“I’m not seducing you,” she said. “I’m telling you plainly that I want you. No games. I’m pursuing something I want. You.” She ran her hand over the sheets. “I want to know you.”
His mouth twisted. “Letting me bed you won’t help you to know me. Plenty of women before you have tried, and I’m certain they know nothing more about me now except that I can make them feel very, very good.”
A shaft of envy made her clench her fists.
“You are telling me something about yourself even now.” She stopped in front of him.
He shook his head. “I’m telling you your seduction won’t work.”
“No.” She bit her lip and slid her hands up his chest to link them behind his neck. “You’re showing me you are honorable, and that you know I’m not really seducing you for information or for any other reason connected with Victoria.”
He did not try to move out of her arms. “How do you deduce that?”
She wasn’t stupid. “If you thought I was seducing you for nefarious purposes, you would have let me. You would not be concerned about my reputation. But here you are, trying to be noble and ensure I leave here as virginal as when I walked in.”
His lip curled. “If you are testing me, my darling girl, you’re treading on thin ice. I’m not known for denying myself. You are overestimating my honor.”
And he was underestimating it, she thought. She pressed herself against him, overjoyed to feel the hard length of his arousal pressing against her stomach. “What if I no longer care about my reputation?”
This time he did unwind her arms from around his neck. “You don’t want to end up trapped in marriage with me. You want a man who trusts you, who can love you, who will be your friend. I can’t be that man.”
“Not yet. But I have high hopes.” If he heard her quiet murmur, he gave no sign. “Why have you not moved into this bedchamber? It is the master suite, is it not?” He must be punishing himself. Was it all part of his belief that he’d shared in the garden, that his wealth was not truly his? Surely there was no other reason he would keep his home in such a state.
He swung away from her, clearly agitated. “I prefer the room overlooking the road.”
“I don’t think so,” she said softly. “I think you are chastising yourself for something. Something you believe is too dreadful to share with anyone, even your fellow Libertine Scholars.”
His shoulders jerked as though someone had flicked them with a whip. Was she right?
She moved up behind him. “I don’t know what happened, but I do know you are carrying this weight round with you. One day you’ll sink from the burden and never get back up. You have to let someone help carry your troubles, ease them slightly, or the rest of your life will count for nothing. I don’t want to see you punish yourself forever. Nothing will change what has been done, Arend. Feel sorrow, feel regret, but don’t stop your life.”
“God.” The oath exploded out of him. “You’re so bloody innocent. You can’t possibly imagine the things I’ve done.”
“No, I probably can’t.” She turned him round to face her and cupped his chin in her palm. “But I can listen to your fears, sympathize with the difficult choices you must have faced, and hold you in your sorrow and remorse. That’s what a friend does.”
She reached up, standing on tiptoes, and pressed a chaste kiss to his lips. “A friend doesn’t judge. A friend listens, consoles, advises, and picks you up when you are at your lowest.” His eyes glittered with emotion, and she could feel the tears behind her eyelids. “Let me be your friend.”
“I’m too ashamed to tell anyone.” The hoarse words, filled with pain, made her even more determined to help him.
She slipped her hand into his and drew him over to the edge of the bed. As they sat, she said, “Well, that’s a relief. Most people are only scared when they have something to lose. It shows you care about something or someone.”
“I care about how my friends view me. The Libertine Scholars.”
“They love you. They would give their lives for you. Surely they would understand—”
He snorted. “Oh, they might understand, but could they forgive? Or would they look at me differently? I couldn’t bear it.”
Her heart was thudding in her chest. It was happening. They were talking to each other. Really talking. Just as if they were—friends.
“You’ll only find out if you talk with them. They do worry about you. They know you are unhappy, and that in turn worries them.”
Isobel watched a variety of emotions—hope, fear, anger, resignation—flash across his face as he thought over her words. The dim candlelight softened his usually hard jawline, and she read vulnerability in his eyes.
In the cold room with its unlit fire she could not prevent the shiver that shook her body. Attentive as Arend was, he noticed she was cold. Damn.
He pulled her tight into his arms, rubbing her back to warm her up. “I should get you home. You’re cold and most likely tired.”
She snuggled into his warmth. “I know you don’t trust me fully yet, but I would like to think of you as my friend.”
He remained silent, perhaps wondering where she was taking this conversation.
She pushed him. “If you are a friend, would you do me a favor if I asked one of you?”
His expression softened. “If it is in my power to do so, of course.”
Say it. Say it. “Would you let me stay the night with you? Would you finish what you started in the stable and introduce me to passion?”
His mouth firmed, and it made her want to nibble on his upper lip.
“Isobel, if I do what you ask, you will be trapped. We will have to marry.” He pressed a kiss to her head where it was tucked under his chin. “I should not have brought you here. What if someone saw you arrive? Or sees you leaving?”
She’d worried about that when they had first driven up to the house. Now, it didn’t matter to her. “I suspect the damage is already done. No one will believe we are here simply talking.”
“You don’t seem to understand the consequences of coming here. You have no father or brother to protect you—”
She waved his protest away. “You of all people must understand that money covers a multitude of sins.”
