by Mari Carr
She looked at him with hot tears gathering in her lashes. The sight of them tore his heart to pieces.
He was—quite simply—shattered. “I forced myself upon you.”
“Forced?”
“God, I’ve been such a fool. Everything about you told me you weren’t a prostitute. You couldn’t be. It isn’t in you! Your blushes, your untried kisses, your trusting nature. All the signs were there, and I ignored them. Ignored them because I didn’t want to see it. I’ve wanted you since the first moment I saw you battered and broken under that damn tree and the only way I could have you was to cast you in the same dark light that hovers over me. To make your soul as black as mine. Sweet Jesus, I’ve ruined you. Ruined your future. Ruined everything.”
“Stop it!” she yelled. “Don’t say another word.” Tears streamed down her face as she reached out to him. “You need to understand, to listen to me. What happened between us tonight was the furthest thing from force.”
He laughed scornfully, but she swatted at him, her face flushed with anger.
“You didn’t force me to do anything I didn’t want to do. My God, Ben, what we did was wonderful, astounding, perfect. Don’t you dare belittle it! Don’t you dare steal tonight away from me.”
“The only thing stolen tonight was your virtue.” Ben’s voice was rife with anguish.
“No, no more words, not from you.” Her furor had grown to match his—hell, it surpassed his—and she punctuated each word she spoke with a sharp finger to his chest. “You’re wrong. About everything. You’ve had your chance to speak, and now it’s my turn.”
He grinned, amused by the power of her anger. She rarely lost her temper or raised her voice. The fact that he found her fury funny enraged her even more.
“Ruined me? Is that what you truly think? You didn’t ruin anything. You saved me. You picked me up from under that tree, cared for me, befriended me, kept me safe. These months with you and Chelsea have been the best of my life.”
He lifted one eyebrow, reminding her she couldn’t recall her life prior to her time at Waterplace.
It didn’t matter. Her tirade full-blown now.
“And, yes, I know I don’t remember anything except the last couple of months, but I still know, somehow, deep inside of me, this time with you is special, unique, a gift. You make me feel good about myself. You laugh at my stupid jokes. You don’t care that I’m clumsy, and when you look at me, I actually feel beautiful.”
“You are beautiful.”
She didn’t acknowledge his words. She rose up until she was kneeling on his bed, standing so close he could see the high color in her cheeks and the slight trembling of her lips. Her finger jabbed him mercilessly in the chest, as she struggled to catch her breath. “If I live to be a hundred years old, I will never regret tonight. Do you hear me? Never!”
Taken aback to see his mild-mannered governess in a true rage, he nodded, afraid to say anything that may set her off again. Unfortunately, she wasn’t finished.
“Don’t you ever act like what we did tonight was anything less than making love. I never want to hear you tell me you forced me to do anything. I wanted this. I wanted you. Dammit, I still want you!”
With that, she grabbed his face, pulling his lips down to hers, kissing him in a manner that left no doubt of her desire.
Overwhelmed and amazed, he could only wrap his arms around her, pulling her to him, desperate to hold on to her. His sunshine, his angel. His love.
Ben’s love for her was more potent than any force on earth. He loved her with every part of his being. In a way he’d never imagined possible, with a heart he thought long dead to the emotion.
“Vee,” he whispered, kissing her brow, cheeks, ears, throat, neck, every part of her he could reach. “My God. It’s you who’s wrong. You saved me.”
With the care one took with a small babe, he tenderly placed her on the bed.
“It was your first time. I should have been more gentle.”
“Shh.” She placed her fingers to his lips. “It was perfect. No regrets?”
“No regrets.” He left the bed to cross to the washbasin. Filling it with warm water, he dampened a cloth before returning to her on the bed. Without a word, he gently cleansed her inner thighs, soothing her. When he finished, he crawled in beside her, settling her firmly against his chest, his muscular arm encircling her waist.
“No regrets.” He kissed her lightly on the brow as two sleepless nights caught up to both of them and they fell into a sound sleep.
Chapter 15
V is for Vast Experience
Lying on her stomach, Vee struggled to make her way back to consciousness. It was still dark in the room, but something stirring in the bed caught her attention. A large hand brushed against her buttocks and she realized it wasn’t a what, but a who that was disturbing her sleep. A small smile pulled at the corners of her mouth, but she didn’t open her eyes.
Ben’s callused hand moved lightly from the small of her back to the top of her thighs in seductive circles. Sighing softly, she heard his deep chuckle before he leaned forward to place a kiss on the nape of her neck. She started to roll over, but was stopped by a strong hand on her shoulder.
“No,” he grumbled. “Don’t move.”
Intrigued, she lay still and let his hands work their magic, roaming along her back to her bottom and down her legs. She giggled when they lightly brushed the bottom of her feet.
“Ah,” he said. “Ticklish.”
Moving back up, he lifted her right leg at the knee and bent it up to her waist before grabbing the pillow beside her and placing it beneath her hips.
“Ben?”
He shushed her.
