“I want to paint you,” he said, denying her the admission of defeat.
She faltered, stopping halfway across the room. “You wish to paint me? I’m hardly a proper subject.”
“I cannot think of a more suitable subject.” He stalked toward her.
“I’ve never been painted before,” she protested, taking a step back. “Surely you could paint a landscape instead. Your Italian landscapes are divine, Heath.”
“No.” He stopped before her, shaking his head. “I’m painting you.”
Very well. Playing along with him wouldn’t hurt her. At least he was willing to paint again. Earlier, she would have sworn he’d never again take up brush and paint. “You truly want to paint again?”
A grim smile stretched his sensual lips. “I’m afraid I haven’t much choice in the matter. It is either paint again or go mad.”
She tried to read his expression and failed. She couldn’t discern if he was still furious with her or if he was merely resigned. “I merely want you to be happy,” she said, meaning the words. The only way to accomplish his freedom from the past was to move beyond it, to stop hiding it away and pretending as though it had never happened. He’d locked up a vital part of himself along with his paintings and it was time he reclaimed it.
“Take off your dressing gown if you please,” he ordered suddenly, startling her with the abrupt shift in subject.
She raised a brow. Was he ready for another round of heated lovemaking? She couldn’t deny that the notion held great appeal for her. “I thought you said you wished to paint me.”
“I do.” His smile turned wicked. “In the nude.”
“Dear heavens.” Her hands went to the belt securing her dressing gown in place, a defensive gesture. “You cannot be serious.”
Dukes didn’t paint their duchesses in the nude. For the love of all the angels, what if someone were to happen upon it? While she was reasonably well-shaped, that didn’t mean she wanted the world to see her en dishabille.
“I’m utterly serious, darling.” His hands covered hers, warm and strong. “Off with the gown. I want to see every inch of you.”
“You already have,” she reminded him. “I’ll be pleased to show you any time you like, but I’d rather not be on display for the world as if I’m a common doxy.”
“You’ll not be on display for the world.” His nimble fingers worked at her belt despite her best effort not to allow it. “It will only be for me.”
She stared at him. “Is this some sort of punishment? That’s it, isn’t it? You’re still angry with me for ordering the servants to hang your pictures.”
“It’s not a punishment,” he said, voice low and seductive. “I’ve been wanting to paint you since I first saw you in the gardens at Penworth.”
“In the nude?” She couldn’t help but ask.
“Yes.” He pried her hands away at last, opening her belt. Her dressing gown gaped, revealing to him that she wore nothing beneath, not even a chemise. His gaze slid over her like a caress. “And a hundred other ways. Your beauty is captivating, Tia. I’ve never wanted to paint anyone more.”
Not even his beloved betrothed? She didn’t dare ask the question, though she longed to know the answer. For now, it would have to be enough that he’d been willing to shed some of the manacles keeping him prisoner. He was ready to paint again. She could scarcely believe it.
Perhaps the ice around his heart was beginning to thaw. The notion filled her with a brash sense of determination. She shrugged out of her dressing gown entirely, standing before him without a stitch just as he had asked.
“Well,” she demanded with a bravado she didn’t entirely feel, “where shall I pose?”
Hours later, Heath was consumed by the canvas before him. Though it had been years since he’d last painted, it had all come back to him almost as if no time had passed. His decision to move his painting supplies to his chamber had been sudden, driven in part by an irrational need, in part by desperation. The emotions Tia had unwittingly unleashed in him were as fierce as they were dangerous. But he had to admit that taking up brush and paint once more felt incredibly right.
Painting Tia felt even more right.
God, she was a beautiful creature. Her form was perfect for painting. He’d always been interested in art that represented a private glimpse into the everyday. It was why he’d been drawn to painting nudes. But he’d never had the opportunity to work with a nude model. Until today.
His wife was draped across a gilded settee he’d had brought into his chamber for just this purpose, her golden hair unbound. She held a book in one hand and rested the other in an indolent pose. She looked like a goddess come to life.
