Daphne’s arms went around his neck, and her eyes luminous and full of that same expression that had taken his breath away earlier, she said, “Do with me as you will…husband.”
Charles groaned, and his mouth came down hard on hers, his hands sliding under her nightgown to caress the silky length of her legs. She welcomed his kiss, his touch, yearning and excitement spiraling up through her as his kiss became more demanding, more urgent, his tongue exploring and tangling with hers, his hands kneading her thighs, stoking the fire that burned within her.
They kissed again and again, each kiss more urgent than the last, each kiss driving them further into the world known only to lovers. Dizzy with desire, her breasts aching and her bones turning to liquid fire, Daphne was hardly aware of Charles shrugging out of his robe. It was only when her caressing fingers touched the warm skin on his shoulders that she realized that he was naked.
She broke the kiss and blinked up into his face. “You’re naked,” she muttered, “and I am not.”
He flashed her a hard, fierce smile. “I’m sure that I can take care of that, sweet.”
He shifted slightly, and she gasped when her gown was whipped over her head and her nude body was pulled next to his. Oh, it was heaven! He was warm and hard in her embrace, the springy hairs on his chest brushing seductively against her breasts, his long legs pressing next to hers, and locked between their bodies was that rigid shaft that both excited and terrified her. He moved over her, his rod stoking her, and any fear of the unknown vanished, leaving only excitement spiraling up through her. She moaned as he slowly rubbed against her, and her thighs parted to bring him closer.
Charles shuddered when his body slipped between her legs, and he fought against the urge to join them into one. To have her willing mouth under his, her naked beauty his to take was almost more than he could bear. Repressing the urge to fall upon her like a ravening beast, knowing it was too soon, he wrenched his mouth from hers and compulsively sought her breasts. Ah, God, she was sweet, her nipples tasting like sugared berries on his tongue. He bit down gently, gratified and aroused by the leap her body gave and the way her hand pulled his head closer to her breasts.
Under his seeking lips, Daphne grappled with new sensations, her body twisting beneath him, each pull of his mouth, each long, slow scrape of his teeth against her breasts and nipples sending a hot pulse of desire streaking down to where their bodies surged against each other. Wanting more, eager for more, her hips pushed up against him, the feel of that unyielding length of flesh between their bodies making her mouth go dry and her body hum with wild anticipation. And when he touched her, when his fingers moved through the thatch of curls between her thighs and lazily stroked the soft folds of flesh he found there, she stiffened, delight and anticipation rushing through her. He lingered there, going no further, his light caresses as he pulled and petted that sensitive skin driving her mad. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, and she arched up helplessly, her body demanding more than this teasing exploration. She ached. She needed. She wanted.
Charles tried to go slow, wanting this moment to last, but Daphne’s generous response was ripping away his good intentions. He felt ready to explode, and the need to bury himself deep within her nearly overrode the restraints he’d placed on himself. He wanted no hurried coupling, but his own hunger, his own desires clouded coherent thought, and his fingers sought her core, one finger sinking into her hot, welcoming depths.
Daphne bit back a scream of delight at the sensation of Charles’s finger sliding in and out of where she most ached, where she most yearned for his touch, transforming want into naked demand. Want, need possessed her, and she unashamedly rode his finger, twisting helplessly beneath his hand, and when he inserted a second finger, she shuddered, a fresh wave of pleasure flooding through her. The feeling was so intense, so powerful that her fingers dug into his shoulders and her entire body arched up off the bed, not wanting to be parted from those seductive fingers.
His brain, body, and heart on fire, Charles could no longer control himself, and with a low growl, he replaced his fingers with his rigid member, the swollen head sinking carefully into her. He tried to go slow, tried to prevent himself from thrusting wildly into that sleek, intoxicating heat, but it was beyond him. His mouth caught hers, and he gently bit her lip. His voice thick and almost unrecognizable, against her mouth, he said, “I may hurt you, but know that it will only be this one time…” She pushed against him, and he muttered, “I cannot go any slower, Daffy—I want you too much. I swear that after this, it will only get better.”
Daphne didn’t care. “I believe you,” she gasped, “but could you please hurry?”
