by Mason, Nina
She let out a low moan of gratification. God, it felt good. Too good for words and far too good not to be sinful.
He pulled back and plunged in again, sinking to her depths. She rolled her hips around his buried length. The groan he expressed sent delicious quivers through her.
“Are you enjoying it this time?”
“Yes. It feels incredible.”
“Good.” He drove into her again.
His thrusts grew more rapid until he was pounding her relentlessly. Each time he plowed into her, she pulled up to meet him and rolled her hips in welcome. His avid, throaty vocalizations told her he approved. She could see why the sisters called this a sin. Something this good had to be. The coil wound tighter with every thrust until at last it sprang. As her body quivered and pulsed, the world fell away. Her mind went blank. Time stood still. Fear fled. There was only sensation. Only Robert, pounding her with abandon.
“Aye. Oh, aye.” His voice was husky and strangled. “Shatter around me, my wee Rosebud. Let me take you to the moon and stars.”
He made a husky, startled sound and jerked out of her. Parking his cock atop her pubic mound, he unloaded onto her belly, breathing like he’d run a mile.
Her thoughts were scrambled, her heart pounded wildly, and her respiration was rapid and erratic.
Falling down on her, he pulled off her mask. “Maggie. Oh, Maggie.” His eyes were intense, frantic, and bright green. “Do you see how good, how much better, it can be this way?”
He pressed his mouth against hers in a desperate, lip-crushing kiss. Just when she thought sure she’d suffocate, he got off her and peered down at her from his perch betwixt her knees.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No,” she said. “‘Twas wonderful.”
“‘Twas for me, as well.”
He untied her hands and lay down beside her.
She stretched out, as boneless and jiggly as molded gelatin. She searched herself, but found not the least shadow of shame. This puzzled her as much as it pleased her. As long as memory served, she’d seen her body only as an instrument of wickedness, temptation, and sin. Clothes were necessary not for protection from the elements, but because nakedness was an affront to God, who’d made Adam and Eve ashamed of their bodies when he cast them out of Eden.
Now with Robert, she could show herself, bare herself, body and soul, because he made her feel beautiful, desirable, and unashamed. Rolling toward him, heart brimming with affection and gratitude, she set her head on his shoulder.
“I feel comfortable with you.” She picked at the dark carpet of hair on his chest. “I do not know why, but I do.”
He snaked an arm around her and pulled her body hard against his side. “It gladdens me to hear you say so,” he said quietly, “because I am exceedingly fond of you.”
“I am happy to hear it.” She kissed his cheek. “Because I am fond of you, too.”
Chapter Five
Like the heather-clad Highland hillsides in summer, elation bloomed inside Robert’s heart as he lay with Maggie in his arms. Not only had she passed her first lesson with flying colors, she’d admitted she was developing feelings for him. Unless she’d only said it to please him, which might be the case, though, she did not seem the type to be deliberately deceptive.
“Maggie, can I ask you something?”
“Of course. Ask what you will.”
“If you had won our wee competition, what might you have asked as your prize?”
She rose up on her elbow and kissed the nearest of his nipples before meeting his gaze. “I had my preferences narrowed down to two.”
“Which were?”
“Spending the night in your bed with you or seeing your secret chamber.”
Suddenly uneasy, he licked his lips and shifted his weight. “Had you asked to see my secret chamber, I would have granted your request, though I would much prefer to delay until you are better prepared.”
“And what about my other request?”
“You may sleep with me in my bed whenever you wish to,” he said. “We only have separate room so we can each enjoy our privacy should we desire to be alone.”
Her mouth turned down in a frown. “If that is so, then why is there a lock only on your side of the door?”
“So you cannot lock me out when I want to come in.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What if at some time I do not wish for you to come in?”
“Then say as much and I shall leave you to yourself.”
She pushed onto his chest and kissed him on the mouth. “Do you think we will quarrel?”
“Married couples generally do at one time or another.”
She set her head on his chest, smothering him with her fragrant, golden curls. “Why do you like to tie women up?”
“To take them out of themselves.”
She turned her head so her chin dug into his chest. “I do not understand.”
He felt relaxed and sleepy, so he took a moment to gather his wool whilst running his fingers up and down her back. “Since Adam and Eve, women have been programmed to defer to men,” he said at last. “To be obedient, subservient, and submissive. ‘Tis so engrained, they are largely unaware of it.”
“I agree with you wholeheartedly, but still do not understand what that has to do with tying them up.”
“When you were tied and blindfolded just now, did you worry about pleasing me?”
Her head bobbed up and her eyes brightened. “No. I confess I did not. I thought solely about what you were doing to me.”
He smiled. “Which was the purpose of the exercise.”
“I see,” she said crisply. “And will you ever allow me to turn the tables?”
“I will only do to you what you may do in kind.” He moved his hands to her buttocks and pressed her against his budding erection. “What do you say to riding me backwards, so I can watch my cock slide in and out of you?”
She pushed up, climbed off of him, and turned around, giving him a view of the female anatomy he had not enjoyed since his last visit to the court at White Hall Palace.
“Is this what you had in mind?”
