But when, a few seconds later, he replaced the fingers with his mouth, Kate experienced a rush of sensations unlike any other she had ever known. The wet warmth of his mouth on that tenderest of all places, the infinite gentleness of his lips, contrasting with the purposeful thrust of his tongue and the roughness of the razor stubble on his chin and jaw grazing the softness of her thighs ... it was too much. It was wicked. It was wrong. It had to be wrong, because nothing that felt this good could possibly be right.
Kate wanted to tell him as much. She wanted to tell him to stop. After all, she still had her bonnet on, for God’s sake. It couldn’t be right to have a man’s head between one’s thighs when one was still wearing one’s bonnet.
And yet it was extremely difficult to think about things like right and wrong when his lips and tongue were doing things to her, making her feel things she’d never imagined in her life were possible to feel. A part of her wanted to break away, push him back, clamp her legs shut and shove her skirts back into place, and stare down at him in outraged modesty. How else was she going to preserve her sanity? And yet another part of her—the stronger part—thought that sanity was overrated, and what was the point of pushing him away, when with every flick of his tongue, every movement of his lips, he was bringing her closer to heaven?
Besides, even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t push him away. He had his arms wrapped around her hips, his broad shoulders wedged between her knees. His face was buried deeply between her thighs. She wasn’t touching him—not purposely—anywhere now. She’d flung both her arms up over her head, and was gripping the back of the settle, as if somehow, that contact with the world beyond the one he was creating with his lips and tongue would keep her grounded.
It was then, almost senseless with pleasure, Kate said his name—a gasp, really, just a breathless movement of her lips. But he heard. He heard. And his name on her lips was, as always, his undoing. Before she was even fully aware of what was happening, Kate felt his head rise—his whiskers raking he sensitive skin between her thighs in the most delightfully painful way—and his arms tighten around her hips.
Then, next thing she knew, he was lifting her, right off the settle, her skirts bunched up around her waist, her heart hammering like a rabbit’s, the gusset of her pantaloons drenched with her own desire. Lifted her straight up into the air, leaving her frantically pushing aside the rings of her crinoline, searching for his shoulders to seize and steady herself. Only by the time she found them, through all those yards of wool and lace, he was already setting her down again. She felt a mattress yield beneath her back, and then he was between her legs again, only this time, it was a knee nudging hers apart, as, above her, Burke struggled to undo his breeches. She watched him in a sort of daze, noticing, with a dizzy sort of sense of satisfaction, that his hands were trembling, and that, when he finally managed to unloose himself, he was huge with his need for her. Ha, she thought. I did that. I did that to him.
But then she didn’t have a chance to think anything more, because, without so much as another caress, he was burying himself into her.
Not that Kate minded. Oh, it was startling, of course—startling enough to cause her to gasp in astonishment, though certainly, this was not something they hadn’t done before. Still, it was startling to have this thick, solid mass suddenly invading her, where just seconds before, there’d been only the tenderest of kisses. Startling to have the full of his weight on top of her. Startling to reach out and feel the starched folds of his cravat, since they were both still fully dressed.
But perhaps most startling of all was how very little any of that bothered her, how very much she’d been craving this, how empty she had been feeling before, and now, how full—more than full, brimming ... brimming with him. It seemed he only had to enter her, and she was already teetering on the edge of climax. Only because, she told herself, he’d brought her so close before, with his lips and tongue. That was the only reason. It wasn’t that she wanted him. It wasn’t that she needed him.
His lips were on her neck, just below her right earlobe. He’d pinned her wrists to the mattress when she’d tried to touch him, as if her touch were somehow dangerous. He was plunging into her, driving her deeper and deeper back into the mattress. And she was lifting her hips to meet him with every lunge.
All right. All right. She wanted him. She needed him.
And then she was slipping over the edge again. She didn’t want to go there, didn’t want to leave so soon. But he was pushing her there, with the raw emotion of his kisses, with the urgency of his thrusts. She wanted to cling to him, to keep from losing herself in the mindless pleasure toward which he was urging her. But his fingers were still wrapped around her wrists, as if she were a captive he was determined to keep from escaping, a prisoner upon whom he was intent on practicing the sweetest of tortures ....
She surrendered.
Waves of erotic pleasure rolled over her. Caught up in their inexorable grip, she could only writhe beneath him, her back arching, her hips raised against him. She let out a sound—a cry of helplessness—and then he released her wrists at last, and cradled her face with his hands as his body, too, was rocked with climactic release.
Kate, feeling much better than she had all day, was nevertheless a little bit ashamed. She found her voice after a few moments, and said sheepishly, “I never even had a chance to take my bonnet off,” sounding as if somehow, the fact that she’d been wearing her bonnet the whole time was infinitely more shocking than anything else that had happened.
Burke raised his face from her throat, where he’d buried it after the last of the spasms that had racked his body had left him. He looked down at her bruised lips and storm-cloud grey eyes. A long strand of her dark blond hair had escaped from beneath the bonnet, and lay across her neck. He rose up to his elbows, shifting some of his weight from her much smaller frame, and lifted that strand.
