by Emily Larkin
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t even nod.
Oliver grinned. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
He slid another finger inside her, and then his thumb did that magical thing again. Pleasure rippled through her. Primrose made a sound similar to the one he’d made before, both gasp and groan. She was melting from the inside out. Her body moved of its own accord, back arching slightly, quivering on the brink of a cascade of pleasure . . .
Oliver withdrew his fingers. “Your turn.”
Primrose opened her eyes. He wasn’t stopping now, was he?
Oliver gave her a jaunty grin. “Your turn,” he said again, and stretched out on the bed, his hands behind his head, waiting.
Primrose sat up with difficulty. Her body hummed with unreleased tension. He was teasing her, damn him. Well, two could play that game.
She looked at him, naked and grinning, beautiful and aggravating. Her gaze fastened on his cock. That strange, fascinating organ that she had yet to touch. And then she realized that she had a problem. “I can’t do to you what you did to me. We’re shaped differently.”
“I explored,” he said. “You can explore, too.”
Explore. The word sent a shiver of anticipation through her.
She reached for his cock, eager to know what it felt like—and then remembered the rules of this game. She’d miss her turn if she skipped straight to that part.
Primrose meticulously arranged Oliver’s legs, spreading his knees apart. He looked quite lewd, on display like that. His cock thrust up from its nest of hair, and below it dangled two plump, egg-shaped objects. “What are those?” she asked.
“My balls.”
As names went, it made more sense than “cock”; they were rather round.
Explore, Oliver had said.
Primrose moistened her lips, and then repeated what Oliver had done to her, skimming her hand up his inner thigh. His skin was surprisingly smooth, and as sensitive as her own, judging from the way he shivered. She let her fingers delve into that thicket of hair, warm, and rougher than her own.
“One caveat,” Oliver said, his voice a little breathless. “George’s baubles are rather sensitive, so don’t squeeze them.”
“Baubles? You mean these? I thought you said they were balls.” She reached out and stroked one with a fingertip, and observed his answering full-body shiver with satisfaction.
“Balls, baubles . . . means the same thing.” Oliver’s eyes were dark, his cheeks flushed, his lips parted.
Primrose stared at him for a long moment—God, he was beautiful—then tore her gaze away and bent her attention to playing the game he’d devised. He’d wanted exploration; he’d get it.
She spent minutes acquainting herself with his balls, mindful of his caveat, fondling them carefully, watching the way his body twitched and shivered, and then moved on to the thing she most wanted to touch: that intriguing cock.
It was quite different from his balls, harder and hotter and smoother. It seemed to pulse with vigor beneath her fingertips.
“George is made of sturdy stuff.” Oliver’s voice was tight, breathless. “You can be fairly rough with him before it hurts.”
She looked at his cock dubiously. The skin looked rather delicate.
“Go on. You won’t hurt me.”
Primrose wrapped her hand around that strong shaft, trying to measure its girth. She couldn’t quite get her fingers around it. You can be fairly rough, Oliver had said, so she tightened her grip cautiously, hesitantly, and when he didn’t flinch she took hold of him even more firmly, but still her fingers and thumb didn’t quite meet.
His cock seemed to thrum in her hand. How alive it felt. How exciting. How different. She’d never touched anything like it before.
Primrose released her grip and ran her fingers up its length, learning the texture: hot, hard, sleek. She trailed her fingertips over the smooth, blunt head, and then around the rim, over that flange of skin. Oliver gave another of his whole-body shivers and his cock moved eagerly, flexing. Oh, yes, he liked that.
She did it again and glanced at him. His eyes were squeezed shut, his face set in a grimace. Every muscle in his body appeared to be clenched: jaw, shoulders, stomach, thighs.
Primrose rubbed her thumb over that ridge of skin a third time, lightly and teasingly, and watched the muscles in Oliver’s belly clench even tighter, watched the tendons in his throat stand out.