Tia sighed just then, ruining the illusion. “My bottom’s growing quite sore.”
“I shall kiss it to make it better.” He worked a bit more pink onto one of her nipples before glancing back at her. “I’ve nearly finished for the day.”
They’d taken a break to eat the supper trays he’d had brought to his chamber, but she’d been posed for the better part of three hours. The light was far too low for proper work at this point anyway, but he’d found that once he’d started he was loath to stop.
Painting had always been that way for him. Consuming. Raw. A part of his very soul. It seemed almost impossible to him now that he had fought it for so long. Although he still objected to her method, he had to admit to himself that Tia had been right to shake him from his stubborn insistence to lock it away. He had painted before Bess. And the stark truth of it was that he couldn’t have known Bess would take ill when he’d left for Italy. Perhaps his time of punishment was done.
He glanced back up at the minx who had become his wife, and tried to imagine Bess resting in her place, nude and allowing him to paint her as he wished. But he could not. He couldn’t imagine his life without Tia in it. Didn’t want to.
Jesus. A whole new rush of emotions came barreling down on him like a locomotive. If he were brutally honest with himself, he had to say that he was damn happy he’d gone to Thornton’s hunting party. Everything he wanted was before him, waiting patiently. It scared the hell out of him. He couldn’t—wouldn’t—be vulnerable again.
He met Tia’s gaze just as she shifted her pose, moving her right arm and wiggling her fingers. “I cannot help it, Heath. I’m not meant to be so still.”
Her tone was distinctly unapologetic. He found himself grinning at her. He couldn’t have managed to wed a woman more the opposite of what he’d set out thinking he’d wanted. But he admired her determination and her daring. Her ease with her body and lovemaking both was unusual for a woman of her station, and he loved every second of it. Just thinking about making love to her again had him instantly hard. Any thoughts he’d had of completing the shading on her breasts dissipated.
He put down his brush and stalked toward her. “You’ve ruined the pose, my dear.”
“Perhaps we could take a break?” she suggested hopefully. “You didn’t warn me how dreadfully difficult this would be.”
“It would seem the most difficult thing for you to keep still is your lovely mouth,” he said, leaning over her. “But I think I know just the remedy for such a quandary.”
Her tongue ran along the seam of her lips, driving him wild. “You do?”
“Oh yes.” He wedged a knee onto the cushion alongside her and caught her chin, tipping her face up to his. Christ, but she was a beauty. And his. “This.” He lowered his mouth to hers for a kiss that was as long as it was deep and possessive.
“That could prove very beneficial,” she murmured when at last their mouths broke apart.
“I want you,” he told her, not bothering with the niceties of seduction. Desire was clawing through him, a rampant beast. He had to have her. Now.
“I thought you were determined to finish painting,” she said, and though her tone was mild, her voice was breathless.
It would seem he wasn’t the only one affected. He caught her hand and pressed it to
the demanding ridge of his cock. “Does it feel as if I want to paint at the moment?”
Her eyes darkened, her fingers working on the fastening of his trousers. “No.”
Though he was in a fine frenzy, he allowed her to undo his trousers and remove them, enjoying the play of her small hands over him. He tore his shirt away, not having a care for the buttons. And then, the sweet suction of her mouth all but brought him to his knees.
His fingers sank into the silken, violet-scented skeins of her hair. He watched as the Cupid’s bow that taunted him so unmercifully worked over the tip of his cock. She swirled her tongue around the head before taking him deep into her throat. He was already on the brink. The sight of her, nude and glorious and pleasuring him, was enough to make him come.
But he so badly wanted to lose himself inside her. He wanted to bring her to the same dizzying heights of desire. One more prolonged pass of her tongue down his length and he gently extricated himself, grabbing her arms to haul her to her feet. Their fingers tangled in an echo of that day in the drawing room at Penworth. Now they no longer needed to hide their desire. They were man and wife. He was hers and she was his.