“Oh, aye.” He wrapped one hand around the base of his erection, put the other on her hip, and pulled the target toward the arrow. “Now, sit.”
He held his breath as her body swallowed his shaft with exquisite slowness. When he was all the way in, he splayed his hands across her buttocks, spread her crack, and gazed longingly upon the tight rosette of her anal sphincter. “Someday, will you let me swive you up the ass?”
“That will depend.”
He thumbed her anus. “On what?”
“On if you will extend the same courtesy to me.”
“I’m sure we can work something out.” He pushed his little finger a wee ways into her rectum.
She squirmed, giving his embedded cock a scrumptious massage.
“For now, however, I should like for you to slide up and down my erection whilst you play with your clitoris and my cods.”
She moved up and forward, giving him a searing view of the mouth of her sex devouring his. Up and down she slid on his glistening pole, time and again. His pleasure intensified with each tantalizing glide. Up and down. Up and down. Oh, aye. This was about as close to heaven as a man could get whilst still on earth.
When she caressed his bollocks, he damn near lost it. Biting back the urge, he grasped her hips and extracted himself. “Put your hands on the bed.” He pulled his legs out from under her. “I desire to take you from behind like one of the king’s pet spaniels. Which, for all intents and purposes, I fear I shall become.”
* * * *
Maggie stiffened at her husband’s proclamation. Did he mean to bugger her? He’d said some women enjoyed it, but she did not believe she’d be one of them. Merely having the tip of his finger in there was most unpleasant—and his cock looked to be ten times as big.
He got up on his knees behind her and ran his hands over her back. “You really have the most b
eautiful skin,” he murmured. “As white and pristine as a freshly fallen snow.”
His hands move downward, skimming her waist and her hips, over her buttocks and down the backs of her legs, leaving tingles in their wake. The pleasure she might have derived from his touch was tempered by her nervousness over what he might do. She clenched as he swept his hands up the insides of her thighs and over the cheeks of her bottom, which he tenderly caressed before trailing a finger down her crack. To her great relief, he did not insert the finger into her rectum. Rather, he moved lower, to her cunny, and, drew rings around her bud.
Maggie bit her lip. As delightful as she found his ministrations, she could not give herself over to them. “I do not think I shall enjoy being sodomized.”
He chuckled and kept circling. “Is that what you think I am about back here?”
“Is it not?”
“Not this time,” he said, “though I do hope you shall open your mind to the experience in time.”
Relief washed through her bloodstream like a sleeping draught, instantly relaxing her muscles, freeing her to enjoy the eroticism of his touch.
“Taking you like this allows for deeper penetration whilst keeping your bud within reach,” he said. “It also provides an exhilarating view of our joining.”
His encircling finger was like a key tightening her mainspring. She closed her eyes to shut out everything but his divinely tortuous winding. He stopped and put the finger in her, burying it deep. When the finger wiggled, she moaned, pushed back, and rotated her hips.
“Oh, aye.” He withdrew the finger. “I love how responsive you are.”
He positioned the head of his cock at her introitus and sank so deep his testicles bumped her perineum. The fullness felt so sublime, she gasped, pushed back, and circled her hips.
He groaned and shuddered in response.
The sounds of his enjoyment heightened hers. She moaned again as enrapturing waves of sensation rolled through her.
He drew his cock out of her and hovered on the brink of separation for several moments before easing his length back into her. He repeated this ritual again and again, each time pushing her incrementally closer to fulfillment.
“You feel incredible, Rosebud. I could keep this up all night.”
As he said it, he pushed deeper into her and circled his hips. She tightened her muscles, squeezing his member for all ‘twas worth.
He murmured a curse, abruptly withdrew, and parked his cock in her crack.
“Did you not like what I did just then?” she asked, concerned by his unexpected reaction.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.” His words were chopped and breathless. “I liked it so much I nearly came off.”
“Is that not the goal?”
“Aye, ‘tis. By the by. First, though, I want to milk from the experience every ounce of pleasure possible.”
He came into her once more and began the whole measured process again. In, with deliciously agonizing torpor, then out with deliciously agonizing torpor. Masterfully meted doses of possession and deprivation. Each time he filled her up, she tightened her sex around his, pushed back, and rolled her hips.
His breathing grew hard and erratic. His muscles quivered. Then, he came into her hard, reached around her hip, and wiggled his finger against her bud.
Pleasure cracked through her, searing and jagged. She cried out and bucked her hips as elation spread like smoke through every part of her being.
As her body convulsed around his, he drove into her furiously, again and again and again. Then, he stopped, pulled out of her, and made a choked sound as his seed spilled over her back.
“God’s bollox, Maggie.” He panted hard. “That was miraculous.”
‘Twas miraculous for her as well, but also exhausting. She collapsed on the bed. He came down beside her, kissed her hair, and wiped up his emissions with a handkerchief.
After draping his arm over her, his breathing turned throaty in the way that told her he was drifting off.
She was spent, too, but her mind was not quite ready to surrender to sleep. She’d never dreamed marrying Robert Armstrong, the devilish duke Hugh had so stridently warned her against, would be so daring or so thrilling. She only hoped she still felt this good after visiting his chamber of secrets.