She knew immediately that she’d said the wrong thing.
“I don’t want to be one of your sins,” he said.
The hurt in his eyes almost undid her. “I’m so sorry. That’s not what I meant. I just…”
Goodness, being honest was harder than she thought. She’d been sitting here, telling him he needed to find a friend and be more open, and here she was with a man she felt she was falling in love with, and she couldn’t be honest with him.
Hypocrite.
She took a shaky breath. For her sake, but most of all for Arend’s sake, she had to open herself up. Be vulnerable. Show him that opening up could be rewarded.
She took both of Arend’s hands in hers. “I suddenly understand why it’s so hard for you to share your past. I’m feeling slightly sick at the thought of doing so myself.” She moved closer. “I want you to be the man who introduces me to passion. I don’t care if you walk away after all of this, or we go our separate ways. But I do care if I never get the chance to express the feelings you stir in me. I can’t imagine having this response to any other man. What if these feelings I have for you tonight I never feel for another man—ever? It will kill me to know I had a chance to experience real passion with a man who stirs my senses—a man I’m losing a piece of my heart to—and I never took it. Surely my first time making love should be with a man I trust. A man I want. A man, I think, after tonight, I can call my friend.”
—
Did she know, Arend wondered, that her words pierced him to the heart and ripped it open in his chest? He didn’t want to believe her, but the two things he knew categorically about Isobel were that she was an innocent and that she came alive under his hands and mouth.
He could still remembe
r her taste from their night in the stable, and already his body was thrumming with the need to taste her once more.
If she was intending to trap him, she had once again overestimated his honor. He had no scruples about walking away from a woman who used sex to snare a husband. But why would Isobel want to? She could do so much better than to take him for a husband. But could she find a better lover? Probably not.
Her words were true. She was a wealthy, beautiful daughter of an earl. Many men would see her dowry and that would be enough. And her beauty alone, even slightly marred, would have men clamoring to wed her.
“What if I get you with child?” He’d always taken care with his many partners, either insisting on sponges, wearing a sheath, or spilling his seed outside of their bodies. But for some reason, the vision of this woman, her body round with his child, did not bring on his usual sense of being trapped and suffocated.
“Is that likely, given it’s my first time?”
He couldn’t help his wry laugh. “Nature doesn’t seem to care if it’s your first time.”
Her lips quivered with a shaky, endearing smile. “Is there a way to ensure I don’t get with child?”
He shook his head. “There are precautions, but only abstinence is totally safe.”
She stood a moment in thought, then risked another glance at him. “I would prefer my child not to be born a bastard, but I am prepared to bring him, or her, up as mine, on my own.”
He wanted to shake some sense into her. “What about marriage? A lifetime alone is a high price to pay for a child. Eventually you’ll want to marry, surely?”
Her chin lifted in stubborn challenge. “I told you. I’ll only marry for love, and if a man loves me, he will love any child of mine.”
He did not doubt it. But the idea of another man raising his child—and with her—stuck in his throat. “If I get you with child we will marry. Do you agree?”
Her eyes lit up. “Does that mean I can stay the night with you?”
He reached out and ran his thumb over her bottom lip. “It’s hard to deny you when you ask so nicely, and when there is a very large bed so inviting behind you.”
She parted her lips under his thumb, and when it slid into the wet hotness of her mouth, any doubts about his decision was buried under a wave of want.
She drew back a little and smiled up at him. “You will have to tell me what comes next. I’ve never done this before.”
“You are doing a pretty good job so far,” he said softly. “Perhaps you could undress. Would you like me to do the honors?”
She turned her back, presenting the hooks of her dress to him. “Yes, please.”
His hands began to shake as he unhooked her gown. When he let it fall around her feet, she casually stepped out of it. His fingers were all thumbs as he began tackling the laces of her corset. As the restricting garment fell away she breathed out a sigh. Her milky white skin took on an ethereal glow from the light of the two candles, and a hint of jasmine perfumed the chilly air. Even the fine goose bumps on her arms did not detract from the softness under his fingertips.
His blood heated even more when he drew her shift over her head and let it drift to the floor.
When Isobel turned to face him, his breath fled his body. She stood regally, unsure but not embarrassed, completely nude but for her stockings and slippers.
She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
From her fathomless eyes to her succulent lips, down to her high, ripe breasts and further, to the triangle of black curls that covered the core of her femininity, she was both a vision of purity and an erotic, sensuous siren. His fantasy come to life.
Arend had never wanted a woman more. His hands itched to explore, to touch, to stroke. Her dusky rose nipples were pebbled and hard in the chilly air, and begged for his mouth to warm them. He wanted to run his tongue down her narrow waist, over her sweetly rounded hips, to her creamy thighs, and to taste the nectar he’d find between.
She had cast a spell over him since the day they met, and now he sensed the slow thudding of his heart speed up in anticipation of the pleasure he’d find within her arms. His loins felt heavy and thick, the cold air banished by the fire she kindled in his soul.
Isobel was too innocent to understand what the sight of her standing there, giving herself, the gift of her virginity, meant to him. She was a gift from God, and one he knew he did not deserve.
