Micah regarded her husband with wide eyes but not as wide as the look he gave the tray of food that arrived shortly thereafter, which he denuded like locusts in a wheat field.
Lark took several of the tin soldiers and dropped them before Micah in the corner, then she returned to stand beside Ash to watch her nephew.
“When he used to speak, he called me Aunt-eee, as if I were someone special to him,” she said.
“How long has it been since he’s spoken?”
“As long as a year, perhaps longer. I could not visit all that often. It took me months to gather enough money to make the journey.”
“Gather?”
“Da’s customers … sometimes … when I served drinks?”
Ash nodded and Lark breathed easy again.
“At least we know that he can talk,” Ash said, “though I would feel we made progress, if he did not look so frightened in our presence.”
“I agree. Perhaps he needs to understand that he has a home for good. Perhaps when we write that letter to our babies, we should write one for Micah. Could we? I know it would be asking a great deal of you?”
“Asking a great deal? To write a letter?”
“No, not to write the letter, but to abide by the promises in it … until Micah is grown.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ash regarded the boy he had promised to raise—sleeping now, curled in the corner he had chosen for himself—and determined to ease his life, not because he was a good man, but because Lark had asked him to do so.
He knew his weaknesses well. He was a rogue, pure and simple, quick to place a bet, bed a wench—until he married. Quick to spend a guinea, so quick, he’d spent the few he had before responsibility came to him. He used to think his lust for drink, women, money, and a good time had saved him after his first jilt. He was certainly looking for all of those distractions when he went to the pub after his second jilt, but he got Larkin Rose instead.
Amazingly, now that he had her, he was beginning to think his consolation prize of a bride might prove to be his salvation, in more ways than the obvious, and frankly, the notion made him skittish. He did not know if he wanted to be saved, but he did not think he could avoid it, if he wanted to.
Lark never took for granted what another woman would surely demand. She appreciated every kindness, no matter how paltry or late in coming. Somehow, she served as a mirror and made him see good in his own reflection.
“I will abide by our letter in regards to your nephew,” he said to her now, meaning it, as he took the sleeping boy and placed him on the small nursery bed in the next room. He bid Mim keep watch and took his wife’s hand to lead toward their own rooms. “I will raise him until he is grown.”
Lark stopped walking and stepped into his arms for the first time ever of her own accord, encircled his neck with a freely-given embrace, and toyed with the hair at his nape as she offered her lips for his kiss.
Ash accepted her unspoken offer.
“You deserve better than me for wife,” she said when he came up for air, “better than a guttersnipe with her sister’s misbegotten child in tow—”
“Do not!” Ash snapped. “Do not speak in that way about my family.”
Lark followed her husband toward her room. She understood. Ash had his pride. Fine. None would hear the brazen truth from her lips again, but she would still know in her heart, what she was, what Micah was, and she would be sorry until the end of her days for the way she had cheated and trapped Ash into taking them both on … well, into taking her on, anyway. Getting him to take Micah had turned into the good that came of her own wicked ways, and for that she would never be sorry.
More than ever, after the gentle way he’d treated Micah, she wanted to tell Ash the truth. More than ever, now that Micah was safe and in Ash’s protection at last, she dare not take the chance.
The truth never helped anybody, so her Da often said, and so life had often proved.
“Ash,” she said, as she stood by her bed, her stomach quivering at the notion of fulfilling her bargain, of pleasuring her husband, of him pleasuring her, “my monthlies have stopped. We can begin making that baby now if you wish.”
“If?” Ash’s body stood at ready attention. Her words alone had accomplished the deed, though he doubted his sanity in hearing them. Then again, Lark was a prideful woman, a woman true to her word. They had made a bargain—Micah for a babe in her belly, and now she had Micah, ‘twas her turn to pay.
Ash almost wished she wanted him as much as he wanted her, another turn that did not fit any previous philosophy in his roguish life. He must be going soft with all this talk of babes, and welcoming little boys with big eyes who needed knowing they had a home … and with broken doll brides who needed knowing they were cherished.
He looked into those doll’s eyes now, with every shade of green and gold imaginable, changing from facet to facet, revealing her as vulnerable and intense, giving and wanting.
Did she want him as much as he wanted her?
Ash called himself a fool as he turned her to undo the thousand buttons that must march down the back of her dress. Little bone buttons stuck into littler fabric loops, one by blasted one, Ash undid them, until he was harder than the proverbial rock, and randier than a strutting cock.
“If the act isn’t called making love, which ours would not be,” Lark said, “what other way can you describe what we are about to do? You never told me.”
That fizzled his cock. “You mean, you want to know how to refer to it?”
Lark nodded.
How to find an expression that would not turn her from baby making forever. “Nothing I tell you can be spoken in company, only when we’re alone, do you understand? This act is never, ever discussed other than between a husband and his wife.”
“Not even between a man and his mistress, or a trollop and her customer, because we had a few of those at the Pickled Barrel, and now that I think back on it—”
“Forget the inn! I’m talking about now—from now on, all right?”
Lark nodded, looking a little surprised at the tone of his voice. “As you wish.”
“Thank you,” he said. “You may refer to the act as “doing the matrimonial.” Now that isn’t too shocking, is it?”
