“Sophie.” He said her name softly. If her life depended on it, she could not have looked anywhere but into the flat, silver depths of his eyes. She didn’t think it was possible to be more aware of him than she already was, but the next moment proved her wrong. “Darling. I must turn down your offer. I am as astonished as you. But this is a subject upon which I’ve had months to think. You’re intelligent. You suspected my first offer of marriage was based upon my conviction that you would never consent to an affair with me and that it was desperation only for your person that drove me to offer for you.”
“And the second upon a need to rescue me.”
He nodded. “Far more straightforward, darling, yet hopelessly complex.”
She ignored the shiver in her belly. “Meaning?”
“I love you.” He reached for the wine and filled the two glasses, though he left them on the table. “I’ve become like you. A hopeless fool who cannot break his vows. And I did make vows to you today.”
She rested her head on her arms again. “That’s not like you at all.”
Anger flashed over his face, quickly mastered. “On the contrary. It is precisely like me, only you refuse to see me for the man I am.”
“I want us to be truthful with each other,” she said. “Even here in Duke’s Head we hear the rumors from Town.”
“Yes, my cousin brought a particularly fine one tonight, didn’t he?” He tugged on his cravat. “But it wasn’t true and well you know it. I don’t give a fig for Mrs. Peters or any other woman whose name has been falsely linked to mine since my return from Paris.”
She said nothing.
“A scandalous number of women have delivered to me their willing persons without benefit of marriage or consideration of their vows. But never you. Not until you were free.” He took up one of the wineglasses and sipped from it. “The truth, Sophie, is that I have been celibate these past months. There’s been no one but you.”
This was not a subject upon which they would agree. She stretched out a hand. “Banallt, come. Let’s not argue. I am your wife and this is our wedding night. Whatever our reasons for marrying, we are here. We are married. And I will be faithful to my vows. You cannot doubt that.”
He faced her, one leg beneath him, one foot on the floor, glass of wine in hand. “That’s so, Lady Banallt.” He breathed up all the air in the room, not leaving any for her. He wasn’t looking away from her, and heaven knows she couldn’t look away from him, not even when he leaned forward and took a stray lock of her hair between his fingers. “Like silk,” he said. “Have I told you what lovely hair you have?”
“It’s brown,” she said. “Plain brown.”
“Hardly. Your hair is brown the way the ocean is blue. How many colors is the sea? A dozen? A hundred? Such a rich color, your hair. Soft. Luxurious.”
“You swore to me you were not a poet.”
“I’m not.” He reached behind him to return his wineglass to the table. “And yet you inspire me to such flights of desire that you transform me.”
She touched his hand, drawing a fingertip from his wrist to the end of his middle finger. “Tonight you are a poet.”
“That is a solid basis on which to make a life together, don’t you agree? Mayn’t a poet and an author find happiness?” He brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. “I mean to prove you wrong about me. You’ve turned me into your faithful hound.”
She smiled softly. “Are you a hound or a poet?”
“Both.” And then, in one fluid move, Banallt moved close to her and put his hands on her shoulders. Her skirts had ridden up when she curled up on the sofa, and, belatedly aware of the fact, she tugged her gown over her exposed ankles.
He covered one of her hands with his. “Don’t.”
She imagined his eyes, lifeless, black-rimmed pewter skimming over her ankles. Her belly felt tight and fluttery. She didn’t want the sensation to stop, and at the same time, she couldn’t bear another moment. She rested her head on her arms again and pretended, or tried to pretend, that she was unaffected. “I’m afraid, Banallt. I’m afraid of everything going wrong. I lost Tommy, and I thought my world would end. And then John died, too.”
“Oh, Sophie,” he said.
“I don’t want to feel anything. Not anymore. I don’t want to lose anyone else.”
He stroked her shoulders. “You aren’t alone. You never were, if only you’d believe it.”
“But the duke will send you to Wellington, and there is to be war.” She bowed her head and realized she wasn’t going to stop the tears burning in her eyes, so what was the point of trying to hide them? “Anything might happen.” She rolled her lower lip over her teeth but that didn’t stop the emotion roiling in her, either. “Anything. You’ve been my friend. You were my friend even when I’d lost my way with Tommy. And I came to know you better than anyone. You loved your daughter so deeply, my heart did break for you, truly, and then you—”
“Insulted you.”
“You were there after John died, looking after me, and now you’re to be sent off to war.”
“Not as an infantryman.” He slid an arm around her. “They’ve no need of generals without experience in war, and I have none of that.” He lifted her chin. “But if I’m asked to go, I will.”
“I know.” She didn’t know how to explain her feelings to him when she didn’t understand them herself. “It’s just—” She threw a hand into the air. “Banallt, I don’t know. I don’t know anything.”
“I’ll not make promises I can’t be sure of keeping. My will is changed. If I am killed, if my ship sinks or some fool soldier aims the wrong direction, if any of that should happen, you will not find yourself alone. That is a promise I can make you. I have family and now they are your family. Harry will look after you. And now, please, you’re right. This is our wedding night. And you are my wife.” He touched the back of her head and pulled out a hairpin. And then a second.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m not leaving this room tonight. I hope we agree. We’ve sent away the servant who was to help you dress for bed. Who else is left to play lady’s maid but me?” He pulled more pins from her hair, and Sophie let him.