Choking on a despairing laugh, Charles kissed her deeply and allowed himself to sink fully into her slick depths, the fragile barrier between virgin and woman breached in an instant. His member lodged to the hilt within her, her body soft and warm beneath him, Charles shuddered at the force of the pleasure that roared through him. Daphne was his! His wife.
There was pain, Daphne couldn’t pretend otherwise, but it was brief and gone in a moment, and the joy, the wonder of being one with Charles instantly banished that small hurt. In dazed delight, she lay there reveling in the solid weight of him pressing down against her, marveling that her body had accepted all of him. It was heaven. She wiggled a bit, testing the tight fit, gasping as a sharp pang of pleasure shot up through her when Charles rocked against her.
It was sweet agony trying to remain motionless, trying to give her a moment to adjust, but when she twisted beneath him, Charles could not help himself and began to slide in and out of her, gently at first, then as the demon sprang free, harder, faster, and deeper. His hands fastened on her hips, holding her to his liking, his body thrust into hers, each movement more urgent than the last, each thrust bringing them closer to the edge.
As lost and frantic as Charles, Daphne clung to him, her fingers digging into his back, her hips rising to meet him, the wildness, the passion between them explosive. Low in her body, something coiled, tighter and tighter, forcing a moan from her at the intensity of the sensation. She pushed up frantically against Charles, seeking something, needing, wanting release from this increasing fierce ache where their bodies met and parted. When it came, when that explosion of ecstasy burst through her, she stiffened, a low keening cry bursting from her throat.
Her cry, the clenching and unclenching of her body around him was his defeat, and Charles writhed helplessly in her arms, pumping urgently into her until he, too, found release. He savored each thrust, each throb his body gave as he emptied himself into her before finally surrendering and sliding bonelessly replete to her side.
He kissed her gently. “I shall treasure this night and what we shared for the rest of my life,” he said huskily.
Daphne twisted her head to stare up at him. In the candlelight, his features looked harsh and forbidding, the flickering light dancing over his high cheekbones, outlining the stubborn chin and the hard mouth—she thought him the handsomest man she had ever seen.
A soft, mysterious smile curved her lips, and she touched his lips lightly with her fingertips. “It is a memorable night for both of us,” she said. An impish gleam in her eyes, she murmured, “The first, I trust, of many.”
He groaned, and his mouth fastened urgently on hers. When they were both breathless, he lifted his lips from hers and said thickly, “Oh, yes, you can most assuredly count on that.”
Despite an active night wherein Charles had made love to her twice more, they rose before dawn and were pulling away from the coaching inn just as the first faint golden fingers of the sun slid across the sky. It was very late in the afternoon when at last the coach swept through a pair of massive stone gates that had given the house its name. A half mile later, they left the forest-edge road, and the coach swung into the wide circular driveway in front of an impressive three-story stone house with mullioned windows and a hipped gray slate roof. The house appeared very old to Daphne, and of no particu
lar design, and she glanced about eagerly as Charles helped her down from the coach. Three wide steps led up to a stone terrace, and as they walked across it, Charles said, “This will be your home.” A cool note in his voice, he added, “The furnishings reflect my stepmother’s taste; do not be hesitant to make what changes you like.”
Daphne glanced up at him, noting the grim cast to his face. This was the first mention of a stepmother, and it caught her by surprise. “Your stepmother? Does she live here?”
Charles laughed without humor. “No. She has been quite, quite dead for almost three years.”
She would have pursued the topic, but they had reached the entrance of the house, where the dark wooden doors were flung wide and a tall, angular gentleman wearing black livery stood waiting for them. When they reached him, he murmured, “Good afternoon, Master Weston.” Turning to Daphne, he bowed low and said, “I am Garthwaite, your butler, Mistress Weston, and I am most happy to be the first of the staff to welcome you to Stonegate.”
“Why, thank you,” Daphne replied, smiling at him. “That is very kind of you.”
“Currying favor with your new mistress already?” Charles murmured, his eyes glinting with amusement as he passed Garthwaite and escorted Daphne into her new home.
Garthwaite’s nostrils quivered, but he ignored Charles’s comment, merely saying in lofty tones, “It will be a real pleasure to have a woman’s hands on the reins of the household once again.”
