by Lucy Ashford
‘Was it an accident?’ he asked, more harshly than he meant.
‘No.’ She spoke without meeting his eyes. ‘We were arguing. He was drunk. And I thought he was going to hit me.’
Again came the low, almost feral growl from his throat. He knew theirs was not a happy marriage. But this...
‘I was afraid of him,’ she went on, ‘because he’d hit me before and done other things. He’d come into my bedroom. He was shaking me and I broke free—I told him not to touch me again, ever, but he laughed and picked up a pair of scissors from my dressing table and lashed out at me. I was wearing only my shift. I tried to protect myself, but the scissors caught me, here, as you’ve seen.’ She pointed, then closed her eyes briefly. ‘I told my maid Martha that my hand had slipped and I’d done it myself. I don’t for one minute think she believed me, but she never said anything else about it, either to me or to anyone else. Because Martha knew as well as I did that there was nothing I could do.’
She looked up at him then. ‘Lionel was my husband. He lied and drank and cheated on me, but he was my husband. And I think a great deal of the problem was me. You see, I was very innocent when I married him and when Lionel took me to bed that first night, I—I did not know how to please him.’
Her voice had broken for the first time. That bastard of a husband of hers, he thought. He said, sharply, ‘Did he not know how to please you?’
She was clearly surprised by the question. ‘He must have done! He was older than me and far more experienced. I was a disappointment to him, I was bound to be.’
Raphael set his jaw grimly. No doubt Lionel had bedded plenty of whores in his time, but he’d decided to grab at the chance of marrying Serena for her money and status, while making her think herself worthless into the bargain.
A disappointment in bed? This beautiful, spirited woman? Never. He’d see the longing for physical love in the darkening of the pupils of her eyes and in the deepening colour of those deliciously sensual lips of hers. He’d noted all her hungry responses, the tremors she couldn’t hide and the subtle yielding of her body. No woman could fake that.
Still sitting at her side, he touched her hand as carefully as if he were touching a highly strung racehorse. He let his thumb caress her palm and he saw the ripple of shock travelling to her eyes, then he lifted her hand to press his lips to her fingers. And he said, ‘I think you’re trying to tell me that you’re incapable of feeling passion. Let me tell you that I do not believe it. Not for one minute.’
Her eyes widened.
‘Look at me,’ he went on, still gripping her hands. ‘I’m telling you. You are brave and beautiful and also extremely desirable. I’ve always thought that.’ He gave a half-smile. ‘Even when you were telling other people—or maybe saying it directly to my face—that I was an odious brute.’
He saw her blink with outright disbelief. ‘Even then?’
‘Really,’ he assured her. ‘Here, I thought, is a woman in a million.’ A wave of powerful emotion surged through him again. The urge to defend Serena from any who would harm her.
The room was growing lighter. Outside, dawn would be rousing the sleepy city. He sighed. ‘You’re cold,’ he said gently and put his arm around her. ‘Serena. I hope to God you rejoiced when the news came of your husband’s death.’
She faced him steadily. ‘I played the part I was expected to play. I spent my time of mourning as was expected. But, indeed, I was glad he was dead. He used physical violence against me sometimes, yes, but the worst of it was that he humiliated me at every turn, whether we were in company or alone. He took delight in finding fault with me, until I didn’t know if what I was doing was right or wrong any more.’
She looked up at him, so straight and honest that it pierced his very soul. ‘And then,’ she went on, ‘I met you, at that dance. And just for a while, I thought, here is someone who is good and honest and true. But then that man came up to you and he made me believe that you’d sought out my company for a wager.’
For one heart-shaking moment Raphael felt that he’d lost her again. And he experienced the rebellion of all his body, all of his senses, at the thought of this woman once more slipping from his grasp. He was in deep, he warned himself. Far too deep.
‘I told you,’ he said. ‘That business of the wager was a complete lie.’
She nodded. ‘And so our punishment of one another began. My public denunciations of you were quite wrong—of course I realise that now. In return you forced me into four weeks of being seen with you, of having to silence my criticisms of you.’ She touched his hand. ‘Oh, Raphael. I would have been silent straight away, if only you’d told me about your brother’s death and your search for his lost wife. I would have believed your story. How could I not?’ She looked up at him with emotion-filled eyes.
Raphael felt flayed. Scourged. She trusted him—what an awful, awful reprimand. ‘Come here,’ he said, holding out his arms.
Her eyes flew again to his, this time almost haunted. ‘No. No—you were quite right to turn me down a moment ago! This is not what I should expect from you. Our agreement is for public appearances only and—’
‘Be damned to our agreement.’ His voice rasped with emotion. ‘If it was written on paper, I’d tear it into pieces this instant. Come here.’
He saw her looking at his arms as they reached out to hold her. Her face was so expressive, reflecting every subtle hint of the early morning light that crept through the curtains. When at last she placed her hands on his, he fastened his fingers around them and felt her tremble slightly.
Right, he told himself. This was the furthest he could go before he started inflicting even worse damage on her than that damned husband of hers. He wished with a fierce passion that things had been different. He felt racked by the harsh regret deep down in his soul. More than ever he had to be strong and let her go, now—but he couldn’t release her hands just yet, it was impossible, because how could he dash the trust from her eyes? How could he banish the flicker of hope that was lighting up her lovely face, after she’d been drained of self-belief for so very long?
