Most Improper Miss Sophie Valentine

by Jayne Fresina

  “You taught me to express my needs and to stop hiding them,” she reminded him.

  His eyes narrowed, but she still felt that smoky heat of the warrior’s raw desire on her face. It was almost comical when he tried to be a gentleman, suddenly concerned with propriety.

  “Will you remove your own clothes?” she asked sweetly, “or shall I do it for you?”

  At last, he relinquished the task to her eager fingers with only one further caution. “We should not. We should wait another three weeks, until the ceremony.”

  “Do stop chattering, Kane. It’s most distracting.”

  He kissed her before the last word was fully out, but this interruption she didn’t mind. She felt the drowsy effects of the sun’s heat that day and all that heady rose fragrance, and she let him take over, allowed his lips to take possession of hers.

  Her fiancé’s hands sought the hooks to her gown, earnest in their task but fumbling.

  “Let me,” she whispered, and he did. She turned her back to him as she undressed. The only sounds were those of his agitated breath and the low, crackling fire. Her gown crumpled to the floor, and she stepped out of it. She heard the soft, pleading moan of her name on his lips. She felt his hand brush her hair aside and then his eager breath, warm on the nape of her neck as he struggled with her corset laces. Her chemise slowly slid down over her hips, silently joining her discarded gown. She closed her eyes as his arms immediately came around her, those rough-skinned hands that so fascinated her, reaching for her bared breasts. His lips were on her neck, his groin pressed hard against her behind. Not knowing what to do, she laid her head back against his shoulder while his hands moved over her body, exploring and fondling without asking permission. He took freely, knowing what he wanted.

  Maria and Lavinia were right; he certainly didn’t have the hands of a gentleman. But her feet were on the ground, and there was no inclination to run away or escape. Except into his arms. And his ungentlemanly hands.

  “I love you,” he whispered and reached into her heart and soul with his gentle admission.

  And she knew how glad she was he’d come to find her, how relieved she was she’d waited.

  His tongue licked the scattered pulse at her neck. His hand cupped her breasts, and his teeth nipped her earlobe. She sank against his chest and reached around to feel him, to free him from his breeches. “Let’s go upstairs,” she gasped.

  He shook his head. “Here will do.” As he sank back into a chair before the low, flickering glow of the fire, he eased her down astride his lap, and then his hands caressed her arms, her back, her hips, and her thighs, continuing the determined exploration. When his fingers moved between her legs, she groaned with joy.

  ***

  Sheer, white-hot pleasure roared through his veins and spun around inside his head. The low purr forming in her throat suggested he pleased her. He could hear and feel the rapid throb of her heart as he nuzzled her firm breasts. He tickled her hardened nipples with his eyelashes and gently rubbed them with his palms. When she tossed her head back, arching her body and offering her breasts to his mouth again, he knew she was about to reach her peak already. Her skin gleamed in the firelight, a gratifying shade of pink. Her nipple was taut and erect, and she wanted his lips on it now, apparently, unless his ears deceived him and she was not, in fact, begging him with breathless desperation to take it. He held back to prolong the pleasure.

  “Russ!” she cried out. “Please! I want you.”

  He laughed low, cradled her to his lap, and fell forward, slipping from the chair to his knees on the crumpled pile of their clothes. Her skin was pure luxury—satin and silk, so soft it melted in the heat of his body.

  “Are you ready, then, Miss Valentine?” Because he was. In one fluid motion, he thrust and fell forward from his knees, covering her mouth with his to halt that shocked gasp. For a moment, they lay still while her heart beat hard and fast against his chest. He was not even completely sheathed yet. Her eyes fluttered open, met his heated gaze, and held it. He began to move, pressing farther with more care, resisting the powerful urge to thrust again, not wanting to hurt her. She was small and very tight but warmly welcoming. Inch by inch, he filled her at last.