“What else?”
Ash wanted to smack his head against the wall. “You would want more. How about we’re “taking a tumble” or I once heard a Scot refer to it as “playing the blanket hornpipe,” and there’s plain old “ballocking.” Your choice milady.”
“Can we just call it making a babe?”
Ash barked a laugh and pulled Larkin into his arms. “Making a babe, it is. Let us begin, shall we?”
“I do not know how, precisely, and the only references I have are animals, but I don’t like the way dogs and horses do it.”
“Can we not simply enjoy getting there,” Ash said, “And stop talking about it?”
Lark crossed her stubborn arms as if to protect herself. “If I am worried about something, I need to talk about it.”
“All right.” Ash clamped a hand to the back of his neck. “All right. I can see that you do. Fine. Not like dogs or horses. Fine. There are plenty of other ways.”
“What are they?”
Ash cursed and apologized. He harrumphed and sighed. “You can lie on your back and I can hover over you.”
“No!” she said, with rising panic. “No, I don’t want you hovering over me.”
“We could do it standing up.”
“That would work,” she said. “Then we would be equal and you would not be looming over me as if to attack. I could not bear that.” She looked around the room. “Where can we stand? Here?” She went to stand against the wall, fully clothed, and closed her eyes, as if she were waiting to be shot, or run through. Er, fine, a near enough description. Perhaps he understood.
His bride opened her eyes and huffed as if he had been dawdling too long. “Come along, then,” she said. “Let’s get it done.”
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“This is so exciting,” Ash said, tongue in cheek as he went to stand before her. “It might help if you took off your clothes.”
“But this is wrong, that part of you meets my chicken peck.”
“Your what?”
“She pointed toward her middle. A chicken pecked me here and gave me a scar.”
“Who told you that?”
“My sister, when she was ten.”
“Then how do you account for the fact that I have one too?”
Lark shrugged.
Ash sighed. “Can we talk about the chicken peck another time? That’s not what it is by the way.”
“Fine,” she said, and her eyes twinkled.
“You’ve been trying to distract me,” he accused.
“I succeeded, did I not?”
“You little—”
“Is there something I can stand on?” She went to grab a footstool and drag it over. A turtle could have carried it faster on its back. Leaning his palms against the wall, above where his procrastinating bride had just stood, Ash shook his head.
She placed the stepstool before him, ducked beneath his arms, and climbed atop it. “There, we’ll meet at just the right place now.” But when she stepped close enough to make contact, the stool wobbled, and she toppled into his arms. “Not so good,” she said as he lifted her higher against him.
“Not so exciting, either,” Ash said. “Please, let us get into bed and frolic, as we did in the lavender field the other day, and work our pleasant way into baby-making as we go?”
“Oh, that sounds lovely.”
“Lovely,” Ash repeated, feeling the knot in his stomach ease. “I believe you have it right.”
“You seem tense, Ash. Should we start afresh tomorrow, instead?”
“No, my darling Larkin, we will begin tonight.” He stood her on her feet. “Let us start by sliding that dress off your shoulders.”
For the past few nights Ash had taken to dreaming about making fast impatient love to Lark one minute and slow patient love to her the next, of exploring her to his heart’s content, every delicious milky inch of her, if only she would welcome him.
He’d imagined making her touch the stars in ecstasy, while he watched her eyes close in pleasure and open in shock to renewed arousal.
As her dress slipped to the floor and puddled at her feet, and she stood before him in her shift and stockings, the intensity in her gaze was enough for him to take her hand and lead her to the bed.
“I am afraid,” she said.
“I know, but you need not be.” He urged her into the bed, still half dressed, because he was certain that rushing her into nakedness was unwise. “I promise to be a patient teacher,” he said.
While she settled herself and watched wide-eyed, he removed his waistcoat and shirt studs, his shirt, his shoes and stockings, but nothing more, exactly as he’d planned, and Lark sighed with what he could only imagine was relief.
Lark stopped holding her breath when Ash climbed in beside her and wrapped his arms around her to bring her wonderfully, incredibly, close. She closed her eyes and remembered her dreams of him, years of dreams, where he did exactly this, with no fear on her part, and she let herself slip into the old fantasy. This was Ash. Her Ash.
Her hero. Her husband.
“Now, my wife,” he said, in counterpoint to her dream, as he nibbled her earlobe, which she liked very much. “It is time for a gentle teacher and an eager pupil. These are lessons I have never needed to teach before, you understand. No innocent has ever been allowed to climb into my bed. I am a jaded rogue, a cad, a scoundrel, you see, just so you know, but if you tell me what you want, I will try to comply. And if I go too fast or forget your fear, you must promise to remind me. Will you?”
Lark nodded as he came for her mouth with his, his kiss deep and achingly slow. Gentle. Her heartbeat quickened in a surprising response, sending shafts of soft pleasure to every hidden spot within her.
He touched his bottom lip to her upper, urging her mouth to open against his, his breath warm and teasing. In the same coaxing way, he touched his upper lip to her bottom one, and then back again, as if their lips should not meet precisely, which made her ache for them to do just that. All the while he teased her, spirals of something distant and achy, foreign yet delicious, invaded Lark in odd tingling places.
