left it at that. “Nor should you think that you have to pay for your keep by agreeing to behave like a courtesan in marriage.”

  She sat up, clutching the sheet to her body. She looked at him in the direct, honest manner he admired. “You are not in love with me, nor I with you. But this…” She glanced to the bed. “This is a joy, and perhaps what we share is a good foundation for a marriage. While it lasts, I would be a fool to pretend it is not real.”

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  I think it is safe to say that I am returning to London a changed woman,” Alexia said as the coach entered town.

  She referred to her body’s discoveries, Hayden supposed. Whether he ravished her or took his time, she did not complain. Her happy compliance had provoked him to see just how bold she was prepared to be. Very bold, if the last few days had been any indication.

  His courtesan in marriage appeared thoroughly sated but not so changed. She smiled impishly as she made her allusion, but he saw no private spark, no knowing glance that indicated she meant more than a sexual transformation had taken place.

  How changed are you, dear wife? When the release came and he collapsed atop her, so spent he lost hold on his soul, did she also feel the contentment so vast, so binding, that it begged for
a prayer to be said or a poem to be written? Had she experienced the yearning that had no name, that ached to penetrate thoughts and know her the ways their bodies and sweat quietly promised?

  She looked lovely today. Very sweet. Very warm. Their passion had taught him a few things too, however. He had gazed deeply into those violet eyes as he moved in her. He had seen far into the distance, where private shadows tried to veil her thoughts. He had seen further than she wanted, feeding his yearning to know, until he went too far. Eventually a wall always appeared, thwarting him.

  There were miles behind that wall.

  “I expect your aunt has settled into Easterbrook’s house by now,” she said.

  “I would not be surprised if my brother has refused to leave his apartment, however.”

  “He will regret this arrangement, you mean.”

  “He suspects that once ensconced in his home, Aunt Hen will be impossible to remove.”

  “Then it is odd that he invited her to come merely to accommodate us. He knows you made a bad bargain in this marriage.”

  “I think he sought to make this easier for you.” He took her hand and kissed it. “As for a bad bargain, if gentlemen spoke of the carnal side of their marriages, my brother and friends would be envious of my choice of bride.”

  “I am glad you are pleased, Hayden.”

  He looked into her eyes. Only the nearest fields were visible now. This marriage would be companionable in the daylight. She would see to his comfort and give him children and, unless another man stole her heart, be faithful. Intimacy would be reserved for bed, when she forgot for a while that he was a man she did not love who had inconveniently seduced her.

  Not a bad bargain. Not really. It was better than most men achieved. And yet…he could not deny that his fondness for the estimable Miss Welbourne had grown in the last weeks and that more than his body warmed in their embraces.

  A conspiratorial spark of glee compromised Falkner’s formal countenance. “Welcome home, madam.”

  Home. Merely entering the house comforted her, much like donning an old, well-worn shawl. The winds of life had buffeted her the last few weeks. The days in Kent almost frightened her, they were so full of new experiences and unexpected intimacy.