They moved to his bed as one, both eager for each other. Desperate for skin and mouths and the fleeting sense of heaven on earth they could find together. He helped Tia onto the mattress and joined her, settling between the tempting curves of her thighs so that his cock nestled in her wet folds. He ground against her, enjoying both the tease and the way she responded, her legs opening and wrapping around his hips. A low, seductive moan rumbled from her sweet lips.
He bowed his head and sucked a hard, pink nipple into his mouth. He’d discovered that Tia’s breasts were highly sensitive. The more he played with her, the wilder she became. And he couldn’t deny that he preferred Tia to be on fire for him, the same way he was for her. He nibbled at her other breast gently and reached down to flick the bud between her legs that was already plump and slick for him.
“Oh Heath,” she groaned. “Please. I want you inside me.”
He tugged at her nipple and sank a finger into her tight channel. Yes. This was what they both wanted. What they needed. This mad release, this gorgeous frenzy. Good Christ, she was so hot, so ready. He ran his tongue around the peak of her breast and worked his finger in and out of her. She jerked beneath him, tightening, trying to bring him deeper.
His cock was hard, his ballocks tight. He didn’t think he’d last for much more sensual torture, which was a pity because his Tia was such a willing participant. He tore his mouth from her breast and kissed her. As she opened for him, his tongue slipped inside, claiming her. She moaned again, raking her nails down his back with just enough force to almost make him come.
With a groan of his own, he withdrew his finger and replaced it with his cock in one swift thrust. He was buried to the hilt, and it still wasn’t deep enough. He didn’t think he’d ever grow tired of fucking his beautiful, maddening wife. Or painting her. God, yes. He’d paint her every day. Naked. And then he’d take her every way he could think of. Against the wall. On a settee. In the bath. On the floor. From behind. As the wicked images swirled through his mind, he plunged into her again and again, the pressure within him building to a crescendo.
She constricted on him as she found her release. And then he was losing control too, that quickly. He cupped her luscious bottom, lifting her to the angle he wanted, and thrust into her one more time, driving as deep as he could. His seed left him in a hot, pulsing rush. Heath jerked into Tia one last time, kissing her again as he emptied himself inside her.
He collapsed against her, his breathing heavy, heart thumping madly. His entire body felt suddenly as if it had been depleted of all its strength. All the fight in him was gone, replaced by a pleasure-soaked languor. He kissed her cheek before rolling onto his back.
She rested a hand lightly on his chest. “Heath?”
Blast. She wanted to talk. His mind was a muddle of spent emotions. He sighed. “Yes, darling?”
“You still love her, don’t you?”
Christ. She didn’t have to elaborate. He knew precisely who the “her” was that Tia spoke of. The thought of his betrothed was akin to a bucket of Wenham Lake ice being dumped directly on his cock. He didn’t want to think about Bess. Not now, not when he was sated and naked and in bed with his wife.
“Heath?”
She was, as ever, persistent to a fault. There would be no dancing around the matter, and she was far too clever for him to bother with prevarication. She’d only see it for what it was. He closed his eyes and gave her the only answer he could. “Yes.” For the truth of it was that he hadn’t stopped loving Bess. In his heart, she was still the sweet, innocent girl he’d known. Her death had not diminished what they’d shared.
Tia withdrew her hand, tensing at his side. The mattress shifted beneath him, and he knew what was happening without having to look. But he opened his eyes anyway to watch as she left the bed.
“Tia,” he called out to her, not wanting her to leave. Not like this. “I’ve never lied to you about my past.”
“No,” she said sadly, keeping her back turned to him. “You haven’t.”
Why did it feel as if he’d done something wrong? Damn it all. She shrugged into her dressing gown without looking at him, and he knew she was deeply wounded by his admission. What had she wanted? For him to lie to her? Loving Bess didn’t preclude him from caring for Tia. Surely she understood that.
“Don’t leave,” he implored, not wanting the evening to end on such a discordant note. Not after what they’d shared.
