by Jo Goodman
Feigning more confidence than she felt, Lily caught Sheridan’s muslin shirt at the waist, pulled the tails free of his trousers, and took it from him. She held it aloft, out of his reach, and made to throw it as he had done.
“Not my shirt,” he said, making a grab for it. “It is from Thorndike’s on Bond Street.” When Lily hesitated, he stole it from her and tossed it over his shoulder himself. “You would never be able to face Kearns if you were careless with it.”
“So you were saving me.”
“Indeed.”
It was that fractional lift to his eyebrow that made Lily’s heartbeat trip over itself. She felt heat rising once again and knew her cheeks would be stained with color. He must wonder that she could be so easily unsettled. Flooded by a wave of panic, she blurted out, “I’m not a virgin.”
“Neither am I.”
She gave him full marks for not so much as blinking. Hers had been a breathless declaration, and he had handled it manfully, giving her the gallant reply. He might just as easily have reproached her for stating the obvious since he had once been moved to inquire if she was a whore. “That is good, then. There will be no surprises for either of us.”
Sherry most sincerely doubted that. Though he hadn’t moved, he was still reeling from her last ill-timed confession. He felt as though he should adopt the stance of a sailor at sea, legs parted, knees slightly bent, body turned from the wind, all of this in aid of keeping him upright in the face of Lily’s unorthodox seduction.
“My boots,” he said. “What is your pleasure?”
“What is yours?”
If she had not already dropped to her knees before him on another occasion, he might have found it erotic to have her there. He suspected now that nothing good could come of recreating that scene. “I will remove them myself.” He deliberately did not fall back into a chair but returned to the bed to sit. He raised his right leg, setting his ankle over the knee of the left, and took off the boot. His stocking followed, then he did the same with the other.
He patted the space beside him. “Perhaps you will join me here.” Lily’s gaze, he noticed, wandered everywhere but at him. When she was sitting at his side, he asked, “Is there anything at all you wish to tell me, Lily?”
She shook her head. “I should like to extinguish the candles, though.”
“By all means.” As soon as she rose again to do so, Sherry lay back on the bed and cradled his head in this clasped hands. He watched her snuff the candelabra on the side table, the candlestick on the writing desk, then draw the curtains before she arrived at the bedstand. When she extinguished this last flame the bedchamber was thrown into almost complete darkness. Only gradually as his eyes adjusted did Sherry see the slip of light coming through a part in the drapes and from under the door.
The light did not matter. He had already memorized the look of her. He had carried it with him when he left Granville for the house party at Sir Arthur’s. Through better than a week of insipid conversation and predictable entertainments, made bearable only by the presence of Lady Rivendale and his host, Sherry had kept Lily’s image in his mind. He did not question the unfairness of comparing her to every eligible female of his acquaintance during the rout, not when it was the company that he found lacking. Among his peers, she had none. Her conversation was more interesting, her mind more lively, and her hair in every way more extraordinary.
He was on the point of convincing himself he was misremembering the particulars of her, that perhaps her eyes were not so bright a green, nor her lips so lush in their line, when he arrived home and saw her by the lake. From the distance of the road he could make out neither eyes nor mouth, only the sweet curve of her figure in recline on the blanket, but he knew she was entertained by the antics of the scoundrels waving to him and rolling willy-nilly on the grass. No, he had not been mistaken about any part of her countenance.
He felt her come to stand beside the bed, and with some sixth sense, he found her hand. “Will you lie with me, Lily?” Sherry could not see her nod, but when she did not remove her hand from his, he knew what her answer was. He moved closer to the center of the bed and felt the depression at his side when she sat.
Lily bent her head and unerringly found his mouth. Her kiss was light, a mere promise of what he could expect. “You are a foolish man,” she whispered against his lips, “to take me into your bed. And I am perhaps more foolish yet for allowing you to do it.”
And lest there be even the smallest sting to her words, she removed it with a second kiss, this one in the shape of her smile.