The large foyer that Daphne entered was sumptuous, the walls hung in a dark green figured silk, French mirrors framed in gold leaf adorning one wall and extending up a handsome staircase of green-veined marble before disappearing into the upper reaches of the house. On the opposite wall, an inlaid lyre table had been placed, and above the table was a large portrait of a man and boy, the style of their clothing old-fashioned. Beyond the portrait was a wide hallway that Daphne assumed gave access to the rest of the house.
Having been helped out of her sapphire blue corded silk pelisse and dispensing with her yellow gloves and hat while Charles made arrangements with Garthwaite for some refreshments to be served in the east salon, Daphne walked over and stared at the portrait. It took only a glance to tell her that the man and boy were Charles’s relatives, the resemblance very strong. Was that Charles at the knee of his father? She frowned, struck again by how very little she knew about his family. He had been singularly reticent about his relatives, and she wondered why. Of course, she hadn’t made any inquiries either, she thought with a pang of embarrassment. Guiltily, she admitted that other than the earl, Marcus Sherbrook, and Stacey Bannister, she had no idea about his family. His reference to his stepmother just a few moments ago pointed out how much she had to learn about her new husband and the family she had married into.
Charles came up to stand behind her, his hands resting on her shoulders, and she smiled over her shoulder at him. His expression was peculiar, and she asked, “Are you that little boy?”
Charles shook his head. “No. That is my elder brother, John, and his son, Daniel.” Bleakly, he added, “They are both dead, John first, and a decade later, Daniel—just four or five years ago.”
“Oh! I am so very sorry,” she said softly, her heart aching for him. “You must have been devastated,” she added, thinking how horrible it would be if she was to lose Adrian or April.
“When John…died,” he said slowly, “I could not imagine anything worse happening.” His face set and his eyes as cold and icy as the North Sea, he said, “I discovered that I was wrong.” His thoughts far away, Charles stared for a long minute at the portrait, and then he seemed to shake himself and return his attention to the present. Forcing a smile, he said, “Come! Let us not dwell on tragic events. We are newly married, beginning our lives together, and we will not let the past intrude upon us.”
Aware that there was much being left unsaid, Daphne nodded and allowed him to usher her out of the foyer and down a wide hallway, but her thoughts still lingered on what she had just learned. Was the topic of his older brother’s death still so raw and painful to him that he could not speak of it? she mused. And what about his nephew, Daniel? His death had been more recent. Was the wound still so tender? What had happened? An illness? Or something else? She suspected the latter. There had been a note in his voice….
“This is the east salon,” Charles said, scattering her thoughts. “It is one of the more formal rooms in the house, and as I said earlier, if you wish to make changes, you’ll not hear any complaints from me.”
Daphne’s first impression as she walked into the east salon was that someone had spent a great deal of money and time on it. The color scheme of blue, gold, and cream had been used throughout the large space, and while everything from the gold damask sofas to the gleaming satinwood tables and chairs were in the first stare of fashion, Daphne found the area strangely uninviting. The room was unwelcoming, as if it had been furnished simply for show but with little thought for warmth and comfort. The fire crackling on the hearth of the marble fireplace drew her, and putting her hands out toward its warmth, she said politely, “It is a very nice room.”
“And you hate it,” Charles said with a laugh. His amusement faded, and he glanced around the room. “Sofia, my stepmother, was very proud of it.”
“Oh, I d-d-don’t hate it,” Daphne stammered. “I’m sure that most people would find it quite delightful.”
Charles lifted her chin with one careless finger. “But you don’t?”
Her cheeks reddened, and she muttered, “I don’t dislike; it is just not the w-w-way I would have furnished it.”
He brushed a kiss across her lips. “Then we must change that, mustn’t we? It is your home now, sweet, and it should reflect the things that you like, not my stepmother.”
