Felicity decided she might as well get to the point, since there really wasn’t much time. Sooner or later her aunts would wonder why she hadn’t returned from the retiring room.
“Do you still want to marry me because of that kiss and—and all the other things?”
He looked surprised that she would ask, as if his reasons hadn’t changed. “Yes, I still want to marry you, and not just because I kissed you and—and all those other things.” He smiled back, and Felicity felt her heart floating in anticipation of what he was certain to say next. I love you. “But perhaps you should return downstairs before someone else misses you.”
And just like that, her heart turned to lead, and she felt a strange burning sensation somewhere behind her eyes. He looked forlorn, as if reluctant to send her away while knowing it was the right thing to do. Would he miss her if she left?
“You want me to leave…?”
He didn’t say anything, but only gazed back at her.
“You want me to leave,” she said again, “without—without…?”
He took her into his arms, and her heart went aloft again. “You mean without this?” His lips covered hers, and this time she tasted brandy, thinking there were so many different tastes to this man…so many facets. Captain Jack Jordan was a brave soldier, a daring highwayman, a future viscount, a loyal friend…and now she hoped to find out just what kind of lover he was, as she slid her arms over his broad shoulders and pressed her body against his. Again she felt that hard length between his hips, but this time she knew it couldn’t be a pistol. Fleetingly she wondered if he’d ever carried one, even on the night he waylaid their carriage. She opened her mouth wider, reaching for his tongue with her own as strange tingles shimmered all over her before gathering in her core, where they tightened into a knot of longing, the same desire she’d felt that night at Halstead House when he’d pleasured her so intimately and thoroughly.
So it was that she sighed in acquiescence as he swiftly unfastened the back of her gown, letting it drop over her shoulders as he stroked them, slipping his fingers under the thin straps of her chemise and leaving her totally bare almost to the tops of her breasts. She opened her eyes to look into his. He was gazing at the tops of her breasts, looking very much as if he wanted to see the rest of them. She was about to shake herself until her gown dropped further when she glimpsed the open door behind them.
“The door…” she gasped. If anyone saw them now, she’d be compromised for certain…and then they’d have to marry for reasons other than love.
He threw the door a quick glance, as if he couldn’t bear to look away from her. “It’s your last chance, Felicity,” he whispered. “Your last chance to leave without…without…”
“And yours.” She tried but couldn’t find any reluctance in his eyes. Instead they shone with a heated gleam in the wavering shadows.
“I intend to stay right here,” he murmured. “But not without…without…” Her heart skipped a beat as he backed his way to the door, all the while keeping his eyes on her. “…Without closing the door first.”
He closed the door. And then he turned the key in the lock.
Felicity held her breath as he stepped back toward her, not once looking away from her. She gave a little shake, and let her peach gown fall to the floor. Jack took her into his arms again, this time kissing her as if he had a thirst that could only be slaked by her mouth. That hardness between his thighs rubbed against her sex as his tongue stroked hers. She held onto his shoulders as he lowered her onto the edge of the bed, not breaking the kiss until she was lying down with her legs hanging over the edge.
“Don’t move,” he whispered, as he knelt between them.
Felicity’s heart raced so fast she trembled all over as she wondered if he was about to do something to the place where she ached so much. The place that ached every time she’d thought of him having his wicked way with her since the night they met.
Instead he removed her shoes. She lifted her head to see what he was doing, as if she didn’t already know he was removing her shoes. “I said don’t move,” he whispered firmly, though she caught the ghost of a smile playing around his lips, and a gleam in his aquamarine eyes.
He leisurely untied her one of her garters, his fingers only inches away from her sex. She whimpered with impatience, and reached for the other garter.
He swiftly put one hand over hers. “No. Let me. You will not surrender your clothing to me as eagerly as you did that garnet ring. You will let me take everything. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she chirped, as she felt a strange, quivery thrill in her very center.
It seemed to take forever for him to untie the other garter, as if it were in a difficult knot. But it soon came undone, and then just as slowly he peeled off her stockings, sliding first one and then the other over her knees. Felicity gasped as he planted a light kiss on one knee, and then the other. He pushed the stockings down further till they reached her ankles, whereupon he kissed her ankles.
She gasped again and writhed, marveling at sensations she’d never known were possible. He removed the stockings altogether, flinging first one and then the other over his shoulder before running his fingers over her toes, tickling them and causing them to wiggle.
And then he mysteriously stopped. Next she heard some shuffling beneath the bed. She lifted her head. “What are you doing? Where are you?”
“Would you like to be ravished by Captain Jordan, or the highwayman?” he said from somewhere around the vicinity of her feet.
“Both,” she answered without hesitation.
He popped back into view, and she gasped as she saw the familiar white bauta mask and tricorne hat. Her most intimate muscles instantly clenched in response.
“The highwayman first,” he said, slipping both hands beneath her shift where they grasped the lacy edge of her drawers. Felicity lifted her derriere as he slid the drawers down, down, down her legs until they were off. Still kneeling, he pushed her shift up to her breasts and then spread her thighs apart.