Then he did something amazing, he pulled away from her, sighed and threw back the covers to reveal his entire breathtaking torso to her view, the tight mound beneath his inexpressibles bringing all manner of imaginings to her mind.
Despite her fears, she could not ignore his manly beauty, even half dressed, like a peacock in his plumes on a silver platter.
“Have your wicked way with me, wife,” he said, presenting her with every power and decision.
Wife. Lark’s heart warmed as she rose over him, incredulous at his offer, grateful. She knelt and looked down upon his beauty. “Does this mean I can do whatever I please? I can touch you wherever I choose?”
Ash shifted and nodded. “I am yours to command. I will dance or lie still, touch you or not, whatever is your desire, with one exception. We will do the deed tonight, if at all possible. No more putting off to another day.”
Lark smiled and placed her palm on his chest. “Tell me then, what is your pleasure?”
Ash groaned as if in anticipation. “I have many pleasures but I am certain that I will like whichever you choose to administer first. If you would rather I guide you than experiment on your own, I shall, or you can explore at your leisure, every mountain and valley upon me, every muscle and furrow. It is entirely up to you. I am at your disposal … exclusively, unequivocally … yours.”
His husky voice licked desire through Lark in warm gentling laps. She combed her fingers through the mahogany waves at his temple, again and again. She had never dared to touch him in so intimate a fashion.
Ash sighed and closed his eyes as if he liked her touch a great deal.
Emboldened by his reaction, she grazed his cheek, thumbed his chin. Then she smoothed her palm down his chest, scratching ever so slightly against the silken mat surrounding his nipple. She knew a sense of power when he shuddered. “I wanted to do that the first time you got into bed beside me,” she confessed.
Ash’s heated gaze held hers captive. “I would have let you.”
“I wasn’t ready.”
“And now, Lark? Are you nearly ready to play the blanket hornpipe?”
Lark giggled at his choice of description and surprised herself with a laugh. “Soon,” she said, shivering, as he took her hand and slid it down his chest and along his belly. She pulled away from his hold to dip her finger into his chicken-peck, and giggled.
Then, when she’d distracted him sufficiently, his brow raised to regard her, she let him begin to guide her hand again, until he slid it toward the placket on his inexpressibles. There he placed it, palm down to cup his sex.
Heat flowing through her, Lark turned toward the erect parsnip she had left on her dresser as a reminder of her duty. She looked back at his trousers, the parsnip, and shook her head at the disparity. Nevertheless, his sounds of appreciation urging her on, her fingertips skimming the fabric of his trousers, she examined, at her leisure, what seemed for all the world like a living, pulsing entity unto itself.
When Ash’s gaze upon her became hot and intense, and when his appreciation turned guttural, and he became harder even than she expected, Lark slipped her hand beneath his trouser flap to cup him and learn his manly secrets.
Knowing full well that she must be prepared to gaze upon her husband’s “hornpipe” for the first time, she hesitated even as she held it pulsing in her hand, as if clamoring to be free. With a sense of power, she kneaded it and brought it to larger life. “It is bigger than you led me to believe,” she said, her accusation laced with wonder.
Ash chuckled. “I promise you, it is exactly the right size for our purpose.”
Lark did not know if she believed him or no
t, she knew only that she could not for the life of her let him go. She unfastened his trouser flap one-handed, despite the barrage of fearful reservations warring with dreadful anticipation inside her, and lowered the flap to reveal … not his hornpipe, but his snowy under linen, with a similar flap that she had breached.
With a sigh, as much relief as regret, she pulled the drawstring to free him into her waiting hands. As fast as a wind-up toy, he rose to the occasion and she squeaked in surprise.
Ash arched, groaned, and chuckled all at once, even as he made to reach for her, but Lark reared away from his greedy grasp. “Not yet,” she said, and so he grabbed the bedclothes instead, as if he must hold on, or fall off the edge of sanity.
“You will have your wicked way with me,” he said, through clenched teeth, as if she were paining him as she pleasured him. “I spoke true and did not realize.”
Lark raised her chin. “I will not be denied. I must have as much time as I require to become acquainted with the hornpipe.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ash barked an involuntary laugh. He gasped. He arched and groaned, caught in the wave of bliss Lark wrought with word and action. She cupped his ballocks in one hand—gently, praise be, fear and joy riding him—while she slid her thumb—he thought before closing his eyes and giving himself up to sensuality—upward along his shaft. As if that were not enough, she completed her first amazing foray with small wet titillating circles at his crown, about raising him off the bed.
“Not yet,” Ash said, swollen to painful proportions, repeating her order as if to himself, bridling his lust and testing his sanity. And while he prayed her investigation would never end, he teetered so close to the sharp-edged brink of release, he thought he’d go mad from the pleasure-laced torment.
“Was that a good groan or a bad groan?” she asked upon his involuntary emission of frustration.
“Better than good,” he said.
His teasing bride tilted her head in consideration. “Better than good would be famous.”
“Redoubtable.”
“Is that bad?”
Untamable Rogue (Formerly: A Christmas Baby) Page 12
