“And that’s why you wish to marry for love yourself,” she said softly. “I did, too.”
He turned, his arm outstretched along the settee’s carved back toward her.
“You did?” he asked. “You no longer do?”
Blindly she looked down to avoid his gaze, while her hands curled together into tight little fists in her lap.
“I believe that love will come with marriage,” she said carefully, without emotion, as if reciting by rote. “I believe that I will in time come to love Lord Crump, and that he will love me in return.”
“Look at me, Diana,” he said, his voice low and rough with urgency. His earlier resolutions were forgotten now, as was his promise to respect her as Crump’s future wife. All that mattered was what she said now. “Look at me, and tell me you believe that.”
Still she did not look up, her head bowed and her shoulders bent as she warred with herself.
“Lord Crump is a good man, an honorable gentleman, who respects and admires me,” she said, her voice trembling. “He will in time love me. They all say so. He will love me.”
“But do you love him, Diana?” he demanded. He’d no right but every reason to ask, and he was not going to give up until she answered him. “Do you love him as a wife, as a lover? Damnation, do you love him as a woman should love a man?”
At last she looked up to him, her eyes bright with tears, and shook her head.
“No,” she whispered fiercely. “I do not love him, and heaven help me, I never will.”
It was exactly what he’d been waiting to hear, and now, at last, he’d wait no longer.
Diana had meant to carry the truth about not loving Lord Crump as a secret forever, buried deep beneath her conscience and somewhere below where her heart had once been. She’d vowed to herself and to her family that she’d try as hard as she could to be the wife and marchioness that Lord Crump deserved, the path that all assured her would be the way to her happiness. She had tried to be as dignified, reserved, and refined as a noble lady must, the wife, daughter, sister, and someday mother of peers and peeresses.
She had tried, and tried harder, and this was what had come of it. For while there was no doubt that Lord Crump was a good man, she was not very good in return. The abundant proof of her not-very-goodness was on display here, now, on a blue silk damask settee in the late Duchess of Sheffield’s Sultana Room, where she was inelegantly and shamelessly entangled with the present Duke of Sheffield, who was kissing her as if his very life depended on it.
Perhaps it did. She knew her own life was hanging in a precarious balance, desperate for the love of a man whom she loved in return. No, not simply a man, but Sheffield, the man whom no one else wished her to have, and the only one she’d ever truly wanted.
All of which was why she was kissing him every bit as fervently in return. He held her with his arm around her, cradling her in the crook of his arm at the exact angle that made her reach out for him, her hands splayed against his chest, the soft wool of his waistcoat covering the hard muscles of his chest. She was always both startled and pleased by how strong his body felt, how different it was from her own—and how much she liked that very difference.
She made a happy, wordless purr of contentment, which he resourcefully employed to part her lips and slip his tongue inside her mouth. Ah, another of the things that fascinated her about him: how he tasted, warm and male and charged with desire. She slid her palms along his chest to rest on his shoulders, letting him draw her closer as he deepened the kiss. She opened her mouth eagerly, taking him deeper. It was almost as if he wished to devour her, and really, if she were honest, that was how she felt about him, too. Kissing him made her heart race and her breath quicken and her body twist against his in a way that only made her long for more of it, and him.
“Do you know how you’ve captured me, Diana?” he whispered hoarsely, breaking away from her mouth to kiss the side of her throat, a place she’d no idea could be so divinely sensitive. “From the first time I saw you, sweet, the first time. I could never put you from my mind.”
“So it was with me as well,” she whispered in return, nearly breathless from joy. “Oh, Sheffield, I cannot begin to tell what I feel for you!”
She cupped her hands around his face and brought his mouth back to kiss him again. She had slipped back farther on the settee, against a cushion as well as his arm, and Sheffield wasn’t so much as sitting beside her any longer, but across her. She was twisted about, her hip and her hoops awkwardly pressing into him, and she shifted to try to become more comfortable. At once he moved forward to settle directly on top of her, drawing his arm from beneath her shoulders. Now he could brace his weight without crushing her, but it also meant that she was lying on her back as if lying in her bed—a bed that now included Sheffield lying with her.