* * * *
The heft of dread pressed down on Robert’s chest when he spied the royal seal among the pile of letters on his desk. He had hoped the morning post might bring a reply from the Carmelite sisters. He’d written to the convent several days prior requesting any information they might have about Maggie’s parentage. While it made no difference to him in terms of their marriage, he wished to satisfy his curiosity. He’d long suspected the choice of companions for Mary had not been as random as his father pretended. The first duke’s deathbed request only confirmed his suspicions.
Robert did not expect to find a letter from the royal palace. Not so soon, leastwise, and was none too pleased by its prompt arrival. He could handle himself well enough, but feared for his bride. While he adored her naivety, the king and his cohorts would use it to their advantage.
Bracing himself for the worst, he broke the seal and opened the letter. The contents were straightforward enough. Word had reached the king of their nuptials and His Royal Highness requested their presence in a week at the newly restored royal palace in Edinburgh.
Robert knew better than to accept the communique at face value. It had been a daring gambit not to seek the monarch’s blessing before marrying Maggie, especially when his fortunes—nay, his very survival—depended entirely on the king’s good will.
He just prayed Charles would not dissolve the marriage—his right as head of church and state.
The prospect curdled Robert’s blood.
The monarch had wanted him to marry another, but he could not bring himself to do it for two very good reasons. Firstly, he’d set his heart on making Maggie his bride, and secondly, was he was no sycophant. Well, no more of one than survival demanded, leastwise.
But he was not about to roll over like one of those spaniels King Charles was so fond of—the way the Duke of Castlemaine had done.
He shook his head and scrubbed his face. Like it or not, he’d have to accelerate his wife’s education.
He’d also have to summon the tailor. Since country life did not demand the same attention to fashion as did courtly life, he’d grown apathetic about updating his wardrobe.
With a sigh, Robert rose from the desk and crossed to the library ladder. Maggie would be in shortly to begin her tutelage and he still needed to locate Margaret Cavendish’s memoir. He vaguely recalled seeing it somewhere on the uppermost shelves.
Climbing to the top of the rolling ladder, he pushed himself across the width of the bookcase, scanning spines as he went. He found what he wanted in the next to last partition. With the book tucked under his arm, he descended the ladder, returned to the desk, and set it atop the books he’d already pulled for the erotic component of her lesson.
A clearing throat called his attention to the door. There stood Maggie, all golden curls and sweet smiles. She had on a simple gown made of pale blue linen, but wore it well.
He’d been right about his Rosebud. She’d bloomed into the most beautiful rose in Dunwoody and quite possibly all of Scotland. ‘Twas a shame, really. Were she less handsome, she might escape the king’s notice.
“I missed you when I awoke to find you gone—and later when I broke my fast alone,” she said with a slight pout.
He’d missed waking up with her, too, but had to arise early to take care of business. He might be a bridegroom, but the duchy would not run itself whilst he frolicked like a man on holiday.
“I’ve received a letter from the king,” he said soberly. “He requests we attend him at Holyroodhouse Palace in a se’nnight, giving us very little time to prepare.”
She came into the room, her pretty brow furrowed. “How must we prepare?”
“I shall need to order suitable cloth
es for the both of us, as it will not do for us to appear at court looking like a pair of country bumpkins. You have no gowns befitting a duchess and I have only doublets, now woefully démodé, I regret to say. Skirted coats with cuffs turned back to reveal the sleeve ruffles underneath are the new rage—a trend popularized by the king himself—so it will not do for me to show up in anything else.”
As a duke, he’d require several in fine velvets and brocades, as well as new shirts, knee-breeches, and shoes with square toes and high heels—red if he wanted to be au courant.
“You will also require lessons in court etiquette and deportment,” he continued, “so you will know how to conduct yourself in the manner of a duchess. And, finally, I must educate you in the ways of the king and his courtiers so you can avoid falling prey to their schemes.”
She approached, set her hand upon his sleeve, and tilted her head to look into his eyes. “That sounds like a very full day. Might I have a kiss before we get underway?”
“Of course.” He bent to meet her waiting lips. The kiss was sweet, but short by necessity. If he kissed her the way he longed to, they would never get to her lessons.
Turning back to the desk, he picked up the Cavendish, and handed it to her. “Here is the memoir I promised to find. I thought we might have a discourse about her views as part of our curriculum on philosophy.”
Her face lit up as she opened the book. “That sounds to me like an excellent plan.”
As she thumbed through the pages, Robert regarded her with escalating trepidation. What if the king did not sanction their marriage? Would she agree to stay on as his mistress? If not, where would she go? Back to the convent? Into another man’s bed? These thoughts tied his intestines in knot upon knot so, with considerable effort, he wrenched his mind back to the task at hand.
“How much do you know about the Duchess of Newcastle?” he asked her.
“I know she was married to a duke.” She kept her eyes on the book in her hand. “I also know she published a novel and book of verses under her own name—ventures her husband championed.” She looked up and met his gaze. “If I had a talent for writing, would you allow me to publish?”