Sherry’s fingers undid the knotted sash at Lily’s waist and pushed her robe over her shoulders. The slippery satin fell soundlessly to the floor, joining every other discarded garment. The light batiste of her shift was as insubstantial as a cloud. When she settled against him, he felt only the heat of her skin and nothing of the barrier that separated them.
Lily slipped her fingers through his hair. He had not had it trimmed since his arrival at Granville, and now it curled at his nape on the precipice of being unfashionably long. She let her short nails lightly scrape his skin and felt him shiver in reaction, then she lowered her mouth once again to his.
There would be no turning back from this.
She kissed the corner of his lips, his jaw. She nudged his cheek with hers, turning his head aside so that she might catch his earlobe between her teeth. Her tongue darted out, and she heard his low, throaty chuckle. She returned to his mouth, deepening the kiss until they were sharing a single breath between them, then she pulled back, slipped lower, and ducked her head against his throat and sipped his skin.
He arched under her, lifting her body but not overturning her. His hands caught her shoulders. He was careful to steady, not restrain. The way she moved over him was maddeningly thorough. No woman had ever been so openly curious about his body. There was no artifice here, no guile. She might know what would please, but she wanted to learn what pleased him. Until now, Sherry had not collected there was such a vast difference in the two.
It was the darkness, he suspected, that allowed her to touch him so freely. In his London library she had been bold, but she had also been angry and afraid. She was different now, driven by different emotions, and though he could not say with certainty what they were, he welcomed them over what had come before.
His skin retracted when her fingers slipped under his drawers. At her urging, he lifted and she drew them down. Her hand circled his erection. He groaned softly at the back of his throat as her fingers explored its length and girth. She cupped his balls, squeezed lightly, and swallowed the next sound he made by covering his mouth with hers. Her hand continued to move, stroking, massaging, wresting one guttural utterance from him after another and taking them all into herself. He was hard and heavy in her hand, hot with the surging and pulsing of blood. His upper lip beaded with perspiration. His hair clung damply to the back of his neck. The rhythm she found was his own, synchronous with his breathing, his heartbeat, the contraction of muscles. His hands fell away from her and clenched the sheets. His head tipped back, dislodging Lily’s mouth but exposing his throat. She nestled her lips in the curve of his neck and sucked.
It was then he thought he would come out of his skin. Every muscle in his body tensed; his heels dug into the bed. She was leaving her brand on his throat, and her hand was still fisted around his cock, squeezing, sliding, milking him.
He reached for her, intent on finding her wrists and pulling her away. Or pulling her closer. He was not at all certain that he knew what he wanted better than she did. In the end it didn’t matter because she eluded him, and he was left to clutch the sheets a second time, straining against pleasure on the verge of pain, almost shouting with frustration when she released him.
Every part of his body vibrated with tension she had created and now abandoned.
“Bloody hell,” he whispered hoarsely. “Bloody, bloody—”
Smiling, Lily rose to her knees and straddled him. “Sha
ll I take you inside, my lord?”
Nine
Lily lifted herself as though to move away. “My lord?”
Sherry realized the strangled sound he’d made was not answer enough for her. “If you do not, I am certain to die of wanting you to.”
The rasp in his voice raised a shiver. She leaned over him, found his mouth, and made this kiss only about sustaining his anticipation a few moments longer. It was when she raised herself a second time that she took him in hand and slowly seated herself until he was deep inside her.
She remained still for a time, taking measured breaths, glad for the darkness that kept him from seeing her face. Accommodating the uncomfortable pressure of joining required that she bite her lower lip until she tasted blood. It seemed that her body remembered the act well enough but had forgotten the nuanced pain of it.
“Lily?” Sherry slipped his hands under her shift and found her thighs. He caressed her lightly from knee to hip, his thumbs running along the inner side until he brushed the soft curling hair of her mons. He meant to say something more, certainly he meant to hear her reply, but then she lifted herself, and his palms were under her bottom, helping her rise, and the pressure in his fingertips was communicating the cadence of the ride.
