“Touch me,” she said, the words a rasp from the tightness in her chest. “Touch me inside.”
He remained still for too long. Was she wrong to want this? Doubt stabbed through her, but then disappeared as his mouth took hers once more. Henry’s hands claimed her, gripping her bottom where she sat against his thighs. She felt soft and perfect, a woman made for love, under the strength of his touch. Ready and wanting.
His hand moved from her bottom around her thigh to her wet curls. His fingers threaded through the dark gold triangle to her cleft. Bit by bit, his questing fingers coursed their way to her warm, soft space. She bit her lip at the extreme sensation, wanting both to pull away and push closer. Yes, this. Her woman’s center drew him in, his fingers gliding over the soft folds seeking ever deeper. She wanted him inside. Wanted to be full of him. Her body beckoned, and he followed, his long fingers finding their path inside bit by agonizing bit. His touch almost burned inside her, and she whimpered as, again, she flexed her inner muscles, gripping him tightly.
“Yes, like that,” was all she could say as her body discovered the pattern his fingers drummed within her tight sheath. She rocked against him, following his motion.
She let her head fall forward against his chest, the still damp curls of her hair falling down. He winced as a cold tendril fell against his penis, and she gasped as it twitched, a dewy drop visible at the head.
All of this was for her. Her comfort and her pleasure. His fingers still stroking, that tight nub of sensation building and building, so close to a release.
Something she wanted to share with him.
With a tentative hand, she reached forward and wrapped her fingers around his steely heat.
“God help me, Frances.” His words held an edge of pain. “I cannot take the torture.”
“Let me,” she whispered, laying a hot kiss against the straining tendon at his neck, “let me give you pleasure too.” She ran a thumb over the moisture at his tip and traced a slick spiral around the pulsing crown. “Does this please you?”
“Christ, yes. I will spill in your hand.” His fingers stilled inside her, their delicious pressure a promise of more. “I want to be inside you when you come apart, Frances. I want to be there with you.”
She gasped at his words and tightened around him, frightened and wanting at the same time. “Inside me.”
“Yes.” He bucked against her hands, and her core clenched in response. He moved slowly, drawing his fingers slowly out of her sheath. “Do you want me?” Henry pressed inside once more, and Frances gripped his member, echoing the response of her body. All she could do was breathe harder as she sought out her climax. She nodded.
“Say that you want me.” Henry was speaking through clenched teeth, his voice no more than a groan. “Say that you want me inside you. I swear that it will be good between us. Just say it.”
“Yes.” Frances’s words were on a sharp intake of breath as passion drove her wild. “Please. I want you. Inside me.”
In a fluid motion, Henry lifted her over him. He slowly eased her down, her body stretching around his cock, until he was buried in her. So full of him tears burned her throat, the pleasure so intense it was agony. He was so deep inside her she couldn’t breathe. Part of her.
And then he moved. Again. A rhythmic upward thrust of his hips. How could he be any deeper? He was truly hers even as she cried out his name against his seeking mouth. He was pounding against her core, and she wanted more. More.
She wasn’t sure if she said it aloud, but Henry picked up the pace, thrusting deeper and harder, his body grinding against hers. The dark hair on his lower belly was a rough pressure against the sensitive nub of flesh between her legs. Both his hands were on her hips, lifting her easily up and down to meet his thrusts. Harder and harder. Faster.
Frances felt as if her world was exploding. With each thrust of his body, the tension threatening to burst free grew and grew. She could hardly contain herself. All she could do was feel and allow wave upon wave of pleasure to ripple through her body in an exquisite torrent. She was almost there . . . almost to that point where it was too much and not enough and she could not hold back any longer. Her body clenched tightly where they were joined as she gave herself completely over to sensation.
Her body wracked in a shudder, Frances’s womb tightened again and again as her cries voice echoed throughout the small cottage. Then he pulled away, leaving her empty as he called out, spilling his seed against her thigh, her name on his lips.