  ***

  Sophie thought there must be something wrong. Surely he was too large for her, but he was patient, careful. When her hands rested timidly on his buttocks, she felt them tense with the strain of holding back, so she caressed them and stroked his back, anxious to help. And then when he did thrust, she gasped again in shock, and her body quivered under his.

  He withdrew slightly and then immediately reentered, watching her eyes all the time. As he repeated the motion, she learned the rhythm, and her body gave as well as received. It became a slick, pumping motion, the friction causing sparks they both felt, a sensation they couldn’t get enough of.

  She curled her legs around his hips, and a symphony of startled gasps and moans accompanied his every thrust and withdrawal. The pleasure swam through her blood like a school of tiny fish, darting this way and that, shooting upward toward the sunlight. She was shameless, utterly lost.

  ***

  Lazarus slid his hands under her bottom as wild heat raged through his veins and his limbs, inspiring him with the need for complete and utter possession.

  As he felt her trembling at his mercy, the half moons of her fingernails digging into his back, he took her nipple in his mouth and thrust again and again. A few harsh breaths later, he thought his skull must have separated from his brain as a sensation stronger than any he’d ever felt ripped through his tight, rigid body and flooded out of him.

  At last, the angel was his, and he was ready to let her take him up, if this is how it must be. But a few minutes later, he was still alive. He opened his eyes and looked down at her flushed cheeks and wet, smiling lips. Her back was still arched, and her full breasts quivered as the last waves of her own pleasure lapped through her. Slowly she raised her lashes and met his gaze.

  “That was lovely, Kane. Again, please.”

  Even with her legs wrapped around him, and despite the complete abandonment she exhibited only seconds before, she was now a prim, bossy Valentine again.

  Still breathing hard, Lazarus gazed down at her and thanked his exceptional good fortune for this very wanton, wayward fallen angel.

  ***

  She woke slowly, keeping her eyes closed and reality at bay until the last possible moment. Aware of a new scent invading her pillow, she tried to think what it might be, and then she remembered. That scent was of another body beside her own, the scent of a man.

  Eyelids still not yet raised, she made a careful assessment of her inner workings and her body parts. She finally concluded she was sore and aching, but she would live, surprisingly.

  Finally she opened her eyes and discovered his face, two-thirds pressed into the pillow, mouth partially open. His hair was a rumpled mess, some of it sticking directly up in the air. Jet-black eyelashes twitched and fluttered against his cheeks. Even in sleep, he was restless. Of what did he dream this morning? Of her? From the coarse words he mumbled into that pillow, she sincerely hoped not.

  But how young he looked while he slept.

  He lay above the sheet, sprawled out naked on his front. There was not a scrap of fat on his body. Every part was well used, from the astonishing width of his shoulders, to the narrow waist and slim hips, to the taut buttocks, hard, lean thighs, and full calves. And, of course, there were those parts not visible while he lay on his front—in particular, that part of him put to very good use last night.

  So this was what it was all about. This is what it should be like. It was more than she’d ever dreamed, this blissful completion, this loving. She’d never trusted like this, never let herself go as she did now.

  She wanted to throw open those shutters and cry her happiness to the wind.

  She wanted to touch him again, but it would be unfair, surely, while he slept. All she could do was stretch out beside him and wa
it.

  Or not.

  She inched her face along the pillow and blew gently on his eyelids. At least this way, if he woke, she could claim it was an accident.

  He stopped cursing in his sleep. His hand, tucked under the pillow, withdrew slightly and then was still.

  She dampened her fingertip and carefully drew it across each of his eyebrows, following the relaxed curve. He groaned and mumbled in his sleep again, something about “giving that bleedin’ gent a right smackin’,” and she hastily took her hand back. She glanced down the length of his prone form to his hip. Perhaps she could just slide her hand under that curve and…

  In the next second, she was flat on her back and he was over her, laughing.

  “You were fast asleep,” she protested. Her heart pounded madly.

  “Never,” he told her. “I’m always alert, even when”—he leaned down to kiss the tip of her nose—“I may not appear to be.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind.” She gasped as she still hadn’t caught her breath. “’Tis a very sneaky trick.”