“Most improper,” he said, bringing the silken threads to his lips. “In the future, I shall remember always to remove your bonnet first.”
“I should hope so,” she said sleepily, quite forgetting that a future with him was the last thing she wanted.
Or was it the only thing she wanted?
Chapter Twenty-nine
When Kate woke the next morning, she hadn’t the slightest idea where she was, or how she had gotten there.
All she knew was that it had to be early, because she didn’t yet feel sick. And she always felt sick, like clockwork, by eight.
It wasn’t until she reached out, expecting to feel Lady Babbie’s silken fur, and felt something a good deal more coarse, that she realized she was not still at White Cottage. When she opened one eye to investigate, she saw her hand resting in a nest of ink-black chest hair. Chest hair, she realized, when she bent forward to examine it more closely, that belonged to the Marquis of Wingate, who was lying—quite naked—in her bed.
Or was it that she was lying naked in his bed? She wasn’t certain.
Then the events of the night before came back to her, and she sank back against the pillows with a quiet “Ohhh ...” of comprehension.
Of course. They were in Gretna Green. They were there to find Isabel, who’d run off with Daniel Craven. Daniel Craven,who had once taken from Kate everything she held dear, and was now attempting, for reasons she could not begin to fathom, to do the same to Burke Traherne.
They were in an inn. The proprietors of which believed them to be married.
Well, they had certainly carried on as if they were. If married people even did things like that, which Kate highly doubted. She did not believe for an instant that her father had ever ... Or that her mother had ever ...
Her cheeks hot, Kate decided it was probably better not to link things like that. What had gone in her parents’ bed had absolutely no relation to what went on in her own. None whatsoever. Particularly when what went on in her bed included Burke.
Burke. She turned her gaze toward him. He was still sleeping, his furred ches
t rising and falling in heavy slumber. That was how she thought of him now. As Burke. Not as Lord Wingate. As his name, Burke. It was a strange name, more of a last name than a Christian name, and much too small a name for the complex man who held it. Burke.
She leaned up on an elbow so that she could look at him more closely.
He had, she saw, with some surprise, a few grey hairs intermingled with the black, both on his head as well as on his chest. Well, and why not? He was in his late thirties, after all. He had a full-grown daughter. Well, practically full-grown, anyway. He had been how old when Kate was born? Thirteen. Well, thirteen years’ difference wasn’t that much. And he certainly didn’t look it. No one, seeing him now, would think him as old as thirty-six. Thirty, maybe. Maybe thirty-one or two. But not thirty-six. Oh, no. He was much too vital, too robust, for so advanced an age. Not that thirty-six was old. Just old for a man who was capable of doing ... well, what they’d done, as many times as they had the past few days.
But they were going to have to stop doing that, she thought to herself, drawing her hand away from his chest. Really. Because how, after they found Isabel, and Kate kept Burke from killing Daniel Craven, could they continue? It wouldn’t work. It couldn’t work. She couldn’t marry him, much as she wanted to. She had reached out again, to touch him. He seemed to draw her in that way. She constantly felt like touching him. Which was why, of course, she’d made him sit on the opposite seat all during those long hours in the chaise. She couldn’t have him near her, within arm’s reach, or she’d start touching him. She couldn’t help herself. He drew her. It was shocking how he made her feel.
Shocking. Pathetic, was more like it.
Well, she wasn’t going to let it happen again. In fact, she could nip it in the bud right now if she could only be up and dressed before he was ... and before the nausea hit. It never lasted long, and if she could only dress without waking him ....
Too late. She had merely pushed the blanket back and set one bare foot on the icy cold floor. But that small action had roused him. Suddenly, the furred chest she’d been admiring was on top of her, his weight pinning her to the bed. Both her wrists, engulfed in just one of his hands, were secured to the pillow above her head while he regarded her, his face just a few inches away from hers.
“Going somewhere?” he inquired quite casually, as if they were back in the town house on Park Lane, and they were passing one another in the hallway.
She said, her tongue feeling as if it had turned to lead in her mouth, “Um. No.”
“I’m pleased to hear that,” he said. “Because it occurs to me that this is quite a pleasant way to wake up. Don’t you think so?”
Kate could hardly say no. Not with his heavy warmth pressing against her ... especially between her legs, which he’d easily pried apart with his knee.
“In fact,” Burke said, his voice a lazy drawl. “I think this is the way I want to wake up every morning.” With the thumb of his free hand, he was tracing the outline of her lips, the rest of his fingers curled around her neck. “With you beneath me, I mean.”
“That,” Kate said, her own voice a husky shell of itself, “might be ....” He moved a little, and she was surprised tofeel that he was already hard. Surprised and, to be strictly truthful, pleased.
“Uncomfortable,” she finished.
“Uncomfortable?” Now he was kissing her where his thumb had been, the corners of her mouth, the place where her upper lips dipped in the middle, to form the shape of a hunter’s bow. What’s uncomfortable about it?”
“Well,” she said. “You do weigh a lot.”
“Ah,” he said. Now he was kissing her on the eyelids. “I can take care of that for you, actually.”