Sobbing though the last of the sensation, she pulled him to her. His lips trembled against hers. She had never felt so content. So complete.
• • •
The rain was still a steady thrum against the shutters when Frances woke on the floor of the cottage, wrapped partially in a quilt.
Wrapped completely in Henry.
The fire sputtered low, and the artificial dark caused by the storm shifted into a very real night. How long had they been there? Frances’s languor quickly evaporated and was replaced by the more familiar high-stress sensation of needing to be somewhere or do something.
Henry woke from his sleep, aware that the warm pressure across his chest no longer felt boneless. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s evening. We won’t make it back to the palace before dark.”
“Then we stay here.” Henry’s hand trailed up Frances’s exposed back to toy with her hair. “This has become one of my favorite spots in the world. No duties, no obligations. Just us. Together. Naked.”
Good God, what had happened? The remnants of pleasure still pulsed through her body, and she wanted to return to his side, curl up into his heat. But what did that mean? Confused, she got up to her knees to add a log to the fire. Henry rose and stretched his hands flat against the exposed beam ceiling.
Frances sat back on her heels and watched Henry. The flickering glow outlined his form in gold. He was a beautiful man. It seemed silly she had never noticed it before.
“We have been wed for ten years.” Frances stated the seemingly nonsequitous fact plainly.
“Aye.”
“We have been wed ten years, and I have never felt pleasure at your touch.”
He looked back at her, his face shadowed in the dark room. “Aye.”
“Why not?” The question was simple enough, but Frances realized it summed up the reasons for so much of her pain. Wasn’t she worthy of love? Wasn’t she desirable? What was wrong with her? She almost wished she had never learned that her husband could be so gentle and so passionate—then she could go on believing the fault lay with him.
He sat down beside her on the rug and shook his head. “I wondered the same thing. We have wasted so many years. I never knew both men and women could find pleasure in bed sport. Not really.”
“I think our lack of affection limited the possibilities. Maybe we would have discovered each other. And still we only coupled roughly, out of duty.” She felt tears sting her throat. “It made me feel worthless, only valued for the children I could bear. And even then, I was a failure . . . ”
The wind shook the shutters and Frances shivered. Henry pulled her close, wrapping the quilt around them both.
“So why now? I am the same Frances as ever.” Self-pity would get her nowhere. She wanted to slap herself, to shake away the melancholy that threatened.
Henry tightened his arm around her shoulders and pressed a hot kiss against the top of her head. “I knew that our marriage lacked any sort of passion or romance, but that was what I knew as normal. Why should I miss flying if it was never something I thought I should have? Passion was for other people who did not do their duty to their family, their name. I came to you an inexperienced boy and never learned that there could be something more. We had a comfortable arrangement so why question it? But then you came to London and challenged everything I knew to be right. You, not my obedient wife, but you, Frances, are a beautiful, intelligent woman. I never wondered if you wanted more. Or wanted me. I assumed you fe
lt the same way, emotionally removed from the act of coupling.” He paused and kissed her hair once more, biting back a curse. “Now I know that you simply obeyed while I used your body . . . It is sickening.”
Wrapped in his warmth, she could feel his guilt, his anxiety, as if it were her own.
Frances could not bring herself to move from the warm haven of her husband’s arms. “The stars were against us developing love in our marriage.”
“We were children, devoid of choice and bound in duty. That is a weak recipe for affection. It’s amazing we can even stand each other.” His arms were locked around her, his muscles tensed, but she could hear a smile in his voice. “But we are not children any longer.”
“No,” she whispered. “We are no longer children.”
He loosened his arms and splayed his hands on her back, strong and warm in the chill night. She moved into the embrace, shifting to sit between his legs. She fit there, cuddled into him as if they were made for each other. He leaned low and kissed her brow. She angled her face to give him better access as his lips teased her cheek, the shell of her ear. “Would you welcome my love? Is it something you want?” he murmured against her throat, his hands sliding up her arms to her shoulders.