But his wife, in typical form, wasn’t listening to him. She marched from the chamber, the door closing loudly at her back. He flinched and pressed his fingers to his newly throbbing temple. The silence in her wake was nearly deafening.
She was gone.
The next morning dawned grim, gray and cold for Tia. She woke from a fitful sleep at dawn and couldn’t force herself to remain abed. Too many thoughts were whirling through her mind, leaving her emotions in a horrid hodgepodge from which she very much feared there would be no return.
She rang for Bannock and requested breakfast in her chamber, intentionally eschewing the private breakfasts she’d often been sharing with Heath. It wasn’t that she meant to punish him, but that she needed time to sort out her feelings. She supposed she’d brought on his agonizing concession and thereafter her own agony with her foolish questioning. Why ask when she’d been petrified of the answer?
Tia didn’t know. She scarcely ate any of the ample selection of fruits, eggs and meats Bannock had brought her to devour. She didn’t even touch her chocolate—a rare event indeed, for Tia adored her chocolate in the morning. Instead, she’d completed her toilette and simply sat alone at her writing desk, staring out the window in search of solace that wasn’t forthcoming.
At last, she took up pen and paper in an effort to distract herself. She wrote to her sisters Cleo, Helen and Bo. She wrote to Miss Whitney to inquire after the girl’s latest societal jaunts and marriage prospects. She wrote to her dear friend Bella, who was likely about to perish from boredom as her lying-in approached. She even wrote to her mother and father, which was even rarer than foregoing chocolate. For while she loved Mama and Papa dearly, her every letter was invariably met with a long list of whisperings they’d heard concerning her reputation.
“Pish,” she said aloud as she finished her last letter, signing her name with an artful flourish. Her hand was cramped, her fingers ink-stained and her heart in no better form than it had been at the onset of her correspondence. Her paltry attempts at distracting herself had failed.
She had fallen in love with her husband.
There. She’d admitted it to herself, weak-willed, foolish creature that she was. She had allowed herself to be wooed and won and seduced. Initially, her attraction to him had been primal, laced with lust and the excitement of doing what she knew she ought not. But it had quickly become different. Deeper. More dang
erous. The time they’d spent together had only drawn her to him even more. He was handsome, a skilled lover, charming when he wished to be. He made her heart flutter and her body hunger. And now that she had seen his beautiful paintings, she couldn’t deny it any longer.
She loved Heath, as frightening and awful as it was.
Because he distinctly did not return the sentiment. No indeed. That tender feeling was solely reserved for the paragon Bess. His dead betrothed. Tia frowned, thinking herself horrid for knowing an instant of stabbing jealousy toward the woman. It was dreadfully small-minded of her, she knew. She simply couldn’t help the way she felt.
A sudden knock on the connecting door startled her then. She stood hastily, straightening her skirts. It would be Heath, likely returned from his ride. And while she wasn’t certain how she would face him after last evening’s debacle, she knew that it wouldn’t do to look a bedraggled mess. Tia took great pains to look her best at all times. Perhaps it didn’t do much for her ability to win her husband’s heart, but it certainly couldn’t hurt.
“You may enter,” she called out, steeling herself.
And then, there he was, standing at the threshold in his riding clothes, sinfully handsome as ever. “Tia,” he greeted her, unsmiling.
The air between them fairly cracked with awkward tension. “Good morning, Your Grace,” she returned, equally polite. “I trust you enjoyed your ride?”
“No.” He passed a hand through his hair and stalked into her chamber. “I daresay I didn’t.”
“I own it is rather dreary,” she commented, trying to hold her wits about her as he stopped close enough for her silken skirts to brush his trousers.
“That wasn’t the reason for my lack of enthusiasm.” He caught her chin, tipping it up so that he could better search her gaze.
“Then what was?” she asked, daring to hope that he felt something for her, however small, beyond mere desire.
“You.” He traced her jaw with his thumb. “I’m sorry, Tia. I never meant to hurt you last night.”
Reckless Need (Heart's Temptation Book 3) Page 15