With no hesitation whatever, he smoothed out the curls the pins had made in her hair. She felt him lean close, and then his breath warmed the skin near her ear. “You’ve not cut your hair in a long while, have you?”
“No.”
“Not very fashionable of you.”
She shrugged. His fingers in her hair soothed her, and after a bit, she actually closed her eyes. Several times in the process of his work, he moved her head this way or that, so when he put a hand on either shoulder and drew her toward him, she complied. But he didn’t do anything more with her hair. His hands continued to cup her shoulders. His palms slid downward to her upper arms, to her elbows, and then to her forearms with but the lightest pressure of his fingertips. And all she did in response was hold her breath. His hair brushed her cheek.
His hands left her arms and settled on her thighs, and then one palm slipped underneath the hem of her black-dyed gown. Linen and muslin rustled. She made no protest when his hands touched her bare thigh. He’d gathered up her skirts and quite completely exposed her legs. He stretched out one of her legs, trailing a finger from her calf to her thigh. His fingers, long fingers, traced a line around the top of her garter. He divested her of her stockings. The moment felt unreal. She shivered with anticipation. Her belly and lower, there, between her legs felt taut with expectation.
“Darling,” he said in his familiar, wicked drawl, “legs such as these deserve prettier garters. Pink silk and Brussels lace.”
“I dislike pink,” she said, but how she spoke at all amazed her.
He laughed, low velvet, a sound as morbidly compelling as ever his eyes were. “In the matter of garters only my opinion is of any consequence, I assure you,” he said. His palm covered the back of her thighs. “I’m going to buy you a dozen new garters, all
lace and silk. Sophie, you are luscious beyond belief. Such soft skin.” His fingers slipped around to the inside of her thigh. “Darling.”
His breath warmed the place where her shoulder became her neck. “You—” His fingers pressed into her, and she bowed a little. “You belong to me now.” She felt his teeth nip her ear, a soft bite, a low growl that reverberated in her heart. The tautness in her belly shot through her, clear to her breasts. “You are mine, Sophie. Legally, now. Morally. Mine. Never doubt that.” He withdrew his fingers, but his thumb moved along her, then his fingertips stroked, moving her into a madness of sensation. He stopped again, his palm slipping around her upper thigh to her backside. She whimpered because he wasn’t touching her there anymore, and the shivering pleasure stopped. When his hand came back, she opened herself to him. “Have you ever done this for yourself?” he asked.
Since words were quite beyond her, she shook her head. Her corset, which wasn’t laced all that tightly, prevented her from getting enough air, though she was uncertain if that was the cause of her light-headedness.
He gave a low laugh in her ear. “When I first met you, you were so careful of your passions and so disapproving of me. I found you quite irritatingly proper, and yet it was a matter of mere hours before you were in my most erotic dreams. Perhaps you’re not really proper.”
Her body and her will loosened. “I still am,” she whispered. “I am a very proper sort of wife. I promise you, I am.”
“You insist you are a good and proper woman,” he said, arms tightening around her. “But good and proper women bore me, and you have never bored me. Not even once, so, darling Sophie, I am forced to conclude that you are not a good and proper woman at all. Are you good, darling, or wicked?”
She meant to inhale, but she had trouble filling her lungs. “I am good,” she whispered. “Always good.” She was going to faint. Her head swam, and she leaned against him for support.
“Yes,” he murmured. “You are good. You are very good indeed. Sublime, in fact.”
His fingers pressed against her, stroking, moving, and there she was, about to lose her mind to her body. She completely lost her breath.
“Let me help you, my odalisque.” His arms around her were a fortress of strength. She was protected here. Revered in his arms.
“Banallt...”
“Resist the pleasure,” he whispered even as he urged her into sensation. Instinct commanded, told her she was peaking toward orgasm. “Resist”
“I can’t.”
“If you come,” he said, his voice a growl in her ear, “I’ll have won.”
“Oh my.” She grasped blindly for him, reaching to curl her hand around the nape of his neck while with the other she gripped his wrist. “You beast. You’re beastly.”
“Go on.”
Banallt wouldn’t stop, yet he wouldn’t give her what her body demanded of her, either. His hair caught between her fingers, soft as silk. “I hate you,” she said. Her voice broke.
“How positively beguiling of you.” His fingers slowed, and she thought she would scream with frustration.
“I despise and abhor you.” She opened for him, pushed her hips forward.
“Do you hold me in contempt?”
“Yes.” But the word came out in a rush of air. She tried to gasp and couldn’t. Her head was spinning, reeling. She wanted.
“You disdain me,” he said. “Scorn me. Contemn me.” With each whispered word, he stroked harder, and then whatever else he said was lost. She could do nothing but hold him as sensation peaked, and he held her there until she thought she could not live. Pleasure washed through her, took her over, filled her so that nothing else existed, and through it all, his fingers touched, caressed, paused, and gave.