A tiny fragment of her conscience howled at this, warning her of exactly how vulnerable her position could be, yet the rest of her ignored it. How could she not, when at this precise moment she was also made aware of how the row of tiny thread buttons on her bodice were not the impenetrable armor that she’d thought? He’d not only deftly unfastened them all, but had slipped his hand inside and was now doing the most bold yet wondrous things to her breast, teasing and tugging and caressing her nipple and the flesh around it until she arched up against his hand as if to beg for more.
“Do you know I love you, Diana?” he said fiercely. “Do you know that of me?”
Her eyes widened, filling with tears as she gazed up at his handsome face, so close over hers. She remembered all the times he’d spoken of how he’d only marry for love, as his parents had done, and of how much he valued a love like that. Is that what he meant now when he said he loved her? Is that what he was offering to her now, the kind of love that would last a lifetime, and not simply for a single achingly perfect afternoon?
“I love you, Diana,” he said, more firmly, as if he’d heard her unspoken doubts. “I love you.”
She gulped, overwhelmed by emotion. He loved her: three words that were more than enough to bring back the impulsive part of herself, the part that she’d tried so resolutely to subdue, but had never quite gone away. She would never again be tempted to abandon everything for the sake of love, of passion, not wed to Lord Crump. She’d only have this one chance with Sheffield—if she dared. She knew what she’d be granting in the name of love, too—she might be an innocent, but thanks to her sisters’ conversations regarding their husbands, she wasn’t ignorant—and she knew the risks of consequences and scandal.
But Sheffield loved her. He loved her, and for that moment, with him, nothing else in all the world mattered more.
“Oh, Sheffield,” she confessed, the words spilling out straight from her heart. “I love you, too. I’ve always loved you.”
“Then let me love you as you deserve,” he said, his voice so low and full of promise that she shivered with anticipation. “Be mine, Diana, here, now. Be only mine.”
“Yes, oh, yes,” she murmured, the only words she could speak before he was slanting his mouth hard over hers once again. He’d shoved aside her bodice entirely and pulled down her shift and stays, leaving her breasts entirely exposed. Easing lower down her body, he kissed each in turn, then licked and nibbled at her nipples until she gasped with the pleasure of it. She tangled her fingers into the dark silk of his hair, freeing it from his once-tidy queue as he suckled at her before claiming her mouth again.
Somehow—she wasn’t sure when—he’d shed his coat, and now when she grasped his shoulders, there was only the fine Holland linen of his shirt beneath her fingers. She moved her hands along his back, relishing the feel of his muscles as he moved over her, all coiled masculine strength and power. She wished he’d shed his waistcoat, too, and as they kissed she reached between them, fumbling a bit as she blindly undid the buttons and shoved the waistcoat across his shoulders.
He grunted with approval, and shrugged the waistcoat free and to the floor. Now when he pressed down
on her, her bared breasts grazed against the linen, the last thin barrier between them. Daringly she pulled his shirt free from his breeches and slipped her greedy hands inside the billowing linen. His skin was hot beneath her touch as she explored him, the long hollow of his spine, the bunching of his muscles. Even his scent intoxicated her, all heated male overlaid with the faint fragrance of bay leaves and lime from his shaving soap.
She felt her hairpins snag on the cushion as her hair came undone, and she did not care. She felt her skirts slide high over her knees and higher, and then his hand trailing along the inside of her bare thigh. Instinctively she tried to squeeze her legs closed, but he was between them, holding them apart.
“Let me please you,” he said, his words warm against the shell of her ear. “Let me love you.”
Love, love: that was the magic word for her, the word that only he could offer, and with a shuddering sigh she relaxed and gave herself over to the love he promised, and her body desired.
And she did desire it. His touch on her thigh was gentle but insistent, coaxing little circles that swiftly inched higher and higher. She gasped with surprise when his hand covered her most private place, and gasped again as he gently parted her to caress her more intimately. She clung to his shoulders as he kissed her again. No one had ever touched her here, pressed her here—oh, heavens, stroked her there.