If Oliver’s cock had its own unique texture, it also seemed to have its own unique scent: masculine and musky and arousing. She was tempted to lean closer and fill her lungs with the smell. Tempted to see what that hot, sleek skin tasted like.
Suddenly, Oliver sat up. He took hold of her wrist and removed her hand from his cock.
Primrose stared at him, alarmed. Had she hurt him?
His eyes were extremely dark, his cheeks quite flushed, and he was panting, but he didn’t appear to be in pain.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Your turn’s over.”
But she hadn’t brought him almost to the brink. Primrose opened her mouth to protest—and then realized that she had brought him there and that was why he was having such difficulty breathing.
Oliver released her hand. “Prim . . . George asks me to inform you that we can either continue with this game or put the acorn to the test, but not both. Not today.”
“Oh.”
Oliver looked a little shamefaced. “George doesn’t have sufficient self-control for both. Regrettably. He’s a little out of practice, but he wants you to know that his self-control will improve if he’s regularly exercised.”
Primrose bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. Did all men talk about their cocks in the third person? “If we keep playing the game, what happens next?”
Oliver smiled at her. “We use our mouths.”
She felt a rush of heat and nervousness and eager anticipation. What would it be like to kiss his cock? To taste that hot, taut skin?
“Your choice, Prim. What would you like most?”
She wanted both. But there was always tomorrow, and the next day, and the one after that. Dozens of days, hundreds of them, thousands.
Primrose weighed the two options. “The acorn.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
The acorn stopped her conceiving, but it couldn’t stop it hurting the first time. Even though Oliver warned her, and even though she was expecting it, that first thrust was more painful than she’d anticipated. Primrose inhaled sharply and tensed.
Oliver halted, his body braced over hers. “Prim?” He began to withdraw.
She gripped his biceps, digging her fingers in. “Don’t you dare stop.”
“Ow,” Oliver said, and then he bent his head and nipped her earlobe. “Bossy.”
“An absolute shrew,” Primrose agreed, aware of the enormous and painful size of his organ inside her. It hurt, dash it.
“That’s not alliteration.”
“What?”
“An absolute . . . what? Give me some alliteration, Prim.”
Primrose struggled to think. “An absolute . . .” God, her mind wasn’t working. “An absolute . . . Autocrat! I am an absolute autocrat.”
“Alliterative and accurate,” Oliver said, and then he grinned. “That was alliteration, too. I’m a genius.”
“You’re a jingle brains,” she told him.
“A jingle-brained genius?” His face brightened comically. “More alliteration!”
Primrose laughed, and realized that the burning pain had faded. Oliver’s organ was still as large as it had been, but it no longer felt like a painful invader. In fact, it felt as if it fitted rather nicely inside her. Very nicely, in fact.
Her hips moved instinctively, arching slightly, trying to gather him a little closer.
Oliver lost his grin. His expression became intent. “Prim?”
“It doesn’t hurt anymore.”
“Well, in that case . . .” He bent his head, kissed her, and moved
his own hips, giving her body what it craved: more of him.
Primrose gasped against his mouth and clutched his biceps.
Oliver slid into her again, and again and again, a delicious rhythm that she responded to instinctively. He picked up his pace, their bodies straining together. Primrose reached the brink and fell over it, and Oliver fell with her. She felt his fall—great spasms that racked his body. And Oliver being Oliver, he laughed as he fell, breathlessly, and Primrose found herself laughing, too.
The falling stopped. Oliver’s body was heavy on hers, and then he pushed up on one arm and rolled off her and lay panting, and then he laughed again, and flung an arm around her shoulders and hauled her close.
They lay together, chests heaving, legs tangled.
It felt very good, this hot, sweaty, panting aftermath. Primrose pressed her nose against Oliver’s shoulder and inhaled his scent, breathing it deeply into her lungs. She loved how he smelled.
Her body slowly cooled. She became grateful for Oliver’s warmth. They were breathing in time with one another, again. She didn’t need to feel for his pulse to know that their hearts were beating in time, too.