She still held him when he said, “Thank you, Sophie. You are exquisitely lovely when you come, and I should not have properly lived if I had not seen that.” He turned away, though one hand remained, touching her as he reached for the wine on the table. When he came back, he extended a glass to her. His other hand slid up to her stomach, as far as her corset allowed. She was glad she wore a short corset today.
“This is my very best Bordeaux,” he said. “From the Cote d’Or, and it’s not to be wasted. God knows when I’ll be able to get more. Drink it all, darling.”
“Must you make everything sound so wicked?”
His fingers splayed over her belly, and his chin once again rested on her shoulder. “Now what kind of question is that? I thought you knew me. The answer is yes, when I mean it to be, and, sometimes, even when I don’t.”
“Really, Banallt.” She refused the wine. She wanted a clear head tonight.
He kissed her neck and then sat beside her, this time very close. He took her glass from her and tipped his head to drink from it. He watched her face, searched her with his tarnish eyes, and this time he did not speak at all unkindly. “I suppose I ought to warn you that I have every intention of hearing you beg tonight.”
“Never.”
He put the Bordeaux back into her hand. “Drink up, darling, and we’ll see which of us is right.”
She drank in the hope that it would give her the courage. No marriage should start out with a lie between husband and wife. She had not told him the entire truth about how her marriage to Tommy had ended.
Thirty-two
BANALLT LEANED OVER SOPHIE AND BRUSHED HER LOOSENED hair over one shoulder. Her spectacular eyes drew him closer. He’d been bowled over by her eyes the very first time he was close enough to see them. There she’d been, standing in the corridor at Rider Hall holding up a lantern and staring at him with eyes that cut straight through him and him thinking no one could really have eyes that color. The effect wasn’t any different now. It wasn’t just the color but the soul that looked through to him.
“Your eyes are lovely.” He drew a fingertip from the inside corner of her eye to the outside. She blinked and her lashes brushed the side of his finger. “I was always jealous of the way you looked at Tommy. Always.” He smoothed the corner of her eye. “Don’t frown, Sophie. I’m complimenting you. Or trying to, anyway.”
“I am not frowning,” she said with a lift of her chin.
“Darling.” He leaned closer to whisper in her ear. “What is that I see that is quite the opposite of a smile?”
She leaned back. “I don’t mean to frown.”
“I want you to be happy.”
“I am.” Her gaze moved up and down his face. Then she reached out and tugged at the front of his cravat. Her mouth curved. “Do you know what I have been thinking lately?” Her voice went soft and liquid, and it was like fire running through his blood. “My lord.”
“That my valet’s skills are lacking?”
“Hm.” Her tongue darted out to touch her lower lip. “It’s unfair to blame him when you’re the one constantly pulling at his creations.”
“True.”
She shifted nearer him, and he stayed still while she loosened his cravat and reached around to unfasten the knot in the back. “I’ve been thinking how much I should like to see you, my lord.”
He quirked his eyebrows. “You may, of course, look your fill, ma’am.”
Her mouth curved into a troublingly sly grin. She was up to something she thought would cause his downfall. Given the circumstances, he didn’t mind in the least. “Yes,” she whispered. “I’d like that a great deal.”
She dropped his cravat to the floor. Her hands went to his shoulders next, beneath his coat, and kept moving back. At last, he had no choice but to oblige that very charming motion by allowing her to valet him and slip his coat off his shoulders and arms. The coat joined his cravat on the floor. His waistcoat was next to receive her attentions. She undid the buttons with care. Teasing, if he didn’t know better. He reached in to secure his watch and set it on the table. She pushed off that item, too, and he let it go without a thought. He reached for his wine and took a sip. At this rate, she was going to send him up in flames.
His pu
lse thudded when she unfastened his braces, just the front buttons. The result, of course, was that the front of his breeches sagged away from his waist. Next, she unbuttoned the three tiny fastenings at the top of his shirt. Her fingers brushed his bare skin.
“Purely out of curiosity,” he said, “how far do you intend to take this?” He hoped the answer was to be quite far.
“I should like to see you, Banallt.” His skin prickled when she ran her fingers from his breastbone to the top of his breeches. “The way you saw me. Without anything on at all.”
A most excellent reply. “You have only to ask, Lady Banallt.” He took her fingers in his and kissed the back of her hand. He let his lips linger there. “The least of your desires is my certain command.” He stood up, wineglass in hand. Light from the fire played over her face. He lifted the wine and watched the light through the liquid, then drank the rest. He returned the glass to the table. No more tonight. He wanted a clear head for whatever she had planned for him. He made short work of his boots and tossed them aside before he reached for his breeches and slid them off. Stockings next, then smallclothes. At last he stood in only his shirt with an erection that was making him just the slightest bit impatient. The fire warmed his back. Beneath his feet, the carpet was soft, with just a hint of chill from the floor. “Am I to continue?” he asked, hands on his hips.
She nodded. Her cheeks, he noted with satisfaction, were flushed.
He pulled his shirt over his head, and there he was, standing before his wife in a natural state. He was fully aroused. He had the great pleasure of watching her gaze track from his face downward and stop the journey just below his navel.
Scandal Page 28