  He grabbed her wrists and held them up over her head. “As long as you behave yourself and I don’t catch you up to no good, you’ve no cause to fear.” A slow grin broke across his lips.

  “I am not very good at behaving myself.”

  “I noticed.”

  He lay with his legs between hers, holding them apart, and she felt the bold, broad head of his erection already poised to enter her again. It pressed at the threshold, throbbed there, taunting her. Apparently that part of him never slept deeply either.

  He held his upper body a few inches above hers and asked casually, “Is there something you wanted from me, then, ma’am? I can’t help noticing you were eager for my attention this morning.”

  She writhed and rubbed her soft, eager womanhood against that hard, male brawn.

  “Is that what you want?”

  She groaned. Her hands struggled to get free of his grip. She wanted to grasp his buttocks and urge him in, but he held himself taut above her, his muscles tense. And then he kissed her eyelids slowly, one at a time as he laughed throatily. He moved his elbows to resettle his weight. The sheet whispered as his thighs slid farther apart, holding hers open. “I think my fine lady is insatiable.” He shook his head. “What shall I do with her?”

  She still couldn’t say the word, although she wanted to. Fortunately, he took pity on her. His question was rhetorical when he asked it, and a few seconds later, it was also entirely moot.

  Chapter 32

  Sophie sat him in a chair by the window, where sunlight streamed in.

  “Now be still,” she cautioned.

  “It might hurt.” He folded his arms. “You might slip and draw blood!”

  “Oh, hush!” She pulled his head back and began ruthlessly trimming his hair, while he muttered low complaints and one foot tapped nervously. “Have you never been to a barber?”

  “Never. Why would I want another man fussing over me, probably stealing my money while he has me at the point of a knife?”

  She laughed. “Such distrust! Where have you lived your life before now, that you think that way?”

  “I told you. I was raised in the rookeries of London. Or rather, I raised myself. Mostly.”

  “But for your sister.”

  He said nothing.

  “And that old man who was like a father to you.” She ran her fingers through his hair, fascinated by the juxtaposition of pale and dark. “The one who left you his money when he died.”

  “Hmm. Are you done?”

  “Not yet. Where did he die? On the hulks?”

  His eyes were half-closed, but she knew he was watching her from under those jet-black lashes. “Yes, he died on the hulks,” he snapped. “Before he was sentenced, he told me where he’d buried his money—his nest egg, as he called it. Wanted me to start a new life with it. Now, are you done yet, woman?”

  “Have patience. I know there’s no trust where you come from, but is there no patience, either?”

  “Very little. Even for beautiful women.”

  “Flattery will get you nowhere with me, Kane. Now be still!” Curling locks of black hair drifted to the flagstones at her feet and then blew about in the breeze through the open window. While still, the strong lines of his face reminded her of the carved profile belonging to one of those ancient crusading knights sleeping in the church crypt. In her opinion, he had a very fine nose, even if Mrs. Flick did think it lacked nobility. What did that old bat know?

  “Tell me more about your sister,” she said quietly.

  “Nosy, aren’t you?”

  “I’m also the one holding the scissors.”

  He groaned and closed his eyes all the way now. “She was seduced by some fancy gent who abandoned her when she was pregnant. I never knew his name. She wouldn’t tell me.”

  “And she was only seventeen.”

  “Yes. Three years older than me.”

  “Did she look like you?”

  “S’pose so. She was dark like me.”

  She stopped trimming. “She worked at Lady Grimstock’s.” She felt cold suddenly, despite the sun.

  “I told you that already. They tossed her out when she told them she was pregnant.”

  Just then, Aunt Finn peered in through the window. “Sakes! What are you doing to that poor man, Sophie? You mean to leave him bald?”

  Alarmed, Lazarus tried to leave his chair, so she held him down by the shoulders. “She teases you, fool.” Her heart was racing, her mind still trying to put everything he’d told her in order. She closed her eyes and saw James Hartley stopping to whisper in the ear of a young, dark-haired maid. No, it couldn’t be. Her imagination had always been too lively.