He told himself he could stay holding her like this for one moment, yes, just the one; then he would tell her that it was over and he was releasing her early from their bargain. It was for her sake, not his, he would assure her. He would use that old, time-worn phrase, I am not worthy of you...
Then she leaned into his arms. And kissed him, full on the mouth.
His resolve vanished into thin air.
* * *
For so long now Serena’s heart, if not her common sense, had been telling her that this was the only man for her, whatever the dangers, whatever the risks. Even if it was just for a short while.
Logic be damned. She’d had enough of all social niceties—she was a widow, therefore free to do as she willed. Even if it was for one night, just the one, she needed this man, needed something to remember him by. And it was looking as if she might have her way, because he’d begun to kiss her back, so she felt again that sweet ache stirring in her breasts and tingling through her veins. She belonged here, in Raphael’s arms. She had never been more certain of anything.
A thrill of delight rippled through her on the realisation that he’d taken charge of matters. His kiss was long and delicious and the pleasure of it rolled through her in waves, making her want even more. She made a small sound at the back of her throat and lifted her hands to cup his face, loving the feel of that strong, sculpted jaw with its shadow of beard scraping against her sensitive palms. She’d never realised she could feel so much pleasure just in her hands! What he could do to the rest of her, she hardly dared imagine.
His eyes never left hers. ‘Serena,’ he said, ‘you’ve had many griefs in your life. And I don’t want to be the cause of yet another one. I think you’ll understand what I’m trying to say and I’m saying it because I respect you so much. This—between you a
nd me—we both know it’s real, the attraction we’ve always felt for one another. But it cannot develop into anything more.’
‘You’re telling me that it will end soon?’ She met his gaze steadily.
‘Much to my regret, ma chère—yes.’
She listened. She pondered it. At least, she was pretending to ponder it, because all she really knew at that moment was that if he left her now, she would be destroyed. She needed his loving like she needed air to breathe. She thought a moment. Then, Don’t think, she urged herself. You know that too much thinking is fatal. This was Raphael, who was perhaps the one man who could make her whole again.
She said at last, ‘I don’t want you to believe that I’m using you to prove anything, you know. I don’t want you to assume that I’m weak and needy and using you as some kind of support to my battered self-esteem.’
His laugh rumbled low in his throat. ‘You, weak and needy? You, who with your friends the Wicked Widows have proved yourselves among the bravest, wittiest ladies in town? You, who once very neatly described me as “one French luxury London could do without”?’
She blushed, but smiled a little. ‘I said that, yes. I apologise. But it was quite neat, wasn’t it?’
‘Actually,’ he said, ‘I’ve not laughed so much since I left France.’
She looked at him in wonder. ‘You didn’t hate me for it?’
He shook his head decisively. ‘I admire someone with spirit. And in my experience, a woman possessed of wit and humour makes a fine bed partner. A fiery bed partner.’
He smiled again. And at his words, at that smile, she felt the same delicious, sweet ache low in her abdomen. This man was making her feel sensual. Desirable. ‘Then try me,’ she whispered. And she said, in shy French, ‘Please, Raphael. I wish very much for you to make love to me.’
‘You’re sure? Absolutely sure?’
‘As sure as I’ve been of anything.’
He let out a low sigh. ‘C’est mon plaisir,’ he murmured. He kissed her hand almost reverently. ‘And Serena, I will, of course, take all the necessary precautions—’
‘No need.’ She was already emphatically shaking her head. ‘I was examined by my doctor a year after my marriage, because Lionel was disappointed I wasn’t yet with child. The doctor told me I was infertile.’
‘That,’ he said, still holding her hand, ‘must have been sad for you.’
‘In a way, yes. But it was good, too, because it meant that Lionel gave up all pretence of interest in me and turned to his mistresses for consolation.’
‘The fool,’ he said quietly. ‘The fool.’
And then—at last—he made his move. He enfolded her in his strong arms, he laid her on that atrociously ornamented day bed George had bought—who would have dreamed what a delightful use could be made of it?—then he arched himself over her and kissed her again. Her heart shook and her body was on fire. Fresh desire pulsed through her as he pulled her close and she felt her entire being tingle with delicious anticipation.
He shifted his legs carefully so that their thighs were entwined and she could feel the hard proof of his desire pressing against her own sensitive flesh. All the time, he was still kissing her—her forehead, her throat—then he was easing her nightgown open and pressing his lips to her breasts. When his tongue began to caress her nipples, each in turn, she clung to his broad back as if without him she would be floating off skywards into heaven. She gasped with delight and at the sound he lifted his head to gaze at her.
‘So lovely,’ he was murmuring. ‘So passionate.’
Passionate? Yes. She was. With him. She was arching against him, demanding more, much more. Already his lips were teasing her breasts again and his hand was sliding up under her flimsy gown, stroking her inner thigh, then finding its way to that secret place that was already engorged with passion. She felt the heel of his hand there, pressing, circling against her throbbing bud of need—and then, just as she began to feel herself soaring out of control, he took his hand away.