Only a simpleton would not have surmised that there had been some conflict between Charles and his stepmother, and Daphne was no simpleton. That he had never mentioned Sofia’s existence until they arrived at Stonegate was telling, but more so was the note in his voice when he spoke of his stepmother. From his manner, she’d hazard a guess that there had been no love lost between him and his stepmother and that being here in this house brought whatever feelings he had for his stepmother to the surface. They had only been here a few moments, but already, Daphne sensed a change in him. Something both troubled and angered him. She could hear it in his voice, see it in the hard curve of his mouth. His brother, his nephew, and his stepmother were all dead in less than fifteen years. Was it just those tragedies that disturbed him? Her gaze searched his, but his cool green eyes gave nothing away.
Deciding to have it out in the open, she asked carefully, “You truly didn’t like your stepmother, did you?”
“Not like her? My dear, you have no idea,” he drawled. “I loathed her.” He looked around the room again. “And the sooner all sign of her is obliterated from this house, the happier I shall be.”
Daphne was shocked by the naked hatred in his voice. “Oh, Charles! Surely she was not that bad.”
A mirthless smile curved his lips. “Believe me, she was blacker than you can imagine.” Daphne’s troubled expression made him attempt an explanation. “This was my home,” he said slowly, “and I loved it, but when my father married Sofia, everything changed. She was very wealthy, and my father…my father needed her fortune. She was the interloper, a rich one at that, and she made John and I feel as if we were intruders, not even worthy of being dust beneath her feet.” He gave a harsh laugh. “She was clever, I’ll grant you that—always very careful to appear a fond and doting stepmother in front of everyone, including my father, but behind his back…” His mouth thinned. “Once my father died, her dislike was blatant, and until her death, I never spent more time here than was necessary.”
“But once your brother, John, and his son, Daniel, died and there were just the two of you, didn’t the situation grow better?” Daphne asked, deeply troubled. “After all, except for your cousins, all you had was each other.”
/> Charles pulled at his ear. “Ah, I forgot,” he said carefully. “I haven’t mentioned Sofia’s son, my half brother, Raoul, have I?”
Chapter 14
Daphne stared at him a long moment before asking sweetly, “Are there any other relatives that you have forgotten? Or shall I forever be opening my door to yet another member of your family that you failed to mention to me?”
Charles grinned. “Technically, you wouldn’t be opening the door—that’s Garthwaite’s job.”
Daphne ignored that sally, and hands on her hips, she said, “I would remind you that I have just become a member of this family. With the exception of your relationship to the earl, something I learned from others, and being introduced to your cousins and others that attended our wedding, you have been singularly secretive about the closest members of your family. I must tell you that I find secretiveness to be a most unattractive trait, especially when it concerns family members.”
“The family is rather complicated,” he said warily, “especially when you factor in the old earl, my paternal grandfather.”
“At the moment, I’m not interested in your grandfather,” she snapped. “It’s bad enough I know nothing of your family, and I didn’t even learn of John and Daniel’s existence, or their deaths for that matter, until just a few moments ago. Since you and your stepmother were not fond of each other and she has been dead for a few years, I can understand, partly, your avoidance of talking about her. But now I discover that you have another brother! Where is he? How old is he? And when do I meet him?” Her gaze narrowed. “Or are you about to tell me that he, too, has met a tragic end?”
“Half brother,” Charles corrected automatically, avoiding answering her last question. The expression on her face warned him that he was about to discover that his sweet wife had a temper and that if he wished to stay in her good graces, he had several tricky minutes in front of him. Dash it all! This wasn’t how he’d envisioned their first moments at Stonegate. Certainly, at some point, he’d planned to tell her about Raoul, not everything, but enough to satisfy any curiosity she might have about him, but this wasn’t that point. It had been wrong, he realized, not to have told her some facts about the family that she was marrying into, but in all fairness, events had moved rather rapidly. He thought back over the past weeks, trying to imagine a time when it would have been appropriate to murmur into her ear, “By the way, did I mention that I had an older brother, John, who was murdered nearly fifteen years ago? Or that John’s son committed suicide, oh, about four years ago, and almost three years ago, my stepmother, a woman I loathed, was killed by a madman…the same madman who just happened to kill my half brother at the same time?” Not even to Daphne, or at least not yet, would he confess the truth of that terrible night. Telling her about Raoul and what had happened in that dungeon below the Dower House was not something he viewed with pleasure.
Seduction Becomes Her Page 21