The relaxed, perfect intimacy between them felt almost unreal. She’d long ago decided that the things she’d wanted in a marriage—passion and love and a meeting of minds—were unattainable, and yet she’d found them all in Oliver Dasenby. Annoying, absurd, ridiculously wonderful Oliver Dasenby.
“You know, Prim, I’ve become rather fond of this room. I think I may have to have gilded columns in my own bedroom. Not four, though—paltry number. I want a full dozen.”
“Gilded columns are only for royalty,” Primrose told him firmly.
They lay in silence for another warm, perfect minute, and then a question sprang into her mind. “Oliver? Do you really call your cock George?”
“As of today, yes.”
Idiot, she wanted to say, but she didn’t, because Oliver wasn’t an idiot, or a jingle brains. He was just . . . Oliver. Uniquely Oliver. There was no one else like him in the world, and she was never going to call him an idiot again.
“George asks me to tell you that you may call him George, too. Or Mr. George, if you wish to be very polite.”
Primrose huffed a faint laugh. “You are an idiot, Oliver.” And then she felt immediately contrite. “I beg your pardon. You’re not an idiot. I won’t ever call you that again.”
“What? No. Don’t say that! Dash it, Prim, your tongue’s the only reason I’m marrying you.”
Primrose smiled against his shoulder. “It is?”
“You’re the only woman in England who would dare to call the Duke of Westfell a jingle brains,” Oliver informed her. “So don’t start being polite to me or I shall have to withdraw my offer.”
He really, truly does love me. Her throat tightened. “All right,” she whispered.
Oliver shifted slightly, not a large movement, and she sensed a corresponding shift in his mood, towards something more serious. “I’m going to run a lot of decisions past you, Prim, and I need you to be honest with me. If you ever think I’m making a mistake, for God’s sake tell me.”
“What sort of decisions?”
“Dukely decisions.”
She didn’t tell him dukely wasn’t a word; he already knew that. “Your men of business will advise you.”
“They will, and I know I can ask advice of your father and Rhodes, too, but I’d like to be able to talk things through with you first.”
“Of course. If that’s what you wish.”
“It is. I value your opinion, Prim.”
Primrose felt herself blush. It didn’t just heat her cheeks; it seemed to heat her chest as well, as if her heart blushed, too.
Oliver stroked her shoulder with his thumb. “You’re a better judge of people than I am. You had Ninian’s measure long before I did.”
“But I was wrong about your uncle.” Primrose remembered the expression on Lord Algernon’s face when he’d tried to smother Oliver—regret and determination—and shivered. “And you recognized Miss Middleton-Murray as a harpy before I did.”
“Perhaps, but two heads are wiser than one. You see things from a different perspective than I do. I think we can do a better job of being the Duke of Westfell together than I could alone.”
Primrose considered this for a moment, and then nodded. “Yes. We could.”
His thumb moved lightly across her shoulder again, an idle caress. “So . . . the first decision I need to discuss with you concerns Ninian.”
“In what way?”
“I’d like to give him one of my estates—and I know my men of business will advise me against it, but I want to, Prim. It feels right.”
She understood what he meant. It did feel right. Profoundly right. “How many estates do you have?”
“Nine. Six unentailed.”
“Then absolutely, give him one.”
“Truly?” Oliver shifted, so that he could see her face. “You mean that?”
“Of course. He saved your life. Three times. Four, if you count him jumping off the jetty when he thought you were drowning.”
“You don’t think I’m being careless with my property? Profligate? Dooming my heirs to hardship and poverty?”
“If you had six cousins and you wanted to give each of them an estate, then I might try to dissuade you. But one estate to Ninian? No. I think it’s an excellent idea.”
“Good.” Oliver laid his head back down on the rather wrinkled Holland cloth. “That was our first decision as Westfell. I think it went well, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Are you ready for the next one?”
“Of course.”