Frances gasped as one hand moved down from her shoulder to lie over her bosom—over her heart. Yes. With those words, she realized with perfect clarity that his love was exactly what she wanted.
“What say you, Frances? Can we start our marriage anew?” Her breath caught as his teeth nipped her neck playfully.
Frances felt arousal build within her. Arousal and something more. Something she couldn’t bring herself to trust. Part of her wanted to turn and let him claim her as his wife . . . She felt like she could not deny him. Somewhere between arriving at court and now her goal had changed: she no longer wished to dissolve her marriage; she wanted to love and be loved. She deserved that and strongly suspected it was well underway to happening with, luckily, her husband. And she wasn’t ready.
“No.” Her answer filled the cottage, clear over the sounds of the storm outside.
He stilled the soft kisses to her ear and asked, “No?”
“Not yet,” Frances repeated, her voice breathy with building desire. She leaned forward, away from his soft kisses, and turned to look him in the eye. “But we appear to be having an affair while I am separated from my husband.”
He laughed and pulled her back to him, but there was an edge to the sound that made his enjoyment unconvincing. “I think, in order to marry again, I need to believe that what lies between us is real. Did you not say you would woo me? Well, I want to be wooed. I do want a love match, but I do not want to force it. I think we should give ourselves the chance to find love first.”
“And this is not love?” he asked.
“This,” Frances gestured roughly toward his manly bits, “is proof of lust only. And I’m not certain that your only motivation is not pride. Love . . . I only hope I can recognize it for what it is. I wasted too many dreams on courtly love. If what we have is an indication, love is a very different beast altogether.”
“I can understand why the scholars prefer to define love by rules. Anything else is too complicated,” Henry murmured and pulled her closer.
Yes, very complicated. Either that or too simple by far.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rule Twenty-Eight: Presumption on the part of the beloved causes suspicion in the lover.
After a night and most of the day in a gamekeeper’s cottage, Frances wanted nothing more than a bath. That, and a better perspective. Desire had a way of clouding one’s vision and making ridiculous things seem like good ideas. At least the bath was something she could manage.
Frances sat submerged in a copper basin full of steaming water and ignored the knock on the door.
Another knock.
Henry came out of the chamber freshly shaven and wearing clean linens. “Surely they will give up soon?”
By the saints, he was a fine-looking man. Frances bit her lip and focused on not becoming randy again.
Another series of knocks, more insistent.
“My last set of rooms did not have a door that could be barred,” Frances mused aloud as she let the heat from the water seep into her muscles. “No way to keep out unwanted guests. I had to request they fix that for me.” Frances cringed at the memories of the rat and the rosary. Things at court were not as expected. She’d not anticipated fear at all—why would she?
“I can personally assure your safety now, Frances,” Henry said before crossing over to the door and leaning against the hinges, presumably to listen. After a moment, he shook his head and shrugged, a clear message that he had no idea who was being so persistent or why.
When they arrived back at the palace after their night in the wood, Henry gave clear instructions for no interruptions. While it was presumptuous of him to assume she wished to stay alone with him, he was absolutely right. She couldn’t face people right now. She was too raw.
The knocking continued.
“We had best answer it,” Frances muttered, really not wanting to face her ladies. Or my mother. “Give me a moment to put on a dressing gown.” And to figuratively gird her loins against coming onslaught of questions she didn’t know how to answer.
“No need,” he answered with resignation in his tone. “I will send them away.”
Henry unbarred the door and opened it slightly. “What is the meaning . . . ” He was unable to finish his sentence before the door pushed into him and a parade of women rushed into the room.
“No time to dawdle.” The Countess of Spencer grabbed a towel and crossed the room and removed Frances from the tub while Blanche rummaged through the wardrobe. Mary followed the countess’s lead and wrapped Frances in a towel while Jane stood by, chemise in hand.