Closing her eyes, Lily moved slowly at first, guided as much by his breathing and the small sounds she wrested from him as she was by his hands on her hips and buttocks. While the sense of fullness never left her, she found she was able to tolerate it and that she could contract around him so that when his breath hitched and his fingers tightened, it was only pleasure that he felt.
She rose and fell and rose again, her rhythm quickening. He bucked, driving himself powerfully into her. She pressed her moan back by flattening her mouth and breathing through her nose and gauged his arousal by the movements he could not seem to help.
It was when his entire frame went taut under her that she drew him out again with an intimate contraction. His fingertips pressed whitely into her flesh and he arched, not to dislodge her but to take her as deeply as he could. She felt his shudder, the spasm of his body as he gave her his seed, then the quieting of his muscles as tension left them.
She made to rise a final time and found herself caught by his hands on her hips. He did not exert a great deal of force, indeed, she did not think he had the strength to do so, but it was enough to let her know he wanted her to remain exactly as she was. It occurred to her to remind him of his promise to let her go but did not say so aloud. She had not extracted that promise from him for a moment such as this, and using it now would be foolish when she was certain to have need of it later.
All that was required was that she wait him out. She was not unduly discomfited by remaining joined to him, and she liked the steady thrum of his heartbeat and the warmth of his body. Leaning forward a small fraction, she laid her palms lightly on his chest and ran them up to his shoulders then down to his waist. His skin was smooth, resilient. Her fingertips lingered over the contrasting textures of flesh over muscle and bone and the arrow of crisp hair that began below his navel and went to his groin.
“What is this?” she asked, tapping the star-shaped cicatrix just above his left hip. It had all the markings of a pistol ball wound. “Were you shot?”
“Yes.” He removed her hand. In order to do so he had to release her hip. It was that moment’s inattention that permitted her to lift herself away from him. “It is of no account.”
Lily righted the hem of her nightshirt until it covered her knees, then she lay on her back beside him. No part of her touched him. “Was it a duel?”
“No.” Sherry sat up, found the flint on the table, and struck it. He felt Lily stirring as soon as she realized his intent, but he was quicker bringing the candlelight to her than she was escaping it. He held the candledish aloft, out of her reach, and pinned her back with his hard, black glance. When she raised her hand, he suspected it was done more in the way of hiding her face than shielding her eyes.
Sherry was having none of it. He grasped her wrist and lowered her hand, easily overcoming what resistance she offered. She blinked up at him, and the wariness of her expression struck him as a blow.
“Was none of it for you, then?” he asked.
She frowned. “I don’t know what you mean.”
God help him, he thought, she didn’t. Her face was pale, the flush of that first arousal had vanished under cover of darkness. Her bottom lip was swollen, though not with the bee-stung appearance of one who had been thoroughly kissed. Her own teeth marks were still imprinted in the line, and a droplet of blood welled up from a cut on the underside. Strands of hair clung damply to her forehead and at her nape. She did not seem to know that her eyes held proof of a wounded soul.
“You let me hurt you,” he said. “No, don’t deny it and lie to me as well as to yourself.” He set the candle aside and threw his legs over the far side of the bed. “Do not move.” Naked, he padded to the dressing room and drew water for his own ablutions, then hers. He carried the basin back to the bed, wet the flannel and wrung it out, then gently pressed one corner of it to Lily’s swollen mouth. He held it against the droplet of welling blood. “I wish you had stopped me, Lily. You could have, you know. At any time.” She looked as if she might say something, but he halted her with a glance. “It was unfair of you to make me think it was what you wanted, too. That you took no pleasure in it is lowering enough. That it was painful for you shames me.”
