The Sergeant's Lady

by Susanna Fraser

  “What was that about?” Will asked.

  “Teresa assuring me that all of them are sound sleepers, even the baby. I suppose we’re rather transparent.” She sounded abashed, but she swayed toward him.

  He caught her and covered her mouth in a rough kiss, snaking his hands around to the small of her back to pull her against him. His cock was already hard, and he wanted her to feel it. She arched against him, her arms wound about his neck, her tongue in an eager duel with his.

  He stepped backward toward the bed, pulling her with him, and caught her by the waist as he lifted her and fell back onto the mattress.

  It rustled noisily under their weight, and the ropes supporting it gave a mighty creak.

  They lay silent in each other’s arms for a long moment. “Oh, dear,” Anna murmured.

  “Indeed,” he replied, his savagery considerably dampened. “Not like this.”

  She shook her head. “No. I—I want this, I want you, but I’d feel as though we were performing on a stage.”

  Will had no illusions that carnal acts required complete privacy. The army often camped in the open. The best a man who married or took up with a camp follower could do was hope that his comrades were sound sleepers. But a lady like Anna deserved better than a semi-public coupling on the noisiest bed Will had ever lain upon.

  “I wish we’d argued harder to sleep in the shed,” he said.

  “So do I.” She sighed, rolled away from him and sat up, accompanied by further rustles and squeaks from the bed. “I don’t want to sleep in my dress.”

  “Nor I in my uniform.”

  She slid to her feet. “Help me with my buttons?”

  “Of course.” He stood behind her and went to work, slowly, with kisses that began at the nape of her neck and trailed onto her bared shoulders. She leaned back against him with a gasp, and his desire began to build again. He determined to find a way to pleasure her without making too much noise on that dreadful bed.

  He kissed her neck once more before releasing her. Without speaking or touching, they stripped, he to his shirt and she to her shift.

  Will slid beneath the blanket. The mattress rustled noisily as Anna joined him. He drew her into his arms and kissed her, running his hand up to cup her breast through her shift. Freed from her stays, it was soft and heavy in his hand. Her nipple hardened against his palm, and he deepened the kiss as he caressed her. Anna whimpered and writhed against him, and the mattress rustled in response.

  “Shh. Be still,” he whispered.

  “You’re torturing me.” Her breathing grew ragged.

  “You’re the one who wanted to take your dress off for the night.” But he lifted his hand to her face and stroked her cheek. “Do you want me to stop?”

  She took his face in her elegant, smooth-skinned lady’s hands and kissed him.

  “Shh,” he whispered again as he ever so slowly eased her from her side to her back.

  He leaned over her and kissed her lips briefly before embarking upon an exploration of her face. He kissed her nose, her cheekbones, her forehead, nuzzled along her arched eyebrows. Her unbound hair fell past her shoulders, and he ran his hands through it and buried his face in the silken length.

  Anna sighed, and Will could feel the effort it took her to keep the sigh from turning into a moan, how stiffly she held her body to only twitch rather than writhe and arch. It inflamed him. He’d spoken truly the night before when he’d told her that knowing she wanted him only made his hunger for her stronger.

  He fanned her hair across the bed and turned his attention to her neck, kissing down her throat to dip his tongue into the hollow of her collarbone. He caressed her breasts again and rejoiced in her gasp when he slid his hand beneath the low neckline of her shift to stroke her bare skin. Slowly and gently he worked her breast free and bent to take it in his mouth.

  “Will!” she whispered. All at once her hands were in his hair, fiercely gripping, and he replied with a harder suck, almost a bite. Her breath came fast, and his heart raced.

  He skimmed one hand down to the hem of her shift. When he raised it, began to slowly trail his hand up her inner thigh, she did whimper, very softly, as her legs fell apart. He lifted his head from her breast. “Shh,” he warned, then kissed her.