“My own love.” His voice was rough with a fresh urgency, his gaze intent upon her. “Love me, sweet, and let me love you.”
He eased a finger into her, then a second, finding deliciously sensitive places within her that she’d never known were there. Charlotte had told her that March’s lovemaking could make her lose her wits, and now, at last, Diana understood what her sister had meant. The more Sheffield touched her, the more the sensations seemed to coil through her whole body, making her writhe shamelessly against him. She didn’t care that her skirts were around her waist, or that she’d looped one leg over the back of the settee, or that her garter had come untied and her stocking drooped around her ankle.
Nothing mattered but him. Her whole being now centered on his caresses like a maddening sweet torture, and she felt herself grow shamelessly wet, as if to ease the way for his fingers. She was pushing against him now, her breath coming in sharp little cries as she struggled for the great prize he was offering, just out of her grasp.
“Sheffield, oh, please,” she cried, begging. “Please!”
She clung to him, reaching, reaching, then suddenly the sensations crashed within her, wave after glorious wave of pleasure. It was beyond imagining, beyond everything, and all because of him. Her eyes closed, she sank back against the settee’s cushions, boneless and dazzled and gasping for breath, and let the last delicious shudders fade through her.
“Oh, Sheffield, how you love me,” she murmured, too blissfully sated to manage more. “How you love me!”
She was only vaguely aware of the settee creaking beneath her as Sheffield repositioned himself, of him saying more endearments, more reassurances, more promises of love, all of it jumbled in her pleasure-sodden brain. She knew there would be more to lovemaking, and that he was right to say they’d only begun. But oh, if it were all as wondrous as this, then she’d eagerly follow wherever he led. He was touching her again, and with languid anticipation she raised her hips a fraction to meet him. He was pushing into her swollen, sensitized again, but this time it wasn’t his fingers. This was larger, much larger, and much hotter and more demanding, and her eyes flew open just in time to see it all: Sheffield with his breeches undone and his shirt shoved aside, kneeling between her outstretched legs to thrust his very sizable member into the core of her innocence.
Or what had been her innocence. She gasped and tried to scuttle backward, but struck against the arm of the settee. By then it was too late, anyway. He was already in her, thrusting once, twice, and then he was buried deep within her. That lovely, spangled pleasure had disappeared, and in its place she felt stretched and filled and pinned to the settee with all the graceless futility of a flopping, broken butterfly.
“Damnation, I’m sorry if I hurt you, Diana,” he whispered, his breath ragged as he lightly brushed kisses across her cheek. “I’ll make it better now, I swear.”
“How, Sheffield?” she asked, her voice squeaking with her rising panic and the surprising sting of discomfort scattering the haze of her first pleasure. “How can it ever be better?”
“Because I love you,” he said hoarsely, “and you love me.”
There was more he planned to tell her, much more, not that Sheffield saw the point of further conversation now. In their present situation—and with the need pounding through his body—demonstration would accomplish far more than any mere words. He was accomplished at pleasing women, and he would make sure that he pleased her, the one woman he loved beyond all others. He regretted the fear he saw in her eyes, the tears that were even now sliding sideways down her cheeks and into her hair. Only a few moments before, she’d been so blissfully beautiful, lost in the pleasure of her spending. Now he’d have to do his best to take her back to that, and join her, too. Yes, he’d make it better, infinitely better.
He kissed her again, moving slowly within her to let her accustom herself to the feel of him. Damnation, she was tight and sleek, and it took every fiber of his willpower to hold back. He had to make this good for her. He had to be gentle, no matter how much he longed to ram himself into her.
He moved slowly, wanting her to discover the pleasure as his cock stroked her from within. Her scent was the headiest perfume he could imagine, the purest scent of sex and desire. He plunged deeply, then withdrew, letting her learn that sweet agony for herself. He knew the exact moment she did from the catch in her breath and the wondering look in her eyes. He kissed her again, nibbling at her lower lip as he drove her a fraction harder, and this time she curled her hands around him. Another stroke, and she rewarded him with a gasp of startled but unmistakable pleasure.