She wanted to cry out in disappointment. Had she done something wrong? Did he find her too tedious to make love to, as her husband had?
The bitter agony of it churned inside her. Her very soul was cold without his caresses. She realised she was squeezing her eyes shut to hide her pain.
‘Ma petite.’ His voice—his husky, aroused voice in her ear—made her eyes fly open again. She realised then that he was half-naked, his shirt tugged off over his head, the placket of his breeches undone. She reached to touch him in wonder and desire as his manhood revealed itself in all its strength.
She softly stroked the silken length of him and heard him catch his breath as he threw back his head with his eyes half closed. She felt a heady rush of power on realising that she, Serena, was doing this to him. ‘Raphael,’ she murmured. ‘Make love to me. Please.’
She remembered how she’d once accused him of treating women as playthings, Only if the ladies in question ask me nicely, he’d retorted. And here she was now, not asking, but begging. His dark gaze was on her face, scorching her, inflaming her. Her mind whispered of danger, but the warning swiftly vanished because her body was urging her, ‘Now. Now is so right.’ Then he was cradling her hips with his hands and with one steady thrust he was entering her. She thrilled to feel the manly strength of him moving deeper inside her, as with mounting delight she began the sweet path to fulfilment. They were as one. Climbing the peaks together.
A low moan escaped her and he froze. ‘Serena. Am I hurting you?’
‘No.’ Her voice was breathy with delight. ‘Far from it.’ She reached to caress the muscles of his shoulders, revelling in his sinewy strength. ‘I want more, Raphael.’
* * *
Raphael gritted his teeth to regain control of himself as she wrapped her supple legs around him and eagerly arched her slender body to meet his. He’d half feared that he might hurt her, as her husband, the bastard, must have hurt her. But, no, it was as if this was meant to be, as if they were made for one another...
Wrong. A dangerous, impossible fantasy. But this was now. This was the present, here to be grasped and exulted in and he guessed that to have pulled back now would have quite possibly broken her. What else could he have done but make love to her? Hadn’t he been longing to do so for days, weeks even?
Ever since he first laid eyes on her last year, if the truth be told.
And in this moment of rapturous intimacy she wanted him and he gloried in it, kissing her lips, her throat, her breasts as he coaxed her into the full rhythm of lovemaking. She was warm and responsive and yielding, tightening herself like a sheath around his hardness, forcing his desire to surge almost to breaking point as she raked his shoulders with her fingers and threw back her head with tiny moans that drove him wild. Raphael reached with his hand to caress her at the very essence of her need, at the same time giving one last powerful thrust as she clasped him close, calling out his name.
He rasped out her name in turn as she shuddered beneath him, uttering low cries of rapture. He withdrew at last to spend himself swiftly while she lay there, eyes closed, face still flushed with delight. As if they were made for each other...
Dear God. She was even more beautiful than he’d dared to imagine.
Chapter Nineteen
And so, thought Serena as she slowly raised herself from her own bed two hours later, with the morning sun pouring through the curtains of her bedchamber, this was what it felt like to have taken a lover. Not just any lover either.
Thoughts of Raphael flooded her senses. The scandalous Marquis of Montpellier, the man the world believed to live only for pleasure. The man who also gives pleasure, a wicked voice inside her whispered. Unbelievable pleasure.
She sighed and turned over, missing him already.
Before any of the servants were awake, she’d eased herself from her lover’s arms to whisper to him that s
he must return to her own room. Raphael, protesting sleepily, had clasped her close and the temptation to stay had almost won. But she’d kissed him and left, so that when Martha arrived at her bedside at eight with her breakfast tray, her maid suspected nothing.
‘Ma’am,’ Martha said. ‘I’m so glad that you managed to sleep well.’
Oh, Lord. If only Martha knew. And Serena doubted she’d sleep as well tonight, because already fresh fears were flooding her mind, fears for Raphael. He had enemies who wanted to stop his search for Madeleine. Enemies who’d been desperate enough to attack him the other night. Had they really intended to kill him? Her heart thudded. Quite possibly.
Raphael had plenty of other enemies, too, of course—she’d always known that. Staid matrons who disapproved of him. Elderly noblemen who were jealous of him. Upright citizens who denounced his morals.
She allowed Martha to help her into a sober print gown and to pin up her hair as usual. She went downstairs to take breakfast in her parlour, outwardly as prim and correct as society believed her to be. No one would guess that her body still tingled with the fire of passion that Raphael had kindled in her. Shortly afterwards Dr Phillips called and Serena sent him straight through to Raphael. She pretended to be absorbed in a fashion journal when the doctor eventually came to her. ‘The news is good, Lady Serena,’ he informed her with a bow. ‘As I told you, the Marquis has a strong constitution indeed. The cut to his forehead will take a week or so to heal, but otherwise he appears to be fully recovered.’
Which meant it was time for Raphael to leave her house, or else the gossips would have even more of a field day for their wagging tongues. Swiftly she ordered a message to be sent to Grosvenor Square and soon one of Raphael’s grooms arrived with a carriage to drive his master home.