  When he reached the curls at the juncture of her thighs he had to choke back a groan of his own. God, how he wanted to be inside her! But not here, not now, not like this. Her breath came in panting gasps as he explored her hidden folds, so slippery with desire. It amazed him to be wanted so by someone like her, and he felt a moment’s dismay at his boldness. But it didn’t stop him from sliding one finger, then two, deep inside her in mimicry of the act he truly longed for.

  “Will! My God.” But she made it a whisper, and stayed still enough not to rustle the mattress, though she trembled from head to toe.

  With his thumb he sought out the hard nubbin at the top of her cleft and stroked it as he thrust in and out. She was already on the brink, and within seconds she came, her breath quickening as he covered her mouth with kisses lest she cry out.

  In the aftermath he gathered her against him, and she kissed him, hard. “Will. I—I don’t know what to say.”

  “You don’t have to say anything.” He smoothed her hair and kissed her forehead.

  “I didn’t know it could feel like that.”

  “Oh, Anna…” He buried his face in her hair, and they lay in silence for a few moments, until she twitched her hip against his emphatically erect cock.

  “What about you? Should I…do you want me to touch you?”

  It was too dark to see her face, but he swore he could feel her skin heat in a blush. “Only if you want to,” he whispered.

  She grasped his shirttail in a shaking hand, then hesitated.

  “You don’t have to,” he reassured her.

  “But would you like it?”

  He considered lying, since the last thing he wanted was for her to feel she owed him something that frightened her. But instinct told him that more than anything, Anna needed his honesty.

  “Yes,” he breathed. “God, yes.”

  She slid her hand beneath his shirt, her fingertips skimming his thighs in a light, tickling caress.

  He choked back a groan as her fingers found their mark. She laid her other hand against his lips. “Shh!”

  Her touch was shy, almost virginal, and her cautious exploration of his length was heavenly torture.

  “I don’t know how to do this,” she confessed.

  “Anything you do is fine.” But after a few minutes he closed his hand over hers and showed her the stroke, the rhythm, that brought him to his own gasping release.

  He wiped up his seed with his shirttail—he would be glad when he finally got a chance to put on a fresh shirt—before gathering Anna into his arms again.

  She stroked his face. “I think this will be my first good night’s sleep since the night we danced together.”

  He shifted her until they lay spooned together. “Likewise,” he admitted ruefully, settling a possessive hand at her belly. “Good night, Anna,” he whispered.

  She nestled closer against him and covered his hand with her own. “Good night, my dear Will.” She took a deep breath. “Beloved.”

  The last word was whispered so softly he could barely hear it. He fell asleep filled with a joy that was half pain.

  ***

  Anna awoke at dawn when the baby whimpered at the other end of the cottage. One of his parents shushed him, but Anna was thoroughly awake. Will still slumbered, his only response to the sound a sigh, a brief interruption in his soft snoring and a tighter grip of his hand at her stomach.

  She was nervous about facing him after what had passed between them in the darkness. Would he be the same Will he’d been in the night, or would he turn withdrawn and proper?

  She was embarrassed at how wanton she’d been. It had taken every ounce of willpower she possessed not to scream his name, thrash on that noisy mattress and be
g him to take her. And he must know—not in all that detail, but he must have sensed how abandoned her response was.

  The baby cried again, louder and longer this time, and Anna heard Pedro and Teresa speak together in low voices.

  Will stirred and woke. Anna rolled over to face him and met amber-colored eyes every bit as anxious as she knew her own must be. She smiled, as did he, and they embraced, forehead pressed to forehead. Anna wanted to weep from relief.

  “Your eyes are the color of Dunmalcolm whisky,” she said.

  “Are they?” He grinned. “Is it good whisky?”

  She laughed. “It’s excellent. But you must pretend I never mentioned it to you.”

  “Not a licensed distillery?”

  “No. My uncle pretends complete mystification about where it comes from, as long as enough comes to him.”

  “A just and fair-minded man.” Will turned serious, stroking her face. “You’ve a cat’s eyes. Such a clear green.”

  She gathered her courage. “Tonight?”