A second later, he was beneath her, with Kate straddling his hips, and not having a very clear idea how she’d gotten there. When she pushed her hair out of her eyes, however, she could see that he was looking enormously pleased with himself.
“How about,” he said, with a crooked grin, “we wake like this every morning? With me beneath you?”
She could feel his erection beneath her, prodding urgently at the soft furrow between her legs. And, much to her shame, her body reacted to his touch, sending a rush of warmth to her loins, and making it easy—oh, so very easy—for him simply to slide inside her, without her having to move an inch.
She sucked in her breath, and looked down at him with wide, reproachful eyes. But it was hard to be indignant when what he was doing felt so very right.
“Or better yet,” he said, grinning up at her, “waking up inside you. Now that’s”—on the word “that,” he raised his hips, burying himself even more deeply within her—“more like it.”
It was on the tip of Kate’s tongue to remind him that this wasn’t what they were here for. No, they were here to find Isabel. Weren’t they?
But it was extremely difficult for Kate to think of anything else but Burke when he was inside her—about as difficult as it was for Burke to think of anything but Kate when she was anywhere near.
She certainly couldn’t think of anything but him when his hands, as they were just then, were on her breasts, cupping them, caressing them. And she certainly couldn’t think of anything but him when he was moving—with a slowness that was causing her toes to curl—in and then out of her. And when he slipped one of his hands beneath the fall of her hair, and around the back of her neck, and brought her face down until it was level with his, how was she supposed to remember anything but the way his lips felt on her mouth?
Then he was kissing her, his tongue forcing her mouth to open to him, just as he’d forced her legs to open to him. The tips of her breasts were skimming the thick forest of his chest hair. Suddenly, and in spite of her best intentions, she was moving a little on top of him. Not much, and certainly not consciously. But enough so that his hands slipped around eagerly to cup her buttocks, and bring her down harder against him.
This was not how she’d intended to start the day. She would have thought, after last night ... Was the man insatiable?
Apparently so.
And apparently she was, too, since she was clinging to him in a disgraceful manner, not just with her lips and hands, but gripping him with her thighs, as well, as if he were a horse she’d mounted.
But this wasn’t like riding. Well, not your average horse, anyway. Maybe ... maybe a winged horse. Because she certainly felt as if she were flying—or rather, being flown, higher and higher. Not toward the burning sun, which would have been thoroughly unpleasant. And not toward the moon, either, ice-cold and distant. But instead toward the stars, sparkling in a sky of velvet black. She could reach out, it seemed, and if she stretched far enough, touch those stars ....
And then it was if she’d flown a little too high, and bumped her head into that velvet sky, because suddenly, all the stars were tumbling down around her, as if it were raining stars. She was trapped in a shower of diamonds. But she didn’t mind. She held out her arms, trying to catch as many as she could, laughing, delighted ....
And then she opened her eyes, and realized she had collapsed against Burke’s chest, and he was laughing at her. Well, not really laughing. He was having too much trouble catching his own breath for that. Plus his heart was thundering with unnatural speed against her breasts. But he definitely looked smug.
“Are you all right?” he asked, between pants.
She moved a little against him. Had he—oh, yes, he most assuredly had. She pushed her hair back from her eyes and looked at him, trying to assume a blank expression.
“Of course I’m all right,” she said. “Why wouldn’t I be all right?”
He looked so self-satisfied, she thought it was a wonder his head didn’t burst. “Well, with all that screaming, I’m afraid we’re probably going to have people banging on the door, thinking I’ve murdered you.”
Indignant, Kate slid from him.
“Careful,” he warned. “You’ll endanger our chances at a family.”
“I don�
�t think,” she said, dryly, pulling the sheets back up to her chin, “that’s going to be something we need to worry about.”
But he still didn’t understand. He obviously thought she was referring to their future together—or lack thereof—and reacted accordingly, leaning over to grip her by the shoulders.
“You can’t mean,” he said, glaring down at her, “that you still don’t intend to marry me? After that? And last night?”
It had to be getting close to eight. Kate could feel the first warning signs of impending nausea.
“Don’t you think,” she said, swallowing hard, “that you ought to be concerning yourself with finding your daughter, and not whether or not I want to marry you?”
He opened his mouth, but seemed unable to find an adequate retort. Instead, he let go of her, and rolled away, his disgust evident.
Still, even disgusted, the Marquis of Wingate, sans apparel, was something to look at. And Kate did look, despite how ill she was beginning to feel. He stormed about the room, throwing on his trousers, and then his shirt. He wouldn’t look at her.
Which was fine. She didn’t want him to look at her. The more he ignored her, the easier it would be, in the end ....
It was a half hour later—it had to be, because Kate was well into her nausea—when Burke came back into the room he’d left in such a huff. He carried with him an enormous tray, from which the odors of bacon and coffee drifted. Pleasant enough odors under normal circumstances. But in the present one, deadly.
“Here, Kate,” Burke said, closing the door with his foot. “I took this off the maid in the hallway. I didn’t figure you’d be up yet. Funny, I never pegged you for a laze-about. Well, get up now, and come eat some breakfast.”
Kate could only pull the sheet up over her head.
A little scandal Page 30