That was what he wanted, what he sought. He wanted this to be for her. He shifted his angle, seeking to intensify the sensation. She gasped, her fingers clutching restlessly at his waist, and he knew he’d succeeded. He dragged his tongue along her throat, there on her pulse, and felt her shiver and twist beneath him. She’d begun to move with him now, unable to resist the rhythm, and her first gasps had changed to a sound that was halfway between a moan and a sigh, the most wanton little sound any man could ever hope to hear. She wanted more. No, she wanted him, and as he gazed down at her, her cheeks flushed and her breasts bare and quivering with each of his thrusts, her nipples red and taut from his kisses and her long, lithe legs curled around his waist—ah, what more could he ever want in return?
His ballocks told him quickly enough. She was so tight, so slick, so hot, that no matter how he might wish to make this last forever, he couldn’t. Bracing himself against the back of the settee, he slipped his hand between their bodies and caressed her there, where they were joined, and where she was most swollen and sensitive. At once she cried out, arching against him, signaling that her crisis was nearing as well.
He needed no more than that. He forgot gentleness, forgot everything but carrying her with him to the end. He drove relentlessly, his own groans mixed with hers, as he pushed her harder, and harder still. Her body tightened beneath his, around his cock, and then with a wordless cry she tumbled over the top, pleasure spinning out from her. That was the last spark he needed, that inner caress of hers. With a roar, he surged forward one final time, burying himself as deeply as he could to come within her. She truly was his now; there could never be any further question of that.
Panting with exertion, he bowed his head over hers and wearily kissed her, a gentling sort of kiss that barely grazed her lips. His hair hung damply around his face, and his shirt clung to his sweat-soaked shoulders. Diana was breathing hard with him, her breasts rising and falling against his chest and her lips sweetly parted. But her eyes were still closed, her lashes feathered across h
er cheeks, making it impossible to tell her mood.
It should be fine, he reasoned with himself. More than fine. Even in his usual post-sex haze, he could understand that. She’d just given her maidenhead to a man who loved her, and by his reckoning she’d spent twice, and quite pleasurably at that. Many women could never make either of those claims, not once in their entire lives.
None of this, however, was what he’d planned. He’d intended merely to show her paintings, as she’d asked, and then, as they discussed the pictures, he’d find a way to tell her he loved her. In a measured and respectful manner, he would have explained why he believed he’d be a far better husband for her than Crump could ever be, and then he’d ask her to become both his wife and his duchess. He’d even planned to kneel before her to do it, the way the swains in poetry did it, here in the Sultana Room before the painted versions of his parents.
But things hadn’t exactly gone that way. She had that effect on him. He really shouldn’t be surprised, since nothing ever did seem to proceed as planned where Diana was concerned. It was only one of her many charms, and he could quite safely predict that she would never, ever bore him.
He smiled down at her now, imagining their life together, and thinking how much more agreeable it would be to make love to her on the generous acreage of his ducal bed, instead of on this infernally narrow settee.
“My own Diana,” he said softly, and kissed her again, not on her lips, but on her forehead. “I love you, sweet.”
He’d never meant the words more than he did now, and he never intended to say them to any other woman. Given the circumstances, he expected she’d say the same in return to him.
She didn’t, leading him to try again. “I love you, Diana.”
But instead of replying, she pressed her hand over her mouth and squeezed her eyes more tightly shut.
He frowned, fearing she felt ill. Damnation, he’d never done that to a woman. His sated cock slipped free of her body, and with a sigh he sat back from her, wiping himself with the tails of his shirt. With a shuddering sigh, she swiftly sat upright, too, shoving her petticoats down over her bare legs and nether regions, then pulling her bodice back over her breasts. He was sorry for that; he’d been enjoying looking at her, yes, but he’d also enjoyed the intimacy that had come with it.
When the Duke Found Love Page 20