Sherry removed the cloth from her lip, dampened it again, then asked her to raise her shift. He watched her fingers curl in the batiste, but she didn’t gather it up. “Did I rend you, Lily? I cannot see what damage has been done. No, do not clamp down on your lip again. We both will be better served by your answer than by more bloodshed.”
“I do not think I am bleeding,” she said, her voice not much above a whisper. “I told you I am not a virgin.”
“That is of no account. You weren’t prepared to take me; of course you can bleed.” He took her wrist, pried open her hand, and placed the wet cloth in her palm. “I will give you some privacy.” Sherry not only turned away, he left the bed and retrieved his robe from the armoire in the dressing room. When he returned, he did not glance at the bed but went straightaway to the window. After drawing back the curtains and securing them, he lifted the latch and pushed the window open. Moonlight glanced off the lake. A light breeze ruffled his hair. He breathed deeply of its freshness. Somehow it was the scent of lavender that was lifted to his nostrils.
“I am finished,” she said. “There was only a little blood.”
He nodded once but did not turn.
“I do not think there is any stain on the sheets.”
Sherry swore softly. “God’s truth, Lily, do you think I give a damn about the sheets?” He spun on his heel. She was sitting up now, her knees drawn to her chest and her shift pulled tightly across the tops. He recognized the hedgehog posture she used to protect herself. “Why did you not have the great good sense to stop? How long has it been since you had a lover?”
Lily’s eyebrows lifted. “I have never had a lover. I have had men.”
Sherry’s gut twisted a little. Here was confirmation at last that there had been more than one. “Lovers. Men. What is the difference?”
She shrugged. “Perhaps it is only that I imagined there must be. You are the first man I ever had of my own choosing, so I thought you might also be my first lover. You are right that I allowed you to hurt me. That, too, was of my own choosing, and I do not regret it save for the fact that you do. It seems that in wanting to pleasure you, I have given you disgust of me after all.”
Sherry pressed one hand to his temple and massaged lightly. He sighed. “You unman me, Lily, and you are right to do so. I have given no thought to any feelings save my own. I bear no disgust of you.” Even watching her closely, he could see no indication that she believed him. “I want to be your lover. I want to know that when we make love that it is always of your own choosing and tha
t you will never again exchange my pleasure for your pain. It can be no other way, else it is for all intents and purposes a rape.”
She clasped her legs more tightly to her chest and nodded once.
“Is that all you have known?” he asked. “Has it been naught but rape, Lily?”
She was a long time answering. With great difficulty she admitted her deepest shame. “I did not always fight.” Her eyes darted away from him, and she stared at the tops of her knees. “Toward the end, hardly at all. Perhaps not so often even in the beginning, though I’d like to think it was otherwise. It is not so easy to fight all the time, but you might not understand that. Men often don’t, you know. Fighting is more in their nature, I suppose, than it is mine.” She swallowed hard, dislodging the lump at the back of her throat to push the last words out. “There were too many times I just gave in.”
Sherry went to the bed and sat down, swiveling sideways and drawing one knee up. “Sometimes surrender is the best fight you can make,” he said quietly.
She glanced at him, uncertain.
“Could you have left if you’d never given in?”
A small vertical crease appeared between Lily’s eyebrows, and she gave him her full attention.
“Where would you have found the strength to run?” he asked. “How would you have been able to plan to leave or take advantage of an opportunity to do so?” He laid his hand over hers. “You have nothing to be ashamed of, Lily. There is no reason for you to question your own courage when it is in every way the equal of men who stand on the front lines of the battlefield.”
She looked from his face to the hand that covered hers. In light of what she’d told him, the fact that he was willing to touch her at all had the capacity to surprise. “You are good to say so, but—”
“I am not good, Lily. I am not even kind. I have committed acts that I once supposed would bankrupt my soul, and I did them for no other reason than I was asked. I had not even the courage of my own convictions, while you had no choice and never strayed once from your moral center. Do not suppose that you are the coward in this room or even the whore.”