“Henry.” Blanche spoke curtly as she selected a gown for Frances and laid it on the bed. “Where is your man? You must dress immediately for the banquet. Dress fashionably but modestly. Understood? All eyes will be on you this evening. Do your family’s consequence proud.”
Frances stood in her chemise and stockings, her hair in a turban as Mary slapped a corset around her and began to lace.
“What is going on?” Frances’s words felt inadequate under the circumstances. “What has happened?”
For less than a second all action within the chamber ceased, morphing into an uncomfortable silence. Henry’s manservant entered the chamber, breaking the tension. Bess snapped her fingers, and Frances’s lacings were, once again, yanked with full force and her feet shoved into slippers. She felt like a child, quite literally, being dressed by her mother. No answers. No control.
Ready for court, or whatever was to come, Frances calmed her breaths and smoothed the front panels of her dove-gray watered satin overskirt. Henry met her eye and crossed to her, dressed and ready, her partner in whatever was to come next.
“Now.” Blanche Parry stood before Frances and Henry. “There was an assassination attempt on the Queen during the hunt. While you were missing from the hunting party.” Her voice lowered to a serious whisper. “There are those convinced it was you, Henry. The Queen Herself withholds judgment, but that alone does not mean She presumes your innocence.”
Frances stood in shocked silence as Mary and Jane fastened pearl studded sleeves under the shoulder rolls of her bodice. “But what of his service to the Crown? His character? All he has done.” These past years where he has been more wed to duty than to me?
Henry took her hand and grazed his thumb over her knuckles, a soft reminder of the new warmth between them. He pulled his gaze from hers and squared his shoulders.
“Have we heard from Walsingham?” Henry asked, his voice steady despite his wan face. “What do we know?”
Of course, in the moments her husband had chosen something outside of duty, everything would come crashing down.
• • •
Henry’s stomach lodged in his throat, cutting off air and rational tho
ught. An assassination attempt? While he was off seducing his wife, the Queen had been in danger. He was every sort of fool.
And they thought he was the perpetrator? He shook his head at the thought, needing more details to help understand. “When did it happen? Who was present? Who was not? What was the weapon?”
Her fingers stretched in his tight grip, her other hand joining his, tracing the tendons pulsing on the back of his hand and lending her strength, her faith. Frances. “Henry, they cannot think it is you.”
He relaxed and lifted her hand to his lips, pressing a warm kiss to her fingers. “Only the ignorant would.” He couldn’t believe that Queen Elizabeth really suspected him. If this occurred on the palace grounds, the possibility that the perpetrator was someone welcome within the court became a fact. Someone trusted.
Sir Harry Lee came to the forefront of his thoughts. He could have used Frances as an excuse to separate himself from the hunting party . . . Henry shook his head and swore. Just because he disliked the man didn’t make him capable of treason.
Blanche Parry laid her hand over Henry and Frances’s joined hands. “You are easy to suspect. Frances as well. These incidents began with her arrival and you do have enemies. Baroness Ludlow has been a font of venomous gossip.”
Frances gasped. “I thought she was my friend.”
Her forehead crinkled with her look of hurt and confusion. Henry pulled her to him and kissed the adorable pucker between her brows. “Friendship at court is as real as courtly love. You cannot trust it.” She lowered her head against his chest, but he could feel the tension still in her back beneath the length of her damp hair.
“No time for that now.” Blanche pulled them apart and tweaked the starched ruff framing his jaw. “You’ll crush his collar. Tonight the Queen calls for a celebration to show the court and the world that she does not fear death—in reality, it is the thing she fears most in the world. She shines brightest when She wants to prove a point, so tonight She will be brilliant. You two must be present in spite of the suspicion. You must show you have nothing to hide. Take a page from the Queen and put all the naysayers to shame. You are newly reconciled, in love, and blameless.” Henry’s stomach dropped, and he looked to Frances.
Courtly Pleasures Page 21