  “You’re sure you won’t regret it?”

  She shook her head. “I’m not sure at all. But I’d regret it far more if we didn’t.”

  And then he was upon her, kissing her desperately. She reveled in his ferocity as she wound arms and legs around him and kissed him back.

  He lifted his head with a new fire in his eyes. “Tonight.” A gleam of amusement returned. “Unless someone else invites us to share his cottage.”

  She laughed with delight. “If anyone tries, we’ll run away.”

  They dressed, and Will discussed with Pedro the safest route for the remainder of their journey while Anna helped Teresa prepare a simple breakfast.

  Before the morning was far advanced, the Vásquezes saw them off. Now she and Will wore broad-brimmed hats to shield their faces from the sun, and their load was heavier by the addition of two loaves of bread, a lump of goat cheese wrapped in a cloth and a bit of ham. Anna had attempted to pay Teresa out of her little hoard of coin, but she had refused.

  “With any luck, this should be all the food we need to get back,” Will said.

  “If not, we can buy more, now that the country isn’t so empty,” Anna replied. They were skirting around a village—with no pressing need for food or information Will felt it wisest to see as few people as possible.

  “If nothing else, they’d slow us down wanting me to tell of every battle I’ve seen,” he said ruefully.

  “And you’d talk yourself hoarse with all the tales. Poor Will.”

  “We can’t dally on purpose. I don’t think we’ll reach the army before tomorrow, but if we stumble upon them today, that’s that.”

  “I know,” she assured him. But she hoped desperately that his calculations were right, and they had enough miles left to allow them their night. Last night had been bliss, but she wanted more.

  Through the cool of the morning Will pushed a relentless pace. Anna understood that it was his salve to his conscience for what he meant to do with her—he couldn’t neglect his duty for the sake of desire—so she hurried alongside him without complaining.

  It was a strange day. They didn’t talk so readily as before. Anna couldn’t speak of commonplaces. It was as though all her vocabulary, all five languages’ worth—six if one counted the Gaelic phrases she had learned from Dunmalcolm servants—had narrowed down to a single English word, tonight, that sang in her ears with every step she took.

  They halted for a midday meal under a tree beside the same quick-flowing stream they had followed all day. For the first time since that morning, Will kissed her, his touch almost reverent. Anna felt ready to bubble over with a shy eagerness. She could hardly look at him without blushing, nor could she keep her eyes off him long. She felt almost bridal, though she avoided that thought. She didn’t want to remember her wedding day, nor her wedding night. Tonight was her gift from the fates to make up for it.

  But today was only half over—the slowest day she had ever known. She forced herself to mind prosaic matters, to break open the bundle of food Teresa Vásquez had made for them and pass the first loaf of bread to Will to slice. She spotted something she hadn’t expected, a little earthenware pot, smaller than her hand and tightly lidded.

  Her eyes widened as she opened it. “It’s honey!”

  Will whistled. “I didn’t know she was giving us that.”

  “Neither did I. If I’d known, I would’ve insisted upon paying her.”

  Greedily they spread the honey on their bread and ate it slowly, savoring each succulent bite. Once a bit of the sticky sweetness trickled down her chin, and Will leaned across the space between them to lick it away, ending with a ravenous kiss. She buried both hands in his hair, longing to pull him down atop her then and there, in the blazing heat of noon.

  Will broke the kiss, and they stared at each other, hungry and shaken. “Tonight,” Will muttered under his breath, sitting back and resuming his meal.

  “It’s strange,” he said, his voice carefully conversational, “how a small thing can become a luxury. If anyone had told me as a child that someday I’d count myself lucky to have honey to spread on my bread, I’d have thought them mad.”

  “I know,” she agreed, striving to match his tone. “The finest ices at Gunter’s never tasted half so delicious, and before I came here I could’ve eaten honey every day of my life if I’d wished it. I doubt it’s such a common thing for Teresa and Pedro, though.”

  “They’re generous people. Teresa seemed taken with you.”