  Suddenly, she leaned down and kissed his brow. He reached one hand up to the back of her head and drew her forward until her upside-down lips met his. At once she felt the heaviness of desire again. Yes, better. Don’t think bad thoughts. Enjoy what you have, Sophie! Chew your toffee. Besides, what good would it do now to speak of what she’d seen and tried so many years to forget?

  Don’t dwell on the past. It was all gone now, and they must look ahead to the future.

  She’d written to James that morning. It had not been easy to explain in words that would not make him angry, but she didn’t want him hurt. She’d known him a great many years. Even during his long absence since her accident, she’d thought about him often. She would always care about James and want him to be happy, but she knew she wasn’t the woman for him. She tried fitting all that into her letter. Her dearest hope was he would move on with his life.

  She straightened up and pushed her thoughts of James aside. “Now for the razor, I think.”

  “I’ll shave myself,” Lazarus protested, but she wouldn’t allow it. She prodded him up out of the chair and instructed him to remove his clothes.

  ***

  His fingers curled around the edge of the old copper bathtub, feeling the dimples and dents. How many previous bathers, he wondered idly, had put themselves at the mercy of a woman with something sharp in her hand? Then he felt the warm soap she rubbed on his face, and shortly after, the first sweep of the razor. She was quite accomplished. Nothing to worry about, then.

  Or was there? Where did she acquire this skill? By practicing on her past lover?

  Damn you, James Hartley.

  With the tip of her finger under his chin, she lifted his face for another sweep of the razor. He swallowed carefully. It was very hard—this trusting. It was also very hard not to be jealous. However, Lazarus was determined, a fighter, and he would beat it back. He wouldn’t let it get in the way of this happiness. What did the past matter? They would have a fresh start with each other.

  In the yard, Tuck and Chivers were preparing the cart for a journey to Sydney Marshes, where they planned to visit a farm sale. Aunt Finn was excited to go with them today, enjoying her new lease on life. Lazarus heard the familiar rusty groan of the gate, wheels rumbling over cobbles,
rioting hens clucking irritably, and then they were gone. Doves chortled in the dovecot, the hens quieted to a low cackle, and the piglets in their mother’s sty grunted, merry and content.

  The last pass of the razor left his face smooth. Sophie wiped it carefully with a towel and then laid a cloth over his face and ordered him to keep his eyes shut.

  “What have you done to me?” he mumbled from beneath the warm, damp cloth.

  “Made you almost look respectable.”

  He gripped the edge of the tub and listened to her steps move back and forth. Having sat still for half an hour under her command, he was now restless, his blood surging, his mind eagerly sending the message to his body they were alone again.

  She beat him to it, however, for when he was finally allowed to look again, she’d already removed her gown, and now let her long hair down from its tidy knot. The beauty and abundance of that hair still shocked Lazarus whenever it was unbound. It fascinated him that so much wildness could be restrained inside that demure knot.

  “Is there room for me?” she asked as she stood naked before him, her skin gleaming.

  If there wasn’t room, he thought, he’d cut off a damned leg to make it.

  She stepped in and lowered herself into the water between his knees. “’Tis my turn,” she said. “I need my hair washed.”

  He eagerly grabbed the lump of soap and lathered up. “Now you’re at my mercy,” he exclaimed.

  “Don’t get soap in my eyes, Kane.”

  He paused and looked at her sitting in the bath, her knees drawn up to her chin and her small, heart-shaped face surrounded by all that stunning hair, the ends of which just dipped in the water. She tried, did Miss Sophie Valentine, but it wouldn’t work with him. Not since he’d seen her go from proud, haughty schoolmistress to reckless, wildly abandoned strumpet.

  “I’m minded to start nowhere near your eyes,” he remarked coolly.

  “I asked you to wash my hair.”

  “I think, madam, you need a good cleansing all over.”

  Her imperious little chin lifted another inch.