She was completely open to his wandering hands and they continued to explore, returning to caress each cheek of her buttocks before investigating the line between. Her breathing accelerated as his fingers traveled between her folds, finding the magic spot he’d introduced her to earlier. Rubbing in slow circles, he leaned over her, placing moist kisses along her spine. She approached her climax quickly, and her breathing hitched as she arched her back up to his hand seeking more, wanting more.
Aware of her desire, he slowly pulled his hand back to her entrance. “Is this what you want?” As he spoke, he slid a finger into her wet passage.
“God, yes.”
She felt his smile against her spine.
His finger found the rhythm she had been longing for, and after several thrusts, he added another finger to the dance. Her hips were gyrating, desperate for more.
“Easy,” he said, though he didn’t stop moving. “Just let it take you.”
His words and fingers pushed her over the edge. She screamed into her pillow, falling into that realm of stars and bright lights and glory. As she slowly came back to the room, she felt Ben poised behind her, his member slowly edging its way into her.
“Christ,” he murmured, entering her inch by inch. “You’re soaking wet and hot as fire.”
He was going slowly, trying to be gentle, trying to make amends for the first time. Unwilling to be coddled, she arched her bottom up, capturing the rest of him quickly in her sudden backward thrust.
All the air flew from his lungs as he froze for a moment.
“Now.” Her voice was still rough from sleep, yet sounded every inch the proper governess. “Do it right.”
Not needing any further instructions, Ben grabbed her hips and began his own journey to heaven. She met him thrust for thrust, as they pounded their way into each other’s bodies, driving themselves deeper and deeper into each other’s hearts. Their movements became frantic as they tried to prolong the moment, tried to make the night last longer. When Vee cried out with her second orgasm, he followed her, pouring his seed deep inside her, his grip on her hips almost painful as he called out her name before collapsing on top of her.
Sweat-soaked and exhausted, Ben rolled to her side, one hand still lingering on her bottom. Taking a deep breath, he smiled at her before lig
htly swatting her rear end. She giggled and he realized that was all he had the strength left to do.
He chuckled when she mirrored his thought with her words. “I don’t think I could move a muscle if my life depended on it.”
He agreed. “We better hope the house doesn’t catch on fire, because I have a feeling we’d both be consumed in the flames.”
“I think we already were. That was—” she stumbled, trying to find the words.
“I know. It was.”
“You must have quite a bit of experience with this.”
“With what?” he asked, merely to see the color in her cheeks darken.
“You know.”
“Come now sunshine, with all we’ve done in this bed, surely you can say the word.”
“Sex.”
“Making love,” he corrected.
“That’s two words.”
He smiled at her joke, then placed his hands behind his head, feeling for all the world like a man completely relaxed and satisfied. He continued to lay in silence, pondering how to answer her question. Finally, he decided on the truth.
“Would you believe me if I said I didn’t have much experience with making love?”
“Not on your life. Besides, I may not remember my own past, but according to Mrs. Henry, men are initiated into—” She waved her hand at their tangled, naked bodies, clearly still uncomfortable with the words.
“Yes?” he prompted playfully.
“Oh you know, all of this sex stuff at a very young age and according to her, they don’t stop until they die.”
Ben laughed at her comments and gestures, a full-blown one that took her breath away. He truly was heart-stoppingly handsome and when he laughed, the change that came over his face was mesmerizing. His eyes twinkled, his cheeks dimpled, the scowl lines in his forehead vanished and all his other features softened.
“What’s so funny?”
After several moments, he calmed down enough to speak. “I just made the mistake of actually trying to picture the Henrys in their bed.”
She crinkled her nose at the thought of the rather robust housekeeper and her pencil-thin, silent husband in bed. “He must disappear in all that—”
Again, she waved her hand about, letting the motion speak the words she wouldn’t say and he chuckled louder.
“Yes, I can imagine it would be hard to find him.”
They laughed together and for several minutes the bed shook with their continued mirth.
“You made a fine effort of changing the subject, but I believe it is your experience, not the Henrys, we were discussing.”
“Ah, yes,” he said thoughtfully. “My vast experience as a rake among London society. My nights spent seducing the ladies of the ton. My numerous mistresses scattered throughout the countryside still nursing their broken hearts. Is that what you wanted to hear about?”
“Well.” She wasn’t so sure she wanted to know about any of that at all. “I suppose—”
“Never happened.”
“What?”
“I’m not like most of the gentlemen of the ton or even like my dearest friends, who certainly had their fair share of affairs before marriage. No, my sweet sunshine, you see before you an anomaly. Counting you, there have been, but three women in my checkered past.”
“Three?” She was so swamped with unexpected relief, she hadn’t even realized she was nervous about his response. Then, she pictured in her mind all the lovely ladies in evening gowns and stunning courtesans in revealing lingerie she’d seen in drawings. How could she compete with them?
“Yes,” he continued, clearly unaware of her shock. “Although, I don’t suppose you can truly count the first time as it was with a chambermaid who thought I was actually my twin brother.”
“What?”