  “The little girls were certainly taken with you. Someday, when the war is over and you can go home, you must marry and have a family,” Anna said.

  He didn’t reply immediately, and when she looked at him his face was grave. So many things that could never be said hung in the air between them. But he should have a wife, should father a brood of clever, inquisitive children—sons to train to be farmers after him and pretty chestnut-haired daughters who’d be just a little spoilt from having so doting a father.

  “I’d like that,” Will said at last. “Someday.”

  They finished their meal in silence.

  She meant what she said. But it brought home how temporary what they had found together must be. She was incapable of bearing him those children he so ought to have. And outside of this haven of solitude, the world would not allow Anna Arrington, sister of Viscount Selsley, niece to the Earl of Dunmalcolm and heiress to one hundred thousand pounds, to have anything to do with Will Atkins, sergeant and son of an innkeeper. Tonight was all they could ever have.

  Chapter Fourteen

  In the afternoon they walked more slowly because of the heat, but they kept on until the sun sank low onto the horizon. On the verge of sunset they reached an isolated spot, deep in a steep-sided valley, where the stream they had followed all day deepened and slowed its headlong flow. Its banks were grassy and lined with cork trees.

  “This looks like a good spot,” Will said, setting his rifle down and sliding the knapsack from his back.

  “Yes.” As Anna set down her own burdens, her knees wobbled. Tonight had come at last.

  Will cupped her chin in his hand. “Anna. We have all night. We should build a fire, eat dinner.” He looked nervous too, his eyes grave, his mouth twisted into a wistful smile.

  Her face heated. “Of course.”

  While Will spread out their gear, Anna gathered an armful of deadfall wood, enough for a summer night’s fire, more for protection and light than heat. She didn’t think she’d need any help to stay warm. Her heart galloped, and she almost expected the dry wood to burst into flame when she touched it.

  Will had spread their blanket on a grassy section of the stream’s bank. “Here,” he said, pointing to a flat rock against which he’d propped their gear.

  While he built a small fire on the rock, Anna unpacked more of the simple fare Teresa had provided them, and they dined almost silently upon goat cheese and bread spread with the rest of the honey.

  Whe
n they were done, he reached out and took her right hand in both of his. “Are you sure you want this?”

  Her hand shook. All of her shook. Despite her hammering heart she met his eyes as boldly as she could. “More than I’ve ever wanted anything.”

  He lifted her hand to his lips for a kiss. Her breath caught and she swayed toward him, but he held her at bay, a mischievous gleam in his eyes.

  “I thought we might bathe,” he said. “I checked the water, and it’s not too cold.”

  An answering smile tugged at her lips. He was right. Better to make this playful, at least at the beginning. And it would feel delightful to be clean when they came together. “Yes,” she said, “that’s a wonderful idea.”

  “Good.” He grinned, and she laughed. All the oddness of the day fled then, though if anything she only desired him more.

  He bent to his unbuckle his shoes. “I should warn you,” he said conversationally, “I have very ugly feet.”

  “Ugly feet? Will, I don’t care what your feet look like.”

  He cocked an eyebrow at her as he kicked off his shoes and peeled away his socks.

  And then she saw what he meant. They must have been unremarkable feet at some point—long, narrow, ordinary feet that took their owner wherever he needed to go. That much they still managed, for Anna had never noticed Will display even a hint of a limp. Yet his right foot lacked a fifth toe and had but a stump remaining of the fourth, while the fifth toe of his left foot had been broken off just below the toenail.

  She leaned over to cradle his feet and caress the mangled toes. When she looked up, the tenderness in his eyes made her blush. “What happened?” she asked.

  “Frostbite.” His voice was matter-of-fact. “My shoes fell apart on the retreat to Corunna, and we’d abandoned all our spares. It could’ve been worse. At least I don’t limp.”

  “Good God, Will.”

  His feet twitched. “That tickles,” he said. “And if you were planning to kiss them, I’d wait till they’re clean. Just now, I’m sure they taste even worse than they look.”