“Which estate shall I give him?”
“Whichever one is his favorite.”
Oliver laughed. “Why didn’t I think of that? See, I knew there was a reason I was marrying you. Which brings me to my next decision—our next decision . . . When shall we marry?”
“When would you like to marry?”
“As soon as possible,” Oliver said. “I’d ride to London today for a special license, if I could, but . . .”
“Your uncle’s funeral.”
“Yes.” He sighed. “Tell me, Prim, how soon after the funeral can we marry without it being deemed unseemly?”
Primrose considered this question carefully. “We really should wait a few months, but . . . we could probably get away with marrying next month if we don’t make a celebration of it. If we keep it small and quiet and unexceptional. Immediate family only.”
Oliver groaned. “Next month? How will George and I survive?” He removed his arm from around her shoulder and rolled to face her. “Just as well we’ve got this,” he said, taking the acorn pendant in his hand.
Primrose blushed.
Oliver laughed and kissed her, still holding the acorn, and then he sobered. “You don’t regret it, Prim?”
She knew what he meant by “it”: the lovemaking. “Certainly not. ‘Live each day as if it were your last.’”
Oliver released the acorn and grinned. “Do you have an Aurelius quote for every occasion?”
“No.” Primrose hesitated, and then verbalized a thought that had been slowly forming over the past few days: “I think Marcus Aurelius might have been rather like you.”
“Me?” Oliver looked astonished. “I doubt it.”
“‘Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.’ That’s you, Oliver.”
“Well, yes, but—”
“‘Death smiles at us all; all a man can do is smile back.’ That’s you, too. Except you don’t just smile back; you laugh.”
Oliver looked at her oddly. “You’re quite uncanny, Prim.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s one of my favorite quotes, and I always change ‘smile’ to ‘laugh.’”
They stared at each other. Primrose didn’t know what to say. It was a little uncanny.
Oliver grinned, and lightly flicked the tip of her nose. “We’re meant for each other, Prim.” Then he sat up. “We’d better get dressed. They’ll be sending out search parties if we don’t show our faces soon.”
Primrose sat up, too, and scrambled off the bed. How long had they been here? It felt like hours. “What’s the time?”
Oliver found his waistcoat and looked at his pocket watch. “Nearly twelve. Still an hour ’til luncheon.”
“Thank heavens.”
They helped each other to dress, then went through to the State dressing room for the finishing touches. Oliver spent several minutes in front of the mirror, retying his neckcloth; Primrose tried to tidy her hair, and then gave up. She needed a hairbrush, and there wasn’t one down here.
When he’d finished with the neckcloth, Oliver met her eyes in the mirror. “About our betrothal . . . I’d rather not tell Ninian until after the funeral. Let him cope with one thing at a time.”
“I agree.”
“But we can tell Rhodes today. I can’t wait to see the expression on his face!” Oliver’s grin faltered. “It won’t send him into the doldrums again, will it? Us getting married when Evelyn is dead?”
“It might a little bit, but I know he’ll be happy for us, too.”
Oliver gave a nod, and examined his neckcloth again. He tweaked it carefully.
Primrose watched him in the mirror—that tiny, intent frown on his brow—and realized that she’d not yet told Oliver that she loved him.
“I love you,” she blurted.
Oliver stopped fiddling with his neckcloth. His frown vanished. Their eyes met in the mirror again. He smiled at her. “I know.”
“How?”
“Because you wouldn’t have done any of that if it wasn’t serious for you.” He gestured to the State bedroom.
He was right, of course. “Would you have done it if it wasn’t serious for you?”
“With you?” Oliver smiled at her. “No. This was never a game for me, Prim.” And then he cocked his head to one side and studied her reflection. “I hate to tell you this, but your hair is rather disreputable.”
“So is your neckcloth.”
“No, it isn’t. I’m setting a new fashion. Dukes are allowed to do that.” Oliver puffed out his chest, and preened in the mirror.