Instead of being embarrassed, Felicity reveled in a wickedly carnal excitement she’d never felt before, most of it centered in the very place where he had to be gazing now. She wondered if she’d feel this same thrill if he removed the mask. Her tender flesh quivered and throbbed as if his very perusal stroked her there. His fingers lightly danced along the outer edges of the tight curls covering her mound, and she thought she would go mad if he didn’t do more than just look, exciting as that already was.
“Oh please,” she whispered. “Please take what you want.” She had to bite back the urge to add, what I want.
As if he could read her thoughts, he said, “But what do you want?”
“You’re the highwayman. I want you to take whatever you want. You never wanted that old ring, did you?”
“Of course not, Felicity,” he murmured hotly. “All I want is you. All of you. I mean that.” To her frustration he rose to his feet, still standing between her open legs that hung over the edge of the bed. He bent over her, grabbing what remained of her undergarments and dragging them over her head, leaving her utterly naked to his masked gaze. The rosy tips of her breasts pebbled and strained for his touch. She sighed as he placed a fingertip on each one, teasing them in a duet of circular motion that only sent more heat to her groin.
“How I long to put my lips where my fingers are,” he whispered. “I can talk and eat and drink with this mask, but I can’t do to you all things I’d like to do.”
“Then take it off,” she gasped. “In fact, you can take everything off. The highwayman has done all I want him to do. From now on I just want you, Jack. Just you.”
He tore off the mask and tricorne, smiling down at her. “Oh, this is so much better. You’re beautiful, Felicity.” Only then did she remember that he couldn’t see all that well with the mask.
As he knelt between her thighs again, his fingers skittered down her belly and into the place where she ached the most, gingerly ope
ning the hidden folds. Felicity arched her hips and moaned as he grazed that tiny knot of flesh that throbbed with pleasure, pulsating and plumping with each stroke of his thumb in the same circular motion he’d used on her nipples. She closed her eyes to savor the incredible bliss that streaked from her swollen nub to every nerve ending, setting her on fire even as it flooded her and left her dazed and dazzled.
Then he did something he hadn’t done that night in the duke’s book room. He slipped his finger all the way inside of her, and to her amazement her slick inner muscles embraced it in welcome, clung to it as he slowly slid it in and out, turning it ever so slightly.
Was this what everyone at the house party thought her highwayman had done to her that night? Until now she’d had no real idea of what it meant to be ravished.
And surely he’d just ravished her. She lay there too weak to move, too sated by his magic touch to do anything except pant for breath as she listened to the rustling of fabric. She opened her eyes to see him swiftly removing his clothes as he gazed down at her with a heated gleam in his aquamarine eyes and a roguish smile playing along his lips. She marveled at the corded muscles in his arms, the perfectly sculpted planes and ridges on his chest and abdomen, and…that. She’d mistaken it for his pistol the other night at Halstead House, but that was bigger than any pistol she’d ever seen.
And much less threatening, despite its size. No, she wasn’t at all afraid of what came next. While his caresses had left her physically gratified to some degree—a great degree, in fact—they’d also left her aching for more of him. All of him.
Now, she thought, surely she was about to be truly ravished.
He covered her body with his own, skin against skin, warmth shared as he brushed his finger through her hair and rained kisses all over her, from her brow to her ears to her throat, and finally across her breasts. His lips traced every curve, over, under, and between, doing all the things he couldn’t do in that mask. His tongue flicked over a hardened nipple before he took it into his mouth. Felicity gasped at the wet tugging sensations that only revived her desire for him.
He lifted her legs and stretched over her, propping himself on his hands. She grasped his biceps, amazed at how thick and hard they were. As hard as his manhood that probed the aching, damp need between her thighs.
“Jack,” she whispered. “I want you. Only you. From now on, just be you.” She felt a sudden urge to add that she loved just him. Because she did. She took a deep breath, about to say it when she felt a sudden sharp twinge between her thighs, and she gasped and tensed beneath him.
“I’m sorry, my darling,” he whispered. “It’ll subside very shortly.”
She managed a smile. “It doesn’t look very short to me at all.”
He chuckled softly, his aquamarine eyes shining with something she knew instinctively could be no trick of candlelight. Then what was it, if not that?
The question fled her mind as he slid into her again. This time it didn’t hurt as much.
He slipped out of her, and buried himself inside of her again. This time it didn’t hurt at all. If anything, it felt as wonderful as his earlier caresses. He closed his eyes and sighed, as if savoring the same sensations Felicity had savored when he’d had his fingers where his manhood now was, stroking her to the incredible bliss that had so dazed and dazzled her.
“Jack,” she said on a gasp, as he sheathed himself again in her slippery, hot passage, and she slid a hand around his neck to pull him down toward her. “Kiss me, Jack.”
“Ah, Felicity,” he murmured, right before his mouth claimed hers, his tongue plunging into hers with a rhythm that matched his steady thrusts and her undulating hips as she wrapped her legs around his and reveled in the masculine strokes driving deep within the embrace of her femininity. She delighted in their ultimate oneness, as if they were meant to be together.