“My brother is much more in line with what Mrs. Henry described to you. A more charming rogue you’ve never met. All the maids in our household were half in love with him. You see, Adam is witty and clever, always the center of attention, always ready with a story or a joke. He is in his element when at a ball or musicale. His easy-going manner has made him a favorite with society, not to mention the fact that he is heir to a prosperous dukedom.”
She watched as he talked about his twin. He cared for his brother, which made her even more curious as it appeared the two no longer spoke very often. In all her time there, his brother had never come for a visit or even written to him.
She also realized the twin brothers must be the epitome of opposites considering every word Ben spoke about his brother was completely untrue about himself. After the past few weeks in his company, she sensed he was most happy when comfortably ensconced in a chair in the library with a brandy and a book or lying across Chelsea’s bed as he read her a bedtime story.
“So the chambermaid thought you were Adam?”
“Persistent, aren’t you? Yes, Adam and I were fifteen and home from school on holiday. My father was away for a few days, checking on a problem at one of his estates. Adam and I, having completed a rather trying year at boarding school, decided that as the men we now considered ourselves to be, we should unwind with a glass of brandy before bed.”
“Just a glass?”
“A glass, a bottle,” Ben waved her question away. “Needless to say, we became rather intoxicated.”
“I gathered that, but that doesn’t explain the chambermaid.”
“I’m getting to that, Miss Impatience.” He playfully swatted her bare bottom again in a gesture she was suddenly growing quite fond of. “We retired and stumbled through the house to our rooms. My room was the first one in the hallway and we were carrying on, as drunken schoolboys will do. We started tussling around in the room, play-fighting. In the midst of our wrestling match, Adam passed out. I was in no condition to carry him to his room, so I laid him across my bed, threw a blanket over him and staggered down to his room. A couple hours later, I woke up to discover I wasn’t alone.”
“Oh, no.” She giggled. “You must have been terrified, poor boy.”
He ignored her jest, unwilling to rise to her bait. “Terrified is not the word I would use, though I definitely stiffened up.”
She swung her pillow at him, laughing at his crude joke, but he snatched it away.
“I received quite an education that night. I realized the young girl had the wrong brother as she kept calling me Adam, and while I was still a bit drunk, I wasn’t so far gone that I didn’t know a gift when I saw it. Adam was far more experienced in that realm, and I was determined he wasn’t going to stay that way. I’m afraid the alcohol made me more adventurous than I may have been otherwise.”
“What happened then?”
“She snuck out shortly before Adam stumbled in at dawn, and we switched places.”
“Didn’t you tell her who you were?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Didn’t you tell Adam what happened?”
“No.”
She tilted her head. “Why not?”
“Didn’t seem to matter in the long run.”
“Well, that certainly wasn’t much of a story. Hope your second love affair was more exciting.”
“Actually, that story is duller than the first.”
“Try me.” She liked hearing stories about his past.
“Shortly before I left for war, I became involved with a young widow. She was twenty-seven to my nineteen. We had a brief, but passionate affair. I assuaged her loneliness and she taught me about the pleasures to be had between a man and a woman. It wasn’t an affair of the heart, merely two people reaching out to each other in loneliness and taking what they needed. It ended when I joined the army, and I haven’t seen her since my return. She is remarried and the mother of two beautiful little daughters.”
“That’s it?” she asked. “That is the extent of your vast experience.”
“That’s it. Disappointed?”
Was she disappointed? She didn’t think so. She rather liked that he wasn’t a
womanizer or a rake. However, there was still one question lingering in her mind.
“Why weren’t there more?”
“More? Women?”
She nodded.
“There weren’t too many opportunities when I joined the war. Of course, there were women available, but they were usually whores, camp followers, and I didn’t relish the thought of surviving a battle only to succumb to syphilis or some other horrible disease. I saw women suffer ill treatment at the hands of men in the villages through which we traveled. I’ve witnessed more rapes than I care to admit. War creates a blood lust in some men. I don’t know how to explain it, but somehow it negatively influenced my opinion of the act of sex.”
She was horrified by his past experiences.
“After the war, I went to work, albeit covertly, with Bow Street. Spent a lot of time in St. Giles and other unsavory sections of London. I saw women sell themselves to keep food on the table and blue-ruin in their men’s hands. I was disgusted with what I saw. How men could use women, demean and degrade them.” He shook his head unable to say more.
One more question kept tugging at the back of her mind, but she wasn’t brave enough to ask it aloud.
Why her?
Her wavering self-esteem wouldn’t allow her to ask. He’d been upset, disturbed deeply by the storm, and she hated to think he’d reached out to her simply because she’d been available and convenient. Shoving her misgivings aside, she shivered lightly.
Mistaking her movement for cold, Ben rose from bed, crossing the room to build up the fire. She hadn’t actually felt the chill until he left her side. His warmth permeated her entire body.
She suddenly felt very uncertain of herself and their unusual situation. “I suppose I should go back to my room.”
“Move one foot from that bed, and I will be forced to punish you.”
“Punish me?”
“Yes, punish.” He came back to the bed, crawling in and pulling her into the protective strength of his arms. “You aren’t leaving.”
“But Mrs. Henry—”