For the first time in his life Arend stood in front of a beautiful woman and felt uncertain. It was as if this was his first time too.
He lifted his gaze from her body and met her eyes, those pale blue eyes full of hope, want, need, and—to his amazement—love.
The knowledge that she truly cared for him humbled him. Isobel was the only woman who had the power to make him ache like this. To make him want—no, need—to be a better man.
The thought of making love to her had consumed his every waking thought for weeks, and now he was light-headed from wanting her. He took a long breath, and the cold air entering his chest spurred him on.
He bent and removed her slippers before rolling her stockings down her legs. The feel of her skin burned through his fingers and into his soul. Knowing he was the first man to see her like this made his heart swell to the point of bursting. He was getting in very deep. Would he be able to let her go when their time ended? A shaft of longing so intense that it was a physical pain hit him in the chest.
Damn it, man, she is not for you. You don’t deserve her.
He rose to his feet, pushing those thoughts away. Selfish bastard, Arend chided himself silently.
With her hand in his he led her to the bed and pushed her gently down. “While I would love to take my time, to walk around you, studying and drinking in your beauty, the room you chose has no fire and you’re getting cold.”
Her mouth quirked up. “Only on the outside. Inside, I’m on fire for you.”
Her silky, sensuous tone almost snapped his control. He stepped back and began to remove his clothes. He loved watching Isobel as he revealed himself to her. Her wide eyes. Her blushing cheeks. The way she bit her lip and looked away, then back. Her little hands clutching the sheet.
Was he the first unclothed man she’d seen? His primitive possessiveness hoped he was.
By the time he was naked, he was barely breathing. He slid into the bed next to her, wrapped his arms around her, and drew her close. She shivered against him, whether from nerves or cold he could not tell.
He wanted to warm her to her soul. Perhaps then his soul would warm too. It had been cold for so long.
He began to stroke her, caressing her hair, her shoulders, the soft skin over her collarbone, trailing his fingers over the luscious curves of her hip and bottom. She was built for sin, and he grew even harder.
After a few minutes the heat between them was blistering, the cold forgotten. She pushed slightly out of his hold and began stroking him in return. Over his chest, down his stomach, and—as she grew bolder—over his groin. Her confidence grew. Soon her hand wrapped round his straining erection.
She pressed a kiss to his chest. “I don’t really know what to do now,” she whispered.
Keeping his attention riveted on her soft, rosy lips, and running his tongue lightly across them, he placed his hand over hers and showed her how to pleasure him.
She was a fast learner. It wasn’t long before he could hold back no longer. A groan escaped him, and he took her mouth, pouring all his longing into the kiss. At the same time he filled his palms with her breasts, kneading gently.
This time it was Isobel who groaned, arching against him, her hips almost touching where her hand still worked him.
All too soon, and breathing like a racehorse, he had to stop her.
“Have I done something wrong?” she asked, wide-eyed and anxious.
He shook his head. “No. But I want you so badly that if we do not slow down I won’t last long enough to see to your pleasure.”
He rolled over on
to his back and tried to rein in his raging desire.
—
Isobel pulled her own emotions together. Her body, unused to such intimacy, was almost overcome with sensations. She only had to look at Arend clothed to want him. But to see him unclothed? He was, quite simply, breathtaking.
His chiseled body was perfection, a Roman god come to life. She’d seen statues of nude men, but Arend’s flesh and blood surpassed her wildest dreams. Pure muscle. Raw power. No wonder he seemed at ease in his nakedness.
His shoulders were broad, his chest and stomach a field of rippling muscle, his erection—
Isobel’s body grew damp, then wet and pliant at the sight of his manhood rising from the nest of curling black hair at his groin. A wicked thrill slid down her spine at the bold evidence of his arousal, followed quickly by trepidation. Like the rest of him, his arousal was large and somewhat intimidating. She had no idea how it would fit.
Only one way to conquer fear, she told herself. Rising up, she began pressing kisses over his face, down his neck, and over his hard, hard chest. Slowly she moved lower, not really sure what she was doing. But he had pleasured her once with his mouth. Surely she could do the same.
His skin felt heated even in the cold room. Warm, musk-scented velvet over muscle and bone. It was strange. Intoxicating. Wonderful.
When she reached his groin he didn’t try to stop her. Unsure, she slid him a look from under her lashes. His face was a mask of need and want, and her cheeks warmed under his deliberate stare. Did he know how wicked her thoughts were? Arend made her want to do naughty things, and if that made her a wanton, well, she did not care.
On impulse she ran her tongue down the length of him. His hips flexed at her touch and a drop of milky liquid appeared in the slit at the top of his pulsing member. She bent lower, slipped her mouth over the head, and suckled him. He felt like satin-covered steel. He tasted salty and somehow very, very male.
Isobel had no idea what she was doing, but she mimicked what she had done with her hand. She drew him deep into her mouth and then released him, her head bobbing.
When she looked at his face he had the devil in his eyes and his jaw was taut. When she used her hand and her tongue, his eyes rolled back in his head and he groaned, his hips jerking to thrust deeper into her mouth.
A Night of Forever Page 19