As if they were always meant to be together, by a force greater than that of fallible humans who’d assumed from her birth that she was always meant to be with someone else.
She’d never felt that the way she did now, stronger and surer with Jack’s every assertive thrust as he enveloped her in his arms and buried his face in her hair, rocking faster and harder till he seemed to freeze in her embrace for a moment as he groaned.
She threaded her fingers through his golden hair as she pressed her cheek against the roughness of his, breathing in his spicy, manly scent. She wanted to tell him that she loved him…only she wanted him to say it first. She had to know that he really loved her, and that he hadn’t done this to compromise her even more than he had already. That he hadn’t done this to give her no choice but to marry him, since he’d already stated to his uncle quite unequivocally—and who knew to who else—that she was his bride and that was that.
For she didn’t want to be his bride unless he loved her. After this, surely now he would say the three words she longed to hear, that she yearned to say to him?
He carefully withdrew from her and rolled over next to her, gazing up at the ceiling. “Surely your aunt must be missing you by now. I’m rather surprised she hasn’t come knocking yet. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.”
A strange pang stabbed her from deep within, prompting her to sit up and stare down at him in dismay.
He ventured a grin and reached up to toy with the brown curls tumbling about her shoulders. “Still trying to trap those flies, eh?”
“Ohh!” It came out low and hoarse, like a monstrous growl. Mortified by his words, coming so close on the heels of what they’d just done, she snatched up her peach gown and clutched it against herself, not wanting him to see what she’d so brazenly allowed him to see only moments ago. What she’d so wantonly allowed him to touch.
And what she’d so rampantly allowed herself to enjoy.
“I suppose that was the wrong thing to say,” he said with a weary sigh.
“Everything you’ve said since—since—since you rolled over onto your back is the wrong thing to say! Are you relieved that my aunts haven’t come knocking, which would’ve meant you had no choice but to marry me?”
“I already thought we had no choice but to marry. Or do you still insist on being properly courted till the end of time?”
“Ohh!” she said again, as tears sprang to her eyes. “Please don’t say another word.”
As he finally sat up, she tried not to notice how gloriously masculine and muscular he looked naked. She fought to tamp down the tiny flame it sparked deep within her, in the same place where she’d been blazing and burning only moments ago, before he flooded her with so much unforgettable ecstasy.
But long after he’d stolen her heart just as he’d stolen the garnet ring Renton’s mother had given to her. She couldn’t begrudge him either.
Oh, how she longed for him to give her his heart. And maybe a ring, as long as he gave it to her himself and it didn’t belong to anyone else.
“I can’t seem to stop bungling things with you,” he said, as he picked up his clothes and started donning them.
She backed into the darkest corner of the room. “I believe you can stop if you really want to. The right thing to say is so simple. So obvious.”
He didn’t say another word until he finished dressing. He stole a glance at her as he donned his coat. “It suddenly occurs to me what you’d like me to say.”
“Only don’t say it now.”
“Do you want me to say it or not?” The irritation in his voice, so soon after what they just did, was like a blade in her heart.
“Certainly not now!” Not when he was irritated and it seemed he’d only be saying it not because he really meant it, but because she expected it whether he really felt it or not.
He threw up his hands and muttered something that sounded like “women” as he strode to the door. Not once did he look back at her, not even when he finally unlocked it.
“I’m leaving now, since we shouldn’t go back downstairs together.”
“Of course not. People might thin
k you ruined me and then we’d have to marry.”
He finally turned to regard her. A sick feeling roiled in her stomach as she discerned no humor in his expression, no twinkle or gleam in his aquamarine eyes. “Is that what you think happened just now—that I ruined you?”
“Isn’t that what everyone else would think? But no one saw it, any more than no one saw what the highwayman supposedly did, or that all you did was kiss me in front of Howland Hall, or—or what you did that night in the duke’s book room. No one has to know. So be gone and marry someone you really want to marry!”
She held her breath, waiting for him to say that he did want to marry her, and not because he felt he had to. But his dour expression did not falter, and he turned the key again to lock the door from the inside before he departed, closing it behind him without—without—
Without another word or backward glance.
And because he’d locked himself out, there was no way he could come back in here unless he asked her to let him in. He didn’t want to be tempted into giving her another chance to bungle things even worse than he had, by pushing him away yet again.
She flopped back onto the bed and burst into tears as she felt her heart breaking into thousands of little pieces she feared would never be put back together again.
Chapter Eighteen
Not until he reached the staircase did it finally occur to Jack why Felicity hadn’t wanted him to say the right thing once he realized what it was.
And it would have been the right thing, too, because he couldn’t deny it. He’d probably started falling in love with her the night they met.
She didn’t want him to say the words under duress, and neither did he. Such a declaration meant nothing unless it was from the heart.
And it would have been from his heart—if only he’d said it when he had the chance. Before she leaped from the bed and accused him of saying all the wrong things while saying something wrong herself.
He thought he’d made love to her. She thought he ruined her, and probably for the same reason she thought he’d kissed her in front of Howland Hall.
The Highwayman's Lady (BookStrand Publishing Romance) Page